In front of the great wooden gates separating the Village of Konoha from the outside world, an old man stood waiting. Though his face was lined and marred by liver spots, the years had nonetheless been kind to him, for he looked much the same as he had back during the first Ninja World War. He could not pretend that the wars that followed had failed to leave their mark, yet he counted himself fortunate to enjoy the current period of relative peace in such good health.

Sarutobi Hiruzen, formerly retired Third Hokage and current leader of the Village Hidden in the Leaves, took another drag on his pipe as he waited for his guest to arrive. He knew his retainers found it unseemly for the Hokage to be kept waiting by a foreigner, but it would not be much longer. After all, his guest was not the type that liked to waste time for no good reason.

Even before the dust clouds had appeared on the horizon, reports had arrived of a grand host advancing upon Konoha. Excited chūnin and incredulous jōnin told hushed tales of a spectacular coterie the likes of which Konoha had scarcely seen before: The Kazekage had brought not only his advisers and retainers with him, but also a full assembly of entertainers including skilful acrobats and seductive geisha, followed by a whole entourage of cooks and bakers and more.

One might be forgiven for concluding that this ‘Golden Kazekage’ was a flamboyant fop given to excessive displays of grandeur, but Sarutobi Hiruzen was not fooled: He would be shocked if any less than half of those retainers turned out to be hidden Anbu and jōnin bodyguards. A more suspicious man might have taken that as an unbridled act of aggression – an obvious attempt to smuggle an invasion force into the heart of Konoha – but Sarutobi Hiruzen knew better. After all, were the Five Kage not threatened by the mysterious mercenary organization known as Akatsuki, which had staged a coup in the Hidden Mist and assassinated the Mizukage mere months ago? It was only natural that the Fourth Kazekage, whose predecessor had also been assassinated, would feel compelled to bring a protective force with him on such a long trip to foreign lands.

Far up in the sky, racing ahead of even this unusually speedy entourage, a carpet made entirely out of gold carried three Sand ninjas through the clouds as though the whole world belonged to them.

The golden platform rushed towards the ground, throwing up a great cloud of dust as it skidded across the earth towards the gates of Konoha. Even as Hiruzen’s retainers coughed and spluttered indignantly, the Fourth Kazekage came striding forward, his two companions following closely behind.

“Lord Kazekage.” Hiruzen bowed politely.

“Hiruzen.” The young ruler acknowledged him with a curt nod. Rasa was barely in his forties, and his hair was still auburn beneath the veil of his headdress, yet his forehead was wrinkled by a perpetual frown. He was joked in hushed whispers to have acquired this consternated expression when he emerged from his mother’s womb and first saw the outside world, only to crawl back inside in disappointment.

“Shall we?”

“Of course.” Hiruzen gestured ahead, and the two of them set off towards the guesthouse which had been set up for the sole purpose of housing Rasa’s massive entourage. The young Kazekage moved with swift strides, and Hiruzen found himself once again grateful for his own good health as he kept up. “It is good to see you again, Rasa. I trust you and your companions found the journey here agreeable?”

“Don’t even start,” Rasa’s closest companion muttered. Hiruzen stopped dead in his tracks: What he had taken at first glance to be a woman in her fifties actually turned out to be a wizened old lady, wearing a brown wig and enough makeup to look twenty years younger. “You know I hate traveling like this, Rasa! It’s far too humid in this bloody country, and the flies get everywhere. If you weren’t so cheap you’d extend that blasted golden carpet of yours to form a proper transport for a lady!”

Rasa shot her an irritated glance. “Oh yes, that reminds me. Hiruzen, I would like you to meet my two new council members. This young man here is Yūra, my new head of intelligence-”

Yūra bowed so low his veiled turban nearly touched the ground. “I am most honoured to meet you, Hokage-sama.”

“-and the woman is Kiara. She is the new joint head of the Medical Division and the Puppet Brigade.”

It took all forty years of Hiruzen’s diplomatic experience not to raise his eyebrows in incredulity. “Indeed. And, may I ask, whatever happened to the honourable Lady Chiyo?”

“I understand that she is no longer welcome in Konoha due to certain… diplomatic incidents,” Rasa said without a hint of irony. “I have asked Kiara here to come in her place. I understand that Lady Chiyo is enjoying her well-deserved retirement in her vacation home in the Land of Wind’s central oasis.”

“She sounds like a very sensible woman,” the old woman muttered darkly.

“Indeed,” Hiruzen said again. “Well, I am most pleased to meet you, my lady.” He bowed deeply.

“Oh, stop!” The old woman giggled, a rattling sound capable of inducing nightmares in children, and flashed a crooked smile full of clearly fake teeth. “You old charmer, you!” She elbowed Rasa in the side and spoke loudly into his ear. “Hey, he hasn’t remarried yet, has he?”

Rasa’s right eye twitched only slightly, and Hiruzen once again reflected that the most important skill for a diplomatic leader was the ability to keep a completely straight face regardless of the circumstances.

They soon arrived at the guesthouse and entered into the luxuriously appointed chamber that had been assigned to the Kazekage. Rasa immediately threw his veiled headgear onto the dinner table in disgust.

“Blasted thing. It protects against the sun well enough, but I feel like a bloody fool wearing it. What incompetent idiot decided that the world’s greatest leaders should wear cones on their heads?”

“You’re quite right,” said Hiruzen, who personally felt it made him look rather strapping. There was probably no sense in pointing out that the First Hokage had decided on the image, and that every other Kage had decided to follow his lead at the time. “Shall we begin? We have much to discuss.”

“That we do.” They sat down around the fine oak dinner table, each seating themselves in front of the delicacies that had been brought in mere moments before they entered the hotel.

“Sashimi!” The old lady recoiled in disgust. “Everybody knows I despise Sashimi! Yūra, be a dear and go tell these useless people to bring me something decent with sweet beans and baked potatoes.”

“Of course, lady Ch- I mean, Kiara!” The young man hastily rushed out the door and shut it behind him.

Rasa sighed wearily. “Would you believe that he is the most competent Head of Intelligence I have had in ages?” He picked up his chopsticks and started to work away at the thin slices of raw meat and fish.

“Good help is hard to come by,” Hiruzen agreed. He deftly picked a slice of salmon from his own plate, carefully sampling the exquisite taste before swallowing. “Rasa, I would like to talk with you regarding your son. I have received worrisome reports that he seems a tad… unstable. During the second stage of the exams, it would appear that he lost control of his powers and killed three Rain genin as a result.”

“He did, did he?” The Kazekage kept eating, not seeming shocked in the slightest. “It’s that damned Beast’s doing, whispering its bloody madness into the boy’s ears. When I agreed to intern the One-tail within my son, I never imagined what the price would be.” He shot an irate glare at Chiyo.

“Don’t blame me for this,” lady Chiyo protested. “You are the one who authorized it: As Kazekage you have to take responsibility for all that is done in your name. You knew perfectly well why the technique is called The Power of Human Sacrifice. Nothing is ever free in life; I’m sure I taught you that much.”

“Enough,” said Rasa, his face drawn tighter than ever. “We have more pressing issues to discuss.”

“Very well,” said Hiruzen. In truth it was not well at all, but he was not about to press the issue when it was so clearly a painful topic. “There is also the matter of this mercenary organization, Akatsuki.”

“Mercenary?” Rasa turned his head and spat onto the ground. “Call them what they are: Criminals and traitors. They staged a coup in the Hidden Mist and killed the Mizukage – one of us, Hiruzen! Now, never let it be said that I was a great admirer of Yagura-” In fact, this had never been said by anyone. “-but it still sets a precedent. With Yagura gone, which of us shall be the next to fall? For all that we speak of our Lineage and you of your Will of Fire, those concepts only hold power for as long as people believe in them. If the world starts to see us as mortal…”

The words hang in the air like a dangling sword. Was that what the Akatsuki were really after? Did they intend to upset the entire shinobi order and throw the world into chaos? And if so, why?

The door opened, and Chiyo perked up. “Ah, my potatoes have arrived!”

“Yūra, you’re just in time.” Rasa beckoned the young man to sit down next to him. Yūra paused only long enough to provide lady Chiyo her dish before obliging. “Show the Third what we have found so far.”

“Of course, Kazekage-sama.” He laid out what appeared to be a deck of cards onto the table. “We have vastly improved our intelligence network thanks to the assistance of the Leaf, as well as increasing the efficiency of our information storage and transfer system.” He started turning the papers over one by one. “These information cards are written in my own chakra, so that only I am able to turn them into-”

“Yūra!” Chiyo yelled, slamming her fist onto the table. “I called for sweet beans and baked potatoes, not baked beans and sweet potatoes. Go back and get the order right this time, you fool!”

The young man nearly stumbled over his chair in his haste to obey, and Rasa sighed wearily. “As Yūra was saying… we are starting to get an impression of Akatsuki’s organization. We count their inner circle at nine so far, plus whatever assistance they may be getting from other countries.” Left unsaid was that the Hidden Stone was almost certainly supporting the Akatsuki by hiring them as mercenaries, if not worse. “Most members are still to be identified, but we do have these.” He pushed two cards forward. “Hoshigaki Kisame, a former member of the Seven Swordsmen of the Mist known as the Living Hunger, and one Uchiha Itachi, a madman who slaughtered his entire clan. I believe the latter was a member of your own Anbu, was he not? And then there’s… this.” One more card was shoved under his nose. “Orochimaru of the Legendary Sannin. That’s one of your former students, Hiruzen!”

Hiruzen stared at the picture sketched at the top of the report. It was only a rough drawing, but still… there was that unmistakable glint in his eyes, that glint which had always been there, even as a young boy. Whoever had drawn this must have met Orochimaru in person, or seen another image drawn by someone who had. Someone who was more observant than Hiruzen had been.

“Two of the Akatsuki come directly from you, Hiruzen.” Rasa leaned forward, his hands white as they gripped the edge of the table. “You know, my council is half convinced that you are the one who is behind all of this; that you founded the Akatsuki in secret to rid yourself of us, and so become the world’s sole power!”

“I am very glad to hear that,” Hiruzen said absently. “Has the fact that it is your council that’s saying this convinced you of the opposite yet?”

There was a second of silence, but then Rasa’s hands slowly unclenched and he sat back, a faint grimace of a smile on his face. “Yes. I suppose it has.”

“There is one other member of Akatsuki we identified,” Hiruzen said, as he turned the picture of Orochimaru over. “One that you seemingly forgot to mention: A rogue ninja whose symbol is a scorpion, perhaps the greatest puppet master this world has ever seen – a man known as Sasori of the Red Sand.”

For the first time that day, lady Chiyo truly came alive. Even through her dark veil and the thick layer of makeup, her skin visibly whitened. “That… that is a vile lie! My little Sasori would never have anything to do with those, those murderous brigands! Where is your proof?”

“Jiraiya of the Sannin has confirmed multiple sightings,” Hiruzen said. “Additionally, you have to admit that it fits with his motives. After all, he did assassinate the Third Kazekage twenty years ago-”

“Lies and slander!” She stood up and gripped a chopstick as though it were a deadly weapon, which in her hands of course it was. “So they happened to disappear around the same time, what of it? Where is your proof that my adorable grandson was involved with any of this, you horrible little man?”

The Kazekage raised an eyebrow. “Don’t you mean: Lady Chiyo’s adorable grandson?”

She swung her chopstick at him. “I am not in the mood, Rasa!”

Hiruzen raised his hands soothingly. “No offence was intended, Lady Chiyo. Such reports can, of course, be in error. All I ask is that the Sand accounts for the possibility that it is true. In the meantime, if you could provide us with a detailed account of his abilities in the same manner as your other reports…”

The door creaked open and Chiyo spun around, her chopstick burying itself deep into the doorpost right in front of Yūra, who promptly dropped the plate of sweet beans and baked potatoes in shock.

“For goodness’ sake, boy! Did nobody ever teach you to knock?”

-o-

It was already evening by the time Hinata came to the agreed meeting place, having spent the day helping Shino prepare for the final round of the chūnin exams. She sat down on the nearest bench, fiddling uncomfortably at the sight of the empty training ground and the memories it stirred up, and worrying faintly about the meeting that was to come. She did not have to wait long.

“Hello, Hinata.” Sasuke somehow managed to appear as though he were stepping out of the darkness, despite the light of the crescent moon above. “Thank you for agreeing to meet with me.”

“Not – not at all, Sasuke-san.” She had spent a long time trying to decide what suffix to apply to his name. In terms of social standing, they were close to equal: She was still technically heir to the Hyūga clan, even if she had been all but put aside for her far more capable younger sister, while Sasuke was still the Lord Uchiha despite his clan’s demise. If she spoke respectfully to him, would he find that strange? She had never really talked to him, but they had still been in the same academy class. Should she match his own familiar tone, or would he be offended if she did?

He smiled at her. “I suppose you must be wondering what this is all about.”

She averted her eyes. “F-forgive me, Sasuke-san, but I think – I think I already know the reason. You want me to tell you all I know about brother Neji… right? In case you end up facing him?” She realized with a flush of shame that she was being rude, but there was no other conceivable reason why Sasuke would want to talk to her. Besides, there was something about him that unnerved her somehow. Then again, she was also unnerved by her family, her teachers and most other adults in the Village, so that wasn’t saying much.

Sasuke’s smile twisted into a smirk, which somehow looked much more genuine on him. “That’s right – you were always the only girl in our class who wasn’t so impressed by me, weren’t you?” He sat down next to her, leaving the exact amount of distance to indicate a meeting between friends – not that anyone would have mistaken it for anything more than that. “You’re right,” he said. “I want you to tell me everything about Hyūga Neji, particularly his strength and weaknesses, and to help me train against the Hyūga’s Gentle Fist style. In exchange, I will use my Sharingan to cast a genjutsu on you that will eliminate your self-doubt and turn you into a worthy heiress to the Hyūga clan.”

A small gasp of shock escaped Hinata’s lips. “W-what?”

Sasuke held up an empty palm. “Pain, paralysis… illusions and delusions of madness and grandeur – all these things can be affected through genjutsu, and the Sharingan can cast the strongest genjutsu of them all. It is true that ordinary genjutsu is only temporary, but genuine emotions are no less transient: If I can impart to you the mere suggestion of confidence then your mind will become used to the idea of success as opposed to failure, and what began as an illusion shall become reality in time.”

She stared at him, her lips moving silently as she sat there in shock. What he had just said, what he was so casually proposing was everything she had ever wanted, and yet…

“I can’t. I’m s-sorry, but I, I can’t…”

“Why not?” He tilted his head to one side, curiously. “Do you think you don’t deserve it?”

“That – that’s not…” How could she possibly explain? Uchiha Sasuke did not seem impatient or frustrated with her the way her tutors usually were, but even so he could not possibly understand. He had grown up as a genius, always excelling at everything he did, while she struggled every day just to avoid having to disappoint her family’s already low expectations of her. It had only been when she joined her genin team that she finally found a small measure of peace, of belonging. She had made a vow then, a silent promise to herself that she would never run away from her fears and failures again.

“My t-teacher, Kurenai-sensei,” she began. “She said that… that I should hold my head on high, and never look for an easy way out. That I could be anyone I wanted to, if I only tried hard enough…” She trailed off.

“Your teacher is a worthless imbecile,” Sasuke said, as though describing the sky as blue. She looked at him, startled. “Or rather, she lacks the imagination to understand problems that are not her own. Strength of will is a quality that varies from person to person the same as any other – telling someone who is lost in despair to try harder is like telling someone without legs to run faster. When you see that someone is drowning, you don’t give a rousing speech or ask for permission to save them.” She flinched as his dark eyes bored into hers. “It’s painfully obvious that your personality is simply not suited to the life of a ninja, but your friends and teachers are unwilling to point this out because it would make them seem cold and cruel, even if it means that you will die on your next mission. None of that will ever change unless a miracle occurs, and I am offering one to you right now.”

She turned away. “I… I will think about it, but please… I don’t want to talk about this anymore.”

“If you want to think about it, you should first know what your choices are.” He cupped her chin in his hand and she froze at his touch. When she turned towards him she found crimson eyes boring into hers, and as they grew to consume her vision the world transformed around her.

She was back in the centre of the great hall again, confronted with the first person to acknowledge her since her mother, the boy who had just saved her life in the Forest of Death.

“That’s why?” Naruto stared at her in anger and disbelief. “If you’re gonna throw your life away just because you’re too stubborn to give up, well, there’s nothing that could make me lose more respect for you!”

A small gasp of pain escaped from her lips, but she could not speak to tell him he was wrong. I wasn’t being stubborn, she thought vainly. I only wanted to show you that I could be strong, too…

As if in reply a cruel, mocking sound came from behind her, and when she turned she found Neji standing there, laughing at her with his arms crossed. “What utter nonsense. It does not matter how much a hare dreams of soaring through the sky, it still cannot grow wings and fly!” The ground opened up beneath her feet and she was falling, desperately flailing her arms but unable to gain any traction on the air. When she opened her eyes again she was standing on the balcony, her arms gripping the railing as she overlooked the fight below, every minute detail picked out in shades of crimson.

“Take a good look around you, Lee. You’ve proved nothing!” Naruto was looming over his opponent, his techniques having ravaged the battlefield. “You wanted to know if hard work and determination could overcome any obstacle, right? Well as you can see, it can’t, and denying it will just get people killed!”

Lee raised his head to face Naruto. “You are wrong… there is nothing more noble than defying one’s own destiny! It is only when you believe in the impossible that you are able to make it a reality.”

“Enough! Why don’t any of you ever fucking listen to reason?” Naruto stepped forward and kicked Lee in the head, and Hinata winced in pain as though she was the one who crumpled backwards in a heap. When she looked again she was running up the stairs, fleeing from Naruto as she always did. She arrived at the top of the balcony, but he was still staring at her with accusing eyes from the bottom of the steps. “What’s wrong with you people? Don’t you get that life is more important than some dumb feelings?”

She struggled vainly to find words to defend herself, but it was Sakura who answered in her stead. “Naruto,” she said, “I think you’re underestimating just how much people can be hurt by ‘mere words’.”

The world turned and suddenly Naruto was standing in the centre of the arena again, scoffing loudly. “Do you hear the fear and pity in her voice? She’s afraid of what my words will do to you – that I’ll crush your dreams and spirit. Is there anything more damning than your own teammate’s pity?”

It’s not real, she tried to tell herself, but she knew that Sasuke could never have constructed such perfect images out of nothing. She was forced to watch as he carved apart her hopes and dreams with merciless strokes. She turned around, desperately searching for a way out, but all she found was Neji crossing his arms and smiling viciously. “Allowing a mere commoner to lecture you, how disgraceful.”

“And there is Neji, who you said you were gonna defeat. He doesn’t acknowledge you as his rival at all!” Naruto appeared at the bottom of the stairs again, his bright blue eyes staring directly into her own, condemning her. “You know what? Screw this, and screw you. I don’t have to deal with this crap.”

Cracks appeared all along the edges of her vision as the world shattered – the walls, the roof of the arena, everything fell apart. Darkness swelled up all around her as the ground melted and turned inky black, swallowing her – drowning her in blackest despair. Right as the last of her breath escaped from her lips, she gasped and took in cool night air: She was back on the bench, sitting next to Sasuke as though nothing had happened. Slowly his red eyes faded into black once more, and he let go of her chin.

He stood up, pale moonlight falling down in thin rays around him. “Now at least you know what your choices are,” he said. Then he stepped into the darkness and vanished once more.

Hinata was left there by herself on the bench, staring at the empty training ground and dimly recalling the memories it stirred up: It had been a training ground much like this one where Naruto had first acknowledged her, holding her hand as he taught her how to throw shuriken.

Sasuke was wrong. If that was how Naruto truly felt, then it was not really a choice at all.

-o-

Gekkō Hayate finished tying up his boots. He draped his sword belt around his shoulder, checking to make sure that the hilt was within easy reach as always. Back when he was still a chūnin he had made it a habit to touch the hilt of his sword whenever he left the house, but now he had to stop himself from checking it four times each morning, as well as in the evening and afternoon. Just as he was about to finally step through the door and out into the evening air, a soft voice spoke up behind him.

“You should not go out in this weather, Hayate. There is a reason the Third asked you to be proctor for the chūnin exams, and not to patrol the rooftops at night.”

He turned around and smiled at the sight that greeted him: There she stood, clad in full Anbu gear and unrecognizable but for a strand of purple hair that peaked out between her mask and hood, all set to go on a mission which she could not even tell him about – and she was worried about him over a little rain!

“Right now there is no exam to be a proctor off,” he reminded her. “And, uhm… if it’s danger you’re concerned about, you should not even be in the same house as me, Yūgao.”

“I am an Anbu of Konoha,” she declared, stepping closer still. “I married death a long time ago.”

He smiled and kissed the top of her white mask. “Get a divorce.”

Once outside, he ran up the walls of the nearest building, feeling vaguely guilty for the muddy footprints he left behind. He held out until he reached the very top of the structure before he allowed himself to start coughing. The fit went on for nearly half a minute, and his throat and lungs burned afterwards, but the soft rain pattering on his face and hair served to cool his forehead down.

If anything the moisture in the air was helping his lungs, he decided. Yūgao had been silly to worry.

He leaped from rooftop to rooftop as he continued his patrol, the wind brushing through his hair and banishing the last of his drowsiness as he felt himself come alive once more. There was the smell of fish rising up from a restaurant down in the streets below, the carefree laughter of civilians echoing of the walls all around him as he went. A crescent moon gave watch in the sky above him.

“The moon always changes shape,” she had said on their first night together. “A promise made beneath something that fickle is bound to get distorted.”

“We just see it that way,” he had answered. “The moon is always full, even if a part of it is hidden. The moon is the moon and a promise a promise – that will never change.”

He landed on the next rooftop, and took a moment to clear his throat once more. Just as he was about to leave again, he noticed movement in the corner of his eye: A figure in black darting in the direction of the Hokage residence. By itself that would not have been too unusual – this was Konoha after all – but this one had come from the area where the Sand ninjas had been housed, and which had been placed under strong surveillance. That left him with a dilemma: Either he could run to the nearest watch post and report what he had seen, or he could pursue the suspect to find out what was really going on.

But dilemmas were for civilians, and so Hayate cast the shadow clone technique.

The world shimmered around him, and then he was watching himself vanish in the direction of the nearest watch post. With his cloned body he set off in pursuit of his suspect, the outlines of the world growing ever sharper as he focused chakra to his senses. No sooner did he catch the enemy’s scent than he cast the transformation technique, wrapping light around him like a cloak until he could scarcely see his own hands. He found his quarry lurking at the base of the Hokage residence, fumbling along the wall as though searching for a hidden entrance until he suddenly sank through the wall and into the ground.

Hayate silently dropped to the ground and ran up to where his quarry had vanished, his exhilaration replaced by dread as he realized he had not been paranoid after all. The enemy had left no trace behind, except… he traced a finger down the stone wall, which felt strangely granular to the touch. He pressed his hand to the surface, and the whole segment collapsed in a cloud of fine dust that invaded his nose and mouth and nearly caused him to go down in another fit of coughing.

With one arm guarding his face he descended down the narrow tunnel, expelling chakra from his feet to stop himself from falling through the dust. Before long a chamber filled with stone pillars opened up before him, but the ground was far too even to be natural and too bare to be intended for human use. He ducked his head to enter, almost having to crouch under the low-hanging stone that had to be the foundation of the Hokage residence, and that was when he saw his target: Something which he had taken to be a shadow was flitting from one support pillar to the next, draped in a black cloak and hood that blended with the darkness as though it were part of it, moving about and doing something to the walls – and then stopped, and turned around. A baleful crimson eye blazed in his direction.

Hayate ducked low and dashed forward, zigzagging between the pillars even as he formed the seals for the shadow clone technique. Two more of his bodies darted left and right as they circled the enemy, each casting the regular clone technique and adding illusory copies to the mix, and then they all drew their swords. The phantom army leaped out from between the pillars and fell upon the enemy in unison, a dance of a dozen blades that was impossible to defend against, and landed on empty space. His enemy was gone, vanished into nothingness.

A shadow clone? Or some kind of teleportation?

He and his shadow clones turned around and scanned their surroundings, swords at the ready for any ambush or trap. Almost nothing could be seen in the oppressive darkness, except… a small light went up on the other side of the room, not unlike a candle being lit. Then another, and another – hundreds, thousands of them, lining the walls and pillars of the stone chamber, lighting up the room like a swarm of glow flies.

Hayate tried to cry out in alarm, but he must have inhaled some of the dust because he went down coughing. One by one his shadow clones vanished, until he was the last one left. His hands were slick with blood.

The explosive tags detonated with the fury of a thousand suns.