nowhere near done
Reverse bigbang goes like this. We were shown little previews of arts. We signed up for particular ones, then were supposed to write fics for those arts. (I partially succeeded?)
Here's the linky for the art I was given. Treehouse by pentapus/pentapus
Here's part one of my reverse bigbang fic
As you might notice, it's not done. Life has been a little unpleasant lately, and personal drama has prevented me from doing any type of writing recently, but I still hope to get it done in the next couple days. We'll see. (I also don't want to just spew a bunch of crap onto the screen, because my prompt picture is super-super-awesome and I want the ficcage to live up to that!)
So here goes:
A sake bottle sailed through the window of the hokage tower, shattering spectacularly on the ground below. The passers-by all seemed relatively unfazed by the event save two - the youth who’d, without looking up, took three steps to the left to avoid getting beaned by the projectile, and the elderly gentleman who shuffled out of the ground floor of the tower to clean up the mess. He opened a little door on the bottom of the waste bin that had been added to the location since Tsunade had come into residence - as this was now a regular occurrence - grabbed a small, handheld broom and dustpan, and within moments the ground was once again clean of debris.
Everyone went about their business, ignoring the heated voices of the Hokage and her apprentice. Back in the beginning they’d drawn crowds, equally appalled and fascinated, but since they went on like this so much like clockwork now, no one much paid them any mind.
…As long as they kept the destruction to a minimum.
~ ~ ~
Sakura left Tsunade's office fuming, grinding her teeth so hard her jaw was actually aching. She had to force herself to relax just enough that she wouldn't risk breaking a tooth because the last thing she wanted to do was go see the dentist; he was an absolute bastard. He just loved to lord it over the medics that their skills and chakra manipulation only went so far. The fact that she was so high up the totem pole just upped the ante. He and Tsunade seemed to get along fine though.
Looking down at her meager chest she glowered and figured she could pretty much hazard a guess as to why.
Mood soured even further, she continued to stalk down the hallway, not bothering to look where she was going. She didn't need to. Only two people in Konoha could slam the heavy doors on the top level of the hokage tower, and when those in the nearby vicinity heard it they knew at least one of them was on the warpath and smartly made themselves scarce.
Which was why she was taken completely by surprise when she ran smack into a wall of person. The poor sap would've been about two seconds away from a maiming - or at least a serious tongue lashing - had it been anyone else.
"Kakashi-sensei?" She rubbed her nose and glared. "It's rude to walk into people, you know."
"I believe you were the one who walked into me," he helpfully pointed out."
She rolled her eyes dramatically. "Fine. Don't you know it's rude to loiter in the middle of hallways and not announce your presence to people who are obviously in foul moods because of their pig-headed shishous?"
"Ah. I take it you two were having another student-teacher conference then."
"You could say that." She snorted. "I've been with her over a decade and there are still things that she refuses to teach me! The stubborn old hag," she added sourly.
"Taking after Sai, are we?" he chuckled. A thought occurred to him. "You didn't happen to call her that to her face, did you?"
Hands on her hips, Sakura challenged, "And what if I did?"
"I'm supposing that would be the epicenter of the very localized mini-quake the building experienced about fifteen minutes ago."
Sakura had the grace to blush.
"Really, the craftsman who landed the gig as furniture maker for her suite has to be living rather well off, I'd guess."
She put her hand to her face and sighed. "Kakashi-sensei, is this conversation going anywhere?"
"What, my company and rapier wit aren't enough for you?"
"Sensei..." she whined.
"All right, all right, I get the drift, I'm going," he went on in a mock pout.
"That's not what I meant."
"No, but I should be going. I'm about an hour late for my meeting with Tsunade-sama so she'll be expecting me right about now."
Sighing, she put her hand to her head. "Why do you always do that?"
"What?"
She glared, temper flaring, and outright growled. "You know what! The late thing."
"Oh, ho, ho," he laughed slightly uncomfortably. "Everyone has their foibles, lest they be too perfect."
With a wave he started off down the hall, leaving her to stare after him. Only after a few seconds did his words truly sink in.
"Kakashi, are you really trying to tell me that you have to manufacture your own faults? Kakashi?!"
He turned around and walked the few paces back to her, leaned in close enough that she could see the vague shape of his smile through his mask. "Are you trying to imply that you think that lateness is my only fault, Sakura?"
"Of course not!" she hissed. "Your ego is another one that we could add to that list right now!"
"Ah, but it's not ego if it's true, now is it?"
"You. Are. Impossible!" She ground out before spinning on her heel and resuming her stomp down the hallway, but with decidedly less murderous force.
After the coast was clear, one of the hallway doors cracked open and a head popped out. "Thanks, Kakashi!" came a voice in a hushed whisper, just in case Sakura was still lingering anywhere nearby.
Without turning around he raised a hand in acknowledgement. "That's me - saving the innocent bystanders of Konoha from impending doom."
But what did they really know? Sure, Sakura was short-tempered by nature, but none of them had to work so fiercely under the thumb of the hokage either. Even Shizune was more in the role of friend and confidante, but what had Sakura expected when she signed up for an apprenticeship? She had to deal with the consequences and negative effects just as much as she got to reap the rewards.
If that meant that things got broken more than they had during the tenure of the last four hokages combined....well at least it was good for the economy.
~ ~ ~
Kakashi walked into the hokage's office and his carefree facade dropped. It wasn't often that he was called in for things other than normal mission assignments, but every single time it wasn't exactly something he'd call pleasant news.
He slouched down into the chair across from Tsunade and noticed that her hands, and even her desk, were curiously empty of sake bottles. Yup, not going to be a pleasant one.
"Care to tell me what this is about or shall I just start guessing?"
"Don't start with me, Kakashi. I've had enough lip today."
"Really? Seems to me like-"
"If you value your life, you will not finish that sentence."
He just shrugged and scratched at his cheek, then sat back and waited for her to proceed. Sometimes Tsunade really wondered about him.
"You're going on a mission with Sakura."
"Just Sakura and I?" he clarified.
"There will be others checking in with you from time to time."
His voice turned flat. "You've initiated it then?"
Tsunade sighed. "I had to. She's growing far too restless, almost reckless even. I can't be the one to direct her path; you should know that well enough."
Kakashi leaned back and rubbed his hand over his face. "Who'll be my superiors on this?"
"You go to meet with them immediately after we're done here."
"And they'll assign the rendezvous?"
"Yes, all of that is in their hands."
"All right. Who's the target?"
"A woman named Haru," she explained, passing him a scroll that contained all the particulars. "She grows and manufactures tinctures - mostly poisons, and incredibly potent and often rare ones at that, which she sells off to the highest bidders, regardless of alliances or loyalties."
"Making her quite the liability."
"Exactly," Tsunade remarked. "She's grown both in notoriety and popularity in recent years so it's something we can no longer afford to overlook."
He hummed his agreement as he scanned through the scrolls contents. "I take it that we are not the first ones deployed to take her out?"
Tsunade snorted. "Hardly, and not just by leaf as she's had no compunction about who she sells to. Unfortunately we have insufficient intel about this last bit, but she has two children that she keeps with her at all times. From what we can tell, they're war orphans that she's taken on, and we don't know how, but they are instrumental in her defense."
At that he skipped to the end of the scroll for the reports from the failed missions but saw nothing. He glanced up questioningly and Tsunade knew what he was going to ask before he even spoke.
"No one who's tried to kill her has come back alive, Kakashi. No one. At least not as far as I can tell, and I've done a bit of digging. I checked in with our allies, even those we only have a tenuous connection with but who would be more than happy to see Haru gone, and none of them could report having had anyone return. She truly is a mystery and a mastermind in her own right.
"The intelligence I've gathered here is from questioning some of her buyers. I also sent in my own buyer - which also came with the added bonus of getting to test of her more innocuous recipes, as she only sells the higher grade and more dangerous stuff to people she knows. I also sent someone to snoop around some of the neighboring villages, but after a few days she became horribly ill. Luckily she was aware enough to recognize it as the signs of poisoning and hightailed it back here, and good thing too. If she'd gotten here a day later it would've been too late to save her."
"So that's why you've had her studying herbology in the laboratory so much lately. For the past couple months almost all I've heard whenever I see her is her complaining about is how she feels like she's in remedial classes."
"Really now." She shot him a speculative glance he didn't notice as he was once again studying the contents of the mission detail.
She shook her head. "Sakura's always had a mind for construction and deconstruction. When that poisoned operative came in, she came up with the antidote only a few seconds after me, actually."
Kakashi's head shot up again and the mischief of his grin leaked into his voice. "Really now," he repeated back to her, and she groaned. So he had caught that.
"Probably the only reason she didn't beat me to it was because of a stupid mistake she made in one of her early batches. I'm still surprised she didn't mention it to you at one of your little 'meet-ups' though."
He shrugged. "You know her. The mistake she made probably more than made up for any successes she had and is all she can focus on."
"True, true." Tsunade sighed. "Well, then, any other questions about the terms of the mission?"
Shaking his head, he said, "Not that I see. I'll let you know if any issues arise."
"Good. You leave one week from today. That should give you sufficient time to make preparations. Once you've made all the assignments for your check-ins, you will hand in a copy of them to me so we will know if someone doesn't make their scheduled time and plan accordingly."
He nodded and stood to leave but a word from her held him back.
"Kakashi, I know that you only have to give me the barest details as the Hokage, but I would appreciate it if you would keep me a little bit more in the loop on this occasion."
He knew she believed in them, two top shinobi with high intelligence, with his sharingan and her medical skills, but that wasn't enough to chase away the worry in her eyes.
Because there was plenty else in this for her to be worried about.
"Of course."
She smiled tightly at him and it never even came close to reaching her eyes.
I've got plenty more written, but I've not read through and edited it yet, so I'll post it up a little later.
Here's the linky for the art I was given. Treehouse by pentapus/pentapus
Here's part one of my reverse bigbang fic
As you might notice, it's not done. Life has been a little unpleasant lately, and personal drama has prevented me from doing any type of writing recently, but I still hope to get it done in the next couple days. We'll see. (I also don't want to just spew a bunch of crap onto the screen, because my prompt picture is super-super-awesome and I want the ficcage to live up to that!)
So here goes:
A sake bottle sailed through the window of the hokage tower, shattering spectacularly on the ground below. The passers-by all seemed relatively unfazed by the event save two - the youth who’d, without looking up, took three steps to the left to avoid getting beaned by the projectile, and the elderly gentleman who shuffled out of the ground floor of the tower to clean up the mess. He opened a little door on the bottom of the waste bin that had been added to the location since Tsunade had come into residence - as this was now a regular occurrence - grabbed a small, handheld broom and dustpan, and within moments the ground was once again clean of debris.
Everyone went about their business, ignoring the heated voices of the Hokage and her apprentice. Back in the beginning they’d drawn crowds, equally appalled and fascinated, but since they went on like this so much like clockwork now, no one much paid them any mind.
…As long as they kept the destruction to a minimum.
~ ~ ~
Sakura left Tsunade's office fuming, grinding her teeth so hard her jaw was actually aching. She had to force herself to relax just enough that she wouldn't risk breaking a tooth because the last thing she wanted to do was go see the dentist; he was an absolute bastard. He just loved to lord it over the medics that their skills and chakra manipulation only went so far. The fact that she was so high up the totem pole just upped the ante. He and Tsunade seemed to get along fine though.
Looking down at her meager chest she glowered and figured she could pretty much hazard a guess as to why.
Mood soured even further, she continued to stalk down the hallway, not bothering to look where she was going. She didn't need to. Only two people in Konoha could slam the heavy doors on the top level of the hokage tower, and when those in the nearby vicinity heard it they knew at least one of them was on the warpath and smartly made themselves scarce.
Which was why she was taken completely by surprise when she ran smack into a wall of person. The poor sap would've been about two seconds away from a maiming - or at least a serious tongue lashing - had it been anyone else.
"Kakashi-sensei?" She rubbed her nose and glared. "It's rude to walk into people, you know."
"I believe you were the one who walked into me," he helpfully pointed out."
She rolled her eyes dramatically. "Fine. Don't you know it's rude to loiter in the middle of hallways and not announce your presence to people who are obviously in foul moods because of their pig-headed shishous?"
"Ah. I take it you two were having another student-teacher conference then."
"You could say that." She snorted. "I've been with her over a decade and there are still things that she refuses to teach me! The stubborn old hag," she added sourly.
"Taking after Sai, are we?" he chuckled. A thought occurred to him. "You didn't happen to call her that to her face, did you?"
Hands on her hips, Sakura challenged, "And what if I did?"
"I'm supposing that would be the epicenter of the very localized mini-quake the building experienced about fifteen minutes ago."
Sakura had the grace to blush.
"Really, the craftsman who landed the gig as furniture maker for her suite has to be living rather well off, I'd guess."
She put her hand to her face and sighed. "Kakashi-sensei, is this conversation going anywhere?"
"What, my company and rapier wit aren't enough for you?"
"Sensei..." she whined.
"All right, all right, I get the drift, I'm going," he went on in a mock pout.
"That's not what I meant."
"No, but I should be going. I'm about an hour late for my meeting with Tsunade-sama so she'll be expecting me right about now."
Sighing, she put her hand to her head. "Why do you always do that?"
"What?"
She glared, temper flaring, and outright growled. "You know what! The late thing."
"Oh, ho, ho," he laughed slightly uncomfortably. "Everyone has their foibles, lest they be too perfect."
With a wave he started off down the hall, leaving her to stare after him. Only after a few seconds did his words truly sink in.
"Kakashi, are you really trying to tell me that you have to manufacture your own faults? Kakashi?!"
He turned around and walked the few paces back to her, leaned in close enough that she could see the vague shape of his smile through his mask. "Are you trying to imply that you think that lateness is my only fault, Sakura?"
"Of course not!" she hissed. "Your ego is another one that we could add to that list right now!"
"Ah, but it's not ego if it's true, now is it?"
"You. Are. Impossible!" She ground out before spinning on her heel and resuming her stomp down the hallway, but with decidedly less murderous force.
After the coast was clear, one of the hallway doors cracked open and a head popped out. "Thanks, Kakashi!" came a voice in a hushed whisper, just in case Sakura was still lingering anywhere nearby.
Without turning around he raised a hand in acknowledgement. "That's me - saving the innocent bystanders of Konoha from impending doom."
But what did they really know? Sure, Sakura was short-tempered by nature, but none of them had to work so fiercely under the thumb of the hokage either. Even Shizune was more in the role of friend and confidante, but what had Sakura expected when she signed up for an apprenticeship? She had to deal with the consequences and negative effects just as much as she got to reap the rewards.
If that meant that things got broken more than they had during the tenure of the last four hokages combined....well at least it was good for the economy.
~ ~ ~
Kakashi walked into the hokage's office and his carefree facade dropped. It wasn't often that he was called in for things other than normal mission assignments, but every single time it wasn't exactly something he'd call pleasant news.
He slouched down into the chair across from Tsunade and noticed that her hands, and even her desk, were curiously empty of sake bottles. Yup, not going to be a pleasant one.
"Care to tell me what this is about or shall I just start guessing?"
"Don't start with me, Kakashi. I've had enough lip today."
"Really? Seems to me like-"
"If you value your life, you will not finish that sentence."
He just shrugged and scratched at his cheek, then sat back and waited for her to proceed. Sometimes Tsunade really wondered about him.
"You're going on a mission with Sakura."
"Just Sakura and I?" he clarified.
"There will be others checking in with you from time to time."
His voice turned flat. "You've initiated it then?"
Tsunade sighed. "I had to. She's growing far too restless, almost reckless even. I can't be the one to direct her path; you should know that well enough."
Kakashi leaned back and rubbed his hand over his face. "Who'll be my superiors on this?"
"You go to meet with them immediately after we're done here."
"And they'll assign the rendezvous?"
"Yes, all of that is in their hands."
"All right. Who's the target?"
"A woman named Haru," she explained, passing him a scroll that contained all the particulars. "She grows and manufactures tinctures - mostly poisons, and incredibly potent and often rare ones at that, which she sells off to the highest bidders, regardless of alliances or loyalties."
"Making her quite the liability."
"Exactly," Tsunade remarked. "She's grown both in notoriety and popularity in recent years so it's something we can no longer afford to overlook."
He hummed his agreement as he scanned through the scrolls contents. "I take it that we are not the first ones deployed to take her out?"
Tsunade snorted. "Hardly, and not just by leaf as she's had no compunction about who she sells to. Unfortunately we have insufficient intel about this last bit, but she has two children that she keeps with her at all times. From what we can tell, they're war orphans that she's taken on, and we don't know how, but they are instrumental in her defense."
At that he skipped to the end of the scroll for the reports from the failed missions but saw nothing. He glanced up questioningly and Tsunade knew what he was going to ask before he even spoke.
"No one who's tried to kill her has come back alive, Kakashi. No one. At least not as far as I can tell, and I've done a bit of digging. I checked in with our allies, even those we only have a tenuous connection with but who would be more than happy to see Haru gone, and none of them could report having had anyone return. She truly is a mystery and a mastermind in her own right.
"The intelligence I've gathered here is from questioning some of her buyers. I also sent in my own buyer - which also came with the added bonus of getting to test of her more innocuous recipes, as she only sells the higher grade and more dangerous stuff to people she knows. I also sent someone to snoop around some of the neighboring villages, but after a few days she became horribly ill. Luckily she was aware enough to recognize it as the signs of poisoning and hightailed it back here, and good thing too. If she'd gotten here a day later it would've been too late to save her."
"So that's why you've had her studying herbology in the laboratory so much lately. For the past couple months almost all I've heard whenever I see her is her complaining about is how she feels like she's in remedial classes."
"Really now." She shot him a speculative glance he didn't notice as he was once again studying the contents of the mission detail.
She shook her head. "Sakura's always had a mind for construction and deconstruction. When that poisoned operative came in, she came up with the antidote only a few seconds after me, actually."
Kakashi's head shot up again and the mischief of his grin leaked into his voice. "Really now," he repeated back to her, and she groaned. So he had caught that.
"Probably the only reason she didn't beat me to it was because of a stupid mistake she made in one of her early batches. I'm still surprised she didn't mention it to you at one of your little 'meet-ups' though."
He shrugged. "You know her. The mistake she made probably more than made up for any successes she had and is all she can focus on."
"True, true." Tsunade sighed. "Well, then, any other questions about the terms of the mission?"
Shaking his head, he said, "Not that I see. I'll let you know if any issues arise."
"Good. You leave one week from today. That should give you sufficient time to make preparations. Once you've made all the assignments for your check-ins, you will hand in a copy of them to me so we will know if someone doesn't make their scheduled time and plan accordingly."
He nodded and stood to leave but a word from her held him back.
"Kakashi, I know that you only have to give me the barest details as the Hokage, but I would appreciate it if you would keep me a little bit more in the loop on this occasion."
He knew she believed in them, two top shinobi with high intelligence, with his sharingan and her medical skills, but that wasn't enough to chase away the worry in her eyes.
Because there was plenty else in this for her to be worried about.
"Of course."
She smiled tightly at him and it never even came close to reaching her eyes.
I've got plenty more written, but I've not read through and edited it yet, so I'll post it up a little later.