(Naruto) Kunoichi
Fandom: Naruto
Characters: Sakura, Hinata, Hanabi, Tenten, Ino, Temari, Anko, Kurenai, Tsunade
Warnings: Some suggested stuff…I guess. I was inspired by this story about the girls, and I doubt I’ll do as good a job as that story did, but I wanted to try anyways. Also, some of the characters might be a little...different, but because of the scenario, I think it fits.
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Kunoichi
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Hear me roar!
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1. Kunoichi are usually considered as the weakest ninja in the village. At least, this is the usual thoughts of the shinobi. While the females are certainly strong-their training has seen to that-they are nowhere near as strong as their male counterparts. They are not as fast, didn’t have as big a chakra reserve, aren’t as powerful in battles, and are in essence, weaker.
There are facts that prove this right, such as bone structures and chemical make-up. The fact that for every female that graduates from the academy, there are two males, and that males usually end up getting the higher ranks does not help either.
This might have been the reason that most girls are not trained as well as the boys in their cell-they aren’t as worthy.
Sakura can attest to that fact. Sure, she never did much during her gennin days, but her sensei never helped. During training, she was normally ignored-Kakashi, at best, made them all train together so she learned something then.
(Even then she realized she was just a tool to improve the other two. Not a ninja-in-training.)
At worst, she was completely left out-and that happened more often than not. Kakashi would train with Naruto and/or Sasuke, even giving them special instruction or teachers. They’d ask for help and he’d be there in an instant, showing them new moves.
When she asked for help, he would usually pat her head and say, “Tomorrow.”
Tomorrow never came.
-x-
2. Another misconception is that girls are fragile, that they need protection like precious jewels. That if they fight even one opponent, they will shatter.
Hinata knows this better than anyone.
For several months after becoming a gennin, Hinata didn’t improve much. During their training sessions, Kiba and Shino fought, while she just watched their battles. They would fight until exhaustion, leaving her to train by herself and never really gaining any fighting experience.
It wasn’t unexpected that during their first violent mission, she froze up and was unable to fight. When the enemy nin approached her, a kunai in the hand, she wasn’t sure of how to react.
It didn’t matter in the end, though. Kiba and Shino, along with Kurenai, took care of it. In the end, Hinata didn’t have to fight during that mission. Or for many missions after that; from that day on she mostly ended up watching from the sidelines. Whenever she tried to get involved, they’d usually cover her and leave her doing nothing.
She felt like a glass object to them: breakable and fragile.
-x-
3. While there are many ways that kunoichi are weaker, there are also many ways that they are just as strong-maybe even stronger than the male shinobi. While the guys could face physical attacks better, the girls had emotional ones.
(And no, the emotional ones were not something that should be ignored. They were even worse than the physical.)
It might be because they had more duties than the males.
All female ninja are required to take kunoichi lessons. They had to learn how to be the perfect woman, able to dress properly and talk nicely and be everything a girl hard to be-on top of taking lessons at the academy to be the perfect tool.
The girls have to learn to use their body-not only in combat, but also to extract information.
(This is one of the main reasons that girls were allowed to become ninja. In fact, they even have to sign a contract informing them of this.)
Ino is very good at these lessons. She was always excited when she learned something new, always eager to try something amazing. She was quick to impress her teacher and classmates. The lessons themselves were fun, and Sakura looking up to her was a bonus.
The word ‘kunoichi’ didn’t mean much besides looking beautiful and acting like a girl back then.
That was the best part of it-acting like a girl-because most of their time was spent on ‘boy’ things in the ninja academy.
Looking back at it now, Ino can’t help but wonder if those days felt sugar sweet because they were trying to hide the dark side of their job.
Those days seemed too good to be true.
-x-
4. One side of their job is seduction. Find a target, use your body and charm to extract information, and then either kill or leave the target. Simple instructions. Some kunoichi don’t enjoy this side of the job, so to make it more interesting to them, they choose to do it in a more…wild, less feminine manner. They took the missions where the target preferred ‘bad’ girls-and then forced the information out.
Tenten never liked being a girl because of these missions and always hated when she had to leave her team to go on one. Whenever she had to go on one, she’d try to get Anko to go on it with her-Anko was similar to her in a way. The purple-haired ninja didn’t enjoy having to use her female talents; she’d rather use torture to get what she wanted. They were both tomboys too.
Through these missions, Tenten and Anko bonded. They bonded as they flirted with their targets, bonded as they tortured them for info, and bonded as they killed their targets.
Tenten wonders if this is the only positive thing in this job: the bonding that the kunoichi have.
-x-
5. All kunoichi have to go on the missions. There isn’t anyway out of going on them-the moment they agreed to be kunoichi was the moment they agreed to these missions.
However, like all things, there is a loophole. A small one that Hinata and Hanabi receive. They are the daughters of the main branch, of the prominent Hyuuga clan. As such, they are exempt from those missions.
(It’s best to keep the main branch pure and clean, argued the Hyuuga elders.
…of course, it helped that they gave generous donations to the village in both money and ninja.)
While the others did the dangerous aspects of this mission, the Hyuuga girls would just be there for back-up. Nothing too dangerous or serious.
This made them the only girls who didn’t experience the dark side of their missions. It also made them the perfect people to go to when something went wrong, or a mission would haunt their dreams and they needed comfort.
They were ‘innocent’ compared to the other girls, and therefore didn’t know anything about the ghosts of rough hands or the lust-filled eyes that the kunoichi felt.
Hinata and Hanabi were comforting because they reminded the others of simpler times.
-x-
6. Sometimes, Hinata and Hanabi hated being the ones exempted from the missions. Sure, they never had to experience all of the terrible things that Ino or Sakura mentioned. Never had to feel those dirty hands or sloppy kisses, never had to drink in a dimly-light bar while faking smiles to the stranger with lecherous hands.
They never had to remember dark nights, where all they could feel was soiled linen and harsh whispers-or the morning after where the red blood just wouldn’t wash off and the gurgle from his throat seemed to echo loudly in the room.
They never had to think of those things and when the girls came to them crying and cold, rubbing themselves as though it might erase the feeling of the touches and wash away the dirt, all the two could do was listen.
(at first, Hanabi never liked having to do anything with the other kunoichi, for she always thought she was superior to them. Later, though, when she realized how close she used to be to having their kind of life, she softened a little. Not enough to give a shoulder, but enough to listen and give a pat.
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She’d also sometimes give food, because she was a good cook and food had a way of healing.)
The sisters would coax out stories about things more fearsome than monsters, offering comfort and being there for when nothing seemed safe and the world threatened to break apart at its seams.
Comforting, though, made them wonder more about those missions and almost wish that they weren’t as safely guarded as they were. They felt a little left out from the group, like outsiders.
Of course, they’d hide that jealousy because it wasn’t something good to be jealous of.
(And the other girls did their best to make them feel part of the group.)
Instead, they’d give hot cocoa and warm the cold night, helping the girls make it through to the morning.
-x-
7. Ino, surprisingly, was not the first one to lose her virginity. In fact, it was Temari. She had put up a good fight, trying hard to stop her target, but in the end lost.
(She wished she had her fan with her, her ninja arts, but to do so would reveal who she was and then end the mission in failure. And Temari never fails.)
The next was Ino, Sakura, and then Tenten. In the end, they all ended up becoming just like their female sensei’s-with the exception of Hinata and Hanabi, of course.
When Temari came back from her mission, strong and proud, Gaara looked into her eyes and saw that she was in shock. Her body might not reveal it, but her eyes did and he knew-good thing he had become closer to his siblings-that she needed some comfort.
She was sent to Konoha for a small delivery and that’s how the girls discovered how her mission went.
She was too stubborn to accept help, but they managed to trap her in Tenten’s apartment and forced her to eat ice-cream until finally she let it out. She let out her fear and pain and oh god, wasn’t she too young for this?
Hinata held her hand, while Ino brushed Temari’s hair. Tenten went and got a blanket and Sakura brought out a movie. Kurenai-for the older ninjas recognized the expression on her face and didn’t want to lose another ninja to the shock-got out food and Anko scoffed at men and their ways.
In the end, they managed to make Temari laugh after two hours. They also decided that from now on these comfort sessions would occur after their first missions and at least once a month.
(The older kunoichi agreed to the idea: they never had something like this before and it felt rather…freeing to be able to talk to others about their missions.)
It was something to look forward to when they felt like they were alone and were giving up.
-x-
8. Others don’t really understand the girls. They never really could.
It wasn’t like the kunoichi are depressed, with an aura of sadness and the need to be alone. Not at all. In fact, for the most part, they are really happy with their lives. They have lots of friends, both ninja and civilians. Naruto is there to amuse them, Kiba flirtatiously teases them, and Neji, oddly enough, is reliable and comforting.
Days go by with laughter or sorrow, but in the end, their lives are, for the most part, normal. They had happy lives-or at least, happy enough.
It’s just that they needed something more sometimes and only the other kunoichi could give it. After all, the guys couldn’t understand what it felt to have to dance in scanty clothing and hope that when the rich man got drunk, it’d be in your ear that he whispers secrets in. They couldn’t understand what it meant to hear the words, “You have a target,” and the only reply you can give is, “Who is it now? What bar now? What type?”
While their male friends are nice and they are happy with their lives, the girls need each other sometimes for things that can’t be described.
They need each other because in the end, there will always be another mission and there will always be another target.
And sometimes having friends who can understand you is the only reason they can accept with a smile.
-x-
9. Some kunoichi were lucky-they fell in love with some guy and got married. Then, as they wanted a family, they were exempted from the missions. They no longer had to go shopping for clothes, wondering what will impress their target the most. They no longer had to brew poison and potions, or figure out the best way to not get drunk.
Kurenai is one of those ninja. She might get married, but she is expecting a child.
(And then Asuma died, leaving her all alone.)
However, as they used to be kunoichi, these ninja never forget their friends. Instead, they are usually the ones holding the get-togethers.
All kunoichi were lucky in one way. They all stayed together, bonded in ways that could not be broken.
-x-
10. Tsunade, while she is the Hokage, is a kunoichi first and foremost. She might no longer do the missions, but she did remember them and is determined to make life easier for the kunoichi.
With this in her mind, she set certain rules in play. Rules that many never thought of before because the world is male-dominated. The first rule she set was that if a kunoichi got pregnant, she’d have the choice of keeping or loosing the child. She’d also get help if she was keeping the child and her family was not allowed to disown her or leave her because of this. The villagers were not allowed to bar her from their stores or look down on her or things like that.
(That didn’t mean that it stopped happening. There were still parents who kicked out their children and stores that didn’t open for the pregnant kunoichi. This way, though, they now had help. And that itself was worth a lot.)
Tsunade also set up rules to protect the kunoichi from the male shinobi. Things such as the men not being allowed to treat them differently because of their jobs and harassment wasn’t allowed either. This was to protect the girls, but also to protect some of the guys-Anko put people into comas when someone tried to get one over her.
She also decided to try and delay these missions, if only by a few years. The age now was 14 when kunoichi went after their first target, and for the first few missions an older kunoichi always went along. In order to make it easier, Tsunade pricked the girls when they were 13-this way, at least, their target never had to be the one who they’d call their ‘first’.
(It was too late for others, but at least she can help some. And in the end, it won’t be enough. It never is enough.)
Tsunade manages to pass many laws that helped the kunoichi.
She just wishes she could have passed a law that barred these missions.
-x-
11. Sometimes, there were hard targets.
These targets are usually the ones with a family, with a wife and kids at home. These are the guys that probably are nice and you wouldn’t mind dating them had it not been for the fact that they were your targets and you needed to kill them.
(These were the targets that painfully reminded the girls of their friends and made them silently say a prayer over their dead bodies.)
These targets were the ones that the girls regretted killing the most. Just because of a simple mistake, some of these guys had to die, leaving behind everything and everyone.
Not all of their targets were bad men, and for the good ones, the girls were merciful and killed them painlessly.
They’d also visit the target’s family and deliver flowers or a gift, before disappearing. It felt like it was the least they could do.
These targets are the ones that hurt the most.
-x-
12. The girls let themselves feel everything. They allow every touch, every kiss, and every death to hit them hard and make them suffer.
Anko, for a few years, tried not to feel anything any more. She didn’t let herself feel her targets and killed them like a ruthless robot. She also didn’t let herself feel anything in her life. Slowly, she realized that by not feeling, she was ruining her own life.
The kunoichi allow themselves to feel everything as if it was their first. As though it was their first kiss and their first kill, while in reality it was their nth target. This way, everything hurts a lot more than it needs to.
This way they also stay human.
-x-
13. Kunoichi are strong. Stronger than they look and certainly stronger than others believe. They are strong because of what they have to face several times a month. They are strong because of their bonds with each other. They are strong because, in the end, they see and feel things that they don’t want, but have to.
They protect each other, like a family, and help each other through their difficulties. All of the ninja are like family, but the girls are like a family within a family. Close and tight.
Some things change over time.
This won’t.
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A/N: I liked the way I ended it, at least. And a few parts. This was supposed to show the darker side of being a kunoichi, because most make it out to be a light, fun thing. And don’t show this…
I’m contemplating putting one on shinobi overall, showing the darker side to that….I’ll see, depending on the response to this.
Review?