Chapter 4: Probation: Moving in & Affinity

AN: There will be no pairings in this story other than those in established canon. I will not be doing slash of either gender. Kimimaro and Juugo will simply have a friend/brother relationship; same for Kakashi and Tenzo. Nevertheless, feel free to quietly ship whoever inside your heads. The first half of this chapter is about as angsty as it's going to get; just setting a baseline.

Probation Month No.1

Moving in

"Home, sweet home," I announce dryly to no-one in particular as I fling open the apartment door. I stare blankly around in response to the small puff of dust my footfall kicked up when I stepped on the welcome mat; "well, somebody hasn't cleaned this place in ages. I wonder how much dust I'm inhaling right now? To hell with it; come on in Juugo! We need to sort out dinner and a place to sleep."

I roll out my storage scroll on the floor and pump chakra into it to make it unseal everything. I fish through the resulting pile and pick out two blankets, my one pillow, three changes of clothes and some ration bars. Pressing my hand under my shirt to a seal drawn in the depression of my collarbone, I unseal a small purse. It's got expansion seals on the inside and I've spent very little, so it should hold about 5280 ryo. Enough to buy food but we can wait until that monthly stipend to get new clothes. Chinsei rushes into the room, sniffing at everything. He's probably glad to be out of the pet carrier he was in all that time, but still...

"Juugo, you will be responsible for house-training Chinsei. I'm going out to get some food, I'll be back soon. Check if all the taps work and turn the heating on while I'm out would you?"

"Uh, you won't go far, will you?" That made me stop and turn around; Juugo sounded nervous. I step up and put my hand on his shoulder.

"I'll be quick, but I don't know how far I'll have to go to find a shop. Does it ache again?" Yeah, if Juugo consciously suppresses his problem for too long, it actually starts hurting him, before he loses it. He told me that while we were on the road; you didn't think he didn't try to control himself all those years alone, did you? He nods. If he can last through the night, I'll find a training ground so he can go nuts. Meanwhile..."Here, have a bit of my chakra; it should keep you until I get back." I send Yang chakra into his coils and he sags minutely in relief. "There'll be an ANBU watching you at all times I expect, so if you lose control while I'm not here, well...um, ANBU? You there?" I say out loud. "If Juugo loses control, that's when his eyes go black and yellow and he gets weird swirly markings on his face, can you get him away really fast to somewhere empty like a training ground, then come and get me?"

Silence.

"I'm just gonna assume you got all that? Moving swiftly onward; I'll be back in a bit."

It's pretty late out by the way; twilight sort-of. Thankfully, this being a shinobi Village with people coming and going around the clock, 24-hour shops exist. I mean, in canon you see Naruto go into one to by an ice lolly after Jiraiya died. There's a 24-hour right around the corner, so I go in and start browsing. I avoid buying fresh stuff like milk because I have no idea what state the fridge is in, but packaged stuff like instant ramen, tinned soup and veg, fresh fruit and veg and a few pre-packed bentos get bought as well as tea. I bought a notebook and some writing pens as well; as pretty as those ink calligraphy brushes are, I cannot write with them. Seals, no problem: but actual kanji are beyond me. Normal pens it is.

When I get back, I find Juugo fiddling with the radiator dial and I can hear the kettle in the kitchenette boiling away. Dumping the bags on the table, I take the tea and set it on the counter. The cupboard under the sink has three mugs(one with no handle) and a few plastic bowls of various sizes. By the time I've rinsed and dried the mugs, Juugo comes into the kitchen and the place feels a lot warmer with the heating starting to kick in.

The kettle boils and I pour tea. We drink it at the table in the dining area.

"Kimimaro? What're we going to do tomorrow?" Well, that brings back memories. Me as a little kid, asking mum the exact same question. I shake away the feeling of deja vu and I put my now-empty cup back down on the table.

"Have breakfast sounds good, maybe wake up a bit earlier. I was gonna ask the ANBU if they know any empty areas where you can work off some steam. I was planning to spar with you while you're in that state, actually; it would be a challenge and so far I don't know anybody here well enough to ask. So, once that's done, I figured we could walk around the Village to get our bearings; we don't want to get lost every time we go out."

"Are you sure? I mean, about fighting me while I'm...like that?"

"Sure! I can learn to combat different styles of taijutsu eventually, but since you don't have a style and you're so unpredictable it would be quite the learning experience dodging you. I also want to test something; I need to see how long you can fight in that state and what you feel like afterwards." He looks at me askance.

"Um, speaking of which," he starts off slowly. "Not that I'm ungrateful or anything, but you said there was someone here who could fix me. I was wondering when...I mean...uh...'"

'Fix me.' Ugh, I know he didn't mean it like that,but that particular word just makes it sound like he wants to be neutered. Besides; "I didn't say you could be fixed, I said you could be helped. I mean, it's possible that your condition is actually natural, so getting rid of it might just hurt you even more." The expression on his face goes from apprehensive to something taut and knarled and disappointed. Something curls in my gut at the sight.

"Whoa, whoa! Come on; I got you here, right? All we need to do is find Jiraiya, figure out exactly how your power works and then sort out how to make it work the way you want it to. Simple!"

"It's NOT!" He roars suddenly, bringing his (non-transformed)fist down onto the edge of the table. Shinobi reflexes ingrained into my body since I-can't-remember-when mean I'm on the other side of the room in a ready position before I can even think about what-just-happened. There's that feeling in my gut again and I know it means I've upset him but I can't figure out how I did it.

"I don't WANT to make it work!" Juugo continues, his posture going from angry and bitter to little-boy-lost, slumping in his seat. "I want it gone...I just...never wanted it in the first place; I don't want to be a shinobi at all but you said 'Konoha will want you because you're strong' which means I have to be a shinobi if I'm going to get help but I don't wanna be a shinobi but I do want to stop losing control but I don't want to control it I just want it GONE and now you tell me I can't get RID OF IT because it's PART OF ME!"

The last few words or so are a garbled mess, but the meaning is pretty clear overall. Damn it all, why did Juugo have to be a supporting character in canon; his emotions weren't covered beyond 'I want to not kill people' but other than that he was pretty much a bookend when it came to personality! I don't know how to deal with this! "Bloody Hell, you don't think I don't feel the same about my Kekkei Genkai at times too?"

His head snaps up, eyes wide with surprise despite being reddened from tears of frustration. "What?"

I said that last bit out loud, didn't I? Thank you -not- brain to mouth filter. But seriously; does he think he's the only person in the history of this screwed-sideways-six-ways-to-Sunday Universe to be born with a power they don't want?!

"Why do you think I RAN THE HELL AWAY from Orochimaru? It wasn't exactly NICE there! Do you know how many times I was EXPERIMENTED ON for THE SOLE REASON he WANTED MY KEKKEI GENKAI? How many times I wished I WASN'T ME? But you know something?" I hiss at him as I lean over the table, the buildup of chakra in my skin from my anger steaming into the air. "If it wasn't for my Kekkei Genkai I spent all those years not wanting, I'd be a gibbering wreck from psychological trauma! It's the reason I'm still sane and the reason I lived through fighting my sorry hide out of the middle of Kirigakure!

So EXCU~SE ME for not being able to FIX you; I'm doing what I can to HELP ALREADY!"

After that little outburst, Juugo looks like I just clocked him round the head with sandbag and I have no idea what the ANBU are thinking. I just...I need space.

I jump out the open window and get onto the roof. The cold night air hits me and evaporates the last of the anger, clearing my head. In canon, Juugo did want to just control his wild side, not get rid of it, and I treated him based on that. I didn't think that when he was younger he might have thought differently. God, I need to stop thinking about him as a work of fiction that yeah, you cared about, but didn't really impact on your life. Not helped by the fact that I'm mentally older than him. I'm a psychologically protected young adult in a body untouched by hormones who knows the future while he's a mentally and physically unstable teen in the midst of the nine levels of hell that is puberty. Oh god...

A shuffling sound a little in front of me in the shadows disturbs my thoughts. Not accidental, like somebody's trying to get my attention in a nondescript way. I feel invisible eyes lock onto mine and the indistinct shadowy lump straightens into a more upright position. In the faint light from the streetlight across the road, I catch a glimpse of a grey breastplate and the handle of a tanto sticking up from the shoulder.

"Hi..." I say lamely, not really in the mood for talking but grateful for the opportunity to take my mind off what just happened. "You're one of our ANBU, right? Why break cover now?"

Silence. Then; "Kiri?"

I snort. "Yeah. My clan decided the best way to make a name for themselves was to charge into the middle of Kirigakure armed with only knives and start hacking away at every living thing in sight. The shinobi in Kiri had other ideas. Now I'm the last Kaguya; known Kaguya, anyway."

I make to sit down, but then I realise that in my anger, massive spikes of bone had sprouted through the skin on my back without me noticing. That instinctive action was what saved my life against the Seven-Swordsmen trainees back in Kiri, but I'm going to need to start getting it under control at some point. I retract the spikes and sit. The ANBU is still there. I ignore him.

Nothing happens for about, hmm, five minutes? Then the cold gets to me and I decide to go back inside, so I stand up. You know, from this angle, the ANBU looks rather short. Okay, he's taller than me but definitely still a teenager. At first I thought it might be Kakashi, but the glimpse of his hair that I can see above the shaft of darkness that conceals his masked face is an average mid-brown. Well, might as well get his name...'

"Look," I say. "I know I'm probably never going to find out your real name and I'm not asking you to take the mask off, but do you have a codename I can call you? It would make things easier if we could distinguish you and you comrade from each other."

After a moments hesitation, he leans forward and in that second I don't know whether the Universe just shit all over me or dumped rosewater and champagne over my head. Because the mask has two stubby ears, eye-holes ringed with a thin circle and framed by red crescents, with small green stripes on the forehead and cheeks. A very familiar mask. Tenzo, better known as Captain Yamato, temporary leader of Naruto's squad in Shippuden, Orochimaru's former experiment, former ROOT member, laboratory-bastard descendant of the Shodai Hokage, only current wielder of the Mokuton and one of the coolest guys in the series. That all went through my head in a second, the second before he says "I am Bear", then vanishes.

I take that as my cue to go inside.

Aaaannd the moment I have both feet on the floor, Juugo grabs me in a crushing bear hug, mumbling into my shoulder about how sorry he is and how he wasn't thinking. But my eyes are caught by the two ANBU in the corner of the room, seemingly holding a conversation in just handsigns. Not just that, but Tenzo's...I mean Bear's(got to get used to calling him that, don't want to slip up) partner has some very iconic spiky silver hair. That comment about the Universe I said before? It's that again.

Juugo, noticing my relocated attention, relinquishes his grip and turns to see what I'm looking at. He catches sight of the ANBU and freezes. The ANBU finish their little chat and turn to us, before Bear speaks up. "I am Bear, he is Hound." They vanish abruptly in a shunshin of leaves.

...

FML

The Importance of Affinity

"Any questions?"

That was the end of my first report session with the Hokage and Inoichi. The day after moving in to the apartment, but they have to get information on Orochimaru from me before it goes out of date. This one was the whole works; personnel, current experiments and base locations. At that last question though, I get the chance to ask something that's been in the back of my head for a while.

"Umm, why don't you just pull all of the information you need out of my head? You have the Yamanaka clan. Not that I don't appreciate my privacy not being invaded, but it would be faster and more efficient."

"Your Kekkei Genkai," Inoichi speaks up. "Your Yang chakra cancels out the Yin chakra that composes a Yamanaka mind-probe. It's...kind of embarrassing."

Gaaaahhh, I rub my eyes with my hands, groaning in despair. "Of course it does, I should've guessed. Of course Yamanaka mind techniques isn't one of the Cyclical Elemental chakra affinities but one of the two Balanced Divine affinities which nullify each other, it's so obvious. But I've heard theories about Yamanaka communicating to their comrades, including Akimichi, with their jutsu but Akimichi are Yang-natured so how does that work?"

Inoichi gives off the vague sense of being shell-shocked but the Hokage takes a long pull on his pipe and smiles. "Akimichi are Yang-natured, yes, but it does not saturate their bodies without handseals or in response to emotion as your chakra does. Inoichi's jutsu, Yin chakra that it is, is unable to pass through your skin and skull to reach your brain. And may I say you are the first shinobi I've met in a long time to know chakra theory in such depth. Cyclical Elemental Affinities and the Balanced Divine; it's been so long since I've heard those terms spoken with any understanding. What drove you to go into it?"

I shrug. "I'm never going to be a sensor or a genjutsu specialist and my ninjutsu has a baseline of average. But if I knew the ins and outs of chakra, the very foundation of shinobi life, then I'd have some sort of advantage against those other three types. It also helps with sealing. That, and there wasn't much else to do down in the labs aside from read. Orochimaru's got some very good book and scroll repositories tucked away in some of those bases I told you about."

"He always did love his books," the Hokage murmured to himself, tipping his hat over his eyes. Inoichi coughed politely.

"Forgive an old man for reminiscing," the Sandaime said, climbing to his feet. "I have a little time before I need to be at my desk; won't you walk with this old man for a while, Kimimaro-kun?" Not phrased like an order, but as a firm suggestion.

"Well, I would, but I agreed to meet Juugo at training ground 2 for a spar..."

"Then I shall accompany you there," he interjects. "It has been a while since I've walked that way and I do really want to get out of my office."

And that was how I found myself walking down a side street side-by-side with the Sandaime Hokage. In the middle of the day. With people around. And as I was accompanying the Hokage, naturally I came under scrutiny too. The eyes were everywhere and it was really uncomfortable since I was an unknown element, meaning that the stares ranged from curious to outright suspicious. I don't like being in the limelight; never have. I was always the person in the corner with a book who just really didn't care if other people thought I was weird.

So you can imagine how relieved I felt when we finally got to the outskirts of town. Oh, right; the Hokage wouldn't know the extent of Juugo's condition. I turn to him just before we enter the gate to the training ground. "Ah, Hokage-sama. I must inform that this is only technically a spar. This is a chance for Juugo to let off some steam; he has been repressing his condition for a while now it is straining him. I am perfectly capable of countering him in his altered state. This information is so you will not be surprised."

He nods in acknowledgement. "I understand, and I must admit I, among many, are curious about the nature of his affliction. You picked up that I intended to observe you the whole time?"

No, I didn't; I can't read people like that. But it was logical reasoning. "I did not, Hokage-sama. I simply knew that you would be watching, regardless of whatever I did; I am still a threat."

There is no response, so I open the gate and walk through. Juugo is waiting, but he is bent almost double from pain.

"It's okay Juugo!" I yell from a safe distance. I don't sense the Hokage anywhere, so he's safe and no doubt watching from somewhere. "Let it out!"

With a whimper of relief, Juugo bends backwards, almost in half and I can hear the cracking of vertebrae from here as his body morphs and a maniacal snarling laugh wrenches itself from his lips. The next second, a great primordial throwback is upon me, all gnarled and knotted and leathery and covered in lumps and spikes like a horrific amalgamation of wood and stone.

I doge and duck the entire time, but I draw bones from my shoulders when I need to, spikes from my elbows come in handy more than once and I aim blows and jabs to various places on his anatomy(those places which are still mostly humanoid, anyway). One time did I make the mistake of grappling. If not for some quick sprouting of spikes on the soles of my feet through my moccasins, for traction, I would have had a rather high-speed airborne acquainting with several boulders.

I held back under Orochimaru for obvious reasons and the trainees who were chibi Sound-ninja Four weren't much competition at all. And I'll say this for Orochimaru; god that man knows how to plan a training regime!

So even though I'm handicapping myself in this fight, I'm not holding back my skill level. Juugo's actually getting me to work up some sweat and this is the most fun I've had in years.

Fic recommendation is The Somewhat Cracked Mind of Uchiha Itachi by Kereea. A funny, cute and sort-of 'ideal world' fic with lots of humour. To quote Kankuro from the fic; "You killed my entire world view in one month! Killed it!" Enjoy.

Just to give you a rundown of this SI-Kimimaro's stats(to remind you and me that I'm not a Mary Sue):

(Bare in mind Kimi here is nine and a half, so he/I will be growing.)

Taijutsu: Fairly good, low Chunin-level, but still in development of an actual style.

Genjutsu casting: Absolute Zero. Genjutsu requires a bit of Yin chakra to work; he has none and it is impossible for him to get any because of his Yang Kekkei Genkai.

Genjutsu resistance: Cast-iron solid for low/middle genjutsu. Shaky on high-level ones.

Ninjutsu: E, D and low C in Doton and Suiton. E and D in Katon. Overall, very low Chunin in skill, high Chunin in range of styles and knowledge of application.

Kenjutsu: basic stances, blocks and parries. Mostly improvised for the rest. Any style still in development.

Fuuinjutsu(seals): Not quite Master level. Difficulty drawing accurately when at speed.

Iryo-ninjutsu(medical): Two basic healing jutsu(for flesh wounds only, really) and one basic chakra scalpel.

Chakra reserves: Mid/high Chunin.

Kekkei Genkai(Shikotsumyaku/Dead Bone Pulse): Spikes from all body parts, Digital Shrapnel, Clematis Vine(pulling spine out), shielding layer of bone under skin only localised, healing accelerated by 0.25%, shielding from mental trauma and immunity to Yamanaka mind-probes.

Personality: Quirky, passive-agressive verbal retaliation, polite, sometimes too cautious in social situations.

For my Christmas present, can I please have reviews that specifically say what your favourite moment/quote from this fic so far is?