chapter 126

It took only one day before someone made it to Suna from Iwa.

It was a day which Eiji spent with Naruto and it was… so very refreshing. Or maybe that wasn't the right word for it. He was filled with this sense of contentment mixed with nostalgia. It was like going back to before they graduated, when they'd first started hanging out with each other and it was just the two of them. It was… great.

Naruto set out to fill the entire village with his traps once more. Some for defense and some for entertainment. Through those hours, Eiji accompanied him, sitting on a nearby rooftop and watching his brother work. Whenever a prank went off, they made sure to watch it together. Eiji also made sure to have a few clones purposely set some off disguised as other people. He didn't want Suna to get angry at Naruto too.

Fortunately, he only had to do that for the meaner traps, which were few. Naruto had eased up a lot on what he considered funny. At worst, they'd be mildly annoying, which meant that Eiji didn't need to intervene too often.

Besides that, they walked around a lot, watching the sights, looking for stuff that was different between their village and the Sand, trying new dishes – even if Naruto wasn't a huge fan of that option – and generally just lazing around. They both needed the time to relax and they were gladly taking some to do so. On top of all that, Eiji simply enjoyed the time he got to spend with his brother. It felt like ages ago since he'd last been around him for so long without something else to do or someone else to visit.

In Suna, it was only the two of them, basically.

'Just like old times, huh?' Eiji mused with a slight grin.

He could almost forget that he didn't have-

"Eiji," Naruto called and Eiji smiled weakly in response. The blonde had learned quickly to pull his mind away when it started spiraling due to his arm. Sometimes, he'd be subtle about it, or as subtle as Naruto could be. Others, he'd just bluntly call him like in this instance. Regardless of the method, Eiji was grateful. "I wanted to ask you… Well, we wanted to ask you something."

Eiji blinked for a second, taken aback by the fact that both his brother and the Kyubi wanted to ask him something together. He'd been aware that Naruto was making progress, however slowly, towards… sort of befriending the chakra beast. What he hadn't been aware of was that they'd gotten so far.

"Almost dying can do that," Kage commented, sounding almost amused. Judging by the yelp that he heard in his mind, Eiji was sure that Tsuchigumo had… "attacked" the Orochimaru lookalike. For what reason, he had no idea, but neither did he care overly much.

"He stopped playing with her," Hachi answered his unasked question, sounding like she was having a good time. Probably watching the two, if he had to bet. "You are right. And regarding these two… They probably want to know about Tsuchigumo, actually. You weren't being very discreet about things, were you?"

'Ah.' Yeah, that'd make sense, he supposed.

"That.. In the fight… Why did it seem like you had… Like you were… like me?" Naruto hesitantly asked and Eiji nodded, confirming that Hachi had been right. If he knew anything about his mind occupants, he was sure that the woman was feeling supremely smug.

"You are not wrong," Kage confirmed.

"Do you remember the Invasion?" Eiji asked, while in his mind, the male twin offered to help him get into Senjutsu Mode. He appreciated it. The sensing ability would let him be sure that nobody was spying on them.

"You mean when you were… out?" Naruto mumbled, and it was evident that those days had been hard on him. Not only because of how low his voice got, coming from a boy that was usually so loud. On top of that, it was evident in his tone and his expression too.

"Yeah," Eiji answered, closing his eyes as he felt Senjutsu taking over. No need to show more of it than necessary, even if the black circles symbolizing the six other eyes of spiders appeared on his face. Showing the beady black that replaced his human eyes would be a step further and while that card was already shown to Akatsuki, there was no need to show it to everyone.

"You don't have to talk about it if-" Naruto started before stopping. Likely because Kurama didn't quite agree with his idea. Understandable, really. If he heard about anyone else having a System, Eiji would likely have been unable to stop himself.

"It's fine, just making sure nobody overhears," Eiji told the blonde, taking a deep breath in. "The Cursed Mark that I had mixed up with the Hachibi chakra of Killer B. That, on top of some other things, created another Chakra Beast."

The twitch on Naruto's face likely meant that Kurama hadn't taken that very well.

"I don't know much more than that. We don't understand how that happened entirely, if we are honest. We'll probably research the whole thing better once we have some more time. As it is… We've all just rolled with things," Eiji continued before smiling softly. "We named her Tsuchigumo. She's a black and white wolf with eight legs."

"Eight-legged wolf? That sounds… weird," Naruto commented, looking a little caught off guard.

"Excuse me?" Eiji asked, narrowing his eyes at his brother. Tsuchigumo hadn't taken the fact that her "uncle" had called her weird very well. Hell, Eiji himself didn't like hearing that. Maybe he needed to smack the blonde a little.

"Sorry, didn't mean to be mean!" Naruto apologized, likely realizing that he'd stuck his foot in his mouth. "It's just… difficult to imagine, I guess. All those legs on a wolf-" He was interrupted as Eiji hit him with a Genjutsu that showed him how Tsuchigumo looked. "Huh… She looks cool," he added then and Eiji could feel how happy that made the Chakra Beast all of a sudden.

"Don't say that too much, it'll get to her head," Eiji commented, chuckling at the offended feeling Tsuchigumo gave. "She's a sweetheart, I'm sure you'll like her. Maybe you can meet her… Some other time though."

"I'd like that," Naruto replied with a grin. Then he tilted his head with a thoughtful expression. "You say she. Ku- Er, the fox is curious about that," he said and Eiji smiled.

"Yeah, we were surprised by that too. She just up and said she was a she one day. We just… Well, we were a bit busy dealing with other things so we just rolled with it. Besides, she's fine as she is, so we didn't feel the need to really address the issue," Eiji answered before shrugging.

"Huh," Naruto replied intelligently. "Well, that's… something."

"I know," Eiji said, nodding. "Does your friend have any other questions?" At the question, Naruto's lips twitched into a grin.

"Too many, according to them. For now, the fox says they'll think about it before talking about it," the blonde answered. "They look forward to meeting their niece though."

Judging by the grin Naruto had on his face, he was saying that to mess with Kurama. Considering the way his smile widened, he likely succeeded too. Good for him. Eiji wasn't sure pissing off a Tailed Beast was a good idea, but that was Naruto's problem. Tsuchigumo took his word for it though, and barked enthusiastically in his mind. In response, Eiji smiled softly to himself for a moment.

"Tsuchigumo looks forward to that meeting too," he informed his brother, so that Kurama could know. "Now, how about-" he started, before pausing. Tilting his head for a second, he grinned widely. "Sorry, Naruto, it seems I'll be busy for a bit."

"Why?"

"A teammate of mine will be here in a bit," he explained, following the presence with Senjutsu. With a groan, Eiji stood up. "I guess I'll make sure that they don't cause a mess, huh?"

"Wait, who is it?" Naruto asked, only getting a grin from him in response.

"Wouldn't you like to know, seal boy?"

And with that, Eiji flickered away.

[}-o-{]

"Hey, Fu," Eiji greeted, Flickering right where she stopped her own dash. The Jinchuriki jumped, clearly taken off guard. The chakra wings behind her back flaring menacingly before they twitched and her form seemed to deflate. Blinking, the girl learned forward.

"Eiji? Eiji! You are alright!" the girl called, all but tackling him. It was good that he'd half expected that. "It's so nice to see you are fi…ne?" she started celebrating before trailing off, her hand palming the place where his left arm should be. When she looked at him, he gave her a bitter smile. "What happened?"

"Two Akatsuki pairs, that's what happened," he answered, making her eyes widen. "I dealt with one of them and the other is likely licking their wounds."

"And we weren't there," she growled, glaring at his arm. He knew she didn't mean anything by it though. She was just angry and feeling powerless. He couldn't do much to help with that though.

"It's not your fault," he reassured, placing his now only hand on her upper arm and squeezing reassuringly. "Don't think about it too much. It's what it is."

It was sort of funny, how it was easier to deal with his arm when he was reassuring other people about it. When he was by himself, it felt like the worst thing ever, like his life was ruined or something of the sort. However, when it came time to talk to someone about it, it felt like it was… less important.

"Still…" she grumbled, eyes still staring at the empty sleeve.

"Come on, let's get to Suna and get something to eat. You must have rushed here if you arrived so fast. I know it was a pain in the ass to get here as fast as I did," Eiji told her with a smile as he threw his arm around her shoulders and guided her towards the village. "What about the rest, by the way?"

"Missing your girlfriend?" she asked with a grin. It looked weaker than usual, but at least she was trying. He appreciated it.

"Like you wouldn't believe," he told her, only half joking. He really was missing Tayuya. He missed her comforting presence when they sat together. He missed her soothing music. He even missed her careless, scathing remarks.

"Man, you've got it bad," Fu commented with a chuckle. "They should be here soon. Jirobo will probably arrive before the others. We were traveling together for a bit, he used his ability to drain chakra to get it from me and keep up for a bit longer. It was too much for him after a while. Should take him a day or two to get here and the others will arrive around the same time after that."

"Good to know," Eiji nodded with a soft smile. He couldn't wait to get the whole team together again. He liked having some time with just Naruto, but he'd gotten used to having them all around. It was a little jarring to suddenly be by himself whenever he wasn't with Naruto. Not bad per se, but strange.

Then, he noticed that the Jinchuriki was leaning a little too much on him. It wasn't entirely surprising though. He could feel the Seven Tails retreating back to its seal. She likely was only now feeling the exhaustion of her trip.

He pulled up a handful of wires to support her as they walked.

"Thanks. It seems that traveling through an entire Nation was a bit much," Fu commented with a chuckle.

"Just a little bit, yeah," Eiji agreed with a laugh of his own.

[}-o-{]

"It's good to see you well, Eiji," was Jirobo's way to greet him once he made it to Suna. His arrival was a little less dramatic than Fu's, mainly because Eiji had informed his spiders of his team's incoming arrival. Thus, there was the Earth Release user of his squad, standing next to him with a hand-sized spider on his shoulder.

"It's good to have you around again, Jirobo," Eiji replied with a soft smile as he watched Fu and Naruto make nuisances of themselves, messing around with Suna citizens and, primarily and to their parent's relief, entertaining children. He wasn't too surprised by this. The two Jinchuriki were bundles of fun and mischief, really. He counted himself lucky that they were on the harmless side of those two things… for the most part.

There was a moment of silence then. Jirobo was staring a little, but Eiji couldn't really tell him anything. He was doing the same thing himself with his brother and Fu. Watching them play with children was nice. It was joyous, it was… so different to how the whole mess with Akatsuki had been.

"Maybe not so well," Jirobo corrected himself and Eiji chuckled. He'd noticed, maybe he'd done so immediately and it'd taken him that long to decide to point it out. Either way, he was starting to accept that he'd have the same conversation several times. If he was lucky, that is. Realistically, he might have to do so a lot.

"I managed as well as I could," Eiji replied with a shrug. The motion highlighted the absence of a limb on his left side, but he was ready for it. Little by little, he was getting better at ignoring the pain of the loss. The more present phantom pains were another thing entirely. Fortunately, Iron Will took away that pain too, even if it was annoying to have to turn it on every time.

"So, two less Akatsuki members, I'm guessing," Jirobo commented and Eiji gave a half smile.

"And one pair got their asses kicked. Unfortunately, they will be harder to face the next time," he told his bigger, more robust squad member. The Earth Release user nodded, considering that information.

"Well, our jobs have never been easy to begin with," the guy said, making Eiji laugh.

"You are not wrong," he agreed, shaking his head.

"The missus will be annoyed when she makes it here," Jirobo pointed out, making Eiji grin wryly at him. "Exactly why is difficult to guess, but I can tell you that much."

"Well, I'll have to be ready," he replied, deciding to ignore the first part. "... I told Fu, but I'll tell you too. Thanks for rushing here," Eiji said then, this time determinately not looking at his teammate. "For all you knew, I'd rushed to my death and you were doing the same."

"Please," Jirobo scoffed. "We know you are immortal, Eiji. No need to pretend."

Eiji snorted at that.

"I guess you've found out my secret, huh?"

"In all seriousness… Don't mention it," Jirobo waved off. "You are our leader, our friend. We won't just leave you alone, no matter what. We owe you too much for that."

"Huh, and here I thought you only followed me out of fear," Eiji half-joked. There was silence after that though. No reply in jest accompanied his comment. No annoyed grumble. Nothing that he could have expected.

"We started like that, yes," Jirobo admitted instead. "But we've seen what you offered us, Eiji, maybe even without knowing about it yourself. We know that you've given us a chance to change our lives for the better."

Coming from the usually quiet Jirobo, Eiji was surprised by that, if he was honest. Out of all the people in his team, the Earth Release user was the one he expected a speech from the least. Maybe that was because in other settings there were other people to talk for him, which made him happy to just fade into the background. Now though, it was just the two of them and he could speak freely.

"We all came from shitty situations, where we were trying to make the best we could with what we had," Jirobo continued then, and Eiji let him speak, taking in what he was saying. "We weren't good people, we might not have made the best decisions, but we did do the best we could. And then, you came and offered us a second chance when everything was falling apart around us. Regardless of how you recruited us, is it any surprise that we've decided to remain loyal to you?"

"... I suppose it isn't," Eiji replied after a long pause. Turning his gaze to the blue sky above, he considered what to say then. However, Jirobo wasn't done yet, it seemed. The guy had thought about a lot of things to say while he traveled, evidently.

"Even if you think you are alone against the world, Eiji, you aren't," his teammate told him. "We'll stand beside you… As much as possible, that is," he added wryly, to which Eiji chuckled. Yeah, the world didn't seem to like that idea too much, if recent events were anything to go by. Still…

"I appreciate the sentiment," Eiji acknowledged with a nod.

None of them said anything after that and remained side by side. Jirobo had told him his piece, and was content with staying silent, it seemed. As for Eiji, he had things to think about. And besides, it was a nice moment to enjoy, he supposed. Regardless, the moment had to be broken eventually.

That came in the form of Naruto and Fu seemingly growing a little tired of messing around with the children. Before the two of them could turn their attention and cause some actual chaos, Eiji decided to intervene. He knew just the way to do so with the least damage done too, as it turned out.

"Say, Jirobo, I know a good ramen stand close by, what do you say?"

[}-o-{]

"Losing the arm did literally nothing," Fu grumbled as she pushed herself up, her arms half-buried in the sand. "What the actual fuck?"

"Did you expect something different?" Jirobo asked, groaning as he followed her example, looking around with a sneer. The environment really wasn't helping them, Eiji would admit, but that was half the reason why they were doing this. His team wasn't used to fighting in a sand-filled place. "Besides, we are lacking a few people in the team."

"What am I? Chopped liver?" Naruto protested, although the fact that half his body was hidden under the sand wasn't helping his argument.

"No offense, but we aren't used to fighting together with you," Fu told the boy with an apologetic smile. Which was true, actually. No matter how good Naruto was, seals and all, Eiji's team members just couldn't coordinate with him half as well as they could with the Tayuya and Kabuto. More often than not, they ended up getting in each other's way.

"Look at it like this," Eiji started, twirling Nuibari with his only remaining hand. "It's yet another part of training. You need to be able to work with new people at the drop of a hat. Or, at least, not affect them negatively."

"Sir yes, sir," both of his team members replied. Meanwhile, Naruto simply groaned, struggling against the sand to pull himself up. It seemed that Kurama didn't feel like playing. Which was fine by Eiji, really, considering that Naruto needed to be able to fight without the chakra beast's help.

'Still, it'd help him to be able to train with Kurama's help,' Eiji mused, but there wasn't much he could do on that front. It wasn't like he could ask the Nine Tails to help his brother train. Or maybe he could, but he'd leave that for later. That was a mess he didn't want to be involved with just yet.

He paused then, feeling a nearby spider signal him something. A grin spread over his face as he turned to the side. Wires came up from under the sand to wrap themselves around Fu, Jirobo and Naruto.

"Oh, come on, we were just getting up!" Naruto whined.

"Get out of that, it seems I gotta give someone a welcome," Eiji told them, not turning to look at them as he started walking. "See you later, guys." Before any of them could answer, he Flickered away. "Took you guys long enough, guys."

Instead of an insult, or a snarky reply, or some other foul thing, he got an unexpected response to his greeting. It seemed that his team had decided that this was a good moment to start surprising him or something. Regardless of that idle thought, the fact was that his girlfriend all but tackled him to the ground.

"I'm fine, don't-" he didn't get to finish his reassuring statement. After all, his mouth was suddenly occupied with Tayuya's. "Well, that's ni-" He was once again interrupted when she pulled away, this time with a slap. That was a little more expected, he supposed. "Nice to see you too, Tayuya," he said with a wry smile.

"Next time you better not go alone like that, you fucker, or so help me I'll… I'll…" Tayuya started, clearly very pissed off. However, at the end, she started trailing for a very obvious reason. A reason that made Eiji smile sadly at her. "Eiji," she whispered, almost a whimper.

"I was fine," he said, his smile falling the smallest bit. "Came out almost in one piece and all."

"Almost?" Kabuto asked, speaking for the first time and appearing next to him. The mednin probably didn't need the jutsu he used while placing a hand on Eiji's shoulder to tell what had happened, but he did that regardless. He was likely looking for any other damage he might have sustained, and to check on the state of his lifespan. "Things didn't go all that well, huh?"

"It's what happens when you cross two pairs," Eiji replied with a shrug, making the ex-spy pale.

"Never," Tayuya growled, pulling him into a tight hug once more. "You are never going alone like that again, you hear me? Never."

"Noted," Eiji agreed easily with a nod, using his one arm to hug her back.

"I hate that we weren't even there," she hissed at him. "I mean it, never."

"Never," He repeated, nodding again.

"Speak like you mean it, damnit!" Tayuya shouted, her face still against his chest as she punched his side. It hurt quite a bit, he would admit. "Stop just saying it and actually mean it, bastard!"

"I won't go alone again, I promise."

"You are fucking liar," she muttered and he felt something warm and wet hit his chest then. Eiji took a deep breath in then before looking up at the sky. "Stop lying."

"I won't do it again," he told her, pulling her tighter against him. "I mean it."

"..." Instead of saying anything, she replied by attempting to squeeze the life out of him.

"... I'll think of something to deal with that," Kabuto said after a moment, his face neutral. "I can think of several ways, but some of them might need more time than others. I'll probably have something provisional ready soonish. I'll need to check with some people here. Good thing we are in Suna," he explained and Eiji nodded.

"If you need to convince anyone, just give me a call. I'll ask in your place if your word isn't enough," Eiji told him.

"Good," the mednin replied before looking at a nearby spider. "I'm guessing they can take me to the rest of the team? They are here, right?"

"Yes, to both."

"Good, I'll be leaving then."

And nothing else was said then, as Tayuya and Eiji were left alone. At least, for a good long moment. Eventually, the silence was broken.

"I think I might be falling in love with you," Tayuya told him, her face hidden against his chest and under her hair. "So you aren't allowed to die, idiot."

"If it helps, I think I might be falling in love with you too," Eiji replied.

"Then you should understand that this fucking hurts."

"Yeah, I do. I'm sorry."

"You better be, Fearless Leader."