Chapter 2 1/2

"Humans aren't rational. We are, however, predictably irrational!"

Tenzuka and Ando were at the research lab, taking notes at Kabuto's explanation. He was incredibly enthusiastic about them working under him for some reason, but didn't give them permission to touch anything until they knew 'the basics.'

"We call this bad way of thinking 'bias' because you can have the best and most relevant information in the world, yet still predict the wrong results."

"So it basically means 'thinking the wrong thing' then?" Asked Ando.

"No. It's an error that depends on how your mind- forget it. Let's take an example; you meet a shy person. Is this person more likely to be a librarian or a merchant in our village?"

"Librarian," they both said without thinking.

"Wrong. We have one library, with I think 4 employees, but we have hundreds of merchants living or going in and out of our village. It is much more probable that he or she is a merchant!"

Huh.

"Another example: you meet an Uchiha. Is he or she more likely to be a ninja or a civilian?"

The obvious answer was 'civilian' but now they weren't so sure.

"Hah!" Exclaimed Kabuto happily, "you two are already learning! The answer is civilians; only about 20% of their clan members are ninjas, or at least that's how it was a few years ago when we took statistics. Anyway the moral is 'we prefer a wrong map to no map' in other words: we'd rather make something up that sounds reasonable then actively search for the truth."

Tenzuka nodded. He was starting to see how this worked.

"But that's just one type of bias. We have all sorts of dumb mental shortcuts which is why I'm giving you homework!"

Kabuto handed the two a book.

"This is just 100 types of biases that we know of. Who knows how many there really are?"

"So once we finish the homework we can work with you guys?" Asked Ando.

"Huh? No. You two will work right away! The reason for that is knowing a bias isn't enough to not do it: you need experience. Your entire lifetime isn't enough to make sure you are perfectly unbiased, may as well get to work right away. The book is very interesting though."

The three left the building.

"Truth is we need a better approach on this. But that's Omori's goal, he's the one who is specializing in rationality and will give you two daily lessons, I just need to give you two an introduction."

Kabuto handed them sheets of paper.

"You guys can specialize either in chakra research, the human body, the human mind, animals, chemicals, you name it! Since these disciplines are actually connected you're going to have to study the basics in everything, but once that is done you get to specialize!"

It sounded like a lot of work. Tenzuka and Ando looked at each other.

"Well, this is my stop!" Said Kabuto, pointing at the library. "See ya later!"

The two remained in the middle of the street.

"This sucks," said Ando, "wasn't research supposed to be the easy path?"

"You can always be a civilian."

"Dude fuck that! I wanna be a ninja. A real one! There's got to be another way!"

"Well, we could always try to make a new category."

"Huh?"

"Based on what Kabuto was saying, the research branch is pretty new. They don't even have a proper teaching system remember? We can probably work something out that is genuinely fun for us. It just has to be profitable."

"Like what?"

Tenzuka shrugged. The whole reason that he had chosen to be a ninja was that it sounded exciting. Like an adventure.

"Why are you a ninja, Ando?"

The boy frowned.

"Because... I guess it's just what I saw myself doing, I don't know."

"Well, what would you like to do?"

"Explore I guess?"

Tenzuka nodded. Relatable.

How could the two of them use the research departments rules to go on adventures?

"This...could actually work." Said Kabuto.

The two genins smiled.

"I'd have to change the proposal a bit, and you two would probably be in danger, but the idea of a cultural exchange program could actually work."

"That's why it's best if we go." Said Tenzuka. "We're inexperienced and weak genin, if the village loses us, no big deal, it's not like we've got some important bloodline or anything. If everything does go well, we get to travel to other locations and learn about their lifestyles. They trade interesting but harmless information, as do we, village relations get better and we get to visit new places!"

Kabuto nodded in understanding. "I'll try to get a meeting with the Hokage this week, I'll keep you two updated. In the meantime, brush up your communication skills, you'll need them for me to make a persuasive argument."

The following week was the most energetic the two had.

Tenzuka found himself incredibly motivated to train and study, as did Ando.

They got to know everyone in their different research branches and locations, learnt interesting concepts and had tons of time for fun.

Ando was slowly becoming a close friend. He always spoke his mind, was confident but not in an annoying manner, could talk about any subject with interest (although the duration of said speeches weren't impressive) and all and all, was just fun to hang out with. He always had a sarcastic joke or comment to add.

They also did small D rank jobs to get some money. The average mission usually paid 7 Ryo each, which was plenty when it came to lunch money, but not nice when rent was on average 400 Ryo per month.

Then again, they did get to cut off expenses.

Tenzuka had recently gotten a notepad and used it at every opportunity.

"So the minimum I spend per meal is 1 Ryo. The maximum...well, if I was rich I could easily spend millions, but realistically I would never spend more then 20 a day..."

Ando was beside him but had another job. He was reading the 'Opportunities weekly' magazine, which usually had a section dedicated to starter homes.

"On average 10 Ryo per day means 300 per month. There's two of us, so 600. With rent costs, that's at least 1000 Ryo per month. I haven't even counted electricity and gas expenses yet."

"We should just buy a battery and make our own electricity," said Ando offhandedly.

"True. Gasses are imported from water countries swamp toads, so if we could manage to get a trip there and capture one, there go those expenses too-"

"Hah! Found one! Small apartment, one bathroom, a kitchen, a lounge room and a bedroom, but only 320 ryo a month!"

"Ok, so 920 Ryo instead of 1000. Big deal."

"It already has a chargeable battery that comes included! We won't have to pay for instalments!"

"Ok, the offer is getting better. What are the downsides?"

"It's not very close to the centre. I'd say it's at least 1-hour walk."

"I don't care."

"Yeah, same. Also, it's on the fifth floor of a building so stairs."

"We can just ninja jump our way up."

"Yep. So it's settled. Should we go now?"

"Hell yes."

The landlord was an annoying old guy that didn't even speak properly. His daughter, an articulate woman in her forties, was ten times more pleasant to listen to.

They needed a bank account so there were guarantees of payment, which was bad but not impossible, an adult's guarantee, which was easy since they were both genin, and finally, their Konoha ID.

The only real problem was the bank account, but that was solved by the end of the day. The only problem they had now was money.

"How about this," the woman proposed. "Instead of demanding payment upfront, I give you the first month off. In exchange I want you to do something for me. You two are ninjas right?"

"Yep."

"I want you to find my missing daughter."

She took out a photo and a piece of paper from a bag.

"The details are written here, please pay close attention. If you find her by the end of the week, you won't have to worry about this month. Otherwise, you have 7 days to have enough money for this months payment or the deal is off."

"We agree," said Tenzuka, "but wouldn't it be better to pay for jonin to help?"

The woman shook her head. "I have a friend who did exactly that when her daughter disappeared a year ago. Missions are usually paid by assignments, but that's only if takes less then 24 hours. After a day, the costs are increased, after a week that happens again, after a month it happens even more. This is obviously used to make sure chunin and genin can take long C rank missions without going hungry."

The two nodded. Otherwise bodyguard C ranks wouldn't exist.

"There are ways to lessen the tax, like housing the ninjas, providing food and so on, but in all legal contracts, the money must come first, then the ninja does the mission. If all goes well, reputation boost. If all goes wrong, the village loses its reputation. Can you guess what happened?"

Tenzuka frowned. "The lady paid for months, didn't get her child back and lost a lot of money?"

"The lady went bankrupt, didn't get her child back and killed herself."

Shit.

"If you two won't manage, I'll directly pay for an A-rank mission, but I probably will never financially recover if the mission goes longer than a month. I have my son to think about and my father. I cannot afford to die or lose everything."

She stopped and looked down, probably trying to hold back tears.

"We'll find her." Said Tenzuka firmly. "Even if it takes more than a week, even if you kick us out. I promise."

"Dude!" Said Ando as soon as the old man and daughter left. "What was that?!"

"I couldn't help it, I felt sorry for her: she just lost a daughter and is worrying about losing everything else, I cannot imagine what that feels like."

"I agree, but I'll find her even if you kick me out?! C'mon what sort of diplomat are you! Will you fold over every sappy story you hear? What the hell!"

Tenzuka felt foolish. What if she did make it all up?

"All missions have records somewhere. If we ask nicely, we can probably get the details of the last recovery mission to verify if what she said was true or not."

"That's not the point! The point is one does not simply fold over whatever sappy story you hear! Can you imagine if that's what type of reputation you got?! Everyone would be making up sappy stories to get a discount! The rules exist for a reason!"

He had a point. Tenzuka didn't care though. "Let's just focus on finding her by the week and getting a house eh?"

"Fine."

The two sat down on the only couch the lounge room had and opened the file that the landlord had provided.

On the top page was a photo of a girl. One that was all so familiar.

It was Tahara.

There were times when Tenzuka had made embarrassing mistakes. The obvious 'oh shit' reaction and the unpleasant emotional states that would come were not the best, but not the worst either. You can't control everything, so sometimes mistakes had to happen, not because of destiny or something, but because humans don't have unlimited foresight, or the ability to see the future. Such mistakes aren't your fault.

This time, Tenzuka couldn't help but feel responsible, even though he had nothing to do with it.

She had disappeared on the day of her graduation. She never went home.

To think that they were possibly the last ones to see her. They could have done something if only they had known. But they hadn't. There was nothing they could have done. It was not their fault.

"I say we should hunt down our would-be sensei and take him to the Hokage. The guy was suspicious since day one." Said Ando immediately.

"It could be, but what motive could he possibly have? Also, how do we beat him? He's a jonin."

"We'll cross the bridge when we get to it. For now, I vote we find out where he lives. Even if he's innocent, he's the last person to have seen her."

Finding out were a jonin lived was actually pretty difficult. They didn't have a name(they couldn't remember it), an age, nothing. Just a vague description.

Tenzuka suggested going to the academy. Wakita would know who he was right?

They did exactly that.

It was afternoon, so Wakita wasn't in the academy of course. They could wait for tomorrow for her lessons but that would take a lot of time from a possibly dead-end.

"Maybe there are written records somewhere?" Said Ando.

So they broke in the building.

Perhaps not one of their brightest moves, but the reason was legit. Worse comes to worst they would get sent to the Hokage to explain themselves, which would only work in their favour.

They went to the teachers' room and broke in the drawers that had Wakita's name on it. Maybe there would be some files there?

Sure enough, they found a team selection, but only of the students, not of the teachers.

"Oh come on." Said Ando in an annoyed tone. "Now what?"

But Tenzuka was transfixed on the bottom piece of paper.

"Oi, what's up?"

No reply.

"Tenzuka? You found something?"

Nothing.

"Dude!" He thrust a finger to the kid's sides, getting an immediate reaction.

"What?!"

"What's going on? You ok?"

Tenzuka pointed to the teams.

"Tenten got paired with Neji."

"So?"

"...So nothing. Was just surprised."

"Focus dude!"

In the end, they left empty-handed. There wasn't anything that led to their supposed-to-be sensei so they left the building.

Ando proposed to go to the mission brief room, a building next to the Hokage tower that dealt with handing out low ranked missions. They were usually used by chunin, but anyone could go.

The idea was to look for 'any mission done by team 2.'

Which was a problem. Apparently the 'number system' was just a thing academy teachers did for graduation. Once they actually became a team, they would go register their existence and get a real ID.

Tenzuka and Ando never passed, so they never found out the real ID.

As a solution, Tenzuka tried to ask for every team ID that had been made in the past week (figuring that it was just those that had graduated a week ago to chose from) but apparently even chunin who temporarily made a team were written down.

As an end result, they had at least 100 teams to go through. Ando and Tenzuka couldn't do it themselves, for obvious reasons (it would be quite the flaw if anybody could walk up and demand to know every single team that the leaf had, their official abilities and so on), so they'd have to pay the chunin to go through everything and that was after gaining permission from the Hokage.

So yeah, a no go.

Having no real leads, they decided to call it a day and wait for Wakita tomorrow. The rest of the afternoon was spent taking D ranks and thinking of ideas.

The next morning, the two raced towards the academy before lessons would start. Hopefully, Wakita was there extra early-

"Wakita-sensei!"

The woman looked up from her papers. "Oh hello Tenzuka, Ando, how are you two faring at the research department?"

They quickly explained why they were there.

"Oh. Well, I have no official piece of paper since the Hokage has them, but I remember the Jonin. His name is Goto Kimi, never worked with him and I don't know his ID though."

They thanked their old teacher. Now they had a name.

Asking at the chunin desk was a waste of time. They classified groups by ID, not by name.

They spent the rest of the morning proposing ideas, but the truth was simply: they had no leads.

Kabuto had organized the two to take turns to work with different individuals of his team for the week, so they were forced to split up. By evening they promised each other to share any ideas that came during the day if they came of course.

Tenzuka was sent to work with the chakra researcher.

He expected it to have something to do with jutsus and stuff, but it was actually an intense study of fuinjutsu: apparently, every individual's chakra was different, it depended on their DNA, their emotional state, foods, heck even their behaviour.

So the only objective way was to study it with a method that would consistently give out the same results.

Fuinjutsu.

The person in charge was a chunin called Hokama, she was incredibly passionate about her studies.

"Many have tried to understand the fundamental logic behind what makes fuinjutsu, and according to the Uzumaki's- an old clan that is basically extinct a few decades ago, fuinjutsu is the language of the gods. Chakra is attached to concepts and fuinjutsu is said to be the physical representation of those concepts."

"So seals are nothing more than writing in god language?"

"It seems so. Thanks to recent instruments we can create a fuinjutsu pattern with incredible precision, but small changes seem to not create different results. That's not how cells work for example; change even a small amount of DNA and all sorts of unexpected things happen."

Tenzuka wrote that down.

"It also explains summoning jutsu. Upon examining the sealing matrix that is created, all summoning jutsus are essentially the same. What changes is the summoning scroll you sign your name in. Why does writing your name on a scroll give you the ability to summon giant animals?"

"But what if you change your name?"

Hokama looked at him. "Have you ever seen a summoning scroll?"

"Nope."

"Ah, that explains it."

Apparently summoning scrolls didn't need you to write your name in blood like the adventure books suggested, they just needed your blood. You could even write 'hello' on the scroll and it would still bind you. The usual choice was to just write your own name, but it wasn't a requirement. The true requirement was blood.

"These are photos of summoning jutsus and their respective scrolls. We guess that all these together somehow combine the concept of 'use the chakra I give you to teleport this animal right here' but we don't know what symbol is changeable and what isn't. Trust me we have dons tons of experiments."

Tenzuka spent most of the afternoon memorizing seals with their supposed meaning.

"So what did you do?" Asked Tenzuka.

"Ugh, had to talk about boring facts about the animals native to Konoha. I mean I guess it would be useful for hunting, but it was super boring. What about you?"

"The basics for fuinjutsu."

"Ah what! No fair!"

"Trust me it's more boring than it looks. What have you got tomorrow? I've got 'chemicals', whatever that is."

"Human mind. Hope it's interesting."

Tenzuka turned for the millionth time that evening, sleep just wouldn't come.

He needed a new lead.

"Morning-"

Tenzuka had his eyes wide open.

"What time did you go to sleep?"

"No."

Ando blinked. "Did you stay up all night?"

"...maybe."

"Dude, that's not good for you or the investigation."

There was a sudden knock at the door. Ando opened it.

"Wakita-sensei?"

"Goodmorning you two. I went to the Hokage tower yesterday and announced the situation. Apparently, Tahara never became a genin."

What.

Tenzuka was instantly by the door.

"We've had these sort of situations in the past, so an Anbu squad was sent to Goto's house in the middle of the night. He wasn't home. We suspect he's either kidnapped her or killed her for whatever reason. Hokage-sama has a squad of Anbu looking for her. I came to ease your worries: the leafs finest are looking into it, you can sleep without worrying."

Ando let out a sigh of relief. "That's probably the best possible outcome. Truth be told I was worried that we were dealing with the situation instead of a jonin. Thank you for everything Wakita-sensei!"

The woman smiled. "When it comes to things like these, you two can always count on me."

She left.

Tenzuka had never felt so relieved.

They went to tell the news to their landlord.

"Why did this teacher of yours go so far? How does she have this much sway over the Hokage?"

"My guess?" Said Tenzuka. "The two knew each other before the Hokage coronation. Everyone knows that Wakita used to be in anbu because she has a faded mark on her shoulder that only ex-anbu have. Everyone knows Itachi-sama used to be in anbu so it's the most probable reason."

"I guess that's lucky then...hopefully they find her."

"Please keep us updated." Said Tenzuka.

The two returned home and had breakfast.

"We need to do more grocery shopping," said Ando looking at the fridge. "Also more missions. We're nearly broke and we have only four days to gather the money-"

The two looked at each other.

"Do we have four days left? Do we have the month off?"

Tenzuka shrugged. "Probably depends if they find her or not."

"We should do more missions just in case."

"Yeah. I was also thinking we should get a part-time job of sorts, to have back up money."

"Good call. Have anything specific in mind?"

"Depends on your chakra nature."

"Fire."

Tenzuka frowned. Well, there went plan A.

"I have no suggestions then."

The two got ready and separated for the morning. This time Tenzuka had 'chemicals' which made him think of a mad-scientist lab full of weird potions with dozens of different colours. It was actually a botany garden with lots of different vegetables and flowers.

The reason for this was because they had a terrible budget, so the best resources were free resources. Tenzuka immediately understood.

Kiyota was an old retired jonin that liked to help out in the garden.

She wasn't exactly part of the research division, Omori was the one who had to teach him the basics about chemistry, but she was the one the branch depended on.

"We use the chemicals for science experiments, especially with fuinjutsu. The fun part is figuring out what they are made of, we have specific runes for that."

"And I suppose they require a crap ton of studying?"

"Oh, you have no idea."

"Fun."

"We also managed to specialize the sealing array for containing heat! You should learn it before going on a trip, it's really useful for food."

"I will. Can you teach me?"

"Sure!"

While the plants were somewhat useful and all, Tenzuka couldn't help but let out a sigh of relief when it was finally over and it was lunchtime. Omori was pretty nice- he offered to pay for his lunch.

Never one to say no for free food, Tenzuka agreed.

They didn't have much to talk about, so Tenzuka told the man the recent developments.

"You have my full support." The fat man said.

"Huh?"

"It's things like these that the department could use to boost our reputation. We should find a universal method to locate the girl... hmm."

"How can we do that?"

The man shrugged. "The obvious path is fuinjutsu- no other ninja discipline could possibly help, but I don't know enough about it to solve the problem on my own. Everyone should collaborate."

"Do you have any idea in mind?"

"Well, I was thinking of a compass or something. Something sensible to only her chakra... although we can't calibrate it towards her. Hm."

Afternoon came and the emergency meeting was called.

The entire division consisted of 7 individuals. He had already met Kabuto, Hokama and Omori, but today was the first time he met Kuga, the psychologist specialist and Hana, the animal expert. He and Ando were also present of course.

Kabuto was standing at a whiteboard writing down everyone's ideas. So far the ideas 'compass,' 'reverse summoning jutsu', and 'scent device' had been written.

"Ok, five minutes are up," said Kabuto. "No more brainstorming new ideas. Now we focus on making whatever we thought of, reality."

He pointed to the first word: the compass.

"How could we make a compass point to a ninja?"

"Make it connect to her chakra?" Said Omori.

"Ok! How do we do that?"

Silence.

"The concept connection theory." Said Hokana after a bit. "We could make a marble that was especially attracted to the girl's nature and out it into a container."

"What do you predict the problems would be?"

She thought for a bit. "It would be impossible to make it sensible to her chakra without her present. Also to make it sensible over long distances would also be difficult. I'd say it's 10."

"Ok. If nothing else comes up we can try that. Second idea! Reverse summoning jutsu! Ideas?"

Hana rose her hand. "I've been researching summoning affinities for a while now, and while it is probably a myth, we could all try to finish my research, calculate her affinity, find someone with the same affinity and go to the animals' lands and make a bargain to summon her."

"Possible problems?"

"We have no idea if the animal affinity idea is a myth or not. Also, it could take ages to actually be able to accurately be able to calculate affinities. I'd give it a 10."

"Ouch. Ok, the last idea, then we take a 10-minute break then we'll have another 5 minute brainstorming period. Ok, so scent device!"

Ando had come up with this idea but he had no clue on how to make it a reality.

"I don't think it's a good idea," said Hana, "no offence Ando-san."

"None took."

"My clan, the Inuzuka, specialize in these sort of things. I doubt we could make a machine better than what my family has managed in a short period of time. Maybe that's my own biases talking, however."

"Nevermind!" Said Kabuto. "10-minute rest!"