The Third Hokage came up slowly behind the crying father, putting a hand down on one shoulder to give what comfort he could.
"I've managed to stabilize her," said Soichiro Tomoe, looking up at the Hokage. "It's..."
"If anyone rivalled Orochimaru's knowledge of genetics and its manipulation, it would be you," said the Hokage softly. "That he struck out at your baby daughter... I'm so sorry."
"It wasn't your fault, Hokage-sama," said Soichiro. "I'm sorry. I have to get busy. There's others I may be able to save despite what that monster did."
The Hokage sagged a little bit as the genetics expert went around trying to supervise the medical teams and make sense out of the devices that Orochimaru had built. There were so many children, and so many of them were already dead.
What could be done, would be done. He'd see to that.
Sarutobi Hiruzen looked around at the various dying children, ranging in age from twelve years to less than twelve months. If anyone could save them, besides Tsunade of course, it would be Soichiro Tomoe.
"Doctor Mizuno?" asked the Hokage days later.
The woman looked up, glanced at where Tomoe was collapsed across his desk, then gestured towards the door.
"I need a status report," said the Hokage once the two were out in the hallway.
"Most of them will live, including many of those that Orochimaru had written off," said Kumori Mizuno. "Including my own daughter."
The Hokage looked at least slightly relieved at that. "How many?"
"Almost forty children recovered will live," said Doctor Mizuno. "It was only after their lifesigns stabilized that Tomoe-kun collapsed. Otherwise, he's been going since the labs were discovered."
"Yes, I was there," said the Hokage gently. The medic-nin he was speaking to didn't look as if she'd gotten much rest herself.
"Right," said Doctor Mizuno, running one hand along her hair. "Other than that, we'll have to wait and see. They're stable but beyond that - only time will tell."
Luna shook herself and stretched. Artemis simply found a patch of shade to rest in and drowse the afternoon away.
"I can't believe that girl," muttered Luna. "Making deals with Elder Multidimensional Spawns From Beyond."
Artemis lazily opened one eye. "Bartering is not generally a skill practiced by princesses. That's one of the reasons they have advisors."
"Well excuse me," said Luna. "Considering the shape we were in - we weren't exactly going to be a lot of help."
Artemis went back to a pleasant drowse. "So? My point. We're alive. Naru and a few others are alive. Usagi could have done a lot worse."
"They're cloned," complained Luna. "There's over a dozen copies of the Senshi now showing up in universes which shouldn't have them!"
"So?" asked Artemis, shifting from sleepy white cat to sleepy white panther, then stretching out further to get comfortable.
"It isn't supposed to be like that!" protested Luna.
"Okay," said Artemis as he shifted to a British-looking bishonen in vaguely aristocratic clothing. "I'm a little prejudiced, I admit, but I don't see anything wrong with that. Those clones are like the originals as modified by the timeline they've been inserted in."
"But who knows what horrors they'll be put through," protested Luna.
"Worse than what we came from?"
Luna hesitated. She wouldn't admit it aloud, but it WOULD be hard to top that in terms of pure horrific awfulness.
Artemis took the silence as requiring clarification. "So we've got a few Senshi put into universes they normally wouldn't exist in. Their personalities will remain intact and they'll be together. In the meantime, Usagi hasn't done that bad. Cut her some slack, would you?"
"I... how did you do that?!" asked Luna, gawking at the bishonen white-haired Artemis.
"Hmmm? Oh I made a deal with the Elder myself," said Artemis. "Argued that I'd be of more use to Minako and the others if I could shapeshift and had some neat ninja abilities. So I'm a werecat. I can assume the forms of cat, panther, hybrid catboy, and human. I'm also a dab hand with Earth techniques."
"Wha- WHAT?!" screeched Luna. "Artemis?! I expect things like this from Minako or Usagi, but you-"
Artemis sighed and slapped the ground. "Earth Release: Stone Bunker!"
Luna blinked as a stone dome formed around Artemis, catching a glimpse of chairs and tables forming out of the ground before the rising walls cut off her view.
Inside, Artemis stretched out on the raised stone bench and looked at the ceiling. Obviously, he'd have to get a bedroll or something but it was cool and quiet inside his bunker. Yes, he could see uses for this.
Usagi Uzumaki knew there was something she should remember. Something important.
However, at the tender age of one year - she was taken along on a training journey by a then-drunk Tsunade and Tsunade's apprentice Shizune.
Tsunade sobered up, realized what had happened, and hunted down Jiraiya to stick HIM with the child.
What happened then was that two Sannin who really had some issues between them kept trading off the little girl who quickly realized that this was a game (or had developed into one) between these two adults.
There WERE breaks in that game, however. Like the time Tsunade had bet a little girl as a stake in a game of chance. By the time Tsunade woke up from that particular all-nighter, Usagi had been sold three times and ended up with a missing-nin.
Tsunade had been tormented by visions of what horrors could be done to the then-eight-year-old and had went off in pursuit.
The missing-nin turned out to have been enthralled by the bright little girl who was all thumbs and enthusiasm. Like someone who had spent too long in the darkness suddenly finding a single gleam of sunlight. He'd been very reluctant to turn Usagi back over to Tsunade when Tsunade caught up. Tsunade was very persuasive and capable. Also somewhat apologetic when it turned out that not only had nothing sinister happened, but that Usagi had managed to thoroughly wrap the big bad missing-nin around her finger.
Tsunade made Usagi promise NEVER to tell Jiraiya about the incident. After all, if JIRAIYA turned out to be the more responsible of the two - she'd never live it down.
Age eight:
Shinomaru Hino looked to be a friendly old man, a grandfather who was mostly harmless. He was. The emphasis was on 'mostly' because even the hardened ANBU members and Uchiha clan gave him a wide berth.
His information network was wide due to the ravens, who were consummate gossips by nature. His spiritual powers and command of fire jutsu were nothing to sneeze at either.
"Grandpa?" asked the little miko girl. "Why do they hate that boy?"
Stopping in the sweeping of steps, Shinomaru looked over at where his granddaughter was pointing. "Ah. That is Naruto Uzumaki."
"But why do they hate him?" asked Rei. "I mean - he's a boy. Boys are icky. But they hate him, and he seems so... sad."
"They hate him because they're idiots," said Shinomaru. "Something bad happened when he was born, and they associate him with that. The boy then pranks and paints graffiti on the places that especially show that hate."
"He's never done anything here," said Rei, glancing up at her grandfather.
"I'm not an idiot," said the priest. "There are a few, like myself, who just see him as a child. So he doesn't prank us. Instead he'll prank one of his tormentors and then hide over near the sacred well or in one of the prayer strip trees."
"Oh," said Rei.
"He knows I tolerate him, and I've left tea and cookies out when I know he's around," said the grandfather. "Since we rely on donations, much of it from idiots, I don't really help him openly. But it's a ninja village so doing things in a secretive fashion is pretty normal."
"I see," said Rei.
"Now get back to sweeping," chided her grandfather. "We'll work on chakra control exercises later."
"Okay."
"When you both make ninja though," said her grandfather thoughtfully. "I would appreciate you being that boy's friend. Destiny swirls around that one, and he'll need his friends then."
"Destiny?" asked Rei, thinking the boy looked dumb. On the other hand, her grandpa had THAT look in his eyes and odd timbre to his voice - which meant that what he'd just said was something that had a lot of meaning. So she'd try to remember that.
Minako grunted as she merged with her eight-year-old self.
She'd flipped through several of the origins before finding one that just seemed so right.
Minako grinned. She was eight years old, but she knew how she was going to do things. There might have been a thousand years of torture between her 'now' and when she'd read the Naruto series - but there were SOME things she remembered. Though that might have largely been due to that thousand year session being largely wiped from her memory.
A tactical advantage like that was not something to dismiss.
The two girls jerked in place, their images blurring for less than a second.
"Well, this is another fine mess you've landed us in," said Michiru, who might love Haruka but it WAS quite possible to be occasionally exasperated with one's love.
Haruka rubbed her temples. "Ugh. Well, at least it worked."
"Worked?" asked Michiru. "We're currently nine years old, kunoichi of the Leaf Village, and literally card-carrying members of the Sasuke Uchiha Fan Club."
Haruka stared at the little laminated business card Michiru was holding up before shaking her head. "Look, the cat-whatever was way too powerful for us to fight."
"So you DID notice that," said Michiru, putting the card away and beginning to empty pockets and otherwise check her inventory.
"I thought there was a possibility that those were false memories and that all that was just a genjutsu," said Haruka, who then frowned. "I meant to say 'illusion.' If not though, that Thing managed to: pull us out of there, resurrect those of us we knew had not only died but whose bodies were converted, restore our bodies to normal, repair our minds, and then dull our memories after a thousand years of torture to the point where we weren't all catatonic."
"So... attacking something that could do all that was part of your plan?" asked Michiru.
"Yes, we could then see exactly what that Thing's plans were before the rest of the Senshi got involved and then try to fight it from that side," said Haruka, frowning a little.
"Well, that much worked," said Michiru, some sarcasm in her tone. "We're in. So what's the next part of your plan?"
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(Posted Wed, 22 Sep 2010 02:37)
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