Hello people!

So I know, I'm so late it's not even funny, but here's the thing: life is busy, my dears, which you already knew; but what you did not know is that not only am I a terrible prorastinator, I am also an extremely unmotivated person. You would have thought that with the confinement, I would have had time to write - and I did, at that, but I did not have the will. And I am very bad at forcing myself to do things I don't feel like doing.

So the only thing I can and do promise, is that I WILL finish this story. The big lines are already drawn, I know where I'm going, I even know what's going to happen in the next chapter (well, inspiration can change it, but you know, even if it doesn't take hold of me it already did once when I imagined the story, so it doesn't matter). I just have to write it. It may take me years, so don't check your notifications everyday, God, really don't do that, but I will complete this story.

For those wondering, since many people asked me in reviews, this story is the Prequel to Team Seven's Strangest Day - so no, Team Seven is not aware of Hari, for it has not even been formed yet.

Sorry for being a bad author, Truth be told I am a much better reader! So many amazing writers on FF or on AO3, and I have so many fandoms, where am I supposed to find time to do everything?

Anyway, stay safe in these Coronavirus-times, and I hope you enjoy this new chapter!

Sarutobi Hiruzen, Hokage of Konoha, puffed happily on his pipe. It was early, not even 5 a.m. yet, but he was long used to being up very early, or even to not sleep for days. Comparatively, being Hokage was much less tiring than being a ninja in the field – though at least ninja got downtime in-between missions, and could take a leave sometimes. It prevented mental breakdowns.

Not to say that being Hokage is a calm and restful job, of course not, he thought, glaring at the piles of papers waiting on his desk. Damn paperwork.

Everywhere on this damn world – and how strange was that, that he now felt obligated to precise which world he was talking about? – people knew the agony of paperwork.

It was the only thing every Kage could relate with the each other about… The one thing they all agreed on: paperwork was evil and the strongest enemy they had ever faced, without being able to defeat it.

But Kakashi had just departed from giving his report and was currently going back to his charge, and he himself still had a few, precious minutes, before having to attack the stacks of papers perilously stacked on his desk; so he very much intended to finish his pipe in peace. Now was his moment, his pause, thank you very much.

A few minutes later, he put his pipe in a drawer with sadness, sighed loudly, before looking with dread at the papers innocently waiting on the desk. Innocent, his ass – and wait just a minute! He was almost certain there had been less of them when he had entered the room this morning! What – When had that happened?!

No matter. It certainly wasn't the first time paperwork seemed to spawn on its own. There was even more of it than usual this week, because of that 'Zoo' the Hime had begun creating. He had yet to visit it – having experienced the Greenhouses, he wasn't keen on repeating the traum… the experience anytime soon – but considering the sounds reported by Kakashi (who had yet to visit too, preferring to wait outside the grounds – and normally that would be a dereliction of duty to leave his charge's side for hours, but Sarutobi honestly didn't feel like forcing him to go in and anyway, the Hime was basically followed around for formality's sake by that point), he had a feeling that the magical fauna was as dangerous and crazy as the magical flora.

Even if they mercifully didn't seem as inclined towards eating humans – no request for an augmentation of the number of corpses to use as food had been made, which was a good thing considering that the plants ate an alarming amount of that all on their own – it didn't mean that they didn't actually like killing humans, and as such the Hokage was perfectly fine staying in a state of 'knowing without knowing'.

Though, the additional paperwork was a pain.

Glaring daggers at said paperwork, he resignedly raised a hand to take a portion of the most urgent pile; before freezing mid-act. Was that... Yes, yes it was!

Smiling smugly, he sat back in his seat, crossing his fingers together, and assumed a waiting pause. Paperwork would have to wait; his student was back today. And not just his student, but Konoha's spy master – he couldn't ignore the man or delay a meeting, now could he? Jiraiya could have very important information to relay, especially when taking into account the fact that he hadn't forewarned Hiruzen of his imminent visit to Konoha.

Clearly, something was bothering Jiraiya, and as Hokage, it was his duty to make sure that everything was okay with him. As much as that pained him (and it pained him very much, please rest assured of that), paperwork would simply have to wait. The whole day maybe, if Jiraiya's news were of utmost importance!

Dreaming about and hoping for a paperwork-free day, Hiruzen didn't so much as twitch when Jiraiya made a grand entrance in his workroom. The ANBUs didn't move either, Jiraiya having sent the correct code with chakra bursts, code which granted him access. The code changed every day, but that was only because ninjas were paranoid, for it would prove extremely hard to spy someone sending the code – the ANBUs guarding the Hokage Tower weren't there to decorate, after all.

Still, 'extremely hard' meant 'not impossible', which in turn meant that the code changed every day.

"Jiraiya", he greeted warmly, a smile overtaking his aged face.

It was good to see his student. With Orochimaru being who he was, Tsunade avoiding Konoha as much as she could (which was a lot), and Jiraiya being a spy master, which meant that he was always out of Konoha to check on his sources... He rarely saw them – only Jiraiya, and then only a few times a year.

It was always good to have him back, even for just a bit of time.

"Sensei", the white-haired man smiled widely.

He looked well, but Sarutobi knew him best, and he easily saw through the mask. There was the shadows under his eyes, small as they were; and the uneasiness in his stance. Clearly, something was off with him – and Hiruzen had an idea as to what it was. It was a guess, but one he very much doubted was wrong. In fact, he had planned for things to come to that point, though it was a bit earlier than expected.

"How are you?", he asked, and Jiraiya smiled sheepishly.

"That obvious?", he sighed, falling onto a seat in front of the large, massive desk. He extended his long legs in front of him, the perfect picture of exhausted laziness.

But Hiruzen knew better than to think he really was as relaxed as he looked. There was an undercurrent of tension in his body language, that showed his readiness to react in less than a heartbeat should anything were to happen.

"What is it?", he pushed gently, taking his pipe out again with satisfaction.

Jiraiya, being the Seal master that he was, efficiently put a Silent Seal around them. Both knew how to speak without moving their lips, as to avoid a possible spying lips-reading master, but Hiruzen very much doubted such precautions were necessary. Still, he said nothing, and only waited for his student to confess what was worrying him.

"So, I'm sorry I didn't tell you I was coming, but I didn't find the time", he apologized vaguely. It wasn't the first time he had showed up unannounced, but that was no problem.

As a spymaster, he could and did come and go as he wanted - the only limits he had were that he had to come when requested. Preferably quickly. And to answer questions, and give reports. Being a spymaster was quite a hard job, but easier in some respects. It wasn't for everyone, but it did leave Jiraiya with a lot of free time to do whatever the hell he wanted.

When there were crises or pressing matters, however, it meant that he had to rush back to Konoha, which was easier said than done considering he was often far away from the village.

Hiruzen waved the half-assed apology away, as he did every time it was uttered.

"Is there a particular problem?"

"Well, I am still investigating that matter about Orochimaru", he said, with only the slightest wince at his old teammate's name. "Since we know for sure he has lost the Snake Contract, I thought I would finally find a lead to his position, but nothing. He's still as good at hiding as ever."

And the scowl on his face showed how much he hated this.

"I know he's not dead, because I've heard some rumors about people disappearing in Tea Country... But when I went there, it was too late already." He took a scroll out of one of his numerous pockets, and placed it on the desk in-between them. "That's all I found, but it's not much."

He sat back in his seat, his scowl deepening.

"I can't say a lot more about that. I still don't know how he managed to lose the Contract – Manda seemed to like the sacrifices, if nothing else – but he's not finished. He will probably try to find a way to make a comeback, especially now that every ninja and their dogs know that he has lost his Contract with the Snakes, but that's all I know. I've left some informants in a few villages, and they will let me know if they hear something... But I have as much hope as ever: not much."

He took a small flask out of another pocket, and sipped a bit, sighing in pleasure.

"Well, Tsuna-Hime clearly is onto something with her love for sake", he nodded seriously, smacking his lips. "Rice Country sure knows how to make it."

The Hokage only raised a silent eyebrow, before smiling when his student sighed and took a small scroll out of the same pocket, sending it in front of Sarutobi with a practiced flick of the wrist.

"You know I will never forget about you, Sensei", he smiled, before his smile widened in a smirk. "Speaking of pleasurable things."

He wiggled his eyebrows suggestively, and took a small, yellowish book out of yet another pocket. Sarutobi's eyes widened, recognizing the book for what it was. He stopped his gathering of chakra that he had intended to use to open the sake-scroll, and extended his hands quickly.

"The latest Icha Icha, not in the stores yet, for my biggest fan!", smugly announced Jiraiya, before a leer took over his face. "I've been in these hot springs in Rice Country, and let me tell you Sensei, there were some beauties here. Very inspiring. Very."

"I'm sure", nodded the Hokage with a perfectly serious face, fingers twitching with the need to take the little book.

It looked like paperwork would definitely have to wait today. Jiraiya had brought some very important information, and it was his duty to explore all of this... In details. Really. Who knew what could be hidden in code in those inconspicuous little books?

Finally getting his hands on the book, he cleared his throat and put it preciously in his Seal-protected drawer. Not that something wasn't not protected in his office, but this particular drawer had a high level of protection indeed. It was known as 'The Precious Drawer', and its content were... top secret. They were. You simply aren't accredited to know about them.

"So", he then idly asked, staring straight at Jiraiya with steely eyes, leaning over his desk. "Why are you really here?"

Jiraiya give a sheepish smile, shrugging at having been discovered. He hadn't really expected something else anyway.

"Well, I heard rumors about a new Hime in Konoha, of course. I'm a bit wounded that you didn't think to tell me yourself, Sensei, but then I remembered that you wanted me to come back for a meeting... That's why you told me nothing about her, right? You wanted me to come and ask myself. It was to make sure I wouldn't skip the meeting as I am sometimes… forced to do."

It wasn't really a question – both men knew that it was the truth. Jiraiya was simply annoyed – he had been avoiding Konoha as best as he could when it had been decided by the Council that he wouldn't take care of little Naruto. It pained him to be away, to miss his godson's childhood; but it was less painful than just watch the little blond walk past him and not recognize his own godfather.

Sometimes, Jiraiya really hated the Council – okay, not sometimes. Ever since he had attained the title of Sannin, they had been a pain in his ass... But he had really hated them ever since Minato's death.

They had ignored Minato's last wishes and spat on the man's memory; all because their hatred and fear blinded them. Naruto was a wonderful little boy, and he deserved better than what Konoha gave him. He didn't deserve the scorn, the reject, the insults, and the occasional beating.

Oh, how he wished to kill those who dared hurt his godson! He was a ninja, had become one to protect Konoha – and yet it was Konoha itself that had forbidden him to protect one of the last members of his self-made family.

Yes, sometimes, he really hated Konoha, especially when he received a report from one of his agents stationed in the Village, about the civilian's treatment of Naruto. He had few agents, but they did try to protect the blond as best as they could, he knew. They were loyal to him, he had made damn sure of that. But it wasn't enough – it could never be enough. He should have raised the little ball of sun. He had failed, again...

But he kept going with the idea that one day, as soon as Naruto was made Chuunin (and he would attain that rank, his lineage alone would make sure of that, he had a lot of talent), he would be able to reveal everything to him, and hopefully train him. That was the only reason he hadn't already kidnapped the lonely little blond, who had spent the few first years of his life crying himself to sleep every night.

Sarutobi knew this, of course. It was one of their strong disagreements. Jiraiya was persuaded that, as the Hokage, he could – and should – have done something. He should have. But Sarutobi was tired, and the Council had gained a lot of power those last years. He guessed he couldn't really fault his old Sensei, but he did nonetheless.

So yes, he didn't really want to come back to Konoha, knowing that his godson was here and that he wasn't even authorized to talk to him. Sue him. Avoiding Konoha was the only reasonable thing he could do to show his opposition to the Council's decision, and serves them right when they were forced to postpone a meeting with him because he was suddenly extremely busy checking some information in another Country.

He had forced them to reschedule six times in a row already this time, and very much expected to keep it going for a few times more. He would have to leave Konoha soon in order to escape for a seventh time... probably fake a new report that required his immediate presence far, far away. None of the Council members were unaware of what he was really doing, or why he was going out of his way to spite them so, but there was nothing they could do about it. Passive-aggressive revenge was a bitch.

He made a note to smile very nicely at any Council member he would see when in Konoha, to let them know how much he despised them. But he had had to come back to Konoha today, as much as he disliked it, because of the Hime.

A mystery, that one.

Of course, as soon as he had learned that some Potta-Hime had settled in Konoha (by second-hand information, even as it was his own Village! What a shame for a Spymaster! He would totally get the Hokage back for that one), he had endeavored to investigate her past. Make sure she wasn't a spy, a mole, an assassin, or Kami knows what.

It was one of his duties as Konoha's Spymaster, after all. He needed to know all about her in order to make sure that she wouldn't be a threat to Konoha. And usually, that would have been it.

Search into the target's past, check that nothing tied her to another Village or Organization, ascertain her intentions towards Konoha, and that was that. If she revealed herself as a threat, he would have gone to the Hokage, and they would have taken care of her. If not, then he would have let Sarutobi know she was clear, and would have kept an eye on her nonetheless.

But nothing about her had been usual.

Now, Jiraiya wasn't flattering himself when he said that he was a damn good Spymaster. He was one of the best, honestly. So when he was searching for someone's past, he would at least find something, no matter how hard they tried to conceal it. That's how he was able to know about his old teammate, Tsunade, even if she tried to disappear. And that's how he had followed Orochimaru all those years, even if he had admittedly never managed to catch him. There had been a few close times, Orochimaru having to leave in a hurry and abandon some of his research behind in order to escape.

More often, he arrived a few days too late, sometimes a mere few hours, to find the hidden lair deserted. Sometimes he could salvage some documents, or some experimentations, and send them to Konoha to be studied. Sometimes, there was nothing. But fact was, he always knew where Orochimaru was, roughly. What he was doing. He was too late, but he could find information about him.

But on the Hime?

Nothing.

Nothing wasn't even enough – before her arrival to Konoha, it was as if she had simply never existed. He could find her nowhere, no family, no native village, no one who knew of her or even of her name. He didn't even know her name. He knew she was Potta-Hime, and that she was really, sickeningly wealthy... and that was it.

And that simply wouldn't do.

He didn't even know how she had come to Konoha! He had agents that watched the roads for him, and he roughly knew who went in and out of Konoha, but none of them had spotted the Hime on her way in. And she was a fucking civilian!

Now, people would say that he was a bit paranoid, but to find nothing on someone? That simply wasn't possible. There was something fishy with the Hime, and if he had to come back to Konoha in order to find out what it was, he damn well would. So here he was.

(At least, he had been able to leave a Christmas present for the impossibly bubbly little blonde, though a bit early, and even if he had to leave it anonymously, he had been able to see the true, happy smile that had lightened Naruto's face. Small mercies.)

His old sensei knew why he was there, of course. There was this damn amused spark in his eyes – he was totally having fun at his expense. Well. He wouldn't get the next Icha Icha early, Jiraiya decided firmly. This one had been a sort of pot-de-vin, to sweeten Sarutobi. Jiraiya wanted information, after all. Even if he was bitter about being in Konoha.

But well. He would have his information, in any case. He was the Spymaster, and Hiruzen wouldn't keep them from him just to spite him. They were shinobis, and professionals before anything else.

"The Hime, yes. Potta-Hime. A marvelous young woman", nodded the Hokage, mock-serious.

He was clearly teasing. He hadn't even bothered to answer to Jiraiya's accusation – they both knew that it was the truth.

"Sensei, I know nothing about her – literally nothing! Not even her name... There's something fishy here, and it could be dangerous. It's like she appeared out of thin air, and... –"

Jiraiya interrupted himself at the amused snort that escaped his Sensei. He hadn't said something particularly funny, not that he knew of at least... Then what was so amusing? They were ninjas, and an unknown person wasn't to their liking. They needed to know the most they could about unknown factors, and yet here the Hokage was, laughing as if the whole situation wasn't a disaster in the making!

"Is there something particularly funny, Sensei?", he asked, a tad annoyed.

But he wasn't worried. Sure, the whole situation was a headache-inducing pain-in-his-ass, as far as he was concerned... And it was hurting his ego as a Spymaster quite a bit… But his Hokage hadn't deemed it serious enough to alert him about the Hime's presence or send him an explanation about her or her situation, so it must mean that she wasn't a threat. It was possible, of course, that she was manipulating Sarutobi, and had asked him to keep her existence a secret from their Spymaster...

At least, it would have been possible, if her entire existence had been kept a secret. As it was, it had been revealed precisely twenty-six days ago, so clearly, she wasn't intending to stay hidden in the shadows and act as a spy. Which also meant that she wasn't controlling the Hokage – because how could she? He had personally checked Sarutobi as soon as he had entered the room, and there was no foreign chakra in his body. What's more, his agents' reports didn't mention a change in his behavior.

And finally, Hiruzen was acting as he did every time they saw each other – he had even skillfully answered to their hidden code, to let him know that everything was perfectly under control. It was a few hand movements, but it was known only to them: the person in front of him was Sarutobi Hiruzen, own master of his body and of mind.

Thanks Kami.

It still left the question of the mystery that was the Hime.

"Funny? No, no, excuse me. It was just the idea that she could have appeared out of thin air. Quite the serious hypothesis, is it?"

And maybe Jiraiya was looking too hard into things, but he could have sworn that there was more to this sentence than he could presently read. Of course it wasn't a serious hypothesis – it was an expression to show his frustration at his inability to find anything on the Hime! He wasn't expecting her to have literally appeared out of thin air, he wasn't stupid.

Yet there was something in his Hokage's tone of voice... In the glint of his eyes... Well. He was being teased, that much he was sure of... But he had the distinct, annoying feeling that he was missing something.

"If you say so...", he nodded cautiously, studying the Hokage with suspicion.

"In fact, you're here at quite the right moment", suddenly beamed Sarutobi, standing and walking around his desk to go stand next to him – and since when was Sensei so happy, he wondered grouchily. "I was due a visit to the Hime, what do you say to accompany me?"

Obviously Jiraiya wasn't about to decline the offer – he dearly wanted to meet the only person he hadn't been able to find the traces of in the whole world.

"Lead the way, Sensei!", he announced loudly, excited despite himself.

"Let's go – we need to catch up to Kakashi before he leaves the ANBU's building", smiled the Hokage, remembering that the Elite Jōnin had mentioned going to the ANBU headquarters to speak with some of his old team and get some information, having to stay with the Hime at all times making it extremely hard for him to keep updated with the latest news. The Hokage then went back to his desk and took the scrolls containing the Sake he had been offered. "I have a feeling you will need a bit of alcohol when you're done", he simply said, upon seeing Jiraiya's questioning glance.

Okay.

There was definitely something fishy.

Hari raised her head distractedly, eyes staying fixed on the heavy book resting on her lap. Yes, someone had just entered her wards... She immediately could feel Kakashi – having lived with him every day for almost five weeks, she had become quite attuned to his soul – and one of the two other persons was the Hokage.

Kakashi had left home this morning (so early, in fact, that it could still count as night, but she wouldn't be difficult and would settle for 'dawn') for a meeting with the Hokage, a report on her activities, as usual, and he had mentioned going to do some sparring with 'old friends' of his - the lucky bastard. Not that Hari was jealous, no... But damn, she was becoming restless. Of course, training and sparring with Kakashi helped exercise, like, a lot; but she was helping exactly no one by resting home, training, and learning magic.

She was being useless and she hated that.

But anyway, she was a bit surprised that the Hokage took the time to come here, for the three men didn't seem in any hurry, and for the Hokage to leave his office in the middle of the day was rare if there was no planned meeting or some kind of urgency. Still, even if it as just a simple visit, she wasn't unhappy at this change of her usual routine. She quite liked the old man, after all, and he probably needed a break from time to time. Plus, being able to interact with only Kakashi was becoming quite old – she may have always hated to be surrounded by pseudo-admirers, and she also abhorred to put on an act for others – yet here she was, allowed to be herself only in her house, or when in the exclusive company of either the Hokage or Kakashi. It got old really fast.

So yes, she wanted to see a few more people, sue her.

She hated to socialize, and hated when there were too many people around her – but she wasn't asocial, no matter what her former friends had believed once. She needed people (friends) around her, needed to talk, to exchange, to belong.

When she had still been immortal – of body as well as of soul, that is – that need to interact had been dulled. She had been quite content to only speak with snakes, and have the odd conversation with Death. Though even then, she had often visited magical cities, having some conversations with wizards that didn't know her, or of her. The latter was rarer, but she only had to introduce herself under a false name, and it was good enough for everyone involved. Her public pictures had always been few, and by then awfully outdated. It worked.

Being alone reminded her of her childhood at the Dursleys'. Where she was not to talk, not to make a sound, not to be seen... Not to breathe too loudly... In fact, if she could simply disappear...

She had been alone in her cupboard, and sometimes, she had even wondered if she existed at all. She had seen some movies (had sneaked at night, watching from the shadows, when Dudley was watching some horror movie or the other – better than when he started watching that kind of awful, badly-played pornographic movies) where ghosts haunted the house they had died in – sometimes without even knowing they had died. What if that was her case?

But no – the Dursleys could touch her, to her great pain; and she had to cook and clean and tidy the house on her own. She had to be alive. But sometimes, the doubt was overwhelming. She was here, but she wasn't allowed to be here, so was she really here? It had been hard, for a child, to see her existence so completely denied.

And ever since, she wanted – needed – to talk, be talked to, and be seen. Paradoxically, she also hated to be looked at, to be remarked: she wanted anonymity, thanks to her years at Hogwarts' and to her childhood at the Dursleys' where getting attention meant getting into trouble.

So she had started to talk only with the people she knew, and even if it was quite hard for her to make new friends, she had managed. Kakashi was a pearl, really, and the Hokage was quite kind too. To have both for breakfast would be awesome, if they so wished, since they were two of the very few who knew who she really was.

As for the rest of those in the known, they didn't really interact with her. They were quite busy, or so she had been told – but she suspected that they simply were trying to cope with what they had learned. It had been second-hand information for some of them (The Jōnin Commander had never even been introduced to her), so it had to be hard for them to believe what their Hokage had told them.

For one of them especially, she knew. From what Kakashi had told her, the Nara were geniuses, and logical to the extreme. To learn that their world was but a drop in an ocean... That had to be particularly difficult for them to digest. They would come around, she hoped...

But for now, she had an unknown person in her garden. Which could mean three things: one, this was a new person who wasn't in the known and wasn't to know; and she wouldn't be able to use magic in her own home. She would have to hide.

Two, this was a new person who wasn't in the known, but was here to learn about her and her capacities; and she would be able to use magic in her own home. She would have another person to introduce to the wonder of Magic (yes, that was sarcasm – though she personally loved Magic. It was just… there was no word to describe it, really. But it was really, really cool.)

Three, one of the persons who knew about her had finally decided that they wanted a demonstration, an actual proof. And she would be able to use magic in her own home, a hopefully see them shocked as hell (she quite liked that look on ninjas – they were so used to always hiding their emotions that when they were startled, they were also startled to be startled. That look was somehow hilariously comical.)

She quite hoped it wouldn't be option 1, and didn't really care if it was any of the two other options. As long as she didn't have to hide her magic. She had never, ever liked having to outright lie about who she was. Playing along a bit was fine, but having to pretend to be someone she wasn't – well, once burned, twice shy.

The door opened, and she finally stopped reading the (fascinating) effects of the Abduco and Abscido and how they completely repelled each other and refused to work together despite having similar roots and being used to rather similar purposes, to the point that you simply couldn't cast one after having just cast the other; to see who the mysterious person was.

And... well. The man – that was clearly a man, despite the long, spiky white hair – was tall. He was huge. What was it with ninjas, that they were all much taller than herself? She barely reached Kakashi's chin – when she was straining upwards on her tiptoes. She had never been the tallest, due to years of malnutrition, but healing potions had taken care of most of the nutritional deficiencies her body had been suffering from, and she had been of relatively reasonable height amongst her fellow humans.

But that was before coming to a world were the shinobi population kept their bodies in as perfect a condition as possible, and generations of excellent health led to extremely well-developed bodies. Small shinobi did exist, but they were not the norm, despite the advantages such a slim appearance undoubtedly gave them.

As for this new man, his Hitai-ate was strange – it wasn't a Konoha one, not that she knew of. Instead, it harbored the kanji for 'Oil'. She had never heard of an 'Oil' Village – did that mean that she would have to hide that she was a literal witch? And what was he doing here, for that matter? She was supposed to be a recluse, away from politics and everything else. He also had two red lines under his eyes, which struck her as really weird, but she had learned that some Clans had facial markings (and did not, as she had first believed, draw the markings with makeup every day.) So maybe the man was part of a Clan.

She took a discreet sniff, channeling a bit of Animagus Magics, and the man mainly smelled of ink, weapon oil, frogs of all things – he reeked of them. And smoke and alcohol, though she supposed it was because he had spent some time with the Hokage, who couldn't help smoking as soon as he could.

And he was rude. Really.

Hari was currently in her at-home clothes: a big, black t-shirt she had stolen from Sirius' bedroom, after his death, so that she would always have his scent with her, if nothing else (a preservation spell had done wonders to preserve the scent, and she loved to have it when she was relaxing, at home. It was... comforting.

Bittersweet, but warm.)

Under that, she only wore shorts – not even visible under the shirt. She was, in fact, clothed comfily and comfortably, as one is prone to be in their own home, when they are not awaiting any guest. Seeing her, one would think she only had a top... and the unknown man certainly seemed to think so.

His eyes were quite evidently running up and down her legs, and she felt the sudden need to curl them under her body, and magic a cover on top of that. It wasn't the first time a man was ogling her, but she had never loved the leers and the suggestive, interested looks.

Kakashi didn't seem to like it particularly either – he was such a good friend! – for he glared at the man, grey eye narrowed in displeasure. To his credit, that didn't seem to particularly bother the white-haired shinobi, though it did amuse him.

Without speaking, Kakashi gracefully glided towards the sofa, before laying down lazily on it. The Jōnin was so tall that his legs were hanging over the armrest. He nonchalantly laid his head on Hari's lap, conveniently covering her thighs, as naturally and casually as if they did this every day. Hari leaned down, enough to put the heavy book she had been reading on the coffee table, before sitting back more comfortably now that she didn't feel so exposed, one hand distractedly beginning to play with Kakashi's silver strands of hair. He was an awesome friend.

The unknown man smirked, seeming very interested, and even the Hokage seemed to chuckle for a moment. Hari and Kakashi ignored them both superbly.

"Hiruzen", Hari nodded as regally as she could in her current position, looking curiously at the old Hokage and acting as if the stranger wasn't there. "To what do I owe the pleasure?"

"Ah, Hime, I thought I would introduce you to my student Jiraiya", the man said, looking around the house with interest, knowing of it thanks to Kakashi's descriptions but never having been there in person. He walked to what he recognized as Kakashi's sofa due to having read between the lines of Kakashi's reports and descriptions, sitting down on it and delighting upon finding it as unbelievably comfortable as his Jōnin had reported. "Have you heard of him?"

The newly identified man looked startled (Hari made sure to memorize the look, with magic she could make it into an actual, physical picture; and with imagination she could change that picture to whatever the hell she wanted – if the man overstepped any boundary, it would be a perfect way to get back at him without making her magic known to the rest of the Village, all the while giving an humiliating experience to him by distributing one such fabricated picture to the Village as a whole. Ninja were proud of their skills and their reputation, and she had quite the fertile imagination), looking alternatively between Hari and the Hokage sharply.

He slowly walked towards the sofa to sit next to his sensei, starting when his body sunk into the material in perfect comfort. Unsure of what was going on, he did what any ninja would do in his situation: he fished for information.

"Damn sensei, if I had known you would bring me to meet one of your friends, I would have dressed up", he smiled, "especially for such a beautiful lady."

"Ah, Jiraiya, this is Hari Potta, new Hime of Konoha", the old man smiled at his student, intent on not helping him find information too quickly. "Hime, this is Konoha's Spymaster, the Sannin Jiraiya."

It may seem as if he had just revealed sensitive information, but every ninja worth their kunai knew that already. Jiraiya, for all that most of his work, and thus his life, happened in the shadows and the anonymity of numerous disguises and false names (more so than any other ninja, that is); was as well-known as any other particularly powerful ninja. That is to say, his major accomplishments and his occupation were known, as well as some parts of his hobbies, though not much more.

He was talked about, and even if most of it was created by people's imagination: the barest, truest facts remained. So really, giving this away was not dangerous at all.

"I see", the black-haired woman nodded, with the air of one who didn't actually see. "Nice to meet you."

Kakashi snorted, not bothering to open his eye.

"What?", Hari asked him.

"You're wondering how such a big man can be a spymaster", the Hatake smirked, opening his eye to look up at the woman. "What a Sannin is, and why his Hitai-ate is different even though he's from Konoha."

Hari blushed faintly.

"He has quite the strong presence, so I don't see him being discreet", she explained, glancing quickly at the carefully poker-faced, white haired man. "I kinda know that a Sannin is a title, 'cause Orochimaru had it too, but I never really got to know what it meant. And the itai-ate is weird. It's normal for me not to know", she huffed with dignity, before narrowing her eyes down at him. "How did you know?"

"How did I know that you didn't know?", Kakashi smirked, amusement coating his words.

"Don't be a smartass", she warned, tugging gently on a lock of spiky hair. "How?"

"I know you", the Jōnin shrugged.

"Huh." She was going to say something else, but Jiraiya interrupted them.

"Appearances are deceiving, and I'm very good at what I do. Sannin was a title given to me and my teammates during a battle. My Itai-ate is different because I'm a Sage", he recited, before smiling winningly. "I answered three of your questions, will you answer three of mine?"

"Your answers gave me even more questions", Hari countered, "and couldn't you ask Hiruzen?"

"So what, I answered honestly anyway. You will get to ask me three more once it's your turn again, and it's easier to ask you directly, right?"

Hari shot a look at the Hokage, and the old man only sat back and nodded at her. The Sannin was good to get in the known. But that didn't mean that she would be frank with him from the get-go – if he wanted to play the question game, Hari would humor him. Or annoy him. Both could be the same in her book.

"Ask away."

"How do you know Sensei so well, where do you come from, why are you here?", immediately asked Jiraiya, scrutinizing Hari to see her body language and reactions.

"I don't know him that well, I met him when I first arrived in Konoha", Hari answered pleasantly. "I come from a country called England, and I am here because I wanted a new life with a clean state."

"You call him by his name despite him being the Hokage, and he wouldn't just let you just because you're wealthy", Jiraiya frowned. "I know every country there is and none is called England. Where is it? Also, a clean state? How dirty was the old one?"

"I believe it's my turn to ask three questions", Hari smiled politely.

Jiraiya moved a hand to indicate that she could do so, smiling right back.

"How and why did you get your title, what does it really mean, and what is a Sage?", Hari stared at him with piercing green eyes – unnaturally bright green in unnaturally large eyes, the effect was quite breathtaking and almost dangerous, enough to tingle his honed danger-instinct. She seemed to see right to his soul, and he did not mean that in a romantic way.

Cautious, he blinked slowly. She had asked questions about his title and his greatest achievement – there were very, very few Sages, after all – but not about what was (or so he thought) the most important point: his job as a Spymaster.

Not that he would have said the truth, had she asked, but this was a golden occasion to ask questions to a Spymaster about his work, no matter how indirectly or sneakily, and any ninja would have seized the opportunity. As would have an enemy spy. In both cases, they would have at least tried to direct the discussion towards that subject.

Still. He was a ninja. He could roll with anything unexpected.

"Why would a sheltered young civilian woman need to know that?", he wondered out loud. "And for that matter, I am famous, and the answers are all more or less known to the interested public. Why ask about them and not, say, something you wouldn't be able to learn from any other source than me?"

Hari looked at him weirdly – though he thought he could see a small amused spark in her eyes – and shrugged.

"What kind of civilian doesn't like a good action story? And I do not think of myself as sheltered. Also, I do not know of you apart from what I learned today and what some of my Summons told me, and I care not about sensitive information. I do not need to add to the secrets I have to keep – and to be perfectly honest, I don't see the interest in knowing important stuff about you."

Hari didn't say that she was basically reading all his immediate thoughts right out of his head (and how had he been able to get her body measurements so accurately? She hadn't even stood up!), and that it went a long way towards speaking with ninjas who said one thing and actually meant the opposite or even something entirely unrelated. She was trying to stop doing that (since coming here, she had the feeling that she had gotten back in touch with her human conscience and sensibilities, and what had seemed perfectly normal and natural before she now saw as somewhat invasive for those around her – especially Kakashi), and to her credit she was doing a good job at it (though she still seemed to perceive the general emotions of the humans around her.)

(It was much better than before, and a work in progress besides. No need to alert the ninjas that their minds could be like open books for her – even Kakashi, friendly as he was, would not take kindly to that; and she was liable to find herself in prison while Mind-readers –Yamanakas, they were called, able to do what she understood to be a somewhat weaker version of Legilimency – tried vainly to enter her mind in order to see what she now knew about the most sensitive secrets of the Village.)

(Not her idea of a good time, for even if they would never be able to imprison her, she would lose their trust, which wasn't something she ever wanted to do – plus, she had deliberately avoided looking far enough to see Village or personal secrets, even if she had stumbled across one. Or two. Or perhaps even three – but who cared? She would tell no one – not even them! And she was really, honestly trying to block any thoughts coming from the people around her, though there were some exceptions, such as this one… and even then, she was reading his surface thoughts, not his memories, as she could have easily done.)

So, reading his emotions and basic thoughts as she was, she had to suppress a smile at the small offended feeling growing in the white-haired man's mind, and his unvoiced protest that he was a very important person indeed.

"You don't know what you're missing", he sniffed, "that's your loss. On another subject, how can you have Summons if you don't have chakra?"

Hari blinked, surprised. She had charmed a simple necklace to confuse all the people around her into believing that she did have chakra, and thus wasn't a walking corpse. It had gone a long way towards assimilating in the village (and also towards raising the suspicions of the ninjas who had seen her before she had done that, and weren't in the known about her they now believed that she had a enough knowledge to be a spy, what with knowing how to hide her chakra pool to the point that it could not be felt, even faintly.) She had almost forgotten about it (she did not wear a lot of jewelry, but the necklace was simple and light, thus easily forgettable), since she never took it off.

Even in her own home – it was easier than having to remember to put it on before leaving the house. Also, not wearing it tended to unsettle Kakashi. As such, no one had made a remark about her lack of chakra since her arrival, thus Jiraiya noticing it (in spite of the necklace, and that should not have been possible) had taken her aback.

"What?", she could only say, and was about to ask how he had known that she didn't have chakra when she realized (passively snatching a passing thought), that he was not wondering how she managed to not have chakra and live. In fact, it seemed he had not even realized she did not have the faintest bit of chakra in her body. Actually, he meant –

"You have nowhere near enough chakra to Summon, so how can you talk with yours? And how did you get them, for that matter?"

"Oh", she paused. The necklace made people see what they expected, after all, which was a civilian with civilian-level reserves. "That's…"

She sighed, the hand not playing with Kakashi's hair (for she still had not stopped) going up to massage her temple. She had become good at them by necessity, but she wasn't good with verbal battles, and in truth disliked them. When she said something, she meant it, and she was by nature rather straightforward. She didn't use a hundred words to say one thing, and she was basically a simple person – character-wise, that is.

Plus, thanks to her use of Legilimency in order to get the meaning behind her ninja friend's words, and her isolation from most persons up until now (and well, she really did only talk with Kakashi, and Hiruzen sometimes), she had somewhat lost the habit of verbal sparring and implied meanings.

"Let's cut to the chase", she said relatively grumpily. "If you're here, you're trusted by Hiruzen. Since the old man's looking like he's having his fun and is doing nothing to prevent me from talking to a Master Spy, you must have been cleared to get 'in the known', so to speak – a select club, feel honored – and thus I will introduce you to the wonders and horrors of Magic", she finished grandly, after a quick glance at the Hokage to take notice of his 'go-ahead' gesture.

Jiraiya froze, eyes darting between the three persons sitting with him in the room incredulously – especially his Sensei. Were they playing a joke on him? Two of these people looked back at him with impassive faces and amused eyes, and the last one did not even deign to open his one eye, looking for all intent and purpose comfortably asleep and petted by a beautiful woman.

"Magic…?", he pronounced carefully. "I don't get the joke."

"Oh yeh of little faith", the Hime smirked, and suddenly she was looking kind of intimidating (which, come on, she was a civilian.) "Let me educate you, child, and listen. It all began around two centuries ago…"

"That's either the single most incredible discovery of all times – before chakra, even –, the single best story ever invented, or you're the craziest person I've ever met", Jiraiya ended up saying, after a good five minutes of silence once Hari had ended her tale.

"It's the third time I've heard it, and I still have trouble to believe it", agreed the Hokage.

"Then how can you be sure she's not…", the Sannin used his finger to trace circles in the head next to his temple, unable to even find the correct work to appropriately describe what he thought of the person imagining – and believing – the grand tale they had been served.

"I saw the trunk", Kakashi volunteered, proving that despite all appearances, he was indeed following the conversation. "I got into it, and walked around too."

"Fūinjutsu can theoretically be used to enlarge already existing space – it's a matter of matrixes and –"

"I saw them", Kakashi spoke firmly, in an almost hushed voice, rising from his position to sit correctly and stare at the Sannin with a haunted eye. "Bloodthirsty, violent, ruthless, cunning, and relentless. They came after us and we were hard-pressed to defend ourselves, and they kept multiplying the number of traps they used against us. I saw them – things chakra can't explain – so don't tell me that Magic doesn't exist."

"Are you remembering a battle?", wondered Jiraiya, a bit taken aback by Kakashi's passionate tirade. "Who are 'they', anyway?"

"The plants", gravely revealed the Jōnin in a hushed, careful voice. "The plants Hari brought back from her world. The unholy vegetation that would be right at home in Hell."

"Are you kidding me?", exclaimed incredulously the Sannin, looking back and forth between the grim faces of two of the ninjas he knew and respected most, though at different levels.

"What was said was the absolute truth, Jiraiya", soberly nodded the Hokage, mind going back to that traumatizing day weeks ago. "I saw them too."

"Genjutsu?", weakly suggested Jiraiya.

"…", the Jōnin said nothing, though his wild stare did take a deadpan quality, and he slowly raised a lazy finger to point at his covered Sharingan. "Even if you somehow doubted my skills as a Jōnin, please. Give me some credit."

The Hokage only raised an incredulous brow. He did not need to say more.

"…Right", the white-haired man nodded. "Then are you both sure you were sober?"

He just kept insisting. He simply couldn't believe it just like that, after all.

He suddenly noticed his Sensei smiling that smirk – the one that meant nothing good for him.

"Since you are free right now, what do you say to do a short visit to the Greenhouses?", the wizened old man asked innocently. "If it is alright with you, of course, Hari."

"I do have to re-pot a few plants soon, they have grown too big for their pot and keep leaving them", the Hime nodded, not seeming to notice the alarmed look both veteran Shinobis acquired at the idea of plants walking around, or the novice's skeptical look. "Why ever not? Though I thought you said you would never go back?"

"Oh, do not worry about my old bones", the Hokage chuckled a bit tightly. "I'll wait for you right here."

"I will guard you, Hokage-sama!", immediately volunteered Kakashi, feeling very protective of his Hokage all of a sudden. "I am certain Hari-Hime will be a perfect guide for Jiraiya-sama."

"O-kay…", hesitantly agreed Jiraiya, knowing and feeling that the trap was closing in on him, uncertain as to whether he truly wanted to see the proof of the truth with his own eyes, and feeling defenseless as he hadn't felt since he had been a fresh Genin in his first battle.

"Give me your weapons", ordered the Hokage. "They are the Hime's plants, after all, you cannot damage them. Refraining from using your chakra is easy, but fingers are often twitchy and kunai fly easier than you can breathe."

Jiraiya said nothing, only stared at the opposite wall blankly, back to sitting on the Hime's (incredibly comfortable) sofa, trying to understand where he had messed up in his life to get to this point. One of his hand clutched a kunai, while the other held a Tantō in a deathly grip.

He decided he would have preferred not knowing.

"Let's say I believe you", he began, ignoring the Hatake brat's derisive snort glumly. The stupid silver-haired kid had stayed safely out of there, and Jiraiya was determined to ignore him for at least a few years. Or better yet, pester him and make him read Icha Icha, converting him to the glorious books. Hmm. "Let's say… Fuck. I don't even remember what we were talking about", he admitted, his mind strangely blank after having spent a whole hour scrambling around, trying to make sense of what he was seeing.

"We were talking about how you didn't believe me about Magic", generously reminded Hari, feeling satisfied with her day. The man had stopped ogling her as soon as he had set foot inside the first Greenhouse, and she felt much better.

"… Yeah", he nodded vaguely. "That."

He stopped, trying to organize his thoughts the best he could. "So your Summons are the Snakes?", he changed the subject, deciding to either forget the last hour the best he could, or come back to it after having had the time to calm down.

Hari simply shrugged, unbothered with the switch of topics, neither confirming nor denying – she was the Boss of much more than just the Snakes, but she didn't feel like sharing. Still, the ninja took it as a yes.

"Ah!", he barked a laugh. "I would have loved to see Orochi-teme's face when you told him off and took the Snake Contract from him."

"Speaking of Snakes", intervened the Hokage, suddenly remembering something he had wanted to ask long ago (there was so many things to remember when it came to the Hime, he sometimes forgot some. The situation was exceptional, though.) "You still have yet to show us your Boss form – if that's not private?"

"Oh", startled Hari, remembering when he had asked that of her – in his office the day they met, with nowhere enough place for her to do it – they still hadn't gotten around to meet so that she could show them her form. "It's not private. It's just another me, I guess". She paused. "Animagus forms are kinda hard to explain. I feel just as at ease in this body than in my Basilisk form, for both are me."

She made a face. "Or something like that. Follow me outside, then", she invited them unceremoniously, walking calmly out and away towards the farthest side of the large garden. "No, you stay here. I need the place", she waved at them, stopping them from actually walking out in the garden, making them stay on the veranda.

She was aware that she was huge. She didn't fancy flattering them on the ground – despite her size, she was fast. In fact, when she had first used her form in this world (when first going to her Summons' realm, to deal with Manda and some of the other snakes that had overstepped their boundaries), she herself had been surprised at her appearance.

Not in that she was a Basilisk, but in that she was much, much bigger than she had been in her old world. Apparently, her old world was far enough from her Summon Realm that, taking this distance into account, it had been necessary to be in a smaller form in order for it to be sustainable. Strange how her own body and magic did things she was never aware of, if they were not thrown into her face.

The new size had surprised her, but she had adapted. She was good at that – adapting. Now she just had to concentrate on not opening all three sets of eyelids, and she was good to go.

Once she had reached the far end of the garden, she turned around, evaluating the distance between the waiting ninjas and herself. Estimating that it was good enough, she closed her eyes (it wouldn't do to change with her eyes open, after all), and centered herself. Calling her form to the surface was easy enough – though the others two often fought to be used too (even if they were herself, intrinsically, they all represented freedom in one way or the other, and as such they – as herself – felt the need to get out, so to speak.)

She felt the change happen, natural and fast. One moment she was human, the next her whole body had changed to become a massive snake, easily towering above both the house and even the massive trees that surrounded Konoha. If she reared her body back up, she would be able to place her head on top of the Hokage tower. She was huge.

Making sure her second and third sets of lids were closed, she opened the first one. Seeing the world through a Snake's eyes could be destabilizing, especially if you weren't used to it – but she wasn't in a snake's body, she was the snake, and so it all was very natural to her.

Had she simply transformed into a snake, the matter would have been very different, but this was one of her Animagus forms. She was as at ease in this body as she was in her human one.

The second and third sets stayed firmly closed over poisonous green eyes. Though each of her Animagus forms had her green eyes, their intensity varied. For killing eyes, the green looked much more sinister and unnaturally bright, almost poisonous at time – in her Phoenix form, her eyes were a warm, clear, shining emerald. In her third form, it as more of a forest green, smooth and wild and a bit cold.

The second set of lids, if opened, unlocked the petrifying ability of her eyes. It was like looking into her eyes through something, not directly, and thus didn't kill. Though, in this world, being petrified was being as good as dead if Hari didn't procure Mandrake's essence. The last set, obviously, unlocked her ability to kill anyone looking into her eyes, or even just glancing at them.

Basilisks, in order to kill someone or something with their eyes, did not stop the heart or destroy the brain or anything like that. No – their eyes targeted the soul, much like the Avada did. It worked in two steps, though they followed each other so closely, it looked as if there was just one action.

First, the eyes severed the links binding the soul to the body; then they forced it out of the corpse. It was simultaneous and irreversible – one moment you were alive, the next you were dead. Because the soul escaped from the body itself, and not just from the mouth (as it did when a Dementor Kissed someone), it also killed the body on its way – the heart stopped, blood ceased to flow, lungs to breathe. Whoever the victim was, they were dead, both mentally and physically (whereas a Dementor's victim was still, in a way, alive; for their body kept on living long after their souls had gone.) It was awfully similar to the Avada – though Hari suspected that it was the Avada that was similar to Basilisks' eyes, and that they had, in fact, been the inspiration for the Unforgivable.

No matter what, the soul then departed from the world, for Basilisks did not eat souls nor did they have any use for them, and that was that.

Since Hari did not intend on killing anyone here, she triple-checked that her two last sets of lids were closed, before looking back down towards the flabbergasted ninjas craning their necks to look up at her.

She flicked her tongue, tasting and smelling the scents around her. She discarded nature's scents – earth and greenery and smells carried by the winds, decomposing leaves and plants and insects and animals, small preys or insects going around, nothing interesting – to concentrate on the people staring at her in awe.

Humans' scents were complex. Someone could not be reduced to one or two scents to describe them. She knew immediately who one of them was – for she couldn't see them as a human would.

Dogs and blood, sweat and that distinctive absence of scent of a scentless soap, iron and weapon oil and mint, peppermint, perhaps, the bitter scent of green tea leaves and the sweetness of the chocolate cake she had made for breakfast, not yet gone, he must have snuck a bite after having washed his teeth; fire and wind and earth and water and, most potently, ozone – electricity; some faint traces of other people's scents; scent of herself, prominent – death and joy and awe and fear and admiration and unlashed danger, and, more faintly, as if disappearing, regret and loneliness and deathwish and pain.

All of that and more merged together to describe one person, unmistakable – Kakashi.

She did not know how the dogs came to mark Kakashi so thoroughly – he was part of a Pack, was the Alpha even, but she had never seen nor heard of any dog around him, so this was a discovery – but the rest described him well, she thought. Deathwish pained her, for Kakashi was important and should live for as long as he could, be as happy as he deserved to be. She would see to it. As for fear, she discarded it, for what sane man (or insane one) wouldn't feel fear upon seeing her Snake form? This was only natural, and she had expected nothing else.

The next person – blood and paper and ink; iron and weapon oil and monkeys, wood, smoke, and tobacco; other people, faint enough that they had not come close, except for one, young still and loved enough to be hugged; fire and wind and water and electricity and earth; death and old age and fatigue; awe and fear and admiration and evaluation; calculation even; mourning, loss, determination.

That had to be Sarutobi. She had been told he had the Monkey contract, and though she had yet to meet a member of these Summons, she knew they were known to be ferocious fighters. She thought she also remembered something about him having a grandson.

The last one, she smelled for the first time. As a rule, her nose was more developed than normal people, due to two of her three Animagus forms, and she had gotten used to the sensory input. Still, it could never come close to smelling them when she was actually in one of her forms. She learned more by smelling them in her Snake form than she would by getting to know them for a month (provided she did not outright use Legilimency.) So this would be helpful to get the measure of the ridiculously tall, white-haired guy.

As any ninja, he reeked of blood, scentless soap, steel, and weapon oil. But more than weapon oil, he also smelled strongly of – was it inflammable oil? And Toads, not frogs as she had first thought (he was the Toad contractor! Her Snakes disliked the Toads, they said they were too excited and loud. Snakes liked whispered hisses, slow preying movements, patient wait and sudden strikes with one-shot kills. Toads were more boisterous.)

He also smelled of Sake, women – anger and fury and rage and outrage were the strongest scents, those which lasted the longest, and then maybe shock and shame – ink (a special kind, though she would be unable to say how), sweat, and scents all over the place (other people, scents she had never smelled before, food, sexual interest – interest and fear, caution and awe, shrewd examination and forced calm. He had so many scents, because he had gone through so many places, talked to so many persons – he was a spy through and through, even his scent was too muddled to be able to accurately determine where he had gone to and who he had met. Of the scents that came from using chakra techniques, ozone was most noticeably absent – he must not use a lot of Lightning Techniques – but there were two other scents she could detect in his chakra pool without being able to identify.

She still had his emotions – the strongest, the most prominent – and his underlying scent (the one that belonged to just him, faint and indescribable, with no name and nothing to compare it to), and she wouldn't forget it anytime soon.

If he had been introduced to her, and was a Spymaster to boot, she was bound to come into contact with him sooner or later, and it would be better to be able to find him in a crowd if necessary. Or just in case he decided to spy on her for a bit (she wouldn't be offended, she was a stranger and unknown quantity to him, doubly so considering it was his job), so she would be able to just let him without looking around in his head to make sure he wasn't a malicious guy wanting to kill her for one reason or the other. Probably money or politics.

There were only so many S-ranked secrets she could uncover before she began to feel bad, and confessing would only make them more wary of her, and possibly break all the trust they had begun to build between each other (she didn't want Kakashi to stop being around her, and to feel uncomfortable in her presence.) But it did not mean she would keep in a secret – if it ever came into the discussion, she would off-handedly mention it, because to do otherwise was to indirectly lie, and she was convinced she was not doing anything wrong or sneaking around in their heads.

She moved a bit, rearranging her body more comfortably – the remarkably warm sun for a December morning heaven of her cold scales – and loomed over them, turning her head to the side in order to look at them with only one, big eye – much larger than their bodies. It prevented having to look at them cross-eyed – if she stayed high enough to not have to cross her eyes, she would be so high she would be unable to hear them correctly. Probably.

It would just be weird.

Flicking her tongue a few more times (Magic had a special, unmistakable tang that she liked, and her wards were very potent), she looked at them curiously. Well, not that they could tell (Snakes are not the best at showing facial expressions, and even her eyes, in this form, revealed nothing of her internal thoughts, for once without having to apply Occlumency), and waited for them to say something.

"That's really, really big", muttered Kakashi, the first to speak – the one who knew her best and was the most at ease in her company.

"Are you calling me fat?", she teased, voice perfectly even – and that was something different, too. Just like the snake that had appeared in her garden so long ago, she was able to speak human language despite being in her Animagus form. This was the only one of her forms that allowed it, because that was the only form that was a Boss, and it had quite shocked her when she had first spoken as naturally as breathing, in the Snake Realm (before she even came to Konoha, when she had taken the Snake contract back and decided to deal with Manda.)

Kakashi startled, and the other two men chuckled, the tension dissipating slowly. A ninja would always tense up upon facing possible danger, no matter that this danger was supposed to be on their side. Hari didn't take it personally.

"Of course not, Hime", Kakashi smoothly corrected. "You are so thin I sometimes think you ought to eat more."

Went unsaid was that Hari never ate less than he did (sustaining her body and magic made her need just as much food as a ninja with Kakashi's metabolism did), that Kakashi had often wondered where it all went (she only trained with him once a week or so, and not hard enough to justify not gaining an ounce of fat) – and that Kakashi had learned that specific phrase from a Noble speaking to his official Wife (a bratty, selfish, self-centered creature he had been glad to learn the death of, a few years later – she had made some passes at him, the nerve of some people), when he had had to guard them during a travel across Fire Country, some years ago.

"Now that's a lie if I've ever heard one", Hari mused, "though I must admit that I do have a great body."

"This one is especially great", remarked Jiraiya seriously. "You're much bigger than Manda, who was… impressive."

Manda had looked as tall as any Summon Boss.

"Manda was a general, nothing more", the giant Basilisk coiled in on itself thoughtfully, remembering the awful snake she had had to take care of. "Too brutish, cruel and bloodthirsty to accomplish anything. If the old Boss hadn't been stuck in my world, Manda would have never managed to attain his title."

"Uh", intelligently said Jiraiya. "You're the tallest Snake, right? Tell me you are."

Hari laughed, a strange hissy sound shaking her head a bit, taking care not to open her mouth too much. The fangs could be intimidating, and the venom sometimes just fell on its own when she was excited, angry, hungry or happy.

"There is no Snake taller than me", she confirmed, "but I am rather small compared to the Elephant Boss, or the Dragon one".

"The – what?", choked the Hokage, the other two ninjas staring at her with wide eyes.

"What did I say?", she asked, wondering what had caused that reaction.

Kakashi and Jiraiya also turned towards their Hokage – they had been shocked to learn that there existed Summons bigger than Hari, who was the biggest they had ever seen, even though they had no idea what an Elephant was, and were half-convinced Dragons didn't exist – but Sarutobi seemed to have understood what she had said, and that was cause for worry.

"These contracts exist?", immediately asked the eldest of the men, breathing back under control.

"They sure do", nodded Hari, "though you needn't worry. The Elephants dislike this world – not enough place for them, they like to stay in their herds, and the Dragons wouldn't fight against us even if they did gain a Summoner. Which they are not interested in."

"What are elephants?", asked Jiraiya, head turned toward his old Sensei but body still facing Hari.

"Extinct animals that lived long ago. Monstrously tall without any chakra, with thick skin and impressive husks.", Hiruzen explained, living up to his title of Professor, even though this was not part of the Ninja Arts. "I would not want to fight against one, if it was a Summon."

Who knew what having Chakra and intelligence would provide them with?

"Can we go back to the Dragons?", asked Kakashi, looking a bit stressed. "We are talking about Komodo Dragons, aren't we?"

"Of course not", Hari huffed, "Those are a branch of the Lizard Clan. I mean giant, cuirassed, bat-winged, fire-breathing Dragons. Or water-breathing – there are a couple that breathe ice, some that do poison – they're nasty – a few that use wind, some earth, though they're rarer, because they as a race prefer to do aerial attacks… And there is a cousin branch which do not have wings but long, serpentine bodies – they are known as Oriental Dragons… But yeah. Dragons."

There as a moment of silence as their world rocked a bit once again (it had never really stabilized after learning about her, but some hits were harder than others), before Jiraiya coughed a bit.

"How sure are you that they wouldn't attack us should their hypothetical summoner be one of our enemies?"

"Absolutely sure", Hari shrugged, the movement strange and not much different from a ripple of muscles in that form. "I'm their official Boss."

"Wait, wait – aren't you the Snake Boss?", interrupted Kakashi in a strangely calm voice (that did sound a bit strangled), as wide-eyed as she had ever seen him.

"Despite the Snake's reputation", Hari said primly, "we reptiles are very loyal. We very, very rarely fight amongst each other, and never without good reason. So to avoid having different, opposing summoners, the Boss of each Reptile Clan fought against each other to determine who was the strongest, and thus who would represent them all in the human world. And, well, it's kind of hard to lose when you just have to look at them in the eye to either paralyze them or kill them outright, and they can't fight me very well with their eyes closed."

"… Are you telling me that you are the Boss of all the – Reptile Clans? What even is that?", Kakashi asked in a surprisingly high voice. He reeked of mounting hysterical distress. She did not like it – the scent.

"No, no, not quite", she corrected. "I'm the Boss of the Snakes, period. And maybe of the – it's not important right now. What is important, is that no reptile part of a Clan will take a Summoner without my… benediction, I guess?"

"We will come back to which other Clans you are part of", warned the Hokage, before concentrating on the most pressing matter. Jiraiya simply stayed silent and listened – a ninja could only take so many shocks in one day before needing some time to ground himself. "But you are basically saying that Reptiles won't be taking summoners without your consent?"

"Yes, and even if I did give my consent", she hissed thoughtfully, fighting the slight lethargy the sunrays tried to plunge her in – winter was here, no matter how warm it was in Konoha, and biological instincts told her it was time to hibernate. "They would not, in any way, ever accept to fight against me – or my summoners. So even if the Dragons were to ever take a summoner, whoever they would be would not be able to use them against Konoha, so… the point is moot, isn't it?"

The ninjas blinked slowly, trying to digest it all, rearranging the information in their heads.

"So Dragons exist", Kakashi said flatly, a faint surreal feeling seizing him. "Are the Salamanders part of the – Reptile Clans?"

"Obviously not", she answered, squinting her enormous eye at him – blurs of red and yellow and orange, so warm, a contrast to the usually cold colors he clothed himself in. "Salamanders are not reptiles, so I would think it rather obvious".

"They aren't? They rather look like one", remarked Jiraiya softly – the battle he had undergone with Hanzō the Salamander during the last war; one of the last times he had fought with his two teammates, the battle that had seen them gifted with the title of Sannin by the very same enemy that had defeated them, was coming back to his mind, as clear as it ever was. "They were – still are, perhaps – our enemies. One of them contracted with Hanzō."

"That guy in… Amegakure, right?", clarified Hari, giant body glimmering under the sun, a perfect image of uncaringness. "Even if he did want to attack, Salamanders wouldn't be a problem. They have pitiful teeth, ridiculous claws and soft bodies."

"Do they really?", frowned the Hokage, feeling a faint headache back to pounding in his head. He sometimes really hated talking with the Hime – she considered some things as absolutely innocuous when they would have felled many a Shinobi. Jiraiya especially looked bitter. Ibuse, Hanzō's summon, had monstrous strength, could burrow into the ground and burst out to swallow unsuspecting preys, and breathe a cloud of poison so potent it could immobilize someone in seconds.

"It really is", Hari mused, massive head tilting to one side. "As I am right now, in this form, they can't and won't go against me, their very instincts would warn them away. Reptiles aren't easy preys, we take attacks very seriously. But me being in human form is a loophole – I'm an exception, see, because I became the Snake Boss despite being human. I'm not just a Snake, I'm… an anomaly. I'm still the Snake Boss and Reptile Clans Representative, so the Salamanders won't go against me – but, well. They could try to attack me when I'm in another form. I don't think they would, though. Reptiles really don't joke around, they would not take the risk."

The explanation did make sense, though it also raised a lot more questions. Jiraiya looked a bit disgusted, but reasoned that Hari could not be held to normal criteria, and thus it was pointless to compare himself to her.

"What kind of Reptile Clans are there?", wondered Kakashi out loud, deciding to leave thinking about all this information to a later time – there would be a meeting with the Hokage and Jiraiya this very night, for sure, and they would be able to make sense of all of this then. Best get the most information he could before that.

"Lots, most of them are the obvious ones – Lizards, Snakes, Turtles, the works", Hari explained, thinking back to the Bosses she had found herself having to fight suddenly when she had appeared to her Summon Realm for the first time. She had learned the why of this only after the battle was over (and won) and had felt faintly pissed off at the lack of explanation of it all – but she did remember all the Bosses she had found herself facing without even knowing why. That she had killed none of them had been a small miracle. Luckily for them, she was always so very careful with her Killing Eyes that not consciously opening them once she was in her Basilisk form had become second nature. "The less obvious for you would probably be the Dragons, Leviathans, all kinds of Magical Snakes that have remained so far away from this world you've probably never heard of them, Wyverns, Kirins, Coquatrices, Quetzalcoatls, Hydras… I'm definitely forgetting some."

"You have access to all these contracts?", demanded the Hokage, and Hari narrowed her eye at him.

"Access, yes", she said, swallowing back the venom that had pooled in her mouth a bit – she had discovered that she was very protective of the Clans under her command. "And I may ask around if some want to try and get Summoners. But if they say no, I'm hardly going to ask them to do it anyway."

"Hmm", the Hokage remained poker-faced. Having all these Summons at Konoha's service would have been an amazing boon – absolutely stunning – but having Hari was even more important, it seemed, and so he wouldn't dream of antagonizing her needlessly. "Of course, I understand."

Hari nodded her head, taking care not to make any movement too quickly or sharply. The three ninjas in front of her were twitchy enough.

"What other Clan Boss are you?", asked Kakashi, remembering that she had never finished that sentence. Knowing Hari, maybe dogs? Despite Kakashi's partial contract with dogs, the rest of the Dog Clan had never been Summoned, so everything was possible. Also, dogs were loyal to the death, mischievous, strong, noble – the very best – and Hari was all of that.

He wasn't partial.

(He really wasn't.)

"The Phoenixes", Hari announced. "Well, not really the Boss? I came here, went to the Summon Realm, met the Phoenix Clan and their Boss, we noticed I was stronger than he was – because of my magic, and stuff – and I somehow found myself being called Boss? But only in title, the actual Boss is a huge Phoenix that's super old and rather strong. It's just that Phoenixes are not big on hierarchy. The strongest is the Boss, but they don't really care. They each do their own thing, the Boss is just the one who goes to Summons meetings and such… And so the real Boss is bigger than me and can actually speak with humans, though he is weaker than me."

"Phoenixes", faintly muttered Jiraiya. "Fire birds, right?"

"That's a very narrow definition", Hari reared her head back, feeling insulted despite not having been, and not even being in her Phoenix Animagus form. That was one of the drawbacks of having very, very prideful forms. "There are Water Phoenixes, Wind Phoenixes – Nature ones, or even Blood, Black, White, Poison, Metal, Lava, Ice, many more. We have lots of subspecies!", she bragged.

It was kind of strange to see a giant Snake ranting about how awesome Phoenixes were, and speaking about them as if it was one of them – but out of all they had heard in the last hour, it was the least disturbing thing of it all.

"Wait – Poison Phoenixes?", frowned Sarutobi, bringing all he knew about the mythical beings to the front of his mind. "I thought Phoenixes were supposed to be a pure representation of… all that was good?"

Hari looked down at him with pity, trying to look a bit disappointed but understanding (that was a very common myth, after all), but her Phoenix's pride and current body meant that she somehow only managed to convey disdain.

The Hokage tried not to take it to heart – Hari didn't even notice.

"How people could ever get to the conclusion that Phoenixes were good despite knowing that they basically die again and again, resurrecting against all odds and natural laws, I will never understand. Phoenixes are creatures of Death – they bathe in it, die regularly to be reborn, and their souls are some of the darkest I've ever seen – not because of their actions, but because of their very being. If they were humans, they would have been a bunch of Necromancers – worshipping Death as deeply as they do already, except it would look less pretty, probably."

"… So Phoenixes are bad?", Kakashi asked, looking at her weirdly.

"I never said that", she disagreed. "Death is nothing bad. Death is natural – She is, in Her essence, neutral. Everyone is equal in front of Her, and She has no wrath or fury. She represents ultimate peace, for almost everyone – very bad persons would call dying the beginning of Hell, certainly, considering what their afterlife is to be – but whether painful, awful, horrible or unjust, it all depends on the humans. Humans bring Death to others, and their means are their own choice – Death does not care about that. She comes when it is time, and it is the natural way of the world. I'm not saying that Death Creatures are bloodthirsty monsters, killing left and right to satisfy an imagined Goddess – far from it."

"Far from it?", pushed the Hokage, actually curious. Ninjas lived in Death – it was their trade – and it was, for them, almost always violent, certainly never natural. Listening to another world's perspective on the subject was fascinating.

(At least, he thought it was another world's. How could he have known that Hari was speaking from experience and intimate knowledge?)

"Death Creatures care not for others, in that they do not go out of their way to meet others. Death is selfish – She comes for one person at a time, unique each and every time, it is personal. If the time hasn't come, Death won't come either – if you ignore a Death Creature, they will ignore you in turn. They have no interest in causing your death, for they have no interest in you. Everything is fated to die one day or the other, and they know that – why hasten the date? They are not here for you, and will thus not bother you if you don't bother them. But dare to court Death – dare to attack them – and they will answer adequately."

The three men said nothing, only trying to understand or structure what they had just heard.

"The problem with the worlds, is that most civilizations see Death as something bad – something to avoid. But it is not, it is natural, needed even, and most of all, it is kind. They say Death is oblivion, the end of everything, cold and dark and empty, sharp bony claws reaching out to grasp your life in their glacial grip. But Death is also the end of suffering and pain, merciful; and She reunites you with your loved ones."

"You seem very passionate about the subject", noted Kakashi faintly, stocking as much info as he could in the back of his mind to think about later, in order to function right now. "Is it because you're also a Phoenix?"

"In a way, maybe", the giant head bobbed in an approximation of a nod, the whole body moving sinuously and somewhat hypnotizingly. "Though as a Death creature, I care not what other think about me. It's just – I dislike being mistaken as either the pinnacle of everything good, or the worst representation of the darkest magic. I'm neutral – not even in the middle, but completely out of these considerations. I'm not something – I just am."

The big eye facing their way narrowed, as if in a glare, though in truth it was a frown. "I don't really know how to explain", she admitted.

"And your Phoenix form?", asked the Hokage, fingers caressing his pipe in his pocket. He would smoke, but he had learned that Hari disliked the scent of tobacco when there was no fresh air to wash it away (though she had tried to hide it and be discreet about her dislike, it was hard to miss volutes of smoke suddenly disappearing before even having had the time to hover a bit in the air), and since snakes had a very good sense of smell, he didn't want to know how she would perceive it right now. He did trust her, but she currently was a gigantic snake perfectly capable of causing havoc in Konoha as she was, without even taking into account her magic. "What is it?"

Knowing her as he did, he thought maybe she was a Fire Phoenix, if that was how they were called. Or maybe a Shadow one, if they existed – she did seem to have a painful, dark past, liked to stay unseen and disliked the spotlight, was careful to trust and appeared to be really fond of the night, if Kakashi's reports of the Hime sometimes going out during the night to stare up at the stars, or just look out into the darkness, were anything to go by.

But she did also seem to be fiercely independent and protective of both her freedom and the people she loved, determinate to raze to the ground everything that stood in her path – it would be well represented by the Wind, or the Water element…

He did not see the Hime as cold, which ruled out Ice; but she also didn't seem to be very grounded, so it was doubtful that she would be an Earth Phoenix. In truth, he would hesitate between Fire, Wind, Water and Shadow, if he had to guess one.

"Oh", the big head reared back a bit, not in shock but rather slight surprise. Being so big, each movement was made obvious, but it would have been minimal had she been in her human form. "Well, sure."

The Snake seemed to shrink, or rather turn in on itself, as if swallowed by a hole or trying to curl tightly in on itself. It was hard to explain. The scales lost their shine, and their deep emerald green color, replaced by feathers, soft; and black, poisonous green, gold and pale blue. The animal in front of them was drastically small compared to what it had been seconds before, though it also was remarkably big for what was, when it all came down to it, a bird. It was the size of Kakashi, a bit smaller than Jiraiya, and it stood on strong claws that gouged the ground without even trying.

Its eyes were the same emerald green as ever, but they shone brightly, warmly, even benevolently. Yet they also seemed to see right through you – the impression was even more potent than the one Sarutobi had felt upon his first meeting with Hari – and straight to your soul. They judged you, and the trio of shinobi suddenly felt keenly the weight of their sins. They remembered every kill, every lie, every stealing they had done – and felt unworthy.

The giant bird blinked, and the feeling changed. Their emotions were judged now – what they had felt, why they had done their deeds, their very nature. And suddenly, the feelings of guilt and unworthiness abated, just like that. Their hands were still bathed in blood, but their soul was warmed by something unseen. And they felt peace.

"Was that you?", murmured Kakashi, glancing back into Hari's eyes, that he had previously taken care to look away from, as soon as the first judgment had started.

Probably, she admitted, feathered head inclining graciously. The Ninja almost had a collective heart attack upon realizing that the voice seemed to come directly inside their heads. It seemed as if she really couldn't speak to humans in this form. In front of Phoenixes, people recall every bad deed they have done. I know not why, however, nor did I try to understand. Then we judge them – pit their actions against their reasons and feelings. People who kill for the sake of violence, we see them as unworthy – we are Creature of Death, after all, and seeing our… Mistress, I guess? thusly misrepresented does not sit well with us. Probably. It is in our nature, I have never really thought about it beyond that…

"You really never think about much, do you?", weakly teased Kakashi, feeling decidedly overwhelmed by everything that had happened that day.

You are an annoying guy, and I don't like you anymore, primly informed Hari, not making a big deal of it since, as a Phoenix, she could very easily feel others' emotions. Empathy had a whole new meaning, for Phoenixes, if they decided to turn it on. For that, you'll get pranked twice in the upcoming week.

"So nothing new?", he retorted, well-used by now to the pranks – though never to their effects.

I was planning on giving you a break…, she mused quietly, balancing on her claws and changing her balance. Being a bird on land was not as easy as it may appear, especially her, what with her rather long tail. Birds were made for either trees, or the sky. Especially the sky.

(Admittedly, as a Phoenix, she was also made for fires in all shapes or form – there was that time she had felt like sleeping inside a volcano… Deep inside… Among the lava… But how could she have known that it would wake the volcano up?! The following explosion had nothing to do with her!)

"You're lying through your teeth", decided Kakashi, for he was no Genin and knew Hari better than she thought.

I really am, she admitted. But I had planned on pranking you only the once, because the week will be especially busy due to the Zoo. I plan on installing the biggest and meanest animals. Don't worry, you won't need to help me either this time.

"Small mercies", he acknowledged, "but that's probably because you consider me finally visiting that Zoo of yours as a prank in itself."

Your face the first time you went into the Greenhouses is a treasure I will always cherish, she confided easily, and Kakashi was suddenly slapped by the ridiculous situation.

He was sort-of-talking to a giant, weirdly colored bird, which had been an absolutely enormous snake minutes ago, which in truth was one of the smallest adult women he had seen. And a witch using magic, and coming from another world.

(So he may still not be entirely over that, yet.)

"I'm very sorry to interrupt", drily spoke the Hokage, who was more used to Hari than Jiraiya, and thus recuperated more quickly – though not as quickly as Kakashi. "Could I ask the reason of your different colors? I guess they represent your different elements, but I thought Phoenixes had only one."

They do, as a rule, Hari confirmed. I'm the exception. It's a long story…

"Shorten it", helpfully required Kakashi, raising a hand to lightly run his fingers through the Phoenix' feathers. They were exceptionally warm and soft. It was all very fluffy, and he immediately began forming plans to convince Hari to change into that form again, just for him, on a cold evening, when they would both be on the sofa with a warm fire in the hearth.

Because that's so easy, the bird complained, but it did so anyway. Very well: I was changed when having Basilisk venom in my veins, so it made me a Poison Phoenix: that's the green. My soul back then was full of Fire – I was all about fighting for my friends, risking my life for what was right, and dying for the greater good. So, yeah, that was Fire: all brawn and brashness, little brains, burning everything around me if need be, and that would be the gold. But I changed radically a few years later – so radically that my forms changed with me – and came to love Freedom above all else, which was represented by Wind. I had always loved to fly, anyway, so that was already a part of me. So, yes, the blue.

"Fascinating", pronounced Sarutobi. "Other Phoenixes never change?"

Death is immutable, the giant wings moved awkwardly in the approximation of a shrug. Their nature will never change. I was different – I was still human back then.

"Back then?" immediately repeated Jiraiya. "You mean you aren't now?"

Hari blinked slowly, before improvising. She had become an excellent liar – and how can you see the tells of a bird? She may be transparent to them as a human, for all that her Occlumency helped her hide her facial expressions, but as a bird or a snake she could lie to them undetected. She didn't really feel like going into the explanation of being the Master of Death.

You know a lot of humans that can do what I do? she asked blankly. Even in my world, I was the exception of the millenary.

"What are you, then?", wondered Jiraiya out loud, staring at her as if he could find the answer on her feathers. He was still kind of avoiding her eyes.

I am, she answered, and that's the only thing I'm really sure of.

"And that simmering black", the Hokage interrupted the slight silence that followed that answer. "What does it represent?"

Her status as Mistress of Death.

Shadows, Hari said instead. Shadows are Death's dominion, and I have died once, voluntarily, and almost died an unknown amount of times. That kind of things tends to stick.

"Hence the simmering?", Kakashi asked curiously, watching pensively the black feathers that seemed to move despite there being no wind. The color itself seemed to swirl, despite the shade of black being always the very same. It was all very – magical.

(As in, it made no sense whatsoever.)

Probably, she nodded, before suddenly blurring into a flurry of motion, a flash of burning, warm light, and ending up standing in front of them as she had this morning, before the presentation began. Not a hair was in disarray, not a wrinkle in her clothes (a simple sweatshirt, black jeans, boots – a bit strange in their culture, but all in all so very underwhelming, knowing now as they did what she could look like) but they now had to look down in order to see her, and her to look up at them. "Satisfied?"

"Convinced", muttered Jiraiya, "Which is more than I had expected ever since I learned about you. But that kind of proof is hard to refute, no matter how I may wish it wasn't, and so I must accept your existence. It does explain why I couldn't find anything on you, though, which is comforting."

The four turned around to head back inside, and Jiraiya suddenly paused.

"Ah, ah, ah", he said sarcastically. "She didn't appear out of nowhere. Very funny, Sensei."

"I thought so too", smirked Sarutobi, watching his closest student take a bottle of sake out of his pocket – feeling the telltale burst of chakra indicating the opening of a sealing scroll inside the pocket itself – and take a big gulp out of it. "I appreciated the irony."

"You would have, at that", nodded Jiraiya, plopping himself down on the sofa he had sat on when he had first entered the house. "Okay. My understanding of the world has been thoroughly broken apart, thank you all very much, and I am now part of that little club. Must be very select – who is in the known?"

He rather thought not many people were in it – that was too big a thing for it to be revealed carelessly to everyone. Otherwise, the people trying to take advantage of the Hime (of what could be considered as a bloodline) would be innumerable.

"Everyone in this room, the Jōnin and ANBU Commanders, Cat, and the Head of the T&I.", enumerated the Hokage thoughtfully.

"Yamanaka?", wondered the Sannin. "Did he...?"

What had happened, if Yamanaka Inoichi had taken a trip inside the Hime's brain and memories, as was the protocol? Did Chakra react with Magic? If so, how? Badly, or well?

"No", Hiruzen shook his head. "It was deemed too volatile." So they still didn't know how Chakra and Magic reacted when placed together.

"What was?", asked Hari, refraining from reading their thoughts thanks to a huge effort. The easy way could be quite addictive.

"Inoichi looking through your head to see your memories", bluntly answered Jiraiya, not seeing the need to hide anything. After all, everyone knew of the Yamanaka's specialty.

"Oh, the Clan that does some sort of Legilimency", Hari nodded sagely, still being in an open mindset after having revealed so many secrets today.

"Legilimency?", repeated Kakashi, laying back down on the sofa, and putting his head back on the Hime's lap. These two sure looked cozy, Jiraiya mused. "What is that?"

"As you may not guess from its name", Hari explained, looking down at Kakashi's sole eye, hand absently going back to his hair, "It is the art of reading people's mind."

"An art?", frowned doubtfully Kakashi.

"Reading people's mind?", spoke both Jiraiya and the Hokage.

"Almost every branch of Magic is an art that has to be mastered", she said to Kakashi, before looking back up at the two men. "Yes, reading the mind. People's thoughts, memories, feelings. A Master Legilimens can enter someone's mind without them realizing it. They can even change memories, replace them, or suppress them with a liberal use of some rather shady spells."

"How can you resist that?", pressed Sarutobi, looking rather alarmed. "And identify whether or not it has been used?"

"Well, you don't have to worry about that, I'm the only one who could – oh", Hari realized. "Well, you can't tell whether it's been used or not without Magic. Or if someone who was supposed to know something has suddenly forgotten it. As to how to defend against it, that would be Occlumency – the art of closing your mind."

"And are you? A Master?", demanded Sarutobi.

"Of which?", wondered Hari, before waving her own question away with her free hand, and with controlled carelessness. "I am a Mistress of both Arts, if you must know."

"Do you read our thoughts?", asked Jiraiya, looking rather uncomfortable with the idea.

Suddenly, Hari was slapped in the mind with the thoughts of a giant frog barfing what had to be a puree of insects. She winced at the sudden image, and raised her free hand to her temple to stave off the headache she could feel approaching. She slammed her barriers shut tightly.

"You do!" exclaimed Jiraiya, feeling unsettled. Kakashi sat up in the sofa, looking at Hari attentively.

"I try not to", she said drily, eyes and face utterly blank, "But when you all but shove your thoughts into my head, I have literally no other choice."

"Explain", ordered Sarutobi, though even he had to squirm the tiniest bit when that blank, empty stare came to rest upon him. Despite her face not showing anything, he knew she had not appreciated the order. And, since he knew how overpowered an enemy she would be, he added "Please."

"Also, what is up with that – lack of emotion?", asked Kakashi, as disturbed by it as he always was. He was frowning, but now was the moment to finally ask her about it.

"Occlumency. I close my mind, and so no emotion passes through. On the plus side, I receive very little of other people's thoughts. On the downside, I've been told it doesn't look natural."

"What does it do, and how does it work?"

"Long story short, I place my memories, thoughts and feelings inside little boxes, so they are organized in order – and when I shut the doors of the rooms the boxes are in and erects the barriers I created to protect my mind from others' attacks, no emotion can reach me. Since my mind is closed, nothing comes out, and nothing comes in."

"Placing your feeling inside little boxes doesn't sound very healthy", remarked Kakashi, for it sounded really like shoving them inside never-opened places and never facing them ever again. It went against everything every psychiatrist had ever told him.

(Not that he listened.)

"On the contrary, to do that you have to face and assimilate each one of your memories, and the feelings that go with them. Same for your feelings when using Occlumency – it certainly mutes them and allow you to keep control of yourself, but then you have to reorganize your mind once the situation is over, and face them by doing that. Very healthy – and very unpleasant."

"Can we go back to the fact that you read our thoughts?", pressed Jiraiya, and the Hokage's eyes were decidedly cold.

"We can go back to the fact that I do not read your thoughts", she corrected idly, "not voluntarily at least. In my old world everyone had a basis defense against Legilimency – even Mundane people, who didn't even know it existed. In this world, I have to have my barriers up at all time, because you people all but broadcast your thoughts and feelings all the time. It gave me the mother of all headaches the first week I spent amongst people here."

"So do you hear our thoughts, or not?", demanded Sarutobi, mind whirling despite himself, thinking of all the A and S ranked secrets she could have acceded to in his mind – all of the secrets he shouldn't be thinking about right now.

"I don't, as a rule", she explained, shrugging carelessly. "Because my barriers are always halfway up, only the loudest thoughts and basest emotions go through. To block these, I need to slam my mental barriers down, but it's unnatural, very obvious, and not healthy to maintain for too long a time. So I make do. I mainly keep my barriers halfway up and ignore what little I hear – much like one would ignore background noise. I got used to it. I mainly hear immediate thoughts and nothing more."

There was a small stretch of silence, and though Jiraiya didn't seem all that ready to trust her, the other two knew her better. Kakashi laid back down in a show of trust, and the Hokage forcibly relaxed himself in his seat. The Sannin took his cue from them, and sighed to show that the tension was over.

He would not stop from thinking about it later on, however.

"Is that how you always know where ninja around you are?", he asked, having heard complaints about that in all his Ninja contacts in Konoha' reports.

That was mainly because they had been marked by Death, but...

"Yes. Hard to think about nothing, even on the job, so I always get some basic feelings from them. Even Ninja aren't emotionless tools."

Both the Hokage and the Sannin looked at her sharply, wondering if she was discreetly letting them know she knew about Danzō and his disgraceful methods, but she did not seem to. Nothing in her body language showed she was trying to convey something more than the words she had pronounced, and as said before, though she could wipe all emotions from her face and eyes better than anyone they had ever met, her body language always gave her away.

"So that's how you know when to trust someone or not", noted Kakashi, remembering that one time at the market that Hari had been rather kind to a seemingly rude lady, even though she usually ignored or politely avoided talking with all of the people that approached her in order to know more about her to serve their own interests – usually by either unsubtly remarking that with so much wealth, she could share with deserving people (which they of course all were), or by unsubtly remarking that being a single Lady had to be hard, and surely finding her soulmate (their son, obviously, who had an excellent pedigree and would be the best groom, ever) would only brighten and better her life.

But that woman Hari had been kind to, and Kakashi had later on learned about all the complicated backstory of the stranger. On a totally unrelated matter, that woman's son had mysteriously found enough money to pay for his daughter's operation the very next hour (the Hime could be thorough when she wanted to be.) Rumors were that saying bad things about Hari Potta in their presence was hazardous for your peaceful life (they had been poor, but far from stupid), and the Hime now had quite the growing number of fervent followers.

She was really kind, thought Kakashi, before concentrating on thinking about fishes in order to make sure she didn't get his errant thoughts, a faint blush on his thankfully hidden cheeks. Hari didn't react about his sudden interest in underwater life, her hand in his hair didn't even pause, and he knew her enough to know she was rather honest, in her reactions in not always in her words; which all gave more credence to the explanation of her innocence.

"It is very helpful, especially when you have trust issues like I do", she nodded.

"And that is how you knew to trust me the first time we met", remembered Sarutobi. He truly had been judged, that day.

"Yes", she admitted. "That was necessary, I wasn't about to take any risk."

"It would be nice to have you with me", mused Jiraiya, quickly explaining why upon seeing the sharp stare Kakashi was trying to pin him with. "To know whether my spies are trustworthy or not, I mean. You would be the perfect Spymaster."

"I really wouldn't", denied Hari. "Too hot-blooded, though I got better with age and experience. But living in shadows, lies, secrets and deceit is just not for me."

With age? pensively wondered Jiraiya, looking at the so-very-young face of the woman in front of him. She was young – much too young to have suffered from all the death and pain her past was bathed in, in fact – yet she had that... ageless quality. That is to say, it seemed as if her physical age had nothing in common with her real age – she was an old soul in a young body. Many ninjas were (he remembered Kakashi, painfully young and already a prodigious killer), but it was a bit more... unnerving, with her.

Had the Hokage not given him her age, he would have been unable to guess it by himself. Still.

"More of a fighter than a planner?"

"Precisely", she nodded, "though I have learned to think before I act. Recklessness can only get you so far – and planning spares you so much pain."

"So now that we have established that you weren't willfully reading our innermost thoughts and secrets, that you have absolutely awesome animal forms, that you have a cheat ability thanks to your magic, and that you are a literal alien – I'm still not over any of it – it there anything else you want to reveal? Another ground-breaking news that would finally lay me down?"

"Now that you speak of it", carefully pronounced the Hokage, visage impassible but with a wicked, vicious spark brightening his eyes. "How much do you like animals?"

"Never really thought much about it?", answered Jiraiya, sounding like he was asking a question. He knew there was a trap somewhere, knew he would end up walking straight in it, but couldn't for the life of him figure out what it was. Keeping pets that were not trained for ninja life was one of these useless hobbies ninjas took to keep a bit of sanity – except for the ninjas who took one because it was recommended by their psychiatrist in order to have at least one good, pure and innocent thing in their lives, but then that was a whole other matter.

"Great", beamed the Hokage. "It's about time to feed them today, anyway", he added, nodding towards Hari – he didn't even pretend not to know her day-to-day planning just as well if not better than she did, though he did have a bit of difficulty planning for her unpredictability. For someone who had almost only known war and hardships, the black-haired woman was surprisingly un-military-like. Though, she was still much more disciplined and reined-in than any civilian he had known or knew, bar the really straight-laced ones. "Mind having Jiraiya's help? He's a newbie, but he learns fast."

"What would I need to learn?", asked Jiraiya, looking rather alarmed. He had had enough of the plants, and had learned too much today – he needed a break, or he would break down.

He was ignored.

"Of course not, he's very welcome", Hari smiled sweetly, remembering the man's wandering eyes when he had first seen her. Making her almost uncomfortable in her own home, the nerve. "He will be the first to visit the Zoo. I'm guessing you won't join me?", she asked the other two men.

"Very important business", coughed the Hokage. "Paperwork, debriefings, reports – no rest for the Hokage. The village would probably collapse if I were to be absent for so long – especially since this was an unplanned visit."

"I'm one of those Hokage-sama needs to hear the report of", quickly added Kakashi, rising to stand behind his Hokage, the very image of professionalism.

"You both really need to work on your excuses", she smirked, before looking back at Jiraiya. "No matter. Let's go get you an armor – we will have so much fun..."

An armor? Jiraiya suddenly had a very, very bad feeling.

That very evening, as both Kakashi and Sarutobi were waiting for Jiraiya's arrival in order to go over the events of the day, a small frog appeared, politely said hello, took a scroll out of its mouth with its tongue, deposited it on the table, politely said goodbye, and disappeared in a puff of smoke.

The two ninjas blinked at the action that had not lasted more than five seconds, all in all.

The frog couldn't be anything else than Jiraiya's Summon, so the Hokage felt confident he could open the scroll without fear. Inside, a hurriedly-written message could be read. The hand that had written it, clearly, had been trembling.

Sensei,

Things happened, I gotta go. Felt the need to go meditate a bit – a year or ten – at Mount Myoboku. Present my excuses to the Council, seems I can't make it this time either. In the scroll is a gift for Naruto-chan, give it to him or else.

See you around,

Jiraiya

P.S: The animals – I have no words. Sensei, I can't even say anything -. Good Luck.

The missive was very to the point, though shorter than he was used to – even from Jiraiya, who wasn't really someone who liked to write much, even in his mission or Spymaster reports. The fact that Jiraiya had hightailed it out of Konoha shouldn't have surprised him, but it did. His student usually faced things head-on, adapting to the situation and panicking later, when it was safe (he had been able to keep functioning after meeting the Greenhouses for the first time – the Hokage himself had had to seclude himself in his office for a quiet 10-minute-long freak-out afterward), and he certainly would have had tons of questions to ask about the Hime.

But then again, Jiraiya did receive quite a few shocks today, so maybe the Zoo was just too much on top of everything else. It could be understood. Kakashi, himself, as well as the other ninjas in the known had yet to see the animals, so he didn't know for sure how bad it was – if the plants were anything to go by, certainly it was very bad – but all in all it explained Jiraiya's hasty departure.

He did note that for once, the Spymaster had one excellent excuse to miss a Council meeting. He would be sure to make clear that it wasn't the usual spiteful refusal. For his trauma, Jiraiya deserved nothing less.

Hari Potta, citizen of Konoha on probatory period since a little less than two months, was excited.

See, she had arrived in Konoha on Samhain's night, the 1st day of November. And they were now the 20th day of December. The day in itself wasn't particularly interesting – but in precisely four days, it would be Christmas!

Her very first Christmas in the Elemental Nations! There were presents and food to buy, dinners dishes to plan, decorations to make!

The only good thing was, she already had all the decorations she could ever need. Family Heirlooms of a sort, you see.

Not that her or her Families really celebrated Christmas, they were more into Yule. But the Potters, for one, had sadly kind of rejected their origins, and the Old Rituals with them. She found that she couldn't fault them for that, since it appeared, at the time, that it was either that or agreeing with some of Voldemort's ideas. Old Traditions were wrongly associated to the Pureblood propaganda spearheaded by Tom Riddle with much hypocrisy (as a Half-Blood, Voldemort didn't care much for the Purebloods who had so mistreated him during his first years at Hogwarts – and Purebloods only cared for their perceived superiority over… everything else, really.)

As it stood, the Potters were a Light Family. Not a Dark, or a Gray one, as some had believed a few times in the past, due to some decisions made by a few of their ancestors before, regarding the preservation of some of the darker forms of Magic, for example.) They were unfailingly Light. And sadly, at that time it meant promoting Muggleborns Rights to the point that they let them destroy the Old Ways.

Now, don't get her wrong – she loved Muggleborns about as much as she loved Purebloods, probably a bit more even. Which meant that she wasn't a fan of them, because she wasn't a fan of Wizards in general.

It was easy to fight for what was right, when you weren't raised by parents who had their very own vision of right. Purebloods children weren't bad or evil – they were simply following what they had been taught all their lives... and which child doesn't believe what his parents say?

So no, she had nothing against Purebloods – though she could admit to being somewhat biased against some. But she really respected those who had fought against everything they had been taught, against everything they were, and against their families and loved ones – just for what was right. What they had realized was right.

That took courage, a lot more courage than she thought she could have ever had.

Because she, herself, was only following what she had been taught, too. Had she been raised in another family... Had someone from a Dark Family rescued her from the Dursleys when she had been younger...

She couldn't swear that she wouldn't have followed Voldemort, either.

Oh, she would have questioned his actions when the murders and useless tortures would have begun – as every Pureblood child did. Or at least, she hoped she would have – she was aware of the darkest parts of herself, mastering Occlumency demanded nothing less than that. But she would have, maybe, followed anyway. It was the easy way, wasn't it? She had always wanted to belong... Who's to say she wouldn't have gone to the extremes in order to please?

As she had said before, to the Hokage... Voldemort and herself had been frighteningly alike. She had had so much pain, rage, fear and hate inside her – for her childhood, for what the Dursleys did to her, for what Voldemort did to her parents, for the lost chance at a happy life with a loving family...

She had taken it all, and turned it against the only true target she could have – Voldemort. Because everyone wanted her to kill him anyway, she was expected to hate and want to kill him. But they would never have condoned her hate of the Dursleys.

So she never said anything about them – about what she felt – and she had all let it out on the only enemies she was allowed to have: Voldemort, and his Death Eaters.

And she had done it well, too.

She had been lucky, in a way. They had given her very convenient targets to vent all of her destructive feelings. The perfect targets – the persons she could and should kill, with the government's blessings. It had saved her, in a way – she had turned all of her hate and murderous rage on them, and when they were finally gone, the feelings had abated on their own. And after, she had just been exhausted. Empty.

She hadn't wanted to kill the Dursleys, to take revenge, anymore. She had been so tired, so done with it all... She had only wanted to be left alone, to be in peace...

But no one had ever given her that.

Faced with all that had happened after the war, she hadn't wanted to fight anymore (whether for the people as she had spent her life doing, nor for herself and her own wish for acceptance) and had only wanted to go away. Leave Britain, and damn them all, but she wouldn't go back there. Not if she could help it. Not even if they asked – begged – for her presence or help.

She was done with them.

Because, going back to the original subject, she wasn't a fan of Muggleborns either.

No one had ever supported – believed in her. Purebloods, Half-Bloods, Muggleborns, they all followed the medias, the Ministry – the ever-changing vision they had of her.

The blood didn't matter, the person did. And no one ever followed her. Listened to her. Believed her. Recognized her as a human being – a person in her own right.

Why should she be loyal to them?

None of them had showed her loyalty. She owed them nothing, not anymore. She had never owed them anything, even if everyone – herself included – had believed it once.

Her loyalty had never been won (not by anyone but her friends, and even then some of them had betrayed her and lost it) and wasn't easily given. An abused child doesn't trust or become loyal just because they're told to, or because it's the right thing.

And while she was all for – had been all for, back when she has still been interested in Wizarding Britain's future – a better integration of Muggleborns in their society; she had never been in favor of forgetting or forsaking the Old Ways. She was aware of the importance of doing Rituals, Ceremonies, or thanking magic and of learning all the magic possible, no matter its branch. How could she not? She had met, personally, a few of the Old Gods, with Death and Fate and Magic the most prominent of them.

All of this to say that she celebrated Yule, Samhain, and other magically important days; and that she did it the wizarding way. Which meant Rituals, mainly. But she had also been Muggle-raised, and while that had meant nothing to her until her eleventh year (and her first, real Christmas at Hogwarts), she had become used to also celebrate some Holidays the Muggle way, in addition to the Wizarding one.

More precisely, she liked to give – and receive, if possible, but she had always preferred to give, never quite knowing how to react to a heartfelt, genuine gift – presents on Christmas. Yule was not a really special day in itself: it was more of a period during which Wizards used to do Rituals and Offerings to the old Pagan Gods for some, or directly to Magic Herself. The period usually fell around December (and often began in November, depending on the year it was, on the size of the Fey Lines, and on the stars' alignment – so many factors made it so that Yule rarely began and ended on identic days whether you were in one country or the other, or even in one part of the country or the other), so the proximity between Yule and Christmas allowed Muggleborns to decide that 'Yule' was, in fact, an outdated tradition that had been replaced by Christmas in all developed countries – and that as such it was unnecessary to celebrate it as Christmas from now on. Wouldn't want to propagate backward and retarded ways of life, right?

More aware and magically educated than them, Hari celebrated Yule (she had already done several Offerings to Magic – though she was unable to worship her, for Death worships no one, she could at least show her respect. Likewise, she was unable to do any Ritual asking for a God's benediction or blessing, because it was asking, and asking was close to begging, and Death does neither – she wasn't even sure that the Offerings she had done during the course of the last week had been received, for Magic certainly didn't exist in this world, and sending Her offerings from one world to the other was tricky and she didn't even know where to begin, so she had just done as she always did and hoped for the best), but she also celebrated Christmas.

The gift-giving tradition of it, with the decorations and the feast.

And this Christmas was all the more important that it would be the first spent in her new world. She hadn't been here for long, but she already felt more at home than she had ever had. Sure, she hadn't really done anything helpful or risky, yet; but it was still her very first Christmas in this world...

And while she, obviously, couldn't celebrate it the Wizarding way with Kakashi (he didn't even know about the Offerings – these things were rather private, not really done with people who weren't family), she could celebrate Christmas with him. Now, she only had to know if they celebrated Christmas, here. In Japan, they did, but it was mainly because of the westernization of the country. Christmas was celebrated roughly everywhere, nowadays. It had lost its religious connotation and had become an occasion to exchange presents with those you loved.

But that was in her old world, and she didn't know if they celebrated it here. She had been at the Market, but there was nothing that indicated that they did. No advertisement – though there was, as a rule, not much ads in this world – no Christmas colors, no rush to find the perfect present. If they celebrated Christmas, it certainly didn't have the same popularity it had had on Earth.

Thankfully, she had a perfectly reliable source who could give her an answer. Hence the reason why she was pensively looking at him instead of reading her new book on offensive magic – and it certainly wasn't because it was theory, and thus boring.

Meanwhile, said source was patiently waiting for his – for the Hime, to explain what made her look at him like that. He was pretty patient. He could wait. She had only been looking at him like that since this morning, after all. Whatever she wanted to ask him, she would do it when she was ready – though he could admit that he was a bit curious.

"Kakashi?", she finally said, putting down the book she hadn't really read since she had opened it two hours ago.

"Hmm?", he lazily rolled his eye up, scroll loosely held in his hands.

Just because he couldn't go on missions for now didn't mean he had nothing to do. He was a ninja, and that meant that year-long vacations just didn't exist outside of some healing time spent inside a bed – though one could argue that his present, long-term mission, could indeed count as a vacation.

(Kakashi wouldn't deny it... Even if he would then add that this break was not as relaxing as one would think. It involved a loosening grip on your sanity, having to assimilate mind-boggling information, and magical pranks, which – yeah. Not entirely relaxing in the least.)

Anyway, he was currently writing his usual weekly report to the Hokage. It mainly meant that he wrote everything new he had learned about Hari's magic, which wasn't a lot since she surprisingly didn't do... spells that often. She seemed to be able to live without it, but used Magic as naturally as breathing sometimes. He had concluded that it was part of her, but not all of her. Knowing even just a little of what Magic could do, he knew it would have been easy to use it as a clutch to do every single little thing, making the person rather useless without it.

Hari had done something to some stones two days ago, carving strange symbols he now knew were Runes on them (though he couldn't for the life of him tell what they meant, or even from which Runic alphabet they were from, and that other world had way too many languages, how did that even work), all the while chanting something or the other in a language he didn't know.

He was pretty sure she had then buried the stones on the edges of the garden, all around the house; but he hadn't the faintest idea as to why. He hadn't asked yet, but he would do it soon – especially considering that she had seemed particularly satisfied with herself, and had stopped reading the old, huge books on wards she had been reading ever since her arrival in this house.

"Do you know what Christmas is?"

And really, he would have been insulted (he was as socially inept as someone could be, but he wasn't that out of it, he knew more things than just ninja-related ones), if she hadn't been really, honestly curious. Thinking about it, she was probably wondering if they celebrated Christmas as well, or if it was a Holiday only known to her old world.

It baffled Kakashi every time to discover that their two worlds were so similar while being so radically different.

"An animal that lives only in Wind Country?", he couldn't help but ask innocently.

He smoothly hid a smirk at the Hime's startled and puzzled look – she was no doubt trying to imagine what kind of animal a 'Christmas' could be.

"No, no, not at all – I mean, yes, probably, if such an animal exists here…", she questioned, frowning.

"No, there is no animal called a Christmas that I know of", sagely nodded Kakashi, putting the scroll on the small table in-between them.

"What? Then why...?"

She stopped talking when she saw his upturned U-eye smile, and his overall innocent look.

"Oh, there will be payback for that, mark my words, my friend", she promised, cheeks painted a soft red. She couldn't believe she had fallen for that.

"Do you know what it is, then?" she grumpily insisted.

"You mean the Holiday everyone celebrates on December 24th?"

"Yes, that one", she bit out grumpily, glaring at him.

Well, she was too easy, really. And Kakashi wasn't usually the kind of person who liked to tease and prank, but she really asked for it sometimes. Plus, her reactions were really funny.

"Well yes, then, I know it. Why do you ask?"

She tsk-ed, sitting back in her very comfortable sofa, and primly crossed her legs.

"I only wanted to know if it was celebrated in this world too, but I don't think you deserve any present", she huffed, crossing her arms as well.

And – wow – okay.

When was the last time he had celebrated Christmas? When was the last time he had even thought about celebrating it?

Christmas was a family celebration, and he... well, he was alone. Last of his Clan, not even a Pack... not since Minato and Kushina had died, and the Council had forbidden him to look over Naruto. If she indeed wanted to celebrate Christmas – a family holidays – with him...

He privately admitted that it would mean a lot. And that he wouldn't refuse. He had known Hari for a little more than a month, but already she was the person he knew the most... and liked the most. She was his closest friend, and he definitely didn't want to go back to the time when he lived alone in his little flat, doing S-rank missions upon S-rank missions to try and erase the emptiness in his heart life.

As for spending Christmas with her... Well, they lived together, and he was closer to her than he had ever been to anyone else – with the notable exception of his father and his sensei – and all in all, they did act like a family... sometimes.

A strange one – training together in the mornings, though he did a lot more than she could ever hope to do (even during the once-a-week Torture Session, as she called it, and during which he really pushed her); teasing each other, and pranking each other too; eating home-cooked food together (he even cooked for them both, sometimes); talking together about little things; gardening together (even though he would really like to be dispensed of that particular activity); reading in the evening, each on their own sofas (that incredibly comfortable fluffy green sofa was his now, thank you very much, his scent was all over it), facing each other and only separated by the coffee table, in companionable silence...

Yes, they did act with the ease and simplicity, the complicity that came with knowing each other – though he knew that he knew her more than she did him, and that she sometimes wondered about him, even if she never asked. She had probably figured by then that he wouldn't answer. It wasn't personal, but as much as he liked her and was close to her, she was still a newcomer – and one from another world at that.

Stranger than that, you simply could not find. And ninjas didn't like unusual things – it messed with their as-organized-as-possible lives. And he trusted her, of course he did... But he had never revealed anything important about himself to anyone... and he simply couldn't do it now.

He wasn't even sure he wanted to. He had known her for about two months, not nearly enough to trust her with his past, and even if he had wanted to open himself to her, he wouldn't know how to do it. But he didn't want to.

Open himself, that is. Sure, he had come to like her – probably more than was reasonable, considering that she was still a risk to the village, officially at least. They had known each other for a short period of time, and already he liked her more than he did ninjas he had worked with for years. That wasn't... wise.

If he hadn't known she wasn't like that – wasn't absolutely sure of her trustworthiness – he would have been worried she had bewitched him.

But he knew she hadn't, just like he knew the sky was blue – well, when it was cloudless and all. Some Nara he knew would argue that it could be gray, or black at night, or insist that it was blue-and-white because of the clouds; but Nara were annoying little shits who were too smart for their own good. People universally acknowledged that the sky was blue, and that was it. There.

But anyway, he wasn't quite sure he wanted to... trust her more than he already did. He wanted to take his time – he had ten months left, after all. They were in no hurry, and there was still so much to learn about her! Just last week, he had heard her hiss to a snake. Not even a Summon, but a simple, perfectly innocent garden snake that was lazing around in their – the, in the garden.

And she had had a perfectly normal conversation with it, apparently. Because people talking animal languages was a thing. Well, she did say that it was exceedingly rare and considered a sign that you were evil, back in her world... but the fact that no one thought it was strange, simply a proof of evil, told him much. That conversation had apparently awakened painful memories, so she had gone to the kitchen to cook (it relaxed her) and he himself had enjoyed quite a good meal.

Still, it meant that he still had a lot to learn. And he refused to let her learn about him as long as he wasn't one-hundred percent sure that she was... worth the risk. He had avoided letting people come too close to him, and she had already waltzed past many of his defenses, as naturally and easily as breathing. She was already too close; did he really want her to get even further in his heart?

He knew how much it hurt, to lose people he loved. Did he really want to go through that again?

But now was not the time to answer that question, and celebrating Christmas with her would mean nothing extreme, surely? Well, apart from the fact that it was a family celebration, and that it would cement the fact that they were close friends... That wouldn't change anything in their relationship…?

He was stupid – of course it wouldn't. Why was he angsting over this, asking himself all these questions? Christmas was – especially for ninjas – a day as any other. He knew Clans were more prone to celebrate it, especially because they had civilians amongst their members, and because they were very family-oriented, and it was a good way to reunite everyone together... but ninjas as a whole didn't really care for it. Most of them lived alone, or simply didn't care about the day itself. Either they passed the day as they did any other day while in Konoha, or were away on a mission and didn't even remember which meaning the day had.

So he was really making a mountain out of molehills.

"We do celebrate it", he finally decided to answer, reasoning that celebrating Christmas with her would mean nothing important and that he would like to spend the day with her anyway. The fact that there was a strange feeling curling in his stomach had nothing to do with anything. He ignored it with practice. "What have you planned?"

Her beaming smile let him know he had given the good answer – though he hadn't even known there had been a good or a bad answer. He often got the feeling he had passed a test of some sort when talking to Hari, strangely… or not. But he apparently got them right, at least until now he always had, so he wasn't really worried.

It did leave him feeling on edge, sometimes – but not in a bad way.

"Oh, you know, just some simple things", she chirped, sauntering into the kitchen.

A quick glance at the clock confirmed that it was soon dinner time (and how strange was that, that he had a precise time on which he ate? Before, he ate when his body let him know it was necessary, be it in the middle of the day or the middle of the night. There had been no fixed hour – it was strangely domestic.)

(He wasn't sure he hated it.)

"So, you would be game?", she asked – and he could have sworn there was a hint of shyness in her eyes.

But that couldn't be true. Just like most of the people having suffered and lost and fought as much as she had, Hari had no time for shyness, or insecurities. She knew what she wanted, how she wanted it, and she didn't care about everyone else's opinion. Kakashi supposed he was lucky she wasn't an overly excited kind of person.

Most ninjas, like Hari, didn't care about others' opinions. Or else, Gai wouldn't run around screaming about youth and wearing that awful green spandex of his. He simply didn't care. He had too much to do, and could die so easily, that there was no point in letting himself be tied down and constricted by others' opinions of what was adequate and what wasn't.

So she couldn't be shy – what a strange idea. The woman had no shame, of that he was sure! She ogled him shamelessly when they were training in the mornings, or when he was training in the afternoons; or when he went out of the bathroom and she happened to walk by (it happened rarely enough that Kakashi knew she wasn't doing it on purpose – and he didn't really want to think about why precisely he managed to always forget to take clean clothes with him when he went to shower or bathe.)

And she herself walked around in her towel sometimes, freshly out of the shower – it often happened when she was captivated by whatever she was reading in a book (it was Offensive magic nowadays, apparently, and she welcomed it after a month of Runes and Arythmancy – or so he had been told by a beaming Hari) and went to bathe, forgetting that she had put something or the other to cook. Then of course, she had to hastily wrap herself in a towel and run into the kitchen as soon as she remembered that she had, in fact, been cooking; to try and save their meal.

Sure, it wasn't one of those smaller-than-small towels some women liked to use (he was a famous and respected ninja, last of his Clan – civilian women could be unbelievably shameless when they wanted his wealth and political influence, and were determined to seduce him and bear his child) but it was still a fairly short one (a dark green, which looked very plush. That was absolutely why he sometimes had the impulse of hugging her – for the towel.)

(Totally.)

But anyway, Hari wasn't shy.

So clearly it was only his mind that was playing games on him.

"As long as you are", he confirmed, looking back down at his scroll to resume his writing as Hari disappeared inside the kitchen with a happy smile. He would ponder more on this exchange later, he decided, when he would have more time.

He had a feeling he was starting to lie to himself, and he didn't like that. Also, he needed to think about presents. What do you offer to your female friend, who is new to this world (literally), is neither a kunoichi nor a civilian, but a witch who can basically get whatever she wants on her own…?

Sarutobi put Kakashi's report down thoughtfully, absent-mindedly taking his pipe to smoke for a bit. Truthfully, he was not thinking about the report itself (admittedly Kakashi did seem a bit distracted when writing the end, though it was more of a gut feeling and altogether not that important), for he saw Kakashi and the Hime themselves regularly during the weeks – it was becoming a bit of a habit, but he could claim it was for security purposes – and as such the reports did not say much that he didn't already know.

He had learned a bit more about magical animals – Kakashi had finally been dragged into the Zoo, and his descriptions of the creatures living inside would have made the Hokage wonder at his shinobi's sanity had he not met the Plants previously – but not much more about Magic as a whole. He did have new questions about Wards (whatever they were precisely), and a plan for a Fidelius to be implemented in one of their more precarious bases to submit to the Hime.

Honestly, Sarutobi Hiruzen felt a bit like he had hit the jackpot when it came to Hari-Hime, and was somewhat baffledly waiting for the other shoe to drop. The things she could accomplish with her magic seemed limitless, and her apparent agreement to help them a bit too good to be true. Nothing came so easily in life, nothing was free.

And certainly, they accepted the Hime inside the Village and among their ranks (or would, once the probatory period was over and a few tests done), but had they known about her, other Villages – and Konoha itself, admittedly – would have paid and made a lot of concessions in order to have her settle in their midst.

Yet somehow, they had been chosen just because of how decently he treated his ninjas. They were not weapons, and were not treated as such, therefore Hari went to him. In your face, Danzō, he thought meanly with a burst of satisfaction. You're so obsessed with your emotionless tools that had you been given free reign, you would have lost Konoha a huge advantage.

Maybe he could use Hari's help to deal with Danzō and his Root. Cleanse the rot away, once and for all, with the certainty that nothing was missed nor overlooked. He appreciated that the Hime did not look into shinobi secrets, and therefore did not know about Root, or Naruto, or a few other distasteful realities known by only a few. He could not be 100% sure, of course, considering she could read minds even better than a Yamanaka just by somehow standing in a room and doing nothing, but as foolish as it may seem, he did trust her.

As a seasoned ninja, he had a good eye for people, and the Hime was not particularly good at hiding her emotions – disturbingly blank face aside. There was no way she had lied about coming from another world (nothing Chakra could do would ever come close to the Greenhouse, the Zoo, the magical trunks or the shapes the Hime could take), and so there was no reason for her to lie about the rest. She was not interested in Ninja politics – or politics at all, really – thus she was here of her own good will.

Jackpot, he thought again, puffing on his pipe and wondering at his luck. It could not have come at a better moment, too, what with Konoha being critically weak. It was a bit better now – thanks to the Hime settling in, they had started to receive more missions from nobles than usual in the past few weeks – but if she did help them with magic… Konoha's future would be a lot more stable.

He was driven out of his thoughts by his secretary's voice coming out of the interphone.

"Hari-Hime is here to see you, Hokage-sama. Shall I let her in?"

They had not planned a meeting, he thought while raising his brows, looking at the door curiously even as he put Kakashi's report away. They knew that the Hime was aware of these reports (Kakashi sometimes wrote them right in front of her), but Sarutobi could be a considering man sometimes, and not letting someone see the report written about them was just good manners. Kakashi was a clueless brat (… in more ways than one, actually, if what he had seen recently was true.)

"Yes, please do.", he gave the go-ahead, dismissing the ANBU guards but for his personal one as usual, and dispelling the accumulated smoke with a controlled burst of wind chakra.

Usually, he wouldn't bother, but he actually liked Hari, and her nose was a fair bit more developed than most, and he didn't want her to sneeze as soon as she walked in. Manners.

"Yes, sir", the secretary acknowledged, and soon enough the door opened on the startingly small form of one Hari Potta.

Hiruzen wasn't one to buy into stereotypes, but so much power coming from so thin a body was always a surprising realization. In his mind, the Hime was always bigger, more imposing – like that huge and deadly snake, or the flaming and dangerous bird – than she really was. Sometimes, her presence was so low that one could have forgotten she even stood in the same room, were it not for her being either the center of attention, or faithfully followed by Kakashi.

She was used to not being seen, and actually preferred it that way. She would do a good Kunoichi, just from how she went through life. The mindset was quite similar.

"Hiruzen", she greeted him, and he showed her the chair with a swish of his hand and a welcoming smile.

They were friends, though recent ones, but better friends than he was now with the ones he had once risked his life and bled with and for. His teammates sided with Danzō (he was no idiot, though old his mind was more than sharp enough to see how they tried to control him, to make him into their puppet – Danzō's puppet. He thought they knew better, but he also knew that the Hime could get glimpses of what he was thinking about even if she tried not to, so as a rule he never thought of these things when she was nearby.)

"What can I do for you?", he asked curiously, taking the precious bottle of Sake offered by his remaining student recently – the really good stuff – and pouring two shots.

He was always a bit fascinated by how easily Hari drank it. Most Shinobis used chakra control to be able to stomach the alcohol (it was that strong), and it was better not to think about civilians even just getting a sniff; but Hari drank it like water. She took the time to taste it, of course, and did say she liked the taste – but it was like the potency did not register with her.

Magic.

"I'm actually coming here for a favor", the black-haired witch answered, taking the offered glass with a nod of thanks. "Well, an exchange of favors perhaps."

"Do share", he agreed, more curious than ever. The Hime rarely asked for things – not since she had imposed her conditions the very first day. She obviously didn't like to impose, or to be in someone's debt. An exchange of favors was more like it.

"It's Christmas soon, and so I was wondering if I could offer some missions for Kakashi", she blinked. "That came out wrong. I was just wondering if you could let Kakashi go on missions during the coming year, instead of staying with me 24/7. He's training like crazy, but he's still unsettled by staying here all the time."

There was a bit of calm silence while she took a sip, before adding "Obviously I would get another guard, but I really think it would be the most meaningful gift I could give him."

"I honestly don't see why not", Sarutobi shrugged. It was a good idea, and they could honestly do with Kakashi being on the field a few times. He was one of their best ninjas, and though the mission-level assigned to the Hime was more than high enough to justify giving it to Kakashi, she had proved to be no threat and it was more of a vacation for the Jōnin than anything actually useful. Kakashi's absence had been noticed, and sending him back now, after he had been able to rest and train to his heart's content (and now that he was in a better mindset) only brought positive points. "You spoke of an exchange?"

"If I can offer this Christmas present to Kakashi, then naturally I can offer a Christmas present to you", she hinted obviously. Then, as if she thought she wasn't already the antithesis of discretion: "Or to Konoha as a whole."

"I would like to think I would have received a present anyway", Sarutobi hummed. "Aren't we friends?"

"We certainly are, distrustful though I am of wise, aged men", she dismissed with a careless wave of her hand. "This would be but one more present."

"And what is this present pertaining to?", the Hokage smiled, amused despite himself. In any case, it couldn't hurt to know what she was intending to offer. And he still had that plan for the Fidelius.

She was supposed to help them however she could, but he knew better than to abuse her offer or take it for granted. A partnership was more like it – for now at least. Maybe later, when she had started to consider Konoha as her home… but not quite right now.

"I was thinking of teaching a few languages to your ANBUs. I know you have coding specialists, and your enemy decoding ones; but all your codes are after all based on only one language. Other languages need a different way of thinking to be mastered, and other alphabets. Experts though they are, it is nigh impossible to accurately translate a language that is not a code, and that you know nothing about. Champollion himself would never have succeeded with the hieroglyphs without the Rosetta Stone."

"Who and what", blandly stated Hiruzen.

"Hm? Oh, nothing. So, what do you think?"

Used by now to her strange remarks and easy dismissals, he let it go. If she did end up teaching his ANBUs, he would make it so one of them got the information out of her without her ever realizing it. Or maybe she would – even without her Legilimency, she had one of the sharpest minds he had seen among civilians and Genins, and some Chūnins as well.

"I am interested in that Christmas present", he confirmed. "Though I would be more interested if I knew how efficient these languages can be. Do you mind if the Cryptography Department learns first?"

He didn't want to waste his ANBUs' time, after all, and his cryptographers could still use the new languages to create new codes at any rate, should the languages prove too easy to decipher.

"It's your present", Hari agreed.

"Do you know how to teach?", he wondered, before remembering that she had told him about some Di-Ay thing she had led back in her school.

"I have some experience", Hari merely answered, before adding. "So are we agreed for Kakashi's present?"

"It's a good idea", Sarutobi nodded with a smile.

"Could you perhaps write it down?"

That was surprising.

"You don't trust me?", he raised an incredulous brow.

"It's just easier to offer that way, rather than having to explain myself. It is hard to wrap words in a pretty decorated paper."

That made more sense.

"I will write especially well, then", he chuckled, preparing his best brush and tipping it into a freshly-opened bottle of ink. This called for his best calligraphy – a gift he gave that benefited Konoha as a whole and strengthened the bond between Hari and himself; and a gift he received that could end up being a great boon for the village.

It was a win-win in his book.

"Wonderful. I will write the best I can for your paper slip too", the small woman smiled widely, and she did seem honestly excited by the idea.

So the language classes wouldn't start until after Christmas, then. Oh well. There were some things he needed to organize beforehand anyway, and it wasn't as if there was any hurry.

"You're invited, by the way", suddenly added Hari as an after-thought, just as he was finishing writing the official orders of going back on the field with a flourish. "If you want to join in on our Christmas dinner."

Sarutobi blinked, then once again for good measure. He thought about going for a third time, in some distantly detached part of his brain, but absent-mindedly decided not to.

That was his first time being invited for a Christmas dinner – outside of his Clan, that was. He was part of a Clan (small in numbers as it had been reduced to), as so he had never been invited by others. Not that it was forbidden, or went against some untold rule: it was just that Ninjas didn't really celebrate Christmas (why would they? There were missions on that day, like on any other), and those who did were the civilian-born Ninja trying to please their families by spending at least a few days a year with them – more for the family than for said Ninja, for being a Ninja meant having a different way of seeing things, of doing things, of thinking, that irremediably separated them from civilians once and for all, no matter how civilian-like they had once been as a child – and Clan-born Ninja whose Clan was comprised of a relatively high amount of civilians, which meant that some days were celebrated together as a way of keeping the familial bonds strong.

Some Clans didn't have enough civilians in it to decide it was worth the trouble. Most Ninjas had taken the habit of offering a gift to their colleagues on that day (usually a new kunai, shuriken, explosive tag or blood pill – nothing expensive but definitely life-saving), but it was mostly because the therapists had recommended adopting some civilian habits in addition to harmless hobbies as a way of gaining a more stable mindset and life in the village itself.

Ninjas didn't bother to look into how civilians lived their lives (civilians were… they were like – like children in Ninjas' eyes; busy and worried with their own little lives and petty problems, and unaware of how hard life could really be. They worried about this stain on their new dress or this mistake in their accounts; while Ninjas wondered if they had trained hard enough with that new technique to efficiently employ it in the field, or if their next mission would be their last), and instead took the first obvious thing that had the possibility of being useful.

That day, they received new weapons and pleased their therapists. It did make them think about who they wanted to give a gift to (who they liked well-enough to call them friends); who they did not want to give a gift to (they trusted each other with their lives on the field; but it did not mean that they liked each other, far from it – but when you're on a mission then you damn well put your feelings on the back-burner and you work with your teammates, no matter what); and who they disliked enough to give a gift to (but then Ninjas went into a passive-aggressive way of expressing that, which would make no sense to civilians and only made sense to Ninjas because that was how it had naturally developed on its own and they didn't bother to understand why; and it was complex and Sarutobi was not going into that anytime soon, if ever.)

Anyway. He was part of a Clan – Clan Head, actually – and wasn't usually invited to Christmas celebrations. He received his fair share of gifts – he was a well-loved and trusted Hokage, and though he did not have any mission in which to use said gifts, he did train with them when he had the time – just as he gave them to each and any Ninja in his employ (even the ones away on long-term missions, he planned it well enough that they received new instructions around Christmas, written on an innocuous paper which also contained a small seal which, once opened, would deliver said present as well as a paper wishing them a Happy Christmas.)

As he was musing on all of this (quite quickly, for Ninjas thought fast), Hari said thoughtfully, "I actually wanted to invite Kakashi's friends, too; but I don't know them and I don't think they've been cleared anyway. I could act normal for one dinner though, if it made Kakashi happy… I don't want him to grow away from his friends while his guarding me."

"Thank you for the invitation, I really appreciate it. I'll have to spend what little free time I will get that day with my Family, though", he said in an apologetic tone, but Hari just shrugged the information away with an easy, understanding smile. "As for Kakashi's… friends", he continued, inwardly wondering at who that could be – Kakashi had been on quite the destructive trend after the Kyūbi's attack, and hadn't particularly reached out to tie new friendship bonds… not that it couldn't have happened, as Hokage he didn't have the time to look into his Ninjas' lives quite so thoroughly so it was possible it had slipped past him, "I'm sorry, but I don't think it will be possible. They will probably be on a mission that day – but I will personally ask Kakashi the next time I see him, would that be alright with you?"

"Quite alright, do not worry", Hari nodded. "Spending the whole day with Kakashi is nothing new, and I was never a fan of spending time with a lot of people all at once. I just wanted Kakashi to have a nice day, that is all."

"I think Kakashi has fun spending his days with you, do not worry", reassured Sarutobi, trying in the same breath to hint at something that Hari missed entirely. "I'm sure he will enjoy his Christmas whether his friends are here or not."

Missing the more than obvious implication that Kakashi enjoyed himself as long as she was here, Hari simply nodded.

"You're probably right", she hummed. "Thank you for this, and tell me how many people I would have to teach as soon as you can after your cryptographers have cleared my languages. Just in order to have an idea", she added, taking Sarutobi's mission order for Kakashi, and getting up in order to leave. "Have a nice day, then."

"You're welcome here anytime", he saluted, relaxing back in his seat. He liked having Hari in his office – not only because she was nice and saw him as an equal (respect and awe were good and all, but they came at the price of not having friends), but also because each and every time she left, he was a hundred-percent assured that there was no spy in the room.

He checked more than thoroughly every day, but then he had thought the room safe before only for his damn potted plant to turn out to be a henge-d Root Ninja. The man hadn't talked – and would never now, the seal had made sure of that – but he knew Danzō was behind this. Seeing the man's annoyed face at having lost an incredibly well-positioned spy, the next day, had brought him but bitter satisfaction – who knew how long the plant (ah!) had been there?

Danzō knew too much on a good day, he didn't need to know what only the Hokage was allowed to know. Hari leaving without suddenly attacking a random object was confirmation that the office was safe, and it gave Sarutobi some peace of mind.

The green-eyed woman smiled at him and slipped away through the door. He absently wondered where Kakashi was – he rarely left her side, which was his mission, in truth; but he could have chosen to simply stay hidden and keep an eye on her after the first few weeks, and that he never did was somewhat revealing – before remembering that he had a meeting scheduled with his therapist. Kakashi usually went, then spent the hour staring at the poor woman and analyzing her (he probably knew everything about her by now, just by looking) before leaving once the time was up.

It wasn't very useful, but he did follow whatever the therapist recommended he do – because if he didn't then she would write a report concerning his mental health, and before Hari he would have been kept away from suicide missions and S-ranked assassinations, and he had lived for them so he would not have allowed his own anti-social behavior, stubbornness and awkwardness, as well as all-around disinterest in anything but his missions to get in his way. Now, he was less interested in death – a remarkable progress, Sarutobi was quite satisfied – but he still didn't talk to the woman.

The therapist would have been freaked out – she was civilian, a Yamanaka with training in her Clan techniques, but a civilian in all aspects otherwise – but she specialized in treating Ninjas, and so she was used to them being weird, invasive and just - creepy.

Well, the rate of burnouts among Ninja therapists was relatively low, and they were well taken care-of, so the situation was the best it could be.

Pushing those thoughts away, he tiredly took another sheet of paper, dragging a disinterested eye down the characters filling it. A demand for the permission of destroying building 157/D/BK in order to build an orphanage.

He would have said yes – Konoha had no shortage of orphans – but not only was this building in the rather seedy part of the village, it was also were Naruto lived. They had taken to referencing the building by its official name (all building had one, it was easier for the Ninja to remember, knowing the reference for each building was one of the many requirement for making it to Jōnin) instead of its civilian address, in some desperate hope he had forgotten it and would approve the request by mistake.

Civilians were weird. Ninjas did not forget.

Denied.

At twelve a.m. sharp on a rather cold 25th day of December (for as cold as it could ever be in Fire Country), one Hatake Kakashi was running fast leisurely walking towards the Hokage Tower, a surprisingly wrinkle-free piece of paper carefully held in one hand.

Christmas, for him, had finished at 7 a.m. this morning, after Hari had gone to bed. It had been – he would have used the word magical, but it didn't hold quite the same meaning for him anymore. Hari was magical, because she had actual magic, not because she was so perfect that she couldn't be real.

Not that she wasn't, don't get him wrong – he wasn't saying she was perfect, per say, no one was, Ninjas are realists – but he also wasn't saying that she wasn't…

He shook his head to clear his thoughts.

Christmas had been magical not because of the actual magic that he witnessed on that day, but because it had been the best Christmas he had ever had – even counting the Before-Hari period. The day had been simple, just the two of them in a house inside which pure white snow was constantly falling softly down the ceiling to the ground, only it wasn't cold and it didn't melt once it had landed. It also didn't accumulate on the ground, though. It just… disappeared.

The Christmas tree (he could have sworn the ceiling hadn't been that high just the day before, but he let it go without comment) had been a reasonable size, though definitely taller than any tree the civilians in Konoha would have gotten, and it had been swathed in glowing decorations, undulating multicolored tinsel and singing baubles, bouncing animals made of colorful lights, flying actual fairies that Hari called Parva Dryadis hiding and playing between branches and decorations alike. They were apparently a type of Dryads that lived inside trees and thrived on the magic Christmas brought – on children's joy and happiness, on the idea of giving gifts to loved ones – and a sighting of them had inspired a whole series to a muggle author, something about Minimoyz, or so he was told; but Kakashi hadn't really been listening at that point, trying to take in the tree and everything on it.)

It had been a mess of decorations and colors, none complimenting the other, but none clashing either, surprisingly. A beautiful mess. And there had been wrapped presents placed under the tree, not to be opened until the night, in scintillating paper with moving illustrations. He had placed his own gifts under the tree, the paper wrapping them looking sad and dull next to the others. He had almost wanted to take them back – because no gifts would still be better than the ones he had cluelessly prepared, anyway – but Hari had smiled so prettily upon seeing them (a small, private smile, all closed lips, fondness in the eyes and blush on her cheeks) that he hadn't had the heart to.

Happy songs had echoed inside the whole house, lyrics he didn't know and didn't understand, but didn't need to. The dinner – had been something else.

Never before had he realized that Hari actually ate rather healthily, so rich were the foods she usually made. But this time, she went all out, with gravy and sauces and meats and don't get him started on the desserts. There had been smoked salmon on fancy toasts with lemon and fresh dill, something called foie gras (he didn't know what it meant, though he had learned it was French and utterly delicious), a stuffed goose (vegetables mixed together inside the meat, he hadn't seen the point but his taste buds had), about every vegetable he could think of, and he had been stuffed (though not as morbidly as the goose he had just eaten) before the desserts even came.

Thankfully he had a very fast metabolism, and after a half-an-hour break they were back to it, sharing stories and jokes and memories – happy ones – all the while. The best part was none of them pressed the other about anything, and there had been no forced conversation or laugh, and no awkward silence. Just two friends enjoying a meal together, having a great moment. The flaming pudding had been a surprise (the thing had been literally on fire, like how), but the fire didn't actually burn hot (which, okay, fine…) and was comestible (…Kakashi had long stopped bothering to try and make sense of things.)

Admittedly, the Wizard Crackers had been another one (well, the whole day had been a succession of surprises, but some were just bigger than others), and he was not ashamed to say that he had nailed the middle of the small pile of presents that had appeared suddenly in a loud CRACK and an explosion of smoke with a well-placed kunai. It hadn't done much (bar making Hari laugh a lot), because you just can't kill sweets (no matter that these Chocolate frogs sure did look goddamn alive, eating one had not been disturbing because he had done much worse – but seeing Hari eat one had made him pause) or even Wizard toys (no matter how annoyingly lifelike they were, what with running puppy plushies, flying owl plushies – how how how – talking, or more like screaming chess pieces – which moved on your orders and liked to tell you how to play, but Kakashi was an expert in strategic games even if he had to learn Chess rules and wasn't a Nara, thank you very much, so the pieces could keep their Very Bad strategies to themselves… Plus, they loved to needlessly swear. Rude.)

Well. The kunai had embedded itself into the table (Kakashi had thrown it with strong feelings, he had been caught unaware – he now knew to be wary of plants, and various animals, but of Christmas crackers? How was he supposed to keep his sanity? What next, be wary of pictures?), Kakashi himself hanging upside-down from the ceiling, his adrenaline levels a bit high. He had calmed down easily, though, because he was used to it and seeing (and hearing) the Hime laugh like that was indication enough that there was no danger to be found.

(He was used to it because no matter how focused his senses on the Hime were, she sometimes just – just appeared out of nowhere, more often than not in his back, just suddenly asking a question about this or that and startling the fuck out of him. Thankfully, her bubble-thingy did its job and stopped the various pointy weapons immediately thrown at her – and he wasn't sad to see that she still did not feel safe enough to drop her protection around him while inside her own home, because obviously it was justified, see how he reacted sometimes, better that than her dead because of him startling and overreacting… he was not sad, no, not at all – and no matter how hard he focused on her sometimes, her presence just seemed to… fade into the background, so quietly and naturally that he never noticed until she made him remember she was here by just, speaking or coughing or dropping something, and giving him a heart attack. So yes, he was used to sudden scares.)

(Didn't mean he liked them.)

They had played a game of chess – Wizarding chess, which was remarkably similar to shogi in spirit, and he had thus picked the rules easily – and Kakashi had, of course, crushed Hari. She wasn't bad at it, definitely Chūnin-level, but her mind just didn't seem to be able to think like how Ninjas did: twenty steps ahead while placing traps everywhere. Well, she hadn't been trained for it.

Still it was pretty good, if only for the novelty of it. Also, these Chess pieces were damn mean, the Queens in particular seemed to absolutely love crushing the other pieces into rubble. They were repaired right after the game was over, but yikes.

He had probably eaten more candies than was reasonable, but they were new and some of them delicious, so he had no regrets. He would steer clear of these Bertie Bott's Beans, magic somehow messing with the scents so that even he couldn't say what he was picking beforehand by smelling it first – and oh boy, had that booger bean been a nasty surprise… Kakashi had been young once so he knew the taste (shameful past he would rather not revisit), but only his years as a Ninja kept him from spitting it out (because where did the taste come from? Whose booger had they chosen for the universal taste? Whose booger was in his mouth right now?!)

He had cheated, in good Ninja spirit, and instead discretely incinerated the bean on his tongue with a remarkably well-controlled Fire Jutsu. A tiny one. Oh, how glad he was for knowing it!

The Jelly Slugs were a bit too much like the basic slugs (taste aside) for him to enjoy, he was not a fan of the Acid Pops (thanks his mask for hiding his awful grimace), exploding bonbons were good, but he could do without them exploding in his mouth when he chewed, without a warning – Hari had choked on hers while laughing at him, served her right – Fizzing Whizzbees were fun in that they did not explode or sting (he had been a bit wary, because of the name that Hari had translated for him, there was bee in it, and he wouldn't put it past Wizards to create sweets that were anything but and hurt instead), and he had actually liked floating around for a few minutes. It was just a few inches off the ground, but it had been pretty funny – and they actually tasted good.

Caramel Cobwebs were great, Cockroach Clusters probably were too but he wasn't touching that anytime soon, Dragon Claws were admittedly tasty but the side-effect was rather underwhelming for a Ninja (Sure, a civilian would absolutely love having claws of flames adorning their fingers without burning anything for a whole five minutes; but as a Shinobi Kakashi could make a whole dragon appear, burning as a flame should burn, and though it lasted for a shorter time it was much more impressive, so…)

Drooble's Best Blowing Gum had been his last try, and after his first bubble had refused to pop no matter what he did (of course he had to test it, who do you take him for?), its annoying bluebell color taunting him, he had thrown the stuff away. But after learning that it did not lose its flavor, ever, and since he actually liked the taste (crazyberry was not a very reassuring name, but it had a surprisingly good taste and no side-effect despite being magical), he had taken another one and was chewing it absent-mindedly even now as he was going to the Hokage Tower.

Seeing all these brightly wrapped sweets full of magical side-effects and diverse tastes, he had come to a rather concerning conclusion: Mr. Spindle's Lick "O" Rish Spiders, Jelly Slugs, Cockroach Clusters, Bat's Blood Soups, Blood Flavored Lollipops, Fudge Flies, Gummy Worms, Honeydukes Mice Pops, Ice Mice, Nautious Jumping Snakes, Peppermint Toads, Powdered Porcupines…

Not only were the names utterly lacking in originality (they just basically said what they were selling), but they also took the worst animals they could find to make sweets out of them. Who thought it was a good idea to make edible insects? Who thought: Yes, I think I would like eating sweets that look like slugs – even better if they're animated to move like the real thing!

There was something deeply wrong with the Wizards' way of thinking.

That Hari just shrugged it off when he pointed it out just showed that despite her best efforts, and though she was leagues better than the other Wizards he had learned about, she had still been contaminated by the Magical Way of seeing things. He would have to work on that with her.

(Also, why so many blood-tasting sweets? He knew Wizards discriminated against any race that wasn't their own, so they were not making sweets for the other Magical Races (which, yes, were also a thing, Vampires and Werewolves and Seelies and Veelas, and Kakashi was not going to think about this all right now), so, what? Did Wizards just like the taste of blood?

Worrying.

(Thank God Hari did not like them and had just taken them out for him to try.)

Anyways, between the literal magic going on and the – the – the niceness of the day itself (he had no other words for it), yes, it was the best Christmas he had ever had. He had received a few gifts, some not worth mentioning (Jiraiya's dubious book had been quickly hidden in his pants pockets before Hari could really see it – he had never read them but he knew their reputation, and would throw the trash away as soon as he could), some expected (a few weapons or scrolls slipped to him by teammates – acquaintances – friends, maybe - in the morning while he had accompanied the Hime outside to buy some last-minutes ingredients), and a few he had wondered over and had actually been surprised by (Hari's.)

She had given him enchanted kunais! There were no Ninjas in her world, at least none answering to the definition the word held in the Elemental Nations. Some Non-Magicals people had a history of being Ninjas, in Japan at least (a relatively small country, from what he had seen on one of Hari's world maps), but they still had the same weapons. How strange – the people of Hari's old world were, in comparison, simply playing at being Ninjas (for they had none of the Chakra necessary to perform the Ninja Arts), yet they still invented and used the same weapons.

He simply could not understand such a similarity. He had honestly thought that the Elemental Nations were at least ahead in terms of weaponry – it was their lifeblood! But Hari's world had the very same weapons (and probably more besides, because he knew when someone was holding back information, but Hari didn't seem ready to tell him more about that for now) – and more, these weapons, once enchanted, were actually used by Japanese Battle Mages in their fights. It was one of their specialties.

He would have thought that Battle Mages were the other world's equivalent for Ninjas, but they had none of the subtlety and mentality Ninjas did, nor did they follow Ninja rules, and in truth it was only a profession. Battle Mages from each country had their own specialties, and weapons.

For one, the Non-Magical Ninjas did have some Taijutsu, but it was a Civilian-level Taijutsu and thus very limited ; while the Wizards as a rule did not seem big on physical attacks (or, indeed, on exercise at all, bar from some professions that simply couldn't do without – Magic as a rule seemed to make people remarkably lazy.) Ninjutsu obviously did not exist amongst Non-Magicals, bar the ones studying what was known as Martial Arts; and it had no use for Battle Mages – they simply used magic. They did not use Kenjutsu, Genjutsu or Fuiinjutsu either – it was either Magic, Magic weapons (with the enchantments doing most of the work – Ninjas here didn't use weapons enchanted to never miss; they trained until their aim was as good as it would get, and kept training after that) or Runes.

Yet for all that the other world had no real equivalent to Ninjas, their weapons were as good as any he had handled during his work as an ANBU. They had perfect balancing, the metal was strong but not too heavy, the handle comfortable and the blade sharp. He had been surprised.

The enchantments – made by Hari herself, she had assured him – were contained inside tiny runes (he really wanted to learn that Runic alphabet, but there were so many of them, and it was not as if he could make use of them, since he had no magic. And he was already learning English (it was the Hime's mother tongue), and there was only so many languages he could learn, especially since it was not his main focus and he didn't have all the time in the world. Priorities.

Basically, the blades were enchanted to be ever-sharp (so they did not need to be sharpened, for they simply never dulled), self-repairing (no chips nor weaknesses would appear in the metal, very useful, he appreciated that), had been magically strengthened (they could cut through anything not magically protected like literal butter, he would know, he had cut straight through one of his own kunai and had to throw it away but no regrets), and most interesting of all, they would always return to the Ninja pouch Hari had tied them to, via another set of Runes. Now that was nice, he would just have to say the adequate word for them to come back inside. During missions – especially ANBU-issued ones – the less traces you left the better; and though kunais, shuriken and the likes were standardized, each Hidden Village had their own Weaponsmiths, and it was still possible to identify in which Village the weapons had been fabricated, by studying how they were made. Indeed, Weaponsmiths who had not been officially tied to a Village by the others made the ANBU's weapons, to ensure the best secrecy possible. Still, they could always be discovered, so it was better to not leave weapons behind – though that was not always a possibility.

As such, having the weapons come back straight to his pouch without him having to go get them by hand was certainly a great advantage. The Jōnin was absolutely certain the Hokage would be very interested in those special weapon pouches, once Kakashi had showed them to him.

Yet as good as that gift was, it failed to be as appreciated as the second gift: that very innocuous piece of paper the silver-haired man was currently reverently holding in his hand. Certainly, less efforts were put into its making, but there were no less thought behind it.

Kakashi was allowed to go back on missions! Admittedly not as often as before – he would be used sparingly, he knew – and it was a rather gross exception to Konoha's procedure of watching over a possible threat looking to live in Konoha; but in all honestly Hari needed neither to be watched (none of them really thought she was a spy doing a long-con, or that she would turn against them if they did not give her a reason to – which they had no intention to do!) nor to be protected (the very idea, for Kakashi, who trained with her weekly, was simply laughable – the flesh was on the weak side, but what did it matter when the spirit was so very strong, and had the means to ensure the flesh could not be hurt at all?); and the Hokage himself had given the go-ahead, so Kakashi would not concern himself with the details.

As soon as the Hime had gone to bed (with a knowing smirk in his direction, but then again he had made no real effort to hide the excited energy that had started thrumming through his body as soon as he had finished reading the aforementioned slip of paper), he had slipped out of his day-off clothes into his ANBU ones, put on his ANBU mask (and a small part of himself felt like he could breathe again – he ignored it), and started running towards the Hokage Tower.

Today, he was reporting to the Hokage for duty, and would (hopefully) go on a mission right after. He was ready, not one ounce out of shape (how risible, he had never been more fit for duty, both mentally and physically, which was saying something), and as soon as a temporary replacement guard was sent to stay with the Hime, he would be high-tailing it out of Konoha.

Best Christmas ever.

Parva Dryadis: Latin meaning Small Dryads, i.e. Wood Nymphs (I don't actually remember where I got that information, sorry. But it's legit!)

Harry Potter Sweets found on Harry Potter Wiki

Most Naruto information found on Narutopedia.

Latin Spells:

Abduco: meaning to lead or take away / detach, withdraw

Abscido: meaning cut off, to separate, to take away

Hope you liked it!