"If I had that much responsibility on my shoulders, I'd crack and disappear, too."

"Then it's a good thing you don't have it, Tenjin-dono."

Business was booming as of late, but not without attracting the worst kind of attention. Smaller nearby nations had sent mercenary after mercenary toward Konohagakure no Sato in the hopes of taking down the First Hokage.

To date, nobody had taken Senju Hashirama down. The closest record went to a Takigakure mercenary named Kakuzu. Upon Kakuzu's failure, the whole of Konoha roared with their Hokage's achievements: both proud and relieved that they still had such a powerful man as their great guardian.

Perhaps they'd build peace with the people of Takigakure someday, perhaps not. They certainly showed no plans of doing so today.

Even the Uchiha Clan got a good laugh out of Hashirama giving that Kakuzu bastard more than he bargained for. Village pride could be a thing, they realized. Many Uchiha had it, but few had truly profited from the creation of Konohagakure more so than Uchiha Tenjin: the Son of a Thousand Fires.

This evening, he invited several of the finest and most promising young men from his clan to join him for a very important reason. It wouldn't be the first time he acted as an impromptu lead since their clan head abandoned his responsibilities and the village.

Although he was born into one of the clan's lowest ranking families, Tenjin carried more political clout in the village than any other remaining Uchiha. It hadn't taken much to strong-arm his way into an unofficial "regent" position, considering the clan's heir was still below the age of majority. Leaving the Uchiha Clan in the hands of a steward was better than entrusting everyone's fate in the irresponsible hands of an inexperienced teenager.

Tenjin, who didn't believe in hiring servants even after finding his fortune in this new village, poured another round of sake for the group. He hoped to get them good and buzzed before the night waxed philosophical.

"The mess that man left behind, though…it's unsettling, isn't it? That we could be so vulnerable?"

One of the men at Tenjin's table, Setsuna, was an old favorite of Uchiha Madara. Setsuna wasn't terribly moved by Tenjin's behavior and oftentimes grounded him back to reality by reminding him of his humble beginnings. A beggar's son would never lead this clan. It was that simple.

And on this particular evening, Setsuna chose to shake his head at Tenjin's statements. The conversation would soon go toward the clan's Great Disappointment: their next in line. "He didn't leave a son behind to build the dynasty we'd hoped for. All we have is the daughter."

And what a daughter at that! She was big-boned, harsh-faced, foul-tempered, vulgar, and carried herself at a height rivaling some of the larger men. If she'd been beautiful or submissive, at least, then this matter could have been salvaged.

Sadly, there were far lovelier girls in the clan and the mere thought of some unlucky man having to actually marry Uchiha Kazusa turned Setsuna's stomach. Sure, he wanted power and Kazusa was the gateway to that, but she was so very, very unattractive.

Since her birth, Kazusa was a symbol of the new ways replacing the old. However, since day one, problems arose. Her mother spent the next three weeks recovering from complications with the birth, only to die afterward.

Things did not improve as she grew, either. The Senju Clan repeatedly tried to calm the Uchiha Clan into keeping the peace within the village. Hashirama hadn't been above trying to bribe their clan head's daughter with a pet cat, not that the clan permitted the girl to keep it because of what the animal represented.

"Someone has to marry that cow just to secure the line."

Even Setsuna felt cow was a bit too cruel a metaphor for their heiress. He chose to glare at Tatsumi: a fellow veteran of yesteryear who once held favor with the old reign.

"I concur," Tatsumi murmured. "If we leave everything up to Kazusa, she'll never go through with it. The line will wither and we'll have to start all over again."

'That's not a valid option,' Setsuna realized.

The others drank and laughed, making wisecracks about their heiress. They teased, saying she was a son in all but the parts where it counted. Others said her eyes were crazy enough that her future husband would need to put a bag over her head just to screw her.

"You're going too far with those jokes," another man in the group, Naka, hissed. "I don't hear any of you talking about how Tenjin's pretty daughter is as flat as a board." The laughter stopped, save for one man in the back who had caught a case of drunken giggles. He quit when Naka glared. "The fact is seventeen years old is far too young to expect a woman to lead a clan without issue. How much do you want to bet the Senju Clan laughed until their sides hurt when we made the news public?"

If anyone would know among them, Tenjin would. His key partner in the Konoha Expansion Campaign was Senju Toka: the Hokage's first cousin. Their professional relationship had opened many Senju doors to him. He fancied himself to be a progressive man. The others, especially Naka and Setsuna, fancied him as a sell-out.

Tenjin slowly shook his head. "That was a mistake on our part. We shouldn't have announced anything until we confirmed an engagement for Kazusa. We're in bad enough graces with the village as it is. I'll try to salvage what I can, but this may be beyond even myself."

"Your reach has limitations?" Setsuna rolled his eyes and once again passed on the sake. He preferred to keep his mind clear at all times. All it took was one instance of a woman drugging his drink in the old days and waking up with a knife pressed to his jaw for him to swear off alcohol forever. "Who knew!"

"Enough with the sarcasm, you ass," Tatsumi growled. "In the meantime, we need to scramble and saddle the horse before she thinks she can run things by herself."

Naori, the only woman to be invited into the group, rolled her eyes at Tatsumi's remark. "You are such a sexist." As Naori saw it, gender wasn't the issue: age was. The previous clan head took over at too young an age and everyone's expectations for him were too high. The village was new, all these new ideals came forward, and Madara had to sort out all the chaos for himself.

Keep everything under control. Keep peace with old enemies. Build alliances left and right in case the village didn't last…but not saying such things aloud because that could be construed as treason or talk of revolt…

And now the daughter would have this burden across her back, sturdy though it appeared to be. Perhaps she could support, step forward, and start grooming her into the sort of leader this clan would need. Marriage, though…she couldn't imagine that any of the men in this group would be a good choice for the girl.

Tatsumi huffed again, downing the whole contents of his glass. Greedily, he held out the cup toward Tenjin, expecting him to pour more. Of the whole lot, his face was now ruddiest. "Am I sexist? We had so many issues with the last one and we allowed him to run wild. You want to do that again, Naori?" Silence all around. "I thought not."

Tenjin shook his bottle a bit, noticing how empty it was. "If Kazusa doesn't marry, I suppose it isn't a total loss. There's nobody she favors more than my daughter."

And they all knew why. Tenjin began cultivating that friendship from the time the girls were infants. Rumor was his wife intentionally induced labor on the same day as the clan head's wife so the girls would share a birthday. If Tenjin actually planned such a thing, it worked; the girls were practically inseparable.

"I'm sure she'll marry one of my sons if Naho suggests it."

And that was even more of a problem. Setsuna saw the writing on the wall with this family. Tenjin was a snake and always had been. He'd carved out his own private empire and made many powerful friends over the last seventeen years.

The Hyūga Clan signed their agreement to enter the village by negotiating with Tenjin, not Hashirama. He'd twisted the Hokage's arm into bringing the Inuzuka Clan under the Konoha banner, even though Hashirama's chief official from the Mitokado Clan begged him to reconsider.

He buddied up to several shady people in the village, mostly Senju, and helped the village expand by becoming the Shodaime's go-to for arson and scorched earth techniques. Many neighboring cultures who refused to bend before the Leaf met their end, thanks to that man. He was rewarded handsomely for it, too.

And with all that affluence, Tenjin grew overly confident and sure of himself. Setsuna was one of the few who remembered him as the scrawny wraith who was willing to do anything if it meant he could feed his invalid mother.

Gold silk garments, saffron-infused cuisine, and a fancy house did not a noble make. So long as Tenjin's contemporaries lived, they'd remember him first and foremost as a beggar's son. No amount of gilding could change that.

Though he was a master manipulator; Setsuna could give him that, at least. Considering all the slippery, unethical, cutthroat things Tenjin pulled in the name of building his own private dynasty, few men were hated inside the clan more than he. The problem was the village liked him. That and their heir was little more than a puppet Tenjin's daughter could control.

"You don't like my proposition to have her marry one of my sons, Setsuna?" Tenjin grinned. "Then maybe you or Tatsumi should consider that arrangement for yourself. Before this village was even founded, you and Hikaku were the left and right hands of–"

Naka slammed both of his palms on the table, causing Naori's cup to fall over. Tatsumi swore. Tenjin appeared slightly startled. "Enough of the circle jerk, you pompous ass! We didn't come all this way just to stroke your ego! We came here in the hopes of discussing a solution to our problem!"

It dawned on everyone then that they had none…and that was a truly terrifying prospect.

…

Konoha's drinking age was technically twenty, but no one really enforced it. Besides, the two of them had well earned a chance to sit on the dock together and share a bottle of plum wine. They weren't alone. A pair of boys sparred with each other in the background. The occasional glow of a fireball lit the quickly dimming sky.

In this heat, the two girls sat together in their light blue yukatas and fanned each other. "Sometimes I think you never sweat," Kazusa remarked, noticing how neat and put-together her friend was.

Naho had to be one of the prettiest girls in the village, even though she smoked and sounded like a hoarse old crone when she talked. She wrinkled up her nose playfully and tapped Kazusa's arm with the edge of her fan.

"What's your secret, Naho?"

Naho scooted closer, resting her head on Kazusa's shoulder. The bigger girl could smell her friend's osmanthus perfume and felt a tad excited over the scent. "Maybe it's the burns," Naho whispered.

In such close proximity, Kazusa had a good view of the tight, hairless pink skin from where her friend accidentally burned herself years ago. Naho came from a line of amazing arsonists and her family could boast a flame hotter than most Uchiha could accomplish. The first time Kazusa saw Naho release a blue katon, she'd watched in amazement as metal melted like ice before it.

But the jutsu came at a great cost to the user. Naho practiced without supervision and permanently mangled her chest as a result. Her ribs were black inside, charred from her actions. Her voice came out as a weak wheeze. It was coarse and rough, and it didn't take much to start her on a painful coughing fit.

Her brother Muraki needed to have an arm amputated because he burned it down to the tendons and couldn't be salvaged. And then there was Naho's father with his tight pink hands that threatened to crack if he stretched them too far.

"I think it ruined my sweat glands…not that you should try it." Naho nuzzled up, giving Kazusa her most winning smile. "Settle for smelling like a sweaty pig and bathe later. Save yourself the trouble."

Kazusa caught sight again of the glow. Both boys training in the distance were familiar to her. Then again, what sort of future leader didn't recognize everyone in the clan?

Uchiha Sarani was out there trying to help sweet curly-haired Kagami improve his aim on throwing shuriken. "You're getting there!" she heard Sarani call out to the boy. "Come on. Let's go and do it again. This time, further away."

Kagami stopped when he realized other people were watching him and happily waved. Kazusa waved back.

"My father says those burns are going to make it more difficult to arrange a marriage for me," Naho admitted, dragging Kazusa back to their conversation. "I think you're the only person outside my family that's seen me up close like that." It was true; she tended to favor high-collar tops and kept her chest hidden almost all the time. "You'll have better offers come around. After all, your father was–"

Kazusa let loose a slow annoyed growl as she downed the rest of the bottle. She rolled her eyes as she swallowed down gulp upon gulp of alcohol. 'Marriage. Marriage. Why the hell should I even think about marriage right now?' Would it put the clan in great jeopardy if she waited a few more years and picked somebody then?

Many girls thought about marriage and their future husbands. Naho certainly did. She'd practiced some of the ceremonies and nudged her father a few times, telling him quite openly which men in the clan she fancied. She'd flirt, too, knowing many of the men found her attractive. To girls like her, attraction was a game and she quite liked to win at it.

Kazusa, by comparison, would have been perfectly content spending the rest of her days adopted by Nekoba and her ninja cats. "Stop talking about it, okay? It makes me feel like a piece of meat." Naho let loose a tiny huff of annoyance, but she didn't go anywhere.

Within her, Kazusa felt something grow. It wanted out and who was she to stop it? A loud belch came out, big enough to make the boys stop what they were doing and stare. Kagami even double-checked to see if it made the lake ripple. "What? Think you can do better?"

Naho groaned again and nudged her shoulder into Kazusa's side. She rested her head on her taller friend and gave her a fake-pleading look. "Please don't encourage them. They'll actually do it."

Considering Naho had five older brothers, she spoke from experience. She could already see Kagami excitedly swallowing a ball of air in an attempt to force a belch. All that came out was an itty bitty baby burp. "Congratulations, Kagami. You're nasty. Go play with Sarani someplace else."

Kazusa laughed, feeling another big bubble build in her chest. Maybe she could set it alight and entertain the kid a bit more.

Naho, on the other hand, gave her a judgmental glare and managed to stop her friend being so unladylike. "You're nasty, too," Naho insisted, arms folded. "Sometimes I wonder why we're best friends. It defies all logic. We couldn't be any more different if we tried!"

"I suppose. You're all prim and proper and I'm…" Well, tomboy was perhaps the most flattering way of putting it. She'd heard far worse from the clan and village.

"You're…?" Naho's smile turned contagious. Kazusa found herself grinning back, easing in until the tip of her nose touched Naho's. A low laugh built up in her throat as she goosed her friend's sides with enough surprise to make Naho squeak. The willowy girl yelped, lost her balance, and fell in the water.

"Ha! I finally got you!" Kazusa thumped the dock with the flat of her palm, roaring in amusement until she felt Naho grab her ankles. A good squeeze there could topple her over and Naho knew it. Within a split second, her rump hit the dock. "FUCK YOU, NAHO! STOP!"

Her legs kicked and flailed, but Naho refused to let go. She was dripping wet, unkempt, and hellbent on dragging her friend into the watery depths beside her. Kazusa continued to flail until her ass touched water. She hit the lake with a graceless splunk and sank like a stone.

When her head resurfaced, she spat some of the lake water at her friend. "This is no way for a new tokubetsu jōnin to behave." Naho gave Kazusa's braid a hearty yank. "I mean it, Kazusa. You're a jōnin. You'll need to start acting like a leader soon, too."

Kazusa grinned, bumping her brow against Naho's before goosing her sides again. "Today's not that day."

"What did I miss?"

Both girls turned around to see one of Kazusa's teammates. "Kariudo!" He'd been a longtime friend of hers ever since they first met. If anyone understood her better than Naho did, Kariudo did. "We're wrestling in the lake." Naho protested, but Kazusa put her hand over her mouth. "Want to join us? The water feels–"

"Look, I came out here to deliver some news."

Whatever that news turned out to be, Kariudo wasn't his usual goofball self. "Why so somber, Kariudo?" Kazusa inquired. "You make it sound like somebody died." When his expression only worsened, she felt a chill. "Who…?"

Kariudo squatted, holding out his hands to pull the two young women out of the water. Naho went first. Kazusa required both hands. Once they sat together, both girls dripping and the Inuzuka youth despondent, he uttered the message he'd sought to deliver in the first place.

"I came out here to tell you the Shodaime's dead."