Living in the Mist (Chapter 28)

Disclaimers: Not mine.

"Gai, this is Yamanaka Ryuichiro," scratching the back of his head in an exasperated manner, Kakashi pulled his legs up to avoid the wet floor. He could never understand how Gai could cry like that without getting dehydrated. And right now, it seemed that Ryuichiro had the same ability as well.

"Gai-san, please," Iruka found himself a seat beside Kakashi and used his teacher's voice without noticing. They had some serious matters to tend to right now and Gai's bawling was definitely not going to help.

"Oh Youthful Sen…"

"Gai-san!" slamming one of his palms on the tabletop, Iruka raised his voice and glared darkly at the Taijutsu specialist. He could felt the tiny waves of pain attacking the back of his head due to his steadily building headache. He was way too prickly to deal with any weird jounin's antics right now. Rubbing at his temples tiredly, Iruka continued with a calmer tone of voice, "Please. We have something important here to discuss." And this time, Iruka was lucky to have both Gai and Ryuichiro nodding at his statement without making any more unwanted noise.

"Ryuichiro-san, you might want to tell us more about yourself," taking control over the conversation, Kakashi switched to a more comfortable position on his chair - or as comfortable as he could get on the very small wooden chair – and requested using his usual bored tone of voice. He still had doubts for the old man's identity although all the evidence he had collected clearly pointed out that the man was indeed Yamanaka Ryuichiro.

"Well, I'll make this short. I was sent to Mist by Sandaime and Yondaime to find out more about the clan right after the Umino pair came to Konoha. I managed to find out a couple of stuffs before I was found out and they threw me into jail since then," Ryuichiro replied steadily without missing a beat. He knew that he did not gain the full trust from the other three ninjas yet so he would have to spend the time to explain himself. A tattoo and a dog tag were not going to help him much in his current situation. They were safe for now and all his words would be carefully analysed, unlike when they were in the underground dungeon.

"Why didn't they kill you?" much to Iruka's surprise, Kakashi did not ask for the clan's information, but instead asked for the reason why Ryuichiro was still alive. However, a little thinking told him that it was the right question to ask since spies were usually killed off immediately once they had been found out. Or they would undergo some torture and interrogation sessions before they were killed as well. So why was Ryuichiro still alive after all these years?

"I assume that you're aware of my clan's specialized technique?" coughing a little, Ryuichiro casted his gaze at Kakashi as he spoke. Iruka focused on Ryuichiro's pair of lidded eyes and instantly noticed the eye colour which happened to be the clearest of blue. It was the exact same colour as Ino's eyes.

"Mind Body Switch Technique?"

"Yes. They made me performed this skill on their Daimyo from time to time. They are the powerful ones in Mist. Even the council avoids having anything to do with them," Ryuichiro nodded at Gai and elaborated.

"So they keep you alive to control their Daimyo?" nodding slowly at Ryuichiro's explanation, Kakashi prodded further. He needed to confirm Ryuichiro's identity and extract as much information as he could before they started discussing about Seiryuu's tattoo in front of the old man.

"Yeah, you could say so. Or you could say that I have a very important thing of theirs with me and they don't know where I kept it," Ryuichiro replied and smiled smugly when he noticed the surprised expression on the other three occupants of the room.

"Y-You have a thing of theirs?" doing a very good job at imitating a gold fish, Iruka asked disbelievingly. Even Kakashi's bored expression changed to a sceptical look when he heard about Ryuichiro's claim. The clan's people were far from weak and from the chakra signals they felt before, those people were in fact very strong. So how on earth Yamanaka Ryuichiro managed to get something from them and kept it so well?

"Did they torture you for the information?" Gai however, did not look affected by Ryuichiro's claim at all since he was more concerned about how Ryuichiro managed to stay alive.

"They did torture me but they couldn't break me. My clan's specialty is messing up with people's mind so I guessed I have immunity towards the commonly used interrogation techniques. They gave up after a couple of years since I didn't break no matter what they did to me," Ryuichiro said and rubbed the back of his neck sheepishly as he felt his face warmed up. Iruka managed to notice the slight blush which crept up the wrinkled neck and he could not help but to ask, "What did they do to you aside from torturing you?"

"They sent Seiryuu to seduce me. You know who she is, right?"

Kakashi's and Iruka's face went from the previous placid expression to one of pure shocked when Ryuichiro mentioned about the beauty seducing him. Both of them were wide-eyes as they yelled "What?!" simultaneously and unintelligently.

"Yeah, the one with the green eyes. Very pretty," Ryuichiro blushed darker and Iruka was vaguely aware of the churning of his stomach's contents. An old man blushing was not a very nice sight to look at, in fact, it was just plain weird.

"But I thought she's in her twenties, or at most reaching thirty years old! Did they ask a kid to seduce you back then? Are you a paedophile or what?" Iruka blurted the whole sentence incredulously, his eyes impossibly wide. Seiryuu's age and Ryuichiro's statement simply did not make any sense for him. The only explanation he could reason out was the paedophile theory and he knew that did not make much sense either.

"That woman is somewhere in her fifties now, just like Kuroshi. I don't know what she did but she looked exactly the same over the years," laughing at Iruka's reaction, Ryuichiro explained, trying to clarify his statement. He was surprised by Seiryuu's ever young look at first but he did not dwell on it. Instead, he just ogled at the beauty whenever he could and teased her about her failed seduction mission in order to get under her skin and made her mild temper spiked. It was fun for a man who had nothing better to do in a jail. However, before Kakashi and Iruka could make any comment, Ryuichiro voiced out again. "Wait, do any of you saw her back before?"

"Seiryuu's back?" tilting his head to the side curiously, Kakashi asked as he wondered if the old man had noticed about the tattoo as well.

"Yes. There's a dragon tattoo with kanji on her back. Too bad I can't catch any of the words back then."

"But we did," Iruka patted Ryuichiro's shoulder and smiled warmly at the old man. He would have to thank Kakashi for the extraordinary observing skill since he would not be able to spot all those tiny words by himself. However, his smile faltered for a little when he thought about the event that they assumed to be related to the sequence of the kanji.

"Really? What did it…"

"What did you know about the clan? What did you get from them?" not allowing Ryuichiro to finish the sentence, Kakashi cut in half way and asked. He preferred to gain all the information first before he shared the information he had with a person whom he could not fully trust yet. That was why he planned to get everything out of Ryuichiro's mouth before he actually started to talk about his own findings.

Ryuichiro sighed in resignation as he realised that Kakashi was still wary towards him. However, he did not complain much about that as he started to talk once again. "I've told you before, the pendant is able to summon something once it's fully filled with chakra."

"Yeah, we already knew that. And?"

"It seems that the summoning had to be done on a certain time since they waited for so long, as in twenty something years, before they made their moves."

"We knew that as well. Anything else?" Kakashi's voice took an impatient edge when all the information that Ryuichiro provided was already figured out by them. The kanji sequence definitely told them a lot of things that Ryuichiro tried so hard to figure out.

"Not much else. I know some of their fighting abilities but we can talk about that later. I took a scroll of theirs. I don't know what is it used for but they seemed to treasure it a lot," Ryuichiro coughed a couple of times before he replied quietly. However, he did not tell them the location of the scroll, nor did he show the scroll to them.

"Ryuichiro-san, what are you waiting for?" Gai who was silent all the time finally spoke up as he looked at Ryuichiro expectantly along with the other two occupants of the room. They were obviously anticipating for the scroll that Ryuichiro mentioned but the old man did not seem to make any move to show them the said scroll.

"Uh, I sealed the scroll using one of the summoning techniques and I'll have to summon the scroll to show it to you guys," shifting nervously on his seat, Ryuichiro started to mumbled as he avoided the gaze of the other three ninjas in the room. Iruka and Gai looked at Ryuichiro with a neutral expression as they knew Kakashi would push the matter even if they did not. And as expected, they were right. "Show us the scroll."

"B-But…"

"Show us. Now," leaning forward, Kakashi put both of his hands on the table and hissed in a low tone of voice. He could not allow his chakra to spike so instead he used his voice to show that there was no room for discussion in this matter.

"I don't…"

"I said, show us, now," Kakashi glared at Ryuichiro and repeated the sentence slowly. However, the warning tone that his voice took was enough to make the message beneath the sentence very clear. Show it or I'll make you.

Mumbling a fine under his breath, Ryuichiro started to make hand seals with ease, if not a little bit slower, despite his injured hands. The hand seals sequence was nothing new to the other three experienced ninjas in the room – it was for the summoning technique. Finishing up the last seal, Ryuichiro nicked his thumb briefly with his fingernail and drew a simple seal on the tabletop using his blood. Right after the seal started to glow, Ryuichiro put his palms on top of the seal, channelled some of his chakra into it and that resulted in a very quiet poof as white smoke surrounded the seal instantly. "There," removing his hands from the seal, Ryuichiro grumbled as he watched the smoke cleared away, not wanting to meet anyone's gaze. He was actually sounding extremely defeated compared to his usual cheerful self but Kakashi was too busy looking at the scroll – no, scrolls – to pay any attention to him. There were not supposed to be two scrolls.

"This…" Iruka looked back and forth from the scrolls to Ryuichiro as he could not form any proper sentence. From Gai's furrowed brows and tightly sealed lips, it was obvious that he was as confused as Iruka as well. They could understand the appearance of the scroll with Iruka's family crest on it, they were anticipating for the scroll after all. But, why was there another scroll with Kakashi's family crest on it resting on top of the table?

Tentatively reaching out, Kakashi took the familiar scroll in his right hand as his left hand gripped the side of the table so tightly until a loud crack was heard when he removed a small section of the table. Trying hard not to let his chakra spiked wildly, Kakashi took a deep breath and asked calmly as he clutched the scroll close to his chest, "Where… did you get this…?"

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"Look at what we have here," Seiryuu drawled lazily as she twirled her hair and let those smooth strands ran between her slim fingers. She was quick to compose herself after she realised that they were busted. The last thing she needed now was panic and panic was what she would not do at any cost, no matter how strong her opponents were going to be.

"What's the meaning of all these?!" Suzaku roared as he whipped his head around, a look of total disbelief plastered on his face. Byakko was gripping the handle of his tachi with one hand while his other hand was placed on Suzaku's shoulder, preventing the red-head to do anything impetuous. Calmly, Byakko looked at the battle worn Seiryuu and demanded, "Explain."

"Do we need to?" Genbu allowed Seiryuu to do all the talking as he slowly planned how to get rid of the two very, very strong opponents in front of him. It would not be easy but he knew he had a better brain than that two. He had to think of a plan if he wanted to get out of this situation unscathed, which was fairly impossible in his opinion.

"Is that Akio? And Junko?!" spotting the lump of people laying unceremoniously on the floor behind Seiryuu, Suzaku narrowed his eyes and stated the obvious. He was angry and he did not hesitate to show it by allowing his chakra to burst and making the already stuffy air even more suffocating. "They're our people! We're supposed to protect them!" Suzaku shook his head repeatedly as he reached for his lance behind his back, his lean form poising in a pre-battle posture.

"No. You're supposed to protect them and we're supposed to use them. Kuroshi-sama gave us different responsibilities so we're just doing our jobs," Seiryuu understood that Genbu needed more time to come out with a plan so she was trying her best to drawl with her very angry opponents who were demanding for an explanation. She did not want to fight Byakko and Suzaku at all. She was sure that she would not be able to escape without getting harm if her opponents were these two. But from the angrily spiking chakra, she knew that most likely she would have to fight after all.

"What the hell are you talking about?!"

"Suzaku!" pulling the furious red-head back to his side, Byakko looked at Seiryuu and Genbu intensely before he spoke, "I want an explanation now. We don't want to fight in case you both have nothing to do with this."

"Byakko, what the hell are you thinking?! They're hurting our people!" Suzaku struggled futilely and cursed when he failed to remove himself from Byakko's death grip. He could not understand why Byakko was reasoning with these people when all the evidence presented in front of them clearly showed that Seiryuu and Genbu were far from innocent.

"Well, what I can say is believe what you see. We're not going to explain ourselves," still playing with her hair, Seiryuu smiled and replied softly, as if the whole argument had nothing to do with her.

"Fine then. We're not going to go easy on you two," slowly releasing his hold on Suzaku's bicep, Byakko unsheathed his tachi and replied in an even tone. He did not know the reason behind Seiryuu's and Genbu's actions, but he did know that he needed to protect his people. And that was what he was going to do.

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