sunshineverse

Entry tags:

zz old game: naruto

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Who: Kushina and whoever
When: Arriving March 1st, late morning, until leaving March 9th, mid-afternoon
Where: In and around Konoha, between the village gates and the travel seal if you really want, ...seriously, just everywhere when she's not spending quality time with her family
Notes: Just come say hi 8| Aforementioned quality time with family will be most mornings from March 2-9, and all nights. But family teammates are always welcome to dinner. >3>

No matter how many times she came back to Konoha, she always made a point to walk around different parts of the village. It felt necessary to reacquaint herself with the streets and various landmarks after spending so long away from home. And meeting up with friends is a must too. On a couple afternoons she even takes some time in one of the training areas by the river. No reason not to keep sharp, even if she's technically on vacation.

Whether you're looking for her or not, that bright red hair of hers isn't hard to miss.

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Unluckily for him, she did see him. And she stopped flinging shuriken at her targets to wave at him. Perhaps a bit useless if he couldn't see her, but it's what he'd see if he turned around again.

"Sasuke! It's good to see you again!"

Of course she'd spot him; Sasuke stopped when he heard his name, considered briefly the merits of making a run for it, and decided that it really wasn't worth getting chased down humiliatingly quickly. With a concealed sigh, he turned around to lean back into the clearing with a half-hearted wave.

"Kushina-san. I heard you were back in town." He paused, and then with a vague gesture at her training weapons, added somewhat hopefully: "I won't interrupt your training longer."

"Oh no, it's fine! Come talk to me, I haven't heard much of anything that's happened in the last few weeks!"

Bright and cheery as ever today. The last news she got from Konoha was Minato's last visit. And now he's on a mission and apparently not due back until that night.

Ah ... not having heard much of the news probably explained it. The people involved had meant that what would have otherwise been a routine mission cock-up had somehow become a well-known fact. Maybe that would mean not having to talk about it and field questions about whether he was fine as if he'd been the one injured.

"Nothing much has gone on in the village," he said, conveniently leaving out that stuff had happened outside of it. "What you did was probably more exciting."

She'd likely be getting some of the gossip later, and if she was gonna harass anyone for details, it would be the Hokage himself. But that's not until sometime later in her stay, if at all.

"Eh? Not really. It's mostly paperwork and the council elders treating me like some new genin half the time."

She blew a raspberry and crouched down to pick up a kunai, which she twirled around her finger by the hole. ~~Such mature. Very adult.~~

"How's the clan doing? I was gonna wait until tomorrow to drop in on your mom. Today I was feeling like I had too much energy to burn off to sit still on a social call."

He relaxed a bit more, finally, when her lack of response to his words made it obvious that she definitely hadn't heard. It was easy then to dig up a hint of a smile at her words, stepping in from where he'd been hovering at the edge of the clearing.

"I'm pretty sure you wouldn't let the elders treat you like that," he pointed out. "And you get to see different places."

Not that Sasuke was discontent in Konohagakure, and not that he apparently deserved to go much further afield with what had happened when Obito had sent them out. The smile faded at the thought of that and the cold disapproval at home; his first mission as ranking chuunin and he'd of course not come anywhere close to Itachi's record.

"It's the same as ever. Mom will be glad to see you when you find the time." That much was true, at least.

"Ha! You know me, I let them have it every single time!" She grinned at him. "It's never quiet in the administrative building. And maybe compared to you, but if you're that bummed about not getting to see new sights, I'll put in a mission with Obito before I go back! Your whole team can come out and see how the rebuilding project's coming along! Think of it like a paid vacation while Hokage-kun has to do all the official stuff."

Okay, maybe she misconstrued his words a little bit, but her offer's genuine.

"I'm glad some things haven't changed, though. Can you tell her to expect me some time after noon?"

"I'll let her know," he nodded, thinking about that first offer now: a vacation didn't sound that bad, really (and paid sounded even better) -- an opportunity to get away from the village and the potential of having to deal with the disappointment all around. Trying not to look like he was too eager about it, Sasuke added: "Going to see the rebuilding would be pretty nice. Hinata's supposed to be training in diplomatic tactics, too."

He paused, then definitely trying not to look eager: "Will Naruto be along if we go?"

Their team had been just that awkward bit off-kilter without the loudest and most obnoxious member. Obito at least had to act like a normal person when there were foreign dignitaries around.

"Of course I want Naruto to come along! Uzushio is part of his clan's heritage and I can't remember the last time he came!"

She seemed a little annoyed thinking about it, but the emotion passes faster than a wave rolling onto the beach and retreating back again. Her usual smile came back into place as she went into planning mode, trying to put together the logistics of what to do and when.

"I suppose I could give everyone a tour to the different buildings that have been completed. And if Hinata's training in diplomacy, I could arrange a meeting with the other council members too. But when would be a good time? We've got business in the Land of Waves at the end of the month, so that won't work. Early April? ...Wait, no, I have to oversee the first academy class graduation exam. But after that, I should be free to arrange things as needed. What do you think, Sasuke? A week or so in early or mid-April?"

Sasuke's face fell when she listed out reasons that pushed the date back further and further, the excitement at the prospect of escaping the village immediately fading into just the vague anticipation of seeing how a fledgling shinobi village would look. Academy graduation for the first time -- it was still something he was interested in seeing, but not until April ...

"Yeah," he said, trying to sound like he was thinking about their schedules (wide open except for missions, with no jounin promotion on the horizon for him at least). "I can talk to Hinata and see if she can get Hiashi to approve."

Disappointment noted Sasuke.

"I swear I'd love to have you all sooner, but that big festival's coming up in the Land of Waves at the end of the month and apparently all the council's making an appearance. And it would be our luck that clan and village politics might get in the way until we can figure out how to make it sound more like a mission and less like a vacation."

The two advisers were still lurking around and she wouldn't put it past them to swoop in and stop the Hokage's team from getting an "easy" mission on grounds of apparent favoritism. She was planning on making it a B-rank, since it would technically be a diplomatic mission.

"I think I can talk the clan heads into it. Even though I'm in charge of another village now, I'm still Yondaime's wife, and that's gotta count for something with making them see things my way, right?"

"Yeah, that makes sense," he said, because it did, however inconvenient the sense might be. Whatever complaints other clans had usually were squashed easily enough if the Uchiha and Hyuuga agreed on something, but that was a big enough if that they'd have plenty of politics to deal with.

Especially since they would be sending the Hyuuga heir and the Yondaime's son into a new village after an event that was more or less a non-violent announcement of the village's arrival as a real village. When it came to this sort of thing, Sasuke probably had it easier than either of his teammates.

Still, he nodded in agreement at her last statement. If anyone could talk until someone agreed, it was probably Naruto's mom. Naruto had probably gotten that trait from her.

"If I tell Hinata beforehand, she can start working on Hiashi now, too."

"Great! If she can start on him, that'd be perfect. Either way, I'll definitely make sure to drop in on Hiashi before I leave. I can't see him saying no since I'll be getting Minato to come along too, even if he wouldn't be part of the mission."

Best part is she hasn't suggested this plan to anyone else yet. But really, voluntelling people for stuff is awesome.

Sasuke nodded, resolving not for the first time to make sure Hinata and Itachi met more often and got along better than Hiashi and Fugaku before they stepped into their roles as respective clan heads. Some of the squabbling seemed petty even from Sasuke's vantage point, and some of the complaints Hiashi levelled about anything out of the ordinary happening to his heir outright ridiculous.

"With both you and the Yondaime Hokage along, it'll be hard for Hiashi to say no without giving offense," he said with satisfaction. "And Mom and Dad won't care where I go."

That was perhaps a bit of an overstatement; Mikoto typically checked in on any of his out-of-town missions. Still, his whereabouts were of considerably less concern than the heir's.

"Mmhm! I think we'll have all his objections beaten to a pulp!"

She punched the air once, looking quite pleased. But it's quickly replaced by surprise at his overstatement. Out of sheer reflex, she almost cuffs him upside the head. But she stops her hand an inch away and rests it on top of his ~~duckbutt~~ head.

"Of course your parents will care where you go! Sure you're not next in line to be the clan head, but they both still care a lot, ya know! You shoulda seen the look on Fugaku's face this one time you all had just left on a mission... I can't remember exactly where. But he kept pacing around with that grumpy look on his face. You know the one."

She does her best to try and imitate it, but she only manages to capture half of it correctly.

He flinched instinctively when her hand was suddenly close to his face, the speed with which she'd moved alarming and the angle alarming for a different reason -- and there it was, he was getting patted on the head like a wayward kid. He hadn't meant for the words to come out as they had and was about to say as much when Kushina dropped a piece of information that left him blinking in surprise.

It wasn't like Sasuke didn't know that his father cared, it just wasn't like Fugaku in the least to show any kind of concern. Even when Itachi was away on a mission their father carried on as usual, for all that he was relieved when his eldest returned.

"I don't ... think I do," he said after a moment of trying to work out the expression on her face. "My dad is never worried; Mom might sometimes, but Dad ..."

"Bah! He just doesn't show it around you kids, tries not to when other people are around, but a woman knows." She winks as she pulls back her hand to tap the side of her head. "But I can't take all the credit. Your mom was the one that clued me into watching for some of those little signs, so now I do whenever I come over."

These are important life lessons here, Sasuke.

"Isn't it funny what you can learn when you pay attention to the smallest details?"

Not showing it around them ... it was weird enough to realize that Kushina was referring to both him and Itachi as 'kids', let alone trying to picture Fugaku's stern face looking anything but stoically unamused. Distantly, Sasuke was aware that Fugaku had been perhaps less inclined to stiffness when he was younger, but he wasn't sure if that was so much his own memory as his mother's stories about things he didn't remember anymore.

"I guess," he said, awkward now that they were definitely talking about feelings (and his father's, of all people). "Anyway -- Dad probably won't say anything against my going, is what I meant."

She grins broadly and sneaks in a quick ruffling of his hair.

"Alright, I get what you mean. I've held you up long enough. Say hi to everyone for me, okay? Even though I'll be there tomorrow..."

It's also her polite way of saying 'I keep forgetting you wouldn't want to hang out with your childhood friend's mom.'

Why did everyone insist on ruffling his hair like he was six year old again -- Sasuke didn't duck quite quickly enough, the mess of black that still made Mikoto sigh on occasion stubbornly fighting its way against gravity even more with Kushina's help.

"It was good to see you, Kushina-san," he said, polite enough that he meant it. "I'll let my mom know to expect you sometime soon."

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