Shikako's most recent mission assignment(s) had been:

(From Danzo): The Ne agent was to observe and report on the political situation in the Land of Birds, with an eye towards preventing the country from gaining ninja forces, and- if necessary- take action towards that end. The Ne agent was to remain unseen.

(From herself): Shikako was to find a plausible cause to delay her return to Konoha. She should not return before the Third Exam.

The Third Exam of the Chuunin Exams were approaching. If Danzo stayed true to her assessment of his character and motivations, all ROOT agents would likely be ordered to remain stationed underground during the invasion of Konoha.

If Shikako was already underground at that time, that restriction would make her next mission far more difficult.


Both missions had been completed successfully:

The Ne agent had revealed the Watari nin and their schemes, without revealing her own presence to anyone. The guards of the Land of Birds had taken losses, but the Ne agent's invisible interference had ensured their ultimate success.

The Ne agent had remained unseen. The Ne agent was excellent at remaining unseen, even among other Ne agents.

Shikako had prevented the assassination of the Daiymo (whose father had already been the victim of a foul and scheming advisor, and who had a twin sister who loved him very much). Shikako had obviously been motivated solely by the desire to fulfill Danzo-sama's wishes that the Land of Birds not be overthrown in a coup by a ninja clan and so "gain ninja forces," because the Ne agent was a good little tool who was incapable of personal motivation.

Most unfortunately, these necessary additional efforts had taken several extra days. It was such a shame to fail to live up to Danzo's totally reasonable standards of perfection. Of course, the Ne agent would not feel personal sadness or disappointment at this failure. Only the blank melancholy at failing to perform successfully for Danzo-sama, which Danzo liked to see in his agents, and somehow didn't consider as an emotion that needed to be crushed, because he was sane and logical like that.

The Ne agent would have to be sure to pack up Sarcasm properly into her shadow again before reporting to Danzo, as it seemed to get stronger when she failed to let it out for exercise.


Shikako returned to Konoha on the day of the Third Exam with some small pride at her success. Shikako did not often unpack Pride, but she sometimes did let it out quiet moments alone after finishing a personal mission.

Shikako had neatly unpacked more than usual from her shadow-storage today, because today was important. Shikako had given herself a mission again.

This was perfectly allowable.

It had never been forbidden.

And it was logical. In order to ensure successful completion, large missions often needed many smaller steps to be performed. Some of these smaller steps had to be self-assigned, as a ninja reacted to problems in the field.

These smaller steps could certainly be considered smaller missions.

The larger mission was neatly shelved in her shadow-storage today, which was also perfectly allowable, because that technique had also never been forbidden (or commented on or even noticed by anyone besides herself, as even Fu merely considered it a personal quirk) and moreover was in perfect alignment with Danzo's insistence that all agents maintain perfect focus on the task at hand.

Shikako had more critical (and insubordinate and even disloyal) thoughts regarding Danzo unpacked than she usually did, and more unpacked feelings regarding a desire to spend time with Shikamaru and Shikaku and Yoshino Nara than she usually allowed. But that was also perfectly fine, because there was zero chance any of that could possibly interfere with the success of her current mission.


Shikako's mission briefing to herself was this:

Orochimaru's invasion of Konoha was happening now. (Happily, this made the Ne agent's upcoming "unavoidable" engagement with enemy forces before the Ne agent's report to Danzo totally plausible.)

Likely as not, Sasuke was going to chase after Gaara. Shika and Sakura and Naruto and Pakkun would then receive a mission to go after Sasuke.

Nine adult Sound ninja would attempt to intercept this team in the woods, and Shika would drop back to delay them. Alone. Thinking thoughts about how he'd just wanted an ordinary life, and a wife that wasn't too pretty or ugly, and a kid, eventually.

Shika was going to drop back to delay nine adult Sound ninja alone, and he didn't have a plan that would let him survive.

(If Shika was lucky, Asuma Sarutobi would come sweeping in at the very last moment. Shika's life couldn't be trusted to luck.)


Shikako's mission was this:

Shikamaru Nara was going to survive his encounter with the nine adult Sound ninja, and he was going to do so without developing any kind of curiosity towards anything remotely connected with Shimura Danzo, because that kind of curiosity was lethal, and Shikamaru Nara was going to survive.


The problem with trying to silently take out nine adult Sound ninja before they managed to encounter your brother who had dropped back alone, was that they inevitably called for backup when their comrades started mysteriously disappearing in the trees.

It was understandable- nothing in this location was critical to holding the village, so the oversized team had likely been ANBU-hunting. And now they thought they'd found one. A skilled one. So they'd called in two other teams of nine.

Shika had, indeed, dropped back to delay the nine adult Sound ninja. He was now facing thirteen. And would have to avoid some blood-slicked trees, and blackened holes of soot and gore, and strings of red-colored ninja wire as he fought. There were some actual corpses, too, but those were easy to avoid.

The thirteen remaining Sound ninja had cornered Shika in hopes of drawing the ANBU out.

Shikako did not know if going after a twelve-year-old was a strategy that would draw out a real Konoha ANBU. She thought, rather cynically, that it wouldn't. Shika was a genin now, not an Academy student. A Konoha ANBU would know that, and act accordingly.

Shikako was not a real Konoha ANBU.

(After today, she was not sure she wanted to be. She remained unsure because joining the Konoha ANBU was the only way she knew of to escape ROOT, other than being sent to spy on Team 7. Although, of course, no one ever escaped from ROOT.)

Shikako dropped down from her spot in the trees, to appear at Shika's back. She was wearing her ROOT mask, so that was good. No recognizable features similar to the Nara clan- or worse, Yoshino Nara- were apparent.

She was also visibly a centimeter or two shorter than Shika, and that was bad, because that would encourage questions. Questions were more dangerous that thirteen adult Sound ninja, because Shikako could not defend Shika from questions he might want to ask without generating more. A conundrum.

The thirteen adult Sound ninja did not look like they were inclined to underestimate Shikako based on her size, and that was a shame. But sacrificing her vantage point in the surrounding trees wasn't the tactical sacrifice it looked to be, because Shikako had already lost most of her stealth advantage. Shikako wasn't good enough at scent-suppression techniques to cover up the smell of this much blood. Especially since most of it wasn't even hers.

Sacrificing her spot in the trees wasn't a tactical sacrifice at all, really- Shikako's goal was protecting Shika, and her spot at Shika's back was the best way of achieving that.

…It was a nice place to be, too. He wasn't even subconsciously flinching away from the tiny gore-streaked masked ninja leaking killing intent at all their attackers, which was sweet. Shikako sent a wave of Positive Intent his way. Shika would be safe.

Shika would be safe, but Shika, unfortunately, had not practiced his shadow jutsu thoroughly enough to catch more than nine adult Sound ninja at once.

(Shikako had some basic abilities in that department. Carefully practiced away from Danzo's gaze, as she wasn't supposed to know she was a Nara. Shikako was far more skilled at the shadows in her mind, which were invisible and didn't even cause a chakra spike. Shikako might theoretically be capable of lending her visible physical shadow as support to Shika. However, that would lead to curiosity. Curiosity regarding unknown tiny masked Naras was also curiosity regarding Danzo's predilection for nabbing and brainwashing clan children as members of his personal secret army, and was therefore lethal. So, showing evidence of Nara shadow affinity was quite contrary to the goal of Shikamaru Nara's survival.)

Shikamaru Nara's effective limit of "nine adult ninja at once" was not something Shikako would have known, because there were only supposed to be nine adult Sound ninja attacking Shika in the first place. Possibly the skill of the members of the two additional teams also had something to do with it. And these thirteen were the most skilled and wary of the initial twenty-seven, because these were the ones who had managed to survive Shikako's preliminary assaults.

(Possibly the two other teams of nine had been the cause of Asuma Sarutobi's delay in the other timeline. Shikako did not know what was keeping him now. He was late. Though probably not in the dead way. Clearly, it was good that Shikako had not trusted Shika's well-being to Asuma Sarutobi's timeliness. Shika defended and facing additional ninja was preferable to Shika undefended and facing fewer ninja, especially since that timeline's Shika had been thinking wistful thoughts about how nice it would have been to have lived a little longer, and hadn't seemed to have a plan.)

There were four Sound shinobi still free, and, of course, they sensibly attacked the ninja holding nine of their fellows still, who was Shika.

Shikako defended him.

She took a few more minor injuries.

Most unfortunately, the wind jutsu that caused her to impact the tree and suffer a minor concussion was followed up by a shuriken that cracked her mask. Hopefully, the blood from her scalp would obscure any familiar-looking features.

The four Sound shinobi took longer than she'd like to finish off, and Shika was straining with the effort of holding the other nine. He was also distracted by looking at the knife buried in her lower chest, which had mostly hit armor and was worse than it looked. It had slowed Shikako down in finishing up the last two free Sound ninja, though. And that was an indication that she might not be able to finish killing all the nine Sound ninja held in Shikamaru Nara's shadow before Shikamaru was forced to drop the technique, so perhaps some concern was understandable.

Shikako attempted to dispatch the remaining nine Sound ninja as quickly as possible. She succeeded, in that she knew she'd pushed her body and chakra to its limit and couldn't have possibly gone any faster.

She got six of them.

Then Shika let out a gasp and knelt one knee on the ground. Shikamaru Nara was not suffering from chakra exhaustion, but he did not have enough left to sustain a jutsu or physical enhancement. And Shikamaru Nara had not practiced fighting without using any chakra.

(This was not surprising. Even the ROOT program had not had anyone practice fighting while deprived of chakra, until Danzo had noticed Shikako doing it, and introduced it into the training program.)

Of the remaining three Sound ninja, two of them headed towards Shika.

It was a poor tactical decision. They were sacrificing an opportunity to attack the person who had killed twenty-four of their fellows and was trying to kill them, in order to go after an exhausted genin who had not killed anyone.

Possibly they had analyzed Shikako's fighting strategy and concluded that this was the best way to really hurt their opponent.

A poor tactical decision. They should have run, instead. Shikako would have let them go.

Shikako broke off her attack on the one Sound ninja who had attacked her (and who did run, after her disengagement, grimly clutching the wound on his leg) and Body Flickered into the very small space between the staggering-up-from-his-kneeling-stance Shika, and the Sound ninja. It was good that she was small.

Shika was thankfully still uninjured.

Shikako had lost her air-was temporarily winded from the attack from the running Sound ninja, and would be for the next few seconds- and did not have enough chakra left to perform a jutsu. So she cut the throat of the adult Sound ninja nearest to her and used him as a meat shield as he died. Holding him up with her arms alone was too difficult without chakra enhancement, but that was what leverage was for. She put her shoulder into it.

It was an effective shield- Shika didn't get hit by the thrown kunai or the Fire jutsu, and even Shikako barely got the edges of her hair singed, although things did get rather smelly- but it made killing the remaining Sound shinobi difficult.

She could throw away the meat shield and try to grapple, but she was at a significant height and weight disadvantage there. Even if she tackled him to cut his throat or stab his heart, her fingers didn't seem to be clenching properly for some reason. It would be ill-advised.

There was the sound of another wind jutsu- a cutting wind jutsu, which sounded precise enough to indicate a very skilled opponent- and Shikako contemplated what she could possibly say that might convince Shika to run. He had no earthly idea who she was, which was a good advantage, but he could be weirdly noble sometimes, which wasn't.

She ditched the meat shield in favor of getting a look at her next opponent.

Oh. It was Asuma Sarutobi.

And he'd killed the runaway Sound ninja, in addition to the fellow who had been trying to get through Shikako's hastily improvised shield. That was good. That meant there were no Sound nin left to report to Orochimaru that a person of her description had been defending Shikamaru Nara.

(Orochimaru was one of the few people to realize that Shikako Nara had not, in fact, died at age two. And he had been interested in her. Not interested enough to take her away from Danzo. But very interested nevertheless. Which pretty much got Shikako all of the bad parts and none of the advantages, as was typical of most things in Shikako's life.)

Asuma Sarutobi looked deeply worried and… aghast. Was aghast the right word? Probably.

Good. Aghast was good. Aghast meant Asuma Sarutobi was very concerned for Shika's well-being, which was appropriate, because what kind of teacher wanted their twelve-year-old student alone in a war zone?

(Kakashi got a pass, because he was sending two of his twelve-year-old students to his other twelve-year-old student who was alreadyalone in a war zone, and he had sensibly arranged for Pakkun to accompany them. Shikako understood necessity.)

But Asuma Sarutobi's concern for Shika mean that Shikako could leave Shika in Asuma Sarutobi's care and know that Asuma Sarutobi would look after Shika.

Asuma Sarutobi was Shika's teacher, and Shika loved him very much and would be very sad if he died (which meant that Protecting Asuma Sarutobi would have to be another mission for later, when Asuma Sarutobi needed it) but also meant that she could probably trust Asuma Sarutobi to get Shika to somewhere safe, rather than just ditching Shika after the nearest enemies were dead.

Shikako gave Asuma a thankful nod, and stepped aside to indicate Shika's slightly shaky but injury-free state. Shikako gave a hand sign in Konoha Basic that indicated that Asuma Sarutobi was in charge of supervising/protecting the junior ninja now.

(Ninja protected clients, and supervised junior ninja. Shikako wasn't disrespectful enough of Shika's skills to consider him a client: Shika was very talented, he was very very brilliant, and he was going to grow up to be amazing and skilled wise and trustworthy and good.

Although Konoha basic was the handsign taught to Academy students, and ROOT trainees (who also learned Konoha basic) were given the opportunity to secretly observe general Konoha nin and their silent conversations on many, many occasions, Protect was a handsign Shikako had never seen accompany the descriptor junior ninja before.

And if that didn't tell her something was wrong with Konoha- the Above Konoha, the Konoha of the Sunshine and the Leaves- well, nothing would.)

Shikako did not have enough chakra for a proper jutsu, but there was still just enough for her to Body-Flicker to the nearest clearing.

And, after a moment, she was able to stagger to her knees from where she'd fallen on the forest floor. It was difficult to focus. She was developing tunnel vision again. It would be problematic if someone were to attack. Luckily, there was a thicket perhaps fifteen feet away that would make good cover as she recovered enough chakra to treat her injuries.

She tried to stand, to start to walk.

…Trying to stand was risky and inadvisable. Hands and knees were good. It was good that the knife had not gone in very deep, and she was wearing armor. It was good that most of the blood was dry, and wouldn't drip. It was bad that she'd lost her scent-suppressing technique, but there was lots of blood in these woods and that would probably give her some time. She made it to the thicket and rolled herself underneath, as close to the center of the plant as possible.


"Why did you make us watch her crawl there?" Shikamaru asked, very quietly, as they made their way through the woods, heading toward the hospital.

His student kept checking the girl's pulse. (The girl's pulse was fine. She wasn't in any danger of dying- from her injuries. Her behavior was pointed to another problem.)

"We needed to know how much trouble she was in," Asuma replied. He didn't know who the kid was. He wasn't sure he cared. She wasn't from Sound. She wasn't from Sand. She'd taken down twenty-seven Sound ninja alone and made sure his student had escaped unharmed.

And the only protection she'd expected was a thicket she could crawl to.

…Sadly, it was quite possible she was from Konoha.

Asuma didn't know quite why his suspicions had landed so firmly on that target, but he had some experience with a fourteen-year-old Kakashi's Black Ops cynicism. There was a certain …type. Ninja from other villages- even ANBU-level ninja- never quite matched it.

"My aunt Igaku is a medic-nin in Surgery," Shikamaru said, looking down at the knife in the girl's gut- it had mostly hit her armor, but Shikamaru wasn't experienced enough yet to notice things like that at a glance.

"Good," Asuma said vaguely, wishing Kurenai was here. "We're going to put up a genjutsu to hide the girl, and I'm going to carry you both in at the same time and say it's you who was hurt. We'll go straight up to your aunt." It would be hard, with the casualties from the invasion, but doable.

Shikamaru looked at him with wide eyes. "Do you want her to kill you?"

"She'll understand," Asuma said vaguely. Medic nins had hated treating Black Ops kids. They had been some of the quietest, fiercest backers… against the program…

(What better way to keep the medic from protesting than to just… not allow underage agents to see them? Politics. Damn.

Asuma remembered having to go up to his father with Gai and Kurenai and beg for Kakashi to get reassigned. Looking at tired eyes and wondering when his friend would just decide to… leave himself open. For the strike.

This kid wasn't tired. This kid was a firecracker and Asuma could understand exactly why Black Ops wanted her.

Konoha could give her better than a fucking thicket, and it was going to, if Asuma had go and dig up the plant and ram it down his Dad's throat himself.

Which was why it was a good idea to get some traditional Medic-nin support from the aunt of the boy this kid had just saved. Politics, again.)

"Aunt Igaku's not great at being understanding," Shikamaru said warily. "I'm pretty sure that's why she went into Surgery."


Aunt Igaku notices that Shikako looks quite like Yoshino Nara, and her own brother Shikaku. Aunt Igaku runs a blood test. Aunt Igaku is Not Understanding. At All.

She is Not Understanding about the 50% DNA match between her nephew and the niece her Hokage had sworn was deceased. She is Not Understanding about having to cut out her niece's tongue to remove a seal, or having to find a tissue match to give her niece a tongue transplant (which went well). She is Not Understanding about Shikako Nara's habit of spiritually manipulating herself to avoid the seal's horrific restrictions and compulsions, and the girl got quite a lecture.

Igaku demanded an account of Shikako Nara's medical record, self-reported as best the girl was able, and she was Not Understanding about that.

This turned into a request for an account of ROOT training methods, a deposition supervised by Morino Ibiki, who was called over to Shikako Nara's surgery room. Ibiki only had a broken arm, after all, and Igaku wanted someone else to hear this nonsense, (besides Asuma Sarutobi, or her nephew who had refused to move or stop holding his sister's hand, and was probably going to be traumatized for life form hearing all this, but was a stubborn little brat who had gotten exactly what he had asked for.)

Ibiki Morino is also Not Understanding.

(He was especially Not Understanding about any situation that forced one ten-year-old Shikako to smuggling another ten-year old "who I named Sai" out of the Land of Fire. After Shikako had carefully explained to "Sai" that the graduation test was really a very special test, to see if you could anticipate the test Danzo-sama was going to give you –which was to kill eachother- and find the hidden test- which was to pretend to kill each other and actually have one agent secretly practice his undercover civilian skills outside the Land of Fire until the test was over. This explanation subverted the compulsion seal that would have killed Sai for running away. "I never thought of just cutting it out," Shikako had said, slightly slurred, giving an admiring glance over towards Igaku Nara and her blazing eyes.

Ibiki asked if anyone else had managed to save their partners. Shikako had told him that Shin managed a really awesome trick where he was able to conceal his worsening terminal illness from Danzo for some months, so that he'd be able to kill himself during the final exam while assuring his test partner that it was just a quicker and more merciful version of a death that would have happened anyway. Shin had probably been the only one Shikako had considered a friend, Shikako had admitted. Sai had been a sweet kid, and Shikako was glad to look after him, but Shin had been the only other one aside from Shikako who's known what was up as soon as Danzo divided them up into training pairs at age six. Danzo was kind of predictable sometimes.

Sadly, a lot of this can be confirmed. It can be confirmed because Shikako Nara made it her special mission to find out where all the little graves were.)

Ibiki has informed Igaku under no circumstances is she to spread the details of those responsible pre-emptively, before confirmation. Because Anko is also in the hospital, has an ear for gossip, and would not be receptive to the idea of being discriminating in her targets, as Anko prefers to sort her victims into 1) the quick and 2) the dead. It is quite possible some elders were not involved. It is quite possible additional people were. They need to find out who those people are.

So.

Ibiki Morino and Igaku Nara work together to make a different plan.

After all, Igaku is brusque, but is extremely well-respected by her fellow hospital staff and supervisors. And the Nara are very big in medicine, so there's a lot of them in the hospital, specifically.

More clan members are called in.

And friends.

This makes perfect sense-most ninja still fighting think the hospital was informed that it was designated a target, and it simply responding promptly to the threat. They're not exactly wrong. Once certain parties discover that Shikako Nara is in the hospital, it will be a target.

The hospital is very efficiently treating patients, and also Maintaining Hospital Security Against Traitorous Child-Snatching Thieves, throughout the invasion. Konoha nin are not totally sure why all the medics are so pissed, but they are sure there is a reason.

The Sound and Sand nin are routed, and the village security is brought down a level.

Just… not at the hospitals.


Shikaku rubbed his head and looked around at the elder council and gathered heads of the division. And Jiraiya, who had brought an... interesting report. "Sand and Sound forces have been routed. The civilians and genin are still in the evacuation tunnels. And the hospital… is threatening to secede from Konoha."

"They're still agreeing to treat patients, apparently," Jiraiya said. "And they're not actually moving anywhere. But they're handling all the security arrangements internally, or through connections with friends and clanmates who are skilled field shinobi, and kicking out everyone they don't like who's uninjured. And they're refusing to let the security forces they've vetted be reassigned somewhere else. And they've commandeered a perimeter of at least several blocks in each direction."

"Have they given a reason for this blatant defiance?" Danzo asked. It should have sounded like a threat. Mostly, it just sounded like Danzo really, really wanted to hear what the reason was. This was… unprecedented.

"Well, I hadn't gotten the news yet, when I told Igaku Nara the Hokage was going to need a reason for the hospital's increased security arrangements."

Shikaku winced. "She's not-

"-good with people, yeah, I've been told. She poked me in the chest with her finger, stared me in the eye, and said 'He knows what he did.' So, then I asked her out for dinner and a drink, and she said she had a date with Ibiki Morino, who was a sensible, principled man, and didn't hold with the kind of sadistic inhumanity she'd had to hear about today. But if I wanted to get Asuma Sarutobi a drink, the poor guy probably needed it, and I could get my gossip then. So I yelled up to ask if Asuma wanted a drink, and Asuma informed me "wouldn't we all effing like one" and told me go back to the tower and find out if anyone knew what was going on, and then to punch those people in the face. And Shikamaru added that I should break all their arms and legs and leave them for Inoichi and his dad to find, although his aunt reminded him that Ibiki would probably be involved as well. So," Jiraiya asked, voice turning hard, "who knows what's going on?"