Inoue-sensei ran her finger slowly down the first of Hazō's sketched routes.
"Well, it was very considerate of you to leave us a suicide option," she said, pointing to the line running south directly through Fire.
"Um," Hazō said. "I was kind of hoping you'd got some safe passage codes out of Jiraiya or something."
Inoue-sensei shrugged. "I hit him with some of my best techniques, but that man might as well be made of iron—in the good ways as well as the bad ones, mind you. It looks like I'm going to have to brush up on my skills before our next encounter—and since it's not like I can practise with any of you kids, that's going to take some doing. I wonder if Kagome..."
Hazō gave her his best "I know what you're thinking, and it's a terrible, terrible idea" look, one he had had plenty of opportunity to hone during the group's travels.
Inoue-sensei sighed.
"Suffice to say, those codes are apparently worth more than our lives, and low-ranking operatives like ourselves aren't getting a single syllable until we've spent more time proving ourselves.
"Moving on... this route is better. Less time spent near Leaf, and River is much safer than Fire. But it's nowhere near as good as it looks. Keiko?"
Keiko didn't even need time to think. "Valley ninja can't have lived there for this long without having developed tracking techniques that work over water. They are probably still less dangerous than Leaf ninja, but that isn't a good reason to pass by two hidden villages through disadvantageous terrain."
"Important lesson to learn, little Hazō," Inoue said, taking advantage of Hazō's momentary embarrassment to reach out and ruffle his hair. "Ninja specialise. Whenever something gives a group of ninja a natural advantage, we immediately look for ways to exploit it as much as we can. Why do you think every Mist kid learns to swim before they learn to talk?
"I mean, it's not a bad route, but I like your third one, the green one, better. For once, geopolitics is on our side."
Inoue-sensei tapped the River/Fire border with her fingernail.
"Quick history lesson. Way back when, after a particularly bad drought, Sand decided to go annex some good arable land. Its northern neighbours aren't exactly poster children for agriculture either, and Rain and Grass managed to throw some kind of pact together with Claw at the last minute, so Sand decided to take a chunk out of River instead.
"Big mistake. River is a labyrinth, kids, a labyrinth that Hidden Valley ninja know like the back of their hand and nobody else does. Guerrilla warfare nearly bled Sand dry—oh, you know what I mean—and if they'd stayed any longer, odds are they'd have had Leaf buying free passage from River and going for a full-on invasion.
"Anyway, lesson learned, stay the hell out of River. Ever since, it's been a stable buffer state between Wind and Fire, and that's one reason why the two are such close allies. Meanwhile, River makes a mint facilitating trade between Wind and most of the rest of the continent. So the border between River and Fire isn't as patrolled as you might expect. Leaf would be crazy to invade, for both military and economic reasons, and anybody else would be crazy to invade through Leaf.
"On the whole I like this route. We mostly avoid Grass, which is great because those guys punch way above their weight. We don't spend much time in Fire. Most of the trip is along one of the least-guarded borders in the region. And the place where that border meets the gulf ought to be a smugglers' paradise, which means cheap boats with no questions asked.
"My one concern is Rain, because no one knows what the hell is going on with Rain. Ever since Hanzō of the Salamander sealed off the borders, not even a Transformed mouse has been able to get in or out. Infiltration teams sent that way stop reporting the second they get close.
"The good news is that after the last Great Ninja War, Rain's eastern border isn't quite as big as it used to be. Still, I want us covering that stretch of the journey at absolute top speed, even if we have to rest on the edge of Grass first."
o-o-o-o
Noburi stalked the eerie narrow corridors and suspiciously empty open spaces of the Labyrinth of Gruesome Howling Death (or "secure equipment storage template 2", as Kagome liked to call it). His quarry was somewhere out there, waiting, lurking. He'd never faced this kind of threat before, and did not know what was in store for him—only that under no circumstances could he allow himself to lose.
There was a soft click beneath Noburi's feet. Warned by instinct, he dove forwards, but not quite fast enough. The training kunai hit his left shoulder, leaving a splodge of red paint that now signalled a disabled limb. Noburi winced, but forced himself to make no sound. He was right-handed, and therefore still in the game.
Ishihara's traps were a force to be reckoned with. In the short setup time she'd been allowed, she'd peppered the training course with tripwires, kunai launchers, poison gas dispensers, and more lethal mechanisms than Noburi could so much as name. On the other hand, her own movement was still impaired, so if Noburi could catch up with her just once, he was confident she wouldn't stand a chance.
There—in the corner of his vision! No, nothing. Noburi gritted his teeth. For a second, he could have sworn he'd seen a blur of movement. But he couldn't chase after every tiniest flicker of motion, or he'd be playing right into Ishihara's hands. He'd already had a very close call with a simulated exploding tag trap, and while he was learning to recognise Ishihara's preferences for tripwire positioning, at this rate she'd beat him through sheer attrition.
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Maybe he was going about this all wrong. Quoth Inoue-sensei, "don't play the game, play the player."
Noburi retraced his steps, back to a passage where he had—he thought—already triggered or disabled all the traps. Choosing his spot carefully, he hit a kunai loudly against the wall, then groaned. "Aah, shit, Ishihara. That was overkill! Ow, my leg!"
He dipped a finger into the still-wet red paint on his shoulder, then dragged it slowly across the ground. The "blood" trail curled around the corner, where a curved wall recess created a perfect ambush spot. Then he groaned again for emphasis.
Noburi stood in the shadows, kunai at the ready. Any second now... Any second now...
A glimmer of movement. A spinning motion. A slash at the throat.
A hand slammed suddenly against the wall. A hidden strand of ninja wire. A puff of smoke.
"How?" Noburi asked once he finished coughing up the lethal poison gas. "I was sure I had you."
"You did," Ishihara said. "But I couldn't remember setting a kunai trap in that bit, and there was something in your voice that didn't quite..." She trailed off.
"Anyway, I guess I felt I ought to be ready just in case."
"I hate to say it, but that was a draw," Noburi told her. "So are we going to have to go another round to decide which one of us has to test Inoue-sensei's new training genjutsu?"
Ishihara opened her mouth. Then she closed it again.
"Wakahisa... did this maze always have steadily-growing fissures in the ground opening into a lava-filled nightmare world?"
"Hello, kids," an all-too-familiar voice whispered as Noburi's footing began to grow unstable.
"Let's play a game."
o-o-o-o
Hazō scanned Kagome's feedback on the HISSS (Hazō's Improvised Sealcrafting Safety System) research proposal sheet. Most of the research ideas were labelled "Dangerous" or "Very Dangerous", which roughly translated to "this is a standard piece of sealcrafting". The chakra drain seal was labelled "Seriously Dangerous", which translated to somewhere between "do not attempt without adult supervision" and "I know people who have died trying this".
The Poor Man's Yellow Flash, on the other hand, received tentative approval. Kagome was very keen on (or at least not terrified of) a seal which merely combined the functionality of a storage seal with the trigger mechanism of an exploding tag, both common seals with which Hazō was already becoming proficient.
And then there was the thing he'd whimsically decided to call the "uum" seal, based on the noise he found himself making when trying to come up with a good name for it. To the extent that he could read Kagome's handwriting around the utterly blotted-out segment of paper, it said:
WHAT THE HELL WHY WOULD YOU EVEN WRITE THAT SYLLABLE NEVER MIND THINK OF PUTTING IT INTO A SEAL ARE YOU CRAZY OF COURSE YOU'RE CRAZY WE'RE ALL CRAZY THAT LAST SEAL MUST HAVE GONE WRONG AND NO ONE KNOWS AND NOW HE WANTS TO INVOKE THE DEVOURING SUN AND PUT AN END TO EVERYTHING BEFORE THE SPIDERS START COMING OUT OF EVERYONE'S EYESOCKETS AND IT'S ALL MY FAULT
...and it went on in this fashion until Kagome presumably either got distracted or ran out of ink.
Hazō made a note to come up with a different name before resubmitting that part of the proposal.
o-o-o-o
So far, the journey south had been proceeding smoothly. No sudden ninja patrols, no chakra monster attacks, and only a moderate amount of general hostility from Keiko, whose mood had plummeted around the same time as Inoue-sensei had started carrying Akane.
They were on the Rain/Fire border when Murphy's Law finally caught up with them.
First came the worsening weather, as seemingly out of nowhere the light, fluffy cloud cover was replaced with pouring rain. Then Noburi tried to get Inoue-sensei's attention.
"Inoue-sensei," he began, "would you mind if we stopped for a second? Something doesn't feel right."
"What is it?" she asked instantly.
"Well, it's probably my Wakahisa senses misfiring from tiredness or something, but it feels like this rain is saturated with chakra."
Inoue-sensei's expression changed. "Break east. Now. Emergency speed."
"They're coming for us, aren't they? I knew—"
"Not now, Kagome."
There was no explanation, as that would have required interrupting her breathing. Just running, for no clear reason, until they were out from beneath the rainclouds, then far away, then finally slowing down in front of a small river.
Inoue-sensei, however, seemed no calmer. "Strip off and into the water. Quickly. We've got to get as much of that chakra water off us as we can."
She registered the hesitation coming from her mostly-teenage team.
"Tch. Boys, face that way. Girls, face this way. No peeking or I'll kill you myself. This is not the time to get distracted."
As soon as the team started moving, Inoue-sensei resumed rattling off orders.
"Noburi, make some clones. They're going to fish our gear out of the backpacks—thank Heaven those are waterproof—without contaminating it. Have changes of clothes ready for everyone."
Hazō saw Noburi's expression change as a sudden thought seemed to occur to him.
"Yes, that means handling girls' underwear, Noburi. Get over it," Inoue-sensei continued without pausing for breath.
A few seconds later, Hazō nearly turned around on instinct as he heard Akane's voice.
"Wow, Inoue-sensei, your—"
"One limb for every female bathing cliché."
Akane fell silent.
Then, right when everyone was finally naked and in the water, there came a sound that nobody wanted to hear. Someone—or something—was making rustling noises from behind the treeline.
"You've got to be kidding me," Inoue-sensei growled. "I'll handle this. The rest of you, be ready to move with all the gear you can carry."
o-o-o-o
Perhaps a minute of incredible tension later...
"Boys, about face!"
Hazō nearly sagged with relief at Inoue-sensei's voice.
"Inoue-sensei, you're hurt!" Keiko exclaimed, audibly rushing over.
"Not my blood. One of the men must've been gay, because he wasn't taken off guard by the gorgeous wet naked woman coming out of nowhere. I hate it when that happens. Boys, you can look now."
Roughly four seconds after coming back, Inoue-sensei was fully dressed and ready to go. Once again, Hazō reminded himself that she was an infiltration and seduction specialist.
o-o-o-o
"So what was that about, Inoue-sensei?"
"It might've been nothing," Inoue-sensei said. "You know how every legendary ninja is supposed to have an impossible technique or two, like the Second Hokage being able to raise the dead to fight for him, or the Second Tsuchikage reducing his enemies to dust with a wave of his hand? Well, using chakra-infused rain to detect enemy ninja is one of those techniques. It probably doesn't exist, but if this was the time and place where it turned out to have been real all along, that would be just our luck.
"Well, the good news is that unless we've got a legendary ninja from Hidden Rain out to get us, we're past the most dangerous part of the journey. It should be smooth sailing from—"
Hazō managed to get his hand over her mouth just in time.