The night before the finals, Nara Shikaku sat at his kitchen table with a half-finished shogi game and a half-finished bottle of sake and thought, as he often did, that it would have been much simpler if he'd just stayed a lazy genius who never got promoted.
The board in front of him was tilted toward the open window. Outside, the village hummed with that particular festival-quiet: streets swept, banners hung, patrols doubled. Konoha smelled like incense, grilling meat, and rain that hadn't quite arrived.
Inside, it smelled like ink, old tatami, and the sharp alcohol on his breath.
He nudged a gold general forward with one finger, then, because nobody else was there yet, reached around and moved a silver against it.
"Troublesome," he murmured to both sides.
The door slid open without a knock.
"You're talking to the board again," Yamanaka Inoichi said, stepping in with two more bottles dangling from one big hand. "That's usually a bad sign."
Behind him, Akimichi Chōza ducked under the frame like it was personally victimizing him. His arms were full of snack trays.
"Shikaku always talks to the board," Chōza rumbled cheerfully, kicking off his sandals. "It's cheaper than therapy."
Shikaku snorted. "If they paid jōnin enough for therapy, I'd consider it."
He waved them in. Inoichi set the bottles down with the ease of a man who knew exactly where the cups were kept in this kitchen. Chōza sat with a grunt that made the table legs complain and immediately started arranging rice crackers like a second game-state.
"Your kid ready?" Inoichi asked, nodding at the bracket paper propped by the board.
Shikaku followed his gaze. The sheet sat where he'd put it earlier, weighted by a spare shogi piece. The inked names were already burned into his brain.
"Shikamaru?" Shikaku shrugged, one shoulder heavy. "As ready as he's going to pretend not to be."
"He complains too much," Chōza said.
"He gets that from you," Inoichi added.
Shikaku made a lazy grab for the nearest sake cup. "He gets that from living in this village," he said. "Drink."
They were halfway into the second round when the air by the door went colder in that precise, composed way that meant a Hyūga had arrived.
Hyūga Hiashi stepped in like he was entering a council room instead of Shikaku's cramped kitchen. White eyes cool, posture straight, kimono a little too formal for the hour.
Behind him, quieter, came Aburame Shibi, coat high around his face, dark glasses reflecting the low lamp-light. His presence was more felt than seen: a faint hum at the edges of hearing, the subtle shift of air around him.
"Apologies for the intrusion," Hiashi said.
Shikaku waved him down. "Sit. If the head of the Hyūga clan is coming to my house instead of pretending he doesn't know where it is, that's already enough of a bad omen I'm not kicking you out."
Hiashi's mouth twitched, which, for him, was practically a belly laugh. Shibi settled silently at the far side of the table, hands folding neatly.
"Choji?" Chōza asked anxiously, half-rising.
"Alive," Shibi said, voice muffled. "Sleeping. As is Shino."
Hiashi inclined his head. "Hinata as well."
"Troublesome," Shikaku repeated, though he let out a breath he hadn't admitted he was holding.
Inoichi poured for the newcomers. "Alright," he said. "We all know why we're actually here, so let's pretend we're subtle about it for five minutes and then give up."
Shikaku pushed the bracket sheet toward the center of the table, on top of the shogi board. Names and lines spilled across it like another kind of game.
Naruto vs Neji.
Shikamaru vs Temari.
Sasuke vs Gaara.
Shino vs Kankurō.
And all the others, already settled in bruises and bandages.
"Kids' exhibition, the official line," Shikaku said. "Nice friendly show for the visiting villages. Promote cooperation, trade, tourism. All that."
"Mm." Hiashi's gaze lingered on one matchup. "And put certain bloodlines in the spotlight."
Neji's name sat there, inked next to Naruto's, looming larger than the paper deserved.
Chōza scratched his cheek. "That boy… he's strong," he said tactfully.
"He is," Hiashi said. His voice was flat, no pride in it. "That is not the concern."
Shibi's insects whispered under his coat, a low, restless shifting like dry leaves.
Shikaku let the silence stretch a moment. Then he tapped a finger against the lower side of the bracket.
"Sound," he said. "Let's start with the obvious question. Anyone here truly comfortable with a village that popped into existence five minutes ago getting front-row seats in our promotion exam?"
Chōza grunted. "I'm still not clear on how they got recognition that fast."
"They were sponsored," Inoichi said. "Fire's daimyo wants to position us as reasonable. Cooperative. 'Open to new alliances.' His words."
Hiashi's jaw flexed. "Danzō pushed for it," he added, voice clipped. "In council. Argued that shutting our gates to 'rising minor powers' would make us look weak. Said if we did not engage, others would."
He made a small, dissatisfied sound. "He brought up Kumogakure as a cautionary example. And the… incident."
The word hung heavy between them. No one needed it spelled out: a Kumo envoy, a kidnapping attempt, a dead branch member, a near-war diverted by a lie on paper.
Inoichi downed his drink. "Subtle as ever, that one."
"Troublesome old warhawk," Shikaku said lightly, which was the polite version of the phrase in his head.
He slid a pawn from his side of the shogi board under the bracket paper, letting the wood click softly. One of the Sound genin names was Dosu. Another, the sand weapon wrapped in bandages. Pieces on someone else's side of the board.
"Point is," he said, "Sand and Sound both walk in holding hands, and we're supposed to pretend Sound didn't just crawl out of the ground like a mushroom after rain."
"In fairness," Shibi said, "mushrooms are part of a complex and ancient network."
Everyone stared at him.
"In my experience," he added mildly, "that is rarely good news."
Chōza wheezed a laugh. "My wife would like you. She doesn't trust mushrooms either."
Hiashi's mouth tightened. "Sunagakure's jōnin have been… guarded," he said. "More so than usual. Baki avoids sharing information with our patrol captains, even on routes. And their Kazekage has not yet deigned to show himself for internal meetings. He sends envoys."
"Delegating," Shikaku said. "Either efficient or hiding something. Always fun to guess which."
Shibi adjusted his glasses. "My kikaichū do not like the Sound delegates," he said quietly.
The room went a fraction stiller.
"Don't like how?" Shikaku asked.
"They exhibit… agitation," Shibi said, searching for the words. "The way they do when a storm front approaches. Or when there is a great deal of chakra below ground that should not be there."
Shikaku's mind flicked instantly to the Forest of Death reports: the giant snakes, the strange surge near Tennozan's ridge, the odd gaps in patrol sightings around certain trees. Orochimaru, slipping through their nets like smoke.
"Below ground," he repeated. "As in tunnels?"
"As in something… coiled," Shibi said. "Waiting. They will not go near certain sectors of the wall. They swarm others, as if looking for… exits."
"Your bugs getting spooked by the weather and a few loud foreigners isn't actionable proof," Inoichi said. It sounded harsh, but the lines between his brows were deep. "Try putting that in a report. 'Dear Hokage, my chakra-eating insects have a bad feeling.'"
"They are rarely wrong," Shibi said calmly. "But I am aware of the… difficulty of quantifying their intuition."
Shikaku poured himself another cup, mind already sketching lines.
Sand genin set up to clash against Leaf in big flashy fights. Sound slotted in like odd pieces that could be advanced or sacrificed. A new village with zero reputation being allowed into the finals without the usual years of watching.
Danzō softening the council ahead of time. The daimyo wanting them to play nice. Orochimaru seen in the tower—Kakashi's quiet, grim debrief still fresh in his head.
Troublesome. Troublesome. Troublesome.
"Speaking of people treating bloodlines like equipment," Inoichi said, turning to Hiashi, "you said you overheard the Kumo delegation?"
Hiashi's eyes chilled a degree. He set his cup down too carefully.
"Kumogakure sent a 'small delegation' to observe," he said. "One jōnin and one chūnin. This afternoon, they were speaking with a Fire official near the Hyūga compound."
His lip curled, just barely.
"They were commenting on the Byakugan," he said. "On 'wasted potential in static clans.' On how the eyes would be put to better use in a 'more dynamic village.' One of them compared us to a weapons cache hoarding kunai while the front lines run low."
Chōza's fingers tightened around his drink. "Bastards."
"The official?" Shikaku asked.
"Smiled," Hiashi said. "Spoke of 'respecting traditions' and 'mutual agreements.' Used many words that meant nothing and changed nothing. He did not correct their tone."
A vein pulsed in his temple.
"It is not merely the past incident," Hiashi added. "They still look at my daughter and my nephew and see… tools. Not children."
Silence again. Shikaku sipped slowly, watching the way Hiashi's chakra spiked—white-hot, then clamped down flat. Years of pushing rage into a rigid cage.
"Any chance they're just posturing?" Chōza asked. "Kumo likes to puff up."
"Kumo likes to steal," Hiashi said. "There is a difference."
Shikaku let his head fall back, staring at the ceiling.
"Alright," he said. "So. On one side, we have an allied village that looks at our kids like inventory. On another, a minor village with no history that smells like snakes and unfinished experiments. On a third, visitors from the Clouds hovering around the Hyūga compound and talking like the Byakugan is on sale."
He moved a knight on the shogi board, hopping it over two other pieces.
"And in the middle," he said, "we've put all our twelve-year-olds. On display."
Inoichi grimaced. "When you put it like that…"
"I dislike being a shopping catalog," Hiashi said dryly.
Chōza met Shikaku's eyes. "Should we pull them?" he asked, low. "Our kids. We still could. Fake injuries. Family emergencies."
Shikaku thought of Shikamaru leaning on the veranda rail, muttering about troublesome clouds. Of the way his son's chakra shifted when he took something seriously, even if his face didn't.
He thought of a blond boy shouting at a Hyūga prodigy in the arena, promising to break a future everyone else had accepted.
He thought of Lee, crushed on the floor, and Sylvie's voice cracking as she yelled.
"If we yank them now," he said slowly, "we tell them we don't trust them. That they're just pieces to hide whenever the board looks dangerous. They're already shinobi. We made that choice for them when we let them graduate."
He slid one of his own pawns forward, then dropped a captured piece—the enemy's—back onto the board as his own.
"But," he added, "that doesn't mean we leave them blind."
"You have something in mind," Inoichi said.
"Unfortunately," Shikaku replied.
He tapped the bracket with two fingers.
"Tomorrow," he said, "we go in expecting a show. But we plan like it's a battlefield. We put jōnin in the stands where they can move fast. We review evacuation routes. Make sure barrier teams are actually awake, not just napping on their posts."
He looked at Hiashi. "Hyūga eyes on the Kumo box. And on the Sand Kage's seat, if he ever bothers to show his face."
Hiashi inclined his head. "That can be arranged."
"And bugs," Shikaku said to Shibi. "If your kikaichū get spooked—more spooked—about anything under the stadium, I want to hear about it before the ground starts breaking."
Shibi nodded. "I will station additional hives along the lower levels. Quietly."
Chōza exhaled, some tension leaving his shoulders. "Alright," he said. "So. We let the kids fight. We keep our eyes open. We hit back if anyone uses our village as their stage."
"Sounds like Konoha," Inoichi said wryly. "Pretend nothing's wrong until it's time to set the sky on fire."
They all drank to that, which probably said something unflattering about all of them.
Shikaku looked down at the board again. At the bracket.
On the surface, he shrugged. Rolled his neck. "Troublesome," he said, which was as close as he'd get to saying he was worried out loud.
Inside, he was already moving pieces.
Contingency routes. Shadow-messaging lines between clan heads. Signals to pull their kids back without sparking a panic.
Danzō's name sat in the back of his mind like a dark rook, one square away from a line he couldn't see yet. It wasn't proof. It wasn't even a pattern you could point to without getting laughed out of council.
But it was there.
He reached over and slid the captured silver general onto his side of the board with a soft click.
"Anyway," Chōza said suddenly, breaking the heaviness. "Tomorrow, our kids are still going to do something stupid and glorious, and we are all going to pretend we aren't terrified."
Inoichi snorted. "That's parenting."
Hiashi, after a pause, allowed himself a single, tiny exhale that might have been a laugh.
Shibi's bugs settled, just a little.
Outside, the wind shifted, carrying the smell of distant rain through the open window. The village lights flickered like pieces on some larger board.
Shikaku lifted his cup in a lazy salute toward the bracket.
"Alright, brats," he murmured. "Your move."
The night air tasted like wet leaves and smoke.
Hayate moved through it like a cough trying not to be heard.
He kept to the upper branches, feet light, cloak snagging only once on bark. His lungs burned with every deep inhale, so he didn't take deep inhales. He'd learned to live around his own weakness.
The village lights were distant behind him now.
Too distant.
This wasn't a patrol route.
This was a wrong decision in motion.
Ahead, Dosu moved fast—faster than a Sound genin had any right to move when he was trying to be quiet. His bandaged arm stayed close to his body like a secret. His head kept turning, checking shadows like he expected them to grow teeth.
Hayate had followed because the shape of Dosu's intent was obvious.
A lone shinobi doesn't slip out at night to go pray.
He slips out to kill something.
And the only "something" that made sense tonight—
Gaara.
Hayate's stomach tightened at the thought.
Not fear.
Professional dread.
A jōnin knew the difference between danger you could measure and danger that felt like it didn't follow rules.
Gaara was the second kind.
Dosu dropped from a branch into a clearing without warning, landing in a crouch like he wanted the earth to think he wasn't there.
Hayate stayed above, breathing shallow, watching.
The clearing was moonlit in patches. Pale light spilled through the canopy and made the ground look like it had been painted in ash.
And in the center of it—
Gaara sat on a low stump like he'd been waiting for someone.
His gourd rested against his back. His hands were loose in his lap. His expression was blank in that way that always felt like a lie.
Temari and Kankurō weren't with him.
Which meant Gaara was either alone—
or he wasn't.
Dosu stepped forward, voice low and flat. "Gaara."
Gaara's eyes lifted.
The air shifted.
Hayate felt it even from the branch—sand, dry and eager, stirring without any wind.
Dosu's shoulders squared. He didn't flinch. He looked like someone who'd convinced himself that courage was just refusing to blink first.
"I know what you are," Dosu said.
Gaara didn't answer.
Dosu's bandaged arm rose.
The speaker ports embedded in his forearm gleamed faintly.
"Your sand moves on its own," Dosu continued. "It protects you. It kills for you."
Still nothing.
Dosu's jaw tightened.
"I'm going to kill you," he said, like declaring it made it true.
Hayate's fingers curled around the handle of his sword.
He didn't move yet.
He waited for the first strike—because interrupting too early just got you killed for nothing.
Dosu lunged.
Fast.
He drove his bandaged arm forward, ports facing Gaara's chest.
"Resonating Echo Drill—!"
A low thrum rolled out, the kind of sound you felt in your teeth more than your ears.
The air in front of Dosu distorted.
Vibration.
Pressure.
A technique built to rupture.
Hayate saw the moment Dosu believed he'd won.
Then Gaara's sand moved.
Not as a shield.
As a mouth.
A wall of sand surged up in front of Gaara, thickening instantly, swallowing the vibration like soil swallowing rain. It didn't just block.
It ate.
Dosu's eyes widened.
He tried to pull back—
The sand snapped out like a whip and caught his ankle.
Dosu stumbled.
His stance broke.
His breath hitched.
Gaara finally spoke, voice quiet.
"You're loud," Gaara said.
And then the sand went for Dosu's body.
Not one clean strike.
A thousand.
A swarm of gritty hands, wrapping, crushing, slicing.
Dosu screamed.
Not long.
The sound cut off abruptly, like someone had pinched the air shut.
Hayate moved.
He didn't think.
He didn't calculate.
He reacted to a kid being torn apart in front of him.
He dropped from the branch in a sharp arc, cloak snapping, sword flashing out as he hit the ground.
"Crescent Moon Dance—!"
His blade cut a bright curve through the moonlight.
It wasn't aimed at Gaara.
It was aimed at the sand between Gaara and Dosu—aimed to sever, to interrupt, to create an opening.
Steel met sand.
Hayate's blade sliced through it.
For half a heartbeat, he felt hope.
Then the sand re-formed.
Not slow.
Not natural.
It flowed back into itself like water refusing to be parted.
Hayate's eyes snapped to Dosu—
There wasn't enough of him left moving to save.
The sand finished its work with ugly efficiency, and what remained fell to the ground in a broken heap.
Hayate's stomach turned.
His throat burned with bile and smoke and the taste of failure.
Gaara stood.
Slowly.
He stepped toward Hayate like Hayate was next on a list.
His eyes were still empty, but the sand around him was excited—rising higher, curling, whispering.
Hayate forced his breathing to stay shallow.
Forced his body to stay forward.
A jōnin didn't get to fall apart.
"You shouldn't be here," Gaara said.
Hayate swallowed, tasted blood from biting the inside of his cheek.
"I could say the same," Hayate replied, voice tight.
Gaara's head tilted.
For a moment, he looked almost curious.
Then his breathing changed.
Uneven.
Wrong.
Like something inside him was pushing against the shape of his ribs.
The sand behind him bulged, clumping thicker near the gourd, gathering like it wanted to be something else.
Hayate felt a chill crawl up his spine.
This wasn't just a violent child.
This was a container.
A cracked one.
Hayate's sword lifted again, not because he believed it would win, but because the alternative was standing still.
Gaara's sand struck first.
It didn't bother with Dosu's slow torture now.
It went for Hayate's torso like it knew exactly where lungs lived.
Hayate twisted, blade cutting, trying to carve space—
Sand wrapped his ankle.
Yanked.
He went down hard, shoulder slamming earth, breath blasting out of him in a painful cough.
His vision flashed white.
He tried to rise—
Sand hit his chest.
Not a stab.
A weight.
A crushing press that pinned him to the ground and made his ribs creak.
Hayate coughed again.
Blood speckled his lips, warm and bright in the moonlight.
Gaara loomed above him, red hair haloed by pale light, expression still blank.
"Why?" Gaara asked, voice distant, almost childlike. "Why do you try to stop me?"
Hayate's breath came shallow and sharp.
Because you're a kid, he thought.
Because you shouldn't be this.
Because nobody should be raised into a weapon and then blamed when it fires.
But he didn't have time for philosophy.
He had time for one truth.
"Because…" Hayate rasped, forcing air through aching ribs, "…you're going to kill someone who can't fight back."
Gaara blinked slowly.
Then the sand tightened.
Hayate's ribs screamed.
His lungs shrank.
His body did what bodies did when they ran out of options: it panicked.
He forced it down.
He made himself turn his head.
Above the canopy, the moon hung full and pale—clean as a blade.
Crescent Moon Dance.
A technique named like poetry.
A life spent trying to make violence look like something elegant.
His throat tightened.
Yūgao's face flashed in his mind—not in dramatic montage, just in small, stupid details. The way she stood too straight. The way her eyes softened only when she thought nobody was watching.
The way she'd said, earlier that week, "Don't overdo it."
As if he ever knew how.
Hayate swallowed blood.
He couldn't lift his hand.
He couldn't reach his sword.
He could barely breathe.
He stared at the moon anyway, because it was the only thing in the world that looked steady.
"I'm sorry," he whispered.
The words came out wet.
Not loud enough to reach anyone.
But maybe the night heard.
Maybe the moon did.
"I said…" Hayate tried again, voice breaking on the breath, "…I'd be back before you missed me."
His vision tunneled.
The edges went dark.
The moon stayed bright.
For a moment, he felt strangely calm—like his body had finally stopped arguing with reality.
His last breath left him in a thin sigh.
"I'm sorry, Yūgao."
Then the clearing went quiet except for the soft, hungry whisper of sand.