It didn’t take long until Ino found me still sitting near the dead woman. My hands were over my ears, trying to heal ruptured eardrums with mystic palm. It wasn’t a pleasant thing to do.

I couldn’t stop thinking about the battle in the minutes I was alone. Fugai wasn’t strong, certainly not jonin-level. It wouldn’t have been hard if it weren’t for their ability to heal themselves and me getting caught by the sonic attack. But it also boiled down to the old question I’ve struggled with for a while. How much force was too much force?

Realistically speaking, I knew I could have killed her before she managed to injure me, and I knew all the Academy training was designed to turn us into killing machines. I shouldn’t hesitate to destroy the enemy once a battle starts. What disturbs me more than the killing… was how little it disturbs me.

I looked at the woman’s dead body, and the only thing I could think of was how more efficiently I could have killed her: better strategies, better ways to use my tools, better ways to end the fight decisively. I didn’t want to be that kind of person, even if it contradicts being a good shinobi.

My ears popped, and pain spiked through my head, the injuries partially healed but not fully gone yet.

I could have trapped the woman in a weight barrier, or just a normal trap barrier. As strong as she was, I don’t think she could break through a force construct or escape the increased weight. This also reminded me that I had the unnamed shield jutsu I had created and seldom used.

So many failures on my part.

Ino’s chakra approached me, and I turned toward her.

Her face is somewhat panicky, eyes wide. She looked a bit worse for wear, but no serious injury I could see. She had a gash on her cheek, blood flowing from a cut on her forehead. 

Her mouth moved, I knew she was talking, but all I heard was the high-pitched ringing.

I didn’t need much to understand her concern, not when she threw herself at me in a hug. I could barely hear the babbling words pouring out of her mouth.

—————————

It took me a bit more to heal my ears enough to walk without tripping over my feet. Ino stayed with me the entire time, then helped me to my feet and back toward the caravan.

The result of the attack wasn’t pretty. Most of the pack animals were dead, some of the vehicles were destroyed. By the number of vacant stares and crying children, many of the people had been taken, too.

I found Karin, Tenten, under Tsunade supervision, healing the few injured left behind. Most of the injuries seemed incidental, scrapes and bruises from proximity to battle rather than direct strikes. For all the enemy ferocity when dealing with the pack animals, there weren't a lot of people killed. I’m guessing they were more interested in taking people alive for the matrix.

What followed next was gloomy work. We didn’t talk, aside from trying to calm down the people we were helping. At some point, I took out sweets and distributed them to the still crying children. It helped distract them while we finished healing whoever we could.

When we were done with serious injuries and things calmed down somewhat, Tsunade waved us to follow, walking until we stood away from the caravan.

I didn’t know what to do, so I just followed.

This wasn’t how I imagined my encounter with the slug princess. I expected to find her in some gambling den, maybe drunk in a bar.

Wordlessly, she healed us. Throughout the affair, I noticed she didn’t glance at Ino’s bloodied cheeks or my still bleeding ears. Knowing Tsunade's aversion to blood, I did my best to help the team clean out all the visible blood. It was the least I could do to make her more comfortable.

“What the hell are you doing here?” Tsunade demanded as soon as there was no more blood in sight. “I told Jiraiya not to look for me.” Tsunade’s voice was harsh, but she didn’t look angry, just tired.

It was still funny how Tsunade immediately assumed we were after her. She wasn’t wrong, but girl, that ego.

I exchanged looks with the team. Karin and Ino looked a bit nervous. I guessed it was a normal reaction after seeing Tsunade fight. Tenten was clearly fangirling, trying not to vibrate out of her boots. Oh, right, Tsunade used to be her idol, before she recalibrated her goals.

The woman in front of us was unmistakable. The diamond-shaped seal on her forehead, the big bust, the blond hair, the ridiculous amount of chakra, the mastery over medical jutsu. It could be no one other than Tsunade, but she hadn’t introduced herself yet.

“I’m Hinata,” I said, then pointed to my team. “Yamanaka Ino, Tenten, Uzumaki Karin.” Tsunade’s eyes stopped on Karin for a moment before returning to me. “Are you Tsunade?”

Tsunade rolled her eyes. “I’m Tsunade. What the hell are you doing here?”

I don’t think right now was the best time to ask for her help. Better talk about the mission first.

“We’re on a mission to find and deliver a pet,” I started.

“Nerugui!” Karin gasped, looking inside her backpack and searching for the ferret.

“Don’t bother,” I told Karin. “I saw the critter following the guy in armor. Nerugui isn’t here anymore.”

I guess that told how out of it Karin was that she had stopped paying attention to the ferret. She’d been glued to the thing.

“And?” Tsunade prompted.

“We found the critter, and when we arrived at the town where the owner was supposed to be, these people attacked us,” I said, gesturing toward where the enemy had fled. “Like here, they kidnapped the civilians.”

A glance around told me our discussion wasn’t all that private anymore. A girl, dressed in the same style as the other in the caravan, had moved closer. She wore a purple short-sleeved dress-type shirt with pink stripes on it. Black hair, big brown eyes. She wasn’t close enough to talk, but close enough that it was clear she wanted to speak. She looked nervous too, if the wringing of her hands and constant looking around was any indication.

“We followed the trail,” I kept to my semi-report to Tsunade, pretending I hadn’t seen the girl. “We found a mobile metal fortress and learned they’re using people to power the vehicle somehow.”

Tsunade’s face turned into a scowl for the first time in the conversation.

“We were on our way to Wind’s border, trying to find a Suna squad and report, hoping the intel would reach Gaara.”

“Gaara?” Tsunade asked.

Ah, right, she might not be fully aware of the political situation.

I shrugged. “Orochimaru killed their Kazekage and manipulated Suna into attacking Konoha. Gaara is the one-tailed jinchuriki. Kazekage in all but name.”

Tsunade blinks. “Wasn’t the jinchuriki a psychopath?”

I shrugged again, a wry grin on my face. “He met Naruto.”

“That loud-mouth brat?”

“Naruto has a certain effect on people.” That’s all I said about that.

Tsunade seemed about to ask something else when the girl finally mustered the courage to speak to us.

“Um, excuse me,” she said, still wringing her hands. “Are you Konoha’s ninja?”

The five of us turned toward the girl, and she shrank into herself before straightening again. I nodded.

She pulls a small leather pouch from her tunic, the unmistakable clink of coins spills into the silence.

“I-I’d like to hire you to rescue my grandpa, it’s a matter of life or death.”