Daybreak didn't bring warmth. It just brought visibility to the exhaustion.
The border between the Land of Rivers and the Land of Fire was marked by a shift in the soil. The sponge-like, sucking mud of the delta finally gave way to the solid, root-packed loam of the Fire Country forests.
The mud on their boots began to dry and flake off, turning from sticky clay to grey dust that puffed with every step.
The air changed, too—the suffocating stench of sulfur, rot, and salt faded, replaced by the crisp, neutral scent of pine and morning dew.
A cool breeze rustled the canopy—shhh-shhh—carrying the sweet scent of wildflowers, jarringly pleasant after the chemical burn of the mine.
Kakashi walked at the rear of the vanguard, his single visible eye heavy with twenty-four hours of sleeplessness.
He watched the backs of his students.
They were walking, because there were no horses. Team Asuma had taken the carriage and the animals days ago to run the Gelel fragments to the capital. That left Team Kakashi and Team Anko to hoof it out of the disaster zone on their own two feet.
Nobody spoke. The silence wasn't the disciplined quiet of a mission; it was the heavy, uncomfortable silence of a family dinner after someone flipped the table.
Kakashi's gaze drifted to Sasuke.
The Uchiha was walking on the far right flank, separated from the group by a deliberate ten feet of empty space. He wasn't limping, despite the burns on his left arm. He was marching. His hands were buried deep in his pockets, his posture rigid.
He didn't look like a teammate. He looked like an escort mission target who despised his guards.
His footsteps were silent, practiced, unlike the weary scuffing of the others.
He enjoyed it, Kakashi thought, the realization settling in his gut like a stone.
He replayed the image of Raiga's death. The way Sasuke hadn't just pierced the heart—the mercy kill—but had flooded the man's chakra network until he popped. The look on Sasuke's face hadn't been determination. It had been a manic, terrifying ecstasy.
I taught him the Chidori to protect, Kakashi thought bitterly. He used it to torture.
"You're doing the 'Brooding Sensei' thing," a rough voice murmured beside him.
Anko fell into step with him. She looked wrecked. Her mesh armor was torn, her trench coat was stained with chemical mud, and her hair was a bird's nest of humidity and static.
She smelled faintly of burnt snake scales and old sweat.
She hadn't slept either.
"I'm thinking," Kakashi corrected softly.
"You're wondering if you created a monster," Anko said. She didn't whisper. She didn't sugarcoat it.
Kakashi flinched slightly. "Anko."
"Don't 'Anko' me, Hatake." She scratched at her neck, right over the Curse Mark. "I know the look. I saw it in the mirror for years. I saw it in his eyes."
She nodded toward Sasuke's back.
"He thinks he saved us," Anko said, her voice dropping to a low, dangerous register. "And logically? Maybe he did. Raiga was going to blow the zip code. But the way he did it... he wanted to see what would happen. He wanted to see if he could burn a man to ash."
Anko looked at Kakashi, her dark eyes devoid of their usual manic humor.
"You need to leash him, Kakashi. Before he decides the rest of us are just holding him back."
A twig snapped under Kakashi's sandal—crack—sounding startlingly loud in the tense silence.
Kakashi didn't answer. He couldn't. Because he knew she was right.
Ahead of them, the rest of the group trudged on.
Neji was walking with his Byakugan deactivated, rubbing his temples. The sheer overload of the lightning storm had fried his sensory nerves; he looked like he had a migraine that could crack a boulder.
He winced at a sunbeam filtering through the leaves, shielding his eyes with a pale hand.
Naruto was walking next to Anko, staring at his feet. Usually, Naruto would be complaining about the walk, or the hunger, or the lack of sleep. Today, he was silent. He kept glancing at Sasuke, his expression a mix of confusion and hurt.
Naruto kicked a pinecone, watching it skitter across the path without his usual enthusiasm.
And then there was Sylvie.
She was walking next to Tenten.
Sylvie looked different. It took Kakashi a moment—through the haze of exhaustion—to realize why.
Her glasses were gone.
They were tucked into her pouch. She was looking around the forest, her hazel eyes tracking the movement of birds in the canopy without squinting. The transition from the desert to the rivers had done something to her biology; the dōjutsu had fully integrated.
Her pupils contracted sharply in the light, the irises vibrant and clear, picking out the texture of bark on a tree fifty yards away.
She was seeing the world in high definition for the first time.
But she looked miserable. Her shoulders were slumped, her face pale.
Tenten, who looked like she had wrestled a swamp and lost, nudged Sylvie with her elbow.
"Hey," Tenten croaked.
Sylvie looked at her.
Tenten pointed to her own face. She was covered in dried grey mud, her bangs were plastered to her forehead, and she had a smear of grease across her nose.
She smelled of gun oil and metallic residue, the scent of her weapons clinging to her clothes.
Tenten crossed her eyes and stuck her tongue out.
It was childish. It was stupid. It was exactly what was needed.
A small, cracked smile broke through Sylvie's gloom. She let out a breathy laugh, rubbing her clear eyes.
"You look like a goblin," Sylvie whispered.
"Takes one to know one," Tenten grinned tiredly.
Kakashi watched the interaction. They're resilient, he told himself. They can bounce back.
He looked back at Sasuke. The Uchiha hadn't turned his head. He hadn't noticed the joke. He was walking in his own world.
But not all of them, Kakashi thought.
Sasuke Uchiha felt the burn on his left arm. It was a sharp, grounding pain.
The burn throbbed in time with his pulse—thump... thump—a constant reminder of the power he had channeled.
He welcomed it.
He walked on the edge of the path, stepping on the roots of the massive trees. He could feel the eyes on his back. Kakashi's singular, judging gaze. Naruto's pathetic, confused staring. Anko's fear.
Let them stare, Sasuke thought, staring straight ahead.
They didn't understand.
They saw cruelty. He saw efficiency. Raiga was a bomb. You don't ask a bomb politely to stop ticking. You destroy the mechanism.
He clenched his fist, the fabric of his pocket straining against his knuckles.
He flexed his burned hand in his pocket. He remembered the feeling of his chakra overwhelming Raiga's. It had been intoxicating. It had felt like winning.
Konoha is soft, Sasuke concluded, his jaw setting. They play ninja. They talk about teamwork and protecting the king. But when a monster like Raiga shows up, they hesitate. They worry about 'how' instead of 'if'.
He touched his neck. The Curse Mark was dormant, but the memory of its power hummed under his skin.
A phantom itch crawled up his neck, cold and seductive.
I didn't hesitate, Sasuke told himself. I did the math. I saved them.
If they couldn't stomach the method, that was their weakness. Not his.
He walked faster, putting another foot of distance between himself and the team. He didn't need their approval. He needed power. And he had just proven to himself that he was willing to do whatever it took to get it.
"STOP!"
The shout came from behind him.
Sasuke stopped. He turned slowly, annoyed.
Anko had frozen in the middle of the path. Her hands were clutching the sides of her head, her eyes wide with a sudden, dawning horror that had nothing to do with Raiga or Orochimaru.
A bird chirped cheerfully overhead, completely oblivious to the sudden existential dread below.
"What now?" Kakashi asked, sounding ready to collapse.
Anko stared at the empty space beside her. She looked at the group. She counted heads. One. Two. Three. Four. Five. Six. Seven.
She looked back toward the Land of Rivers.
"WE FORGOT THE PERVERT!" Anko shrieked.
The entire group froze.
"What?" Naruto blinked, his brain rebooting.
"Jiraiya!" Anko yelled. "We left him at the curry shop! He's face-down on the table!"
The wind seemed to stop, the forest holding its breath in collective embarrassment.
Silence.
"Oh my god," Sylvie whispered, her hands flying to her mouth. "We left a Legendary Sannin in a swamp."
"What do you mean 'we'?" Tenten groaned, sliding down a tree trunk. "You guys are Team Anko! He's your responsibility!"
"He was drunk on spice!" Naruto yelled. "Rokusuke said he'd watch him!"
"Rokusuke is a miner!" Anko shouted, looking frantic. "If Raiga's men wake up, they're going to use Jiraiya as a hostage! Or worse, he'll wake up and eat the rest of their inventory!"
Kakashi sighed. It was a long, deep sigh that seemed to deflate his entire body.
He rubbed his face with his gloved hand, the sound of fabric on skin rasping loudly.
"We have to go back," Kakashi said miserably.
Anko looked at the exhausted genin. She looked at the miles of mud they had just traversed. She looked at Kakashi.
She made a command decision.
"SMOKE BOMB!" Anko yelled.
She threw her hands down.
Nothing happened. She didn't have a smoke bomb.
"SCATTER!"
She turned and sprinted into the woods, running perpendicular to the path, fleeing the consequences of her own oversight.
Her boots crunched through the underbrush—crash-snap-rustle—as she abandoned all pretense of stealth.
"Hey!" Naruto shouted, chasing after her. "Get back here! You can't just run away from paperwork!"
"I'm not going back!" Anko's voice drifted from the bushes. "You tell Tsunade! I was never here!"
Sasuke watched them running in circles. He watched Sylvie put her face in her hands, shaking her head.
Sylvie let out a long, ragged groan that vibrated in her chest.
They're idiots, Sasuke thought, rolling his eyes.
But for a second, just a second, the darkness in his chest felt a little lighter.
"Whatever," Sasuke muttered.
He sat down on a tree root. He wasn't going back for the Toad Sage. But he would wait until they finished screaming.
He leaned his head back against the rough bark, closing his eyes as the cool forest air washed over his burning arm.