Chapter Text
Somewhere in the Land of Grass…
There was the stench of failure and shame in this place. It was a monument to…some kind of failure that happened here. Although what exactly, he wasn’t quite sure. The trail was not hard to find. A bridge he had found earlier was destroyed and eviscerated from the earth with signs of some kind of battle that happened nearby that felt primal in a way that spoke of anger without the need for words. Only destruction.
His happening upon the place was the result of a contract he had taken on from Kusagakure, him being known as “The Mule”. This was officially, and unofficially, a way of trying to get a read on the place without gaining the ire of a greater shinobi village. There was a certain irony to it. Kusa knew something happened here, and likely from one of the greater villages. Still, as a village and a smaller nation, they could not afford a direct confrontation or to even try to lay a claim of responsibility and guilt on any. So they chose the next best thing.
Have a deniable asset.
The Mule followed along as best he did and as best he could. He was no stranger to doing this kind of work. It suited him. And it also suited him to see more of the world beyond what is only present. He kept going, the wind picking up as his heavy, brown canvas duster, stained by rain and road dust, its pockets filled with maps and ration bars and fine cigars lightly moved with the wind. He takes a cigar and lights it, his eyes squinting and watering a bit from the good cigar. A fine complicated taste of woody and earthy notes with the experience evolving over time to a smooth finish of something sharp and spicy, like cinnamon and cedar.
Eventually after a solid journey he comes upon it. And what a sight indeed. It is a hideout…or, well, what leads to one. There was a massive crater or a sort of one, and…there. A hole, leading to a room. There was the smell of ozone and something dark being carried by the wind, enough that it clashed with the notes and scent of the cigar. He decided to put out the cigar for now. Good tasting can wait later.
“So…they went and fucked it here.” He thought silently to himself.
The rest of the process of checking out the place was standard. Truly whoever had been here, whatever mission there was, they had left it as it was. There were long dark hallways and a sort of sensory deprivation that happened from a lack of stimulus. There were different rooms, each again seemingly having their own purpose. But one always got the sense that this was never a home. Nor a home away from home. But a place to examine a human being and dissect them. This place was its own character.
One room had shackles meant to place a human being up like they were meat. Which in this world, they were. S shaped hooks meant to hang and to process and to observe and to finally discard like a wet rag. The walls have lines by lines of racks of tables vertically hung up, presumably where a human body would be pinned to. You could still see the faint blood on all of them. Not to mention a dedicated table to further explore a human body. Eventually after travelling along for a while and seeing more signs of fighting, he had enough. He knew from his travels over the years on the road that only one sick animal can treat a human life with such callous disregard. Orochimaru. One of the Sannin. It tracks.
“...What kind of person tolerates this? Just wakes up past all of the suffering as if it were irrelevant or beneath them?” He thought to himself. “No man is an island unto themselves. Everyone is born from something. From somewhere. He is a man who sees no moral distinction between natural death and murder from experimentation, for the victim is never a victim but merely a conclusion for a scientific inquiry, regardless of how their deaths come about.”
He pulls out his bounty book, a marked down recording of various individuals with a price on their person.
He thinks to himself. “I don't hunt missing-nin. What is a missing-nin? A failure? A traitor? A runaway tool? I still remember one time when the world wasn't as long and dark as today. Or maybe it was then too and I was just too stupid to see it. I was about 15 and had just gotten done getting my ass handed to me by some missing-nin from Suna. This was back when that crazy fucker Rasa was still around. The missing-nin always talked about wanting to purify the world of fear and to do that he needed to kill to do that. It was a twisted sort of logic. If you are alive, you either inflict fear or experience fear. His solution? Kill you. Simple. Clean. Elegant. And trying to argue him out of it only made the circular logic more tighter.”
He walks some more as his pacing becomes something almost melodic and meditative. “Yoshiro was his name. A genuinely tough man. Probably could have beaten the Kazekage easily in strength. He managed to get me to a not so advantageous position, where I was literally holding on for dear life. I managed to get a Kunai into his stomach. A mortal wound but survivable if he had taken time to heal and mend himself. He looked at me with those wide yet somehow paradoxically insane and understanding eyes, and said “So you live in fear too don't you?”
“My grip was faltering and my hands were screaming in anguish and my chakra reserves were nothing. He had me dead to rights. I should have died…but he reached down and grabbed my hand just as I was about to fall and eventually lifted me up. I laid there slumped against a nearby wall. I was shocked. How could he? He tried to kill me. I tried to kill him. He had me there. It was a warm day. The sun was out and the clouds were few. The day bleeding into evening, fireflies glowing in the hazy vision of it all. He simply sat for a while. He said nothing for a while. Eventually he just looks at me, and says “All I ever wanted...was to live in a world... without fear. For myself...and for others. And now I realize...that's not possible. I'm just a tool...and I'm not a man.” He looked around for a bit, blood from a cut under his eye making makeshift tears. “But maybe...maybe I can take away the fear from anyone's life...if only for a moment. Maybe...we can have moments... without...fear. Moments where I can be...a man.”
“His head dropped. He died. Blood loss. I don’t understand why he saved my life. And maybe I never fully understand why he did it. All he ever wanted was to not be afraid. But who made him afraid? Who taught him that stopping fear was the priority at all costs? Or rather who gave him that mindset? The ends justify the means?
“...That's when I realized I never wanted to hunt missing-nin ever again. Sure...you have genuine pieces of work. You have those who have completely lost their humanity. But then you have those where you wonder...what if? A different world...a different time...a different place…would they be the same? No.”
He decided he had enough monologuing to himself in a dirty nasty place. He moved from there and kept going, interested to see if the place had anything to offer…beyond the macabre and the occasional booby trap. The place was much the same. There was little to no variation in terms of the layout and schematics of the place. It was the shed skin of a snake. Dead and repulsive with nothing more to offer in value, not even seemingly to the creator and shedder of it who found it right to leave it. Upon further inspection of the place there was nothing to be taken in terms of valuable information. And even if there was he had considered it a foolish endeavor to consider if perhaps there were any scrolls of jutsu or research laying around. Not because he couldn’t take them, but because he could not risk the information spreading into the world. Some “research” he thought, deserved to be destroyed and forgotten forever.
“Alright…alright. Fair enough. Time to put an end to this abattoir.”
He began to use his Explosion Release…but not with clay. And not with the kinjutsu used by the Explosion Corps to knead their Explosion Release into the clay via hands with mouths on them. Through the pinnacle of shape transformation, making pure chakra constructs just from his hands…he begins to make bombs. They look bluish in a way. Shimmering with potential. Long stick-like dynamite figures.
He begins to go around the place whistling a simple jaunty tune to himself as he does so. His leather boots echo in the hallways and rooms too as he whistles. He figures to himself a few good spots for some demolition work. A bomb here. A bomb there. A bomb even in the ceiling. There is no place not considered good enough for a nice amount of dynamite. His lean but wiry build lets him navigate the place well enough, slipping through places and tight spots. Not too tall either, at only 5’11 (181 cm) in height.
Eventually he emerged from the place. Feeling all the more like a man who had got done with spring cleaning and some redecorating. The stench from the place was gone and in its place was the nice clear air carried by the wind. His own scent coming through which was a godsend. Of leather and cedar and cigar smoke, bow tied with the scent of the open road.
He goes and reaches for the same cigar he had put away due to it clashing with the scent of the place and pulls out his lighter and asks himself…
“To be…or not to be…”
“...Not to be.”
And when he lit the cigar…the earth roared.
BOOM!!!
A series of explosions wrecked the world as the birds fled to the skies and the animals skittered and dispersed to safety away from it all. The series of explosions was a cacophony of timed releases that destroyed chunks and then sections and then whole areas of the place. By the time it was done…there was truly nothing left. Just a large crater. He stood overlooking his handiwork, his squinting dark hazel, almost black eyes taking in the look of the place one last time. He finished his cigar, and flicked it off. The less said of the place, the better…
Later that night…
The dream was just a dream. But it was a reminder of something more than a dream.
Kurotsuchi was small again. Maybe seven, probably eight. She was every bit as audacious then, even a bit cocky. She was still in the academy at the time and took great pride in being the granddaughter of Onoki, the Third Tsuchikage of Iwa. But she was not at the academy. Not today anyways. She was being given a “tour” of Iwa, or more so was being shown around the village by Onoki, a sort of demonstration of what she might inherit one day. A title. And a burden.
The tour went on before it took a more boring turn for her. For one reason or another, and she can’t quite tell why, Onoki was busy talking to a group of men in lab coats. The conversations are getting boring, she thought to herself. There were some phrases thrown around. Some words used that piqued her attention, such as Explosion Release and prodigies for the Explosion Corps that would be “ready” in due time. But again, it was all a carrot on a stick for her. She had no interest in sitting around being bored. A bored Kurotsuchi was not a happy one.
So she did what any child with a lack of inhibition control would do. She wandered off. And her eyes caught movement. The movement of a strange procession across a dusty field. There were four men in grey and black uniforms, bearing armor more reminiscent of the warring states period. That alone drew her eye.
But it was the boy in the middle who seemed out of place in it all. He could not have been that much older than her. He had wavy black hair, short, almost medium length. His facial features were sharp, angular even, with high cheek bones and deep set eyes. He was quiet, walking in the middle of the procession of the guards. It did not look like an honor guard, but almost as if he was a valuable cargo that the guards seemed to radiate with their body language:
“Do. Not. Touch.”
This was not a typical Iwa shinobi. There was a pride in most shinobi, something that could come off as arrogance or unearned cockiness (simply ask the neighbors southeast who love trees and leaves what they think of the collection of rocks up northwest). He was quiet. Almost melancholic, and he did not radiate Iwa pride at all.
She approached closer. Much closer. And called out to him in her childish voice then. “Hey! What’s your name?”
This was a mistake.
The procession did stop, and the boy did turn to her. There was no rudeness in his gaze nor dismissiveness in his eyes. He looked curious. It was a curiosity that mirrored her own.
But she was not prepared for what happened. One of the guards, an older man with a cruel thin mouth turned around and looked down upon her with an expression of absolute fury, as if his station were being challenged. He was ready to deliver a cruel backhand that could have potentially sent her flying that was meant to punish and to silence.
“Guard…that is quite enough.”
The voice was from Onoki. The guard stopped his movement, his expression in a terrifying way going back to neutral once again as if the “transgression” never happened.
“Forgive my granddaughter for this act.” Onoki said. “She is a…curious child.”
The guard performed a deep bow, and the procession turned and walked off again.
“Grandfather.” She said, curious and a little angry by the almost sudden blow, her not understanding the sudden escalation to violence. “What was that all about? Why did he almost hit me just for asking that boy’s name?”
“That…is a conversation for a different day.”
“A different day? You said I could ask any questions during this showing of the village and-”
“A conversation…for a different day.” Onoki said again, his voice making it very clear that she ought to drop the current conversation and let it go.
After a brief Iwa standoff moment, where two rocks, really a young hill that could erode into a mountain one day and a very much old unyielding mountain, both acknowledging each other but not wanting to move, she let it go.
“Fine!” She said, spitting out the word.
…She wakes up.
The morning light from the sun peers through the window illuminating her face. Her rising from sleep was not gentle, but it could have been worse. To this day she still does not know who, or perhaps more accurately what he is. All she knows are rumors and whispers of orders in the highest echelon of command and power, a grand standing S rank order/mission. Retrieval. To bring back subject 7, at all costs. She does not fully know why. Not really. Is he subject 7? Was he? And what is he like now?
…Questions for another day. For now, she has to go train today…and complain about Kitsuchi not getting those liniments from the Land of Hot Waters for Onoki’s back. He said it was “unnecessary.” Right. As if the safety of the village doesn’t depend on an old man’s back giving out. Luckily she had sent Akatsuchi to get the job done.
In that very same night, another dream’s a dream.
It was always the same dream for him.
The first thing he would notice are the lights. The harsh lights just above the ceilings. Sterile and cold and radiating something akin to a migraine. It reflects off the dead walls and the long metal tables. The air today has the enticing aroma of antiseptic and boiled vegetables. It’s a mess hall. The mess hall…of Kiln.
He is just a twelve year old boy again. There is no duster. There are no boots. There is no long sleeve buttoned dark green shirt, with the sleeves rolled up to the elbows often. There are no durable grey trousers. Instead he has on the standard gray drab uniform of the project. A simple grey tunic and grey pants that always managed to feel too stiff even after trying to break them in. He sits at a table with a simple tray of food…and how simple it is. A scoop of plain white rice. Two scoops of boiled vegetables. And a simple piece of protein…whatever it is. The sounds of the mess hall have the sounds of metal chopsticks and metal spoons meeting the stainless steel trays where the food is all kept on. The other kids…”subjects”...other numbers…eat their own food at a simple mechanical pace. The walls are lined with various guards overlooking the place.
The peace of the non-peace gets broken with a loud non-peaceful bang.Someone had decided to sit next to him.
The young boy who sits next to him is smaller, a bit younger than him. He has a sort of manic and restless energy to him that seems almost infectious in an odd way. His own movements are sharp and jerky and pronounced. He is alive where the mess hall suggests he be subdued. This…is subject-11.
He does not speak to subject-7. Not at first. He is seemingly content to focus on his slurry of food first. He takes a scoop of the vegetable concoction and takes a scoop of rice and begins to mix together as his tongue sticks out to the side in concentration with his brow furrowed too. He does this until they are made into a…something. Some kind of strange abstract thing that is an ugly mixture of colors. But it is made. And however bad it looks, it is an improvement subject-7 had to internally admit over the drab setting…and even more drab food. Subject-11 does not look at subject-7, yet subject-7 could feel the manic energy and attention.
“You know…it’s just chaos to them, hm,” he says in a low whisper as if meant to convey a grand secret. “The handlers I mean. I mean…they just look at this and think it has no meaning, only chaos. Or that it has like…no value. But that’s not what this is! It’s a…It’s a moment. What’s that word…uh…ephemeral! Yeah, it’s beautiful because it won’t last.”
He turns his head to look at him, his slanted blue eyes conveying a feverish belief and intensity to them. He brings his hand forward. This entire time his portion of the protein slurry had been missing, but it turns out he had been kneading it earlier under the table after the brief moment of the art slurry on the tray. When he places it on the table, the form is revealed to be a jaunty eight-legged spider. Impressive given the protein slurry did not lend itself easily to being manipulated…or digested well.
“See? That’s what it is, yeah. It won’t last forever, but the…the look of it will be a memory you’ll want to hold on to. This is not just power which is what our handlers want Seven…but art! What do you think, hm?”
Seven doesn’t say anything for a moment. He looks at the jaunty little spider molding. Without looking at Eleven he says “It’s…art.” He does not say it with a sort of faux appreciation, nor does he try to flatter Eleven with it, but just acknowledging that what eleven made does not fit the standard category of their day to day lives. “They don't see what we do as anything but just...a bang. No emotion. No purpose. Just...a bang. So is that why you like art? It goes beyond...well, all of this?”
Eleven’s fidgeting stopped at that moment.
He did not expect this. His eyes wide with surprise with his usual smirk blown off his face as it were. He was expecting a grunt or a shrug or indifference. Anything that marked what Eleven had usually received in response to his “art”. Even Seven at times could be aloof to it, which infuriated him at times in the past.
But not today.
He had a wide appreciative grin. He leaned forward a bit, his intense feverish whisper continuing. “Yes! Yes, exactly Seven, hm!” he said. “It's not just a bang! A rock falling makes a bang. They could teach a monkey to make a bang. It's... it's the soul of it all, yeah!” He gestured at the grey walls and everything around them, his expression one of disgust and contempt for it all. “This place. These walls. This schedule. It's all permanent. It's boring. It's dead, yeah. They want us to be like that. Just tools. Permanent. Predictable.”
He looks back at the spider again.
“But real art? Real creation? It’s alive my man! And what can be more alive and present and in your face than the moment of its own destruction, hm?” He gestured towards the jaunty spider. “This little guy right here, yeah, he won’t exist forever. One moment, one act, one dedication…and then…bang! Gone! But in that moment, it’s more real than all of this, Than anything on this…this mountain! It’s art because you can’t own it, you can’t buy it, you can’t steal it. It’s there and then it’s gone. That’s like…freedom. Yeah. I mean…you get it don’t you? I mean your bangs are like powerful and stuff, everyone knows it. But what do they mean?”
Seven leans back a bit in the stainless-steel chair, thinking. Then looks at Eleven, his eyes for once seeming kinder and softer for once.
“Well... hehe...maybe...they mean me. Maybe they mean...someone who wants the bang to mean something.”
“Mean you…yeah. Yeah!” He said feeling excited, as if he found a fellow co-conspirator in this drab place. “That’s what I’ve been trying to teach these fools, hm! The explosion is you! It’s like your seal…you know those seals they use for like scrolls and stuff right? The seal of the kage and all that? That is what it is! Your signature in the world, if only for a second. Our art is what makes us, us if that makes sense. It’s more real than this bland and drab place. So,” he said, his voice dropping even more into a whisper. “If your bang is you…what are you trying to say? What will you do with it? When will you be loud enough for the whole world to hear?”
Seven looks at him with a thoughtful look on his face that seemed earnest, perhaps even a bit mischievous. He then says, and for once a small sly smile on his face, “Something like that... something like that. Trust me...you'll hear it...and you'll understand.”
“HEY! STOP MESSING AROUND AND GET BACK TO EATING YOUR FOOD! NOW! OR SO HELP ME YOU WILL BE ON LATRINE DUTY FOR A MONTH! A MONTH! START EATING NOW!” A handle barked out these series of orders, and the brief moment of connection between the two was gone, both going back to eating their food. But Eleven would glance over at Seven…his eyes curious indeed.
Some things…never changed.