[45] Traitor

"Kagami Hatake may be the one leaking information," the new Hokage, Tsunade, glares over her desk at the jonin she has left.

Approximately 20 sit in rows in front of her, her office not near capacity. Kakashi doesn't react as she expects, he just simply continues to look lazily at her desk. He is used to it, months Kagami has been under speculation, but this attack and her accurate knowledge of it has raised alarms higher than ever.

"I highly doubt a Genin woul-"

"But she isn't a Genin," Tsunade cuts him off, her eyes sharp, "She has been trained by the Root to be a killing machine, and by the looks of this," she lifts up a file off her desk, Kagami's name scrawled across it neatly, "I won't need to even guess why she might hate the village."

Kakashi's head does slightly lift his head to her at this point, his interest peaked, "Why is that?"

Tsunade gives him a small glance before opening the file and shuffling through a few papers. She pulls out a certain one and places it on her desk, leaning forward slightly to read it.

"Kagami Hatake, April 13th, age 9, tortured for three hours and 40 minutes because of a failed mission. August 26th, age 10, tortured for fourteen days, nine hours and 36 minutes because she was identified by Shikaku Nara around the village border. The list goes on, but it would seem that Root has questionable methods of dealing with failure." The woman glances down at the ninja, anticipating a reaction.

Kakashi sighs heavily, rubbing his face. He is well aware of how the Root works, but he never thought that this could be one of the outcomes of the corrupt Foundation. Shikaku, who is sitting lazily at the back of the room leans back against the wall and looks to the roof, closing his eyes.

He remembers the day he found her. She was looking at the dead trees in the Nara forest and she wandered too close to the edge and he could see her through the trees. He had never seen her around before and was aware of run-away orphans sneaking into villages at the time. So he trapped her in his shadow possession quite easily and walked his way to the Hokage office, Kagami following his every move.

The Hokage also had no idea who she was, and immediately called for her to answer his questions, but she chose not to talk and all she did was lift her shirt slightly to show off her black foundation symbol to the two.

The rage in Danzo's eyes that day was very clear. It became obvious to Shikaku that Kagami wasn't supposed to be found or known about. That she was his secret weapon, yet he had found her wandering through his forest in broad daylight on his day off.

"Shikaku," The man looks over to his Hokage hesitantly, "Tell me what you found her doing."

The man sighs and sits up straighter, scratching his head.

"She was trespassing on Nara land, I don't think she knew about the boundary between parkland and our land." He makes eye contact with Kakashi briefly. "She was looking at the dead trees, the ones burnt in the fire."

"I assume you mean the Nara fire?" He nods, "When did it take place?"

He looks up again, as if the ceiling has the answer, "A few years ago, hm, maybe a week before the Uchiha Massacre."

The edge on the roof hardens and seems to become darker.

"Well, something may be tied in there, the culprit was never found I remember." Tsunade leans back in her chair and stares down at the folder in front of her, her mind spinning to a conclusion. "I want 24 hour surveillance of that girl."

The room shifts suddenly, eyes widening and gasps leaving mouths.

"I know we are low on Shinobi, but, I believe there is something up with that girl." She leans forward in her chair and stands up, pulling out all the papers in her folder and glancing over them. "This girl, she has been through too much to not be affected by this . . . this upbringing."

Kakashi watches the woman moving the papers around before picking one up again.

"In the Root, you are given teams correct? Teams with a Captain, much similar to Genin teams." Kakashi nods to her in confirmation, wondering where she is going with this.

"Kagami did have a team, but not for long. She also had two roomates that were designated 'guardians' to make sure she didn't run off. But she also had Itachi Uchiha." Silence falls over the room, the shuffling stops, everyone holding in her breath.

"Children who are orphaned always find someone to attach to, an elder sibling or parental figure. Otherwise they give up," She glances around at her subordinates and sighs, sitting down, "because Kagami was mostly alone, my guess is she chose her attachment, we just need to find out who." The room stays silent.

"She is to be monitored at all times, anything sent to or from her is to be checked."

"Tsunade-sama," the woman looks down at Kakashi, motioning for him to continue, "Kagami has a summoning, a wolf called Masaru. He has been with her all her life and I think he is the attachment not a Root member, most Root members try to kill off the youngest ones."

Tsunade looks at him for a moment before speaking again, "that could be true, but no matter how close the summoning, she would have still confined in a human. Most likely a female her age, or a male many years older than her."

She suddenly freezes, her head tilting a little. "Where did she come from?"

The room looks at her confused.

"Kagami, you never met her until she was transferred, correct?" Kakashi nods back, "her file says she joined at age three. So where was she?"

She narrows her eyes at Kakashi. "You don't remember anything correct? Another woman in the house when you were young? Random disappearance of your father?"

Kakashi shakes his head, starting to become wary of the woman.

"So you are all telling me that we have no idea where this girl has come from and we are letting her run her way through this village? How has nobody picked up on this before?"

"The Third," The heads turn towards the window, two young men leaning against the wall next to an open window. "The Third didn't want you to know. He wanted Kagami to have a normal life. But it would seem she can't."

"Who are you?" Tsunade stands up in warning, confused by how they were not noticed.

"Oh! How silly of us, we are Kagami's 'roommate, guardians' from the Root." One of them smiles warmly.

"And we are here to raise a very important piece of information to the table." The other smiles as well, his hands holding a box out to his Hokage.

"What is this," she narrows her eyes as she grabs the box from the two delicately.

"I am Toshiro and this is Masaaki, and we need to talk to you about Kagami's stalker."

s.h.o.u.t.

Kagami rolls her eyes as she stares at the ceiling. She's on a higher floor and can hear Naruto and Sasuke shouting at each other from the roof. She thinks she should probably go and stop them but that would take a lot of energy.

'Kami damn it.'

She sighs and stands up, shuffling very slowly towards her door and down the corridor. They have been arguing for a little more than a minute so she should have some time to get up to them before anything bad happens.

But then again.

Those two have a tendency to escalate situations rather quickly.

Kagami sighs once again and tries to speed up a little, focusing on their chakra. From the feels of it, they aren't too riled up at each other. Just yelling like usual. But she can feel something beneath it, like a small darkness within one of them.

'Today will be fine, but someday soon they will snap against each other.'

Kagami scales the last few steps and pushes open the roof door, starting the two boys. They glance towards the door in annoyance, thinking it may be Sakura again, but freeze when they see Kagami giving them a very obvious deadpan.

"I can't rest while you two are yelling at each other," she steps onto the roof and immediately regrets it.

The winds up here are stronger and cause her to stumble to the right lightly, almost pushing her into Sasuke. But, she stands her ground and pushes up against it until it passes.

She glances between the two boys, her eyes a little unfocused.

"What happened?"

The two boys are slightly shocked by her.

'She cares . . . ?'

'She doesn't understand anything.'

"Nothing," Sasuke shakes his head and shoves past her, his hands in his pockets. \

Kagami reaches out and grabs his wrist and stops him from leaving.

"Lying is a weakness Uchiha, it causes room for death and enemies to get under your skin if you do not tell your team the truth." She yanks the boy backwards, making him stumble back in front of her and next to Naruto.

She grabs onto Naruto's hand as well and brings his to Sasuke's, which is struggling to get out of her cold grip. She opens his fingers effortlessly and forces the two to shake hands, bringing their wrists up and down for them as the two are just glaring at each other at this point instead of paying attention to Kagami.

"If you two don't cooperate I will make you hug." She doesn't look up, she just stares at their hands, waiting.

The two glance at her, knowing her capabilities and have no doubt that she could force them to hug. So the two shake hands lightly before letting go, crossing their arms and turning away from each other.

Kagami sighs and turns away from them as well, giving up on them.

'If they want to fail in life, so be it.'

She walks towards the roof door and away from the two, hoping to get away quickly.

But no.

The door slams open, smacking aggressively right against Kagami's broken arm, making her hiss loudly and grab onto it instantly. Sakura stands in the doorway, breathing heavily and glancing around warily.

"I heard arguing when I walked in." She huffs and turns to Kagami, "Kagami?"

"I just dealt with it Saukra, these two have decided to not become Shinobi."

The silver-haired girl walks around her other female teammate and heads down the stairs, leaving the two boys with the aggressive girl. She smiles slightly.

'I hope she hits them.'

'That's not a very nice thing to say.'

'I hope she does more than just hit the Uchiha."

Kagami freezes, her hand on the cold railing and her foot hanging off the last step of the stairs.

'Hokage-sama?'

' . . . .'

' . . . .'

She lets out a breath and continues on her way, walking back to her room with a little more caution in her step. She glances around stonily, her gaze chilling. She doesn't pass anyone on her way back. Her ward was mostly full of people who are bed ridden or can't move for long periods of time.

She slides her door open and freezes instantly. She stares at Shikamaru who is sitting comfortably on the end of her bed, smiling lazily at her.

"I was wondering if you had ran away."

She glares at him and walks in, closing the door and heading back to bed. She rolls her eyes at him and gers under the sheets, wanting to warm her legs up again after being outside in the wind.

"Anything interesting happened today?"

Shikamaru shakes his head, confusing the girl.

"Then, why are you here?"

"Maybe I just wanted to visit you, troublesome woman." He gives her a look and she looks away, her cheeks heating up slightly.

'Thank Kami for masks.'

Shikamaru sighs and scratches his head, "Sorry about Dad and the whole, 'welcome to the Nara clan thing,' he can be a bit odd sometimes."

Kagami doesn't answer, she just looks back at the boy, noticing his embarrassment. She nods slowly, leaning forward, her head spinning.

"Huh? Kagami?" He freezes.

His eyes go wide and his hand raises slightly from the back of his head. His entire body goes rigid as he stares down at her.

She pulls her mask down to her chin and places a soft kiss on his lips. [oh my fucking god, only took you forever and a life time]

She keeps her eyes closed, scared to look at the boy. She leans back and covers her mouth again, looking away from him as he stares at her, still frozen in his position.

"Well this is awkward."

s.h.o.u.t.

Who do you think is at the door?

~shadow.