No yes or no on the amnesty then, I thought glumly. "No, Lord Third.
"
"This matter is tabled then. " He put away his pipe and clasped his hands behind his back.
"Come. "
Where?
But I got up and followed, because obviously.
He led me out of the room, down the hallways and stairs, past bustling and bowing nurses and doctors. Stately.
Sedately. Apropos of nothing, Sarutobi Hiruzen was a very, very short man.
The room we entered was full of a thick, almost buzzing feeling in the air I assumed was waste chakra, clearly wafting from the medic nin and various seal arrays around the room, and that's all I managed to glimpse before the return of The Menace.
"It's you! You're okay, I'm so glad, you were hurt and it's all my fault, there was so much blood and I thought you were gonna die and that would've been awful, I can't become Hokage if I'm in jail and if you'd died after all that it would've been so sad, why did you have all those knives there anyway?"
Where did you come from? I despaired as he yanked so hard on my hands that I barely managed not to fall on my face. "So little hellions guilty of involuntary manslaughter can have an easier time blaming the victim," I grunted through the spike of pain.
Unfortunately for my unequalled wit, Naruto didn't understand a word I said. I sighed.
"You'll do the same when you get older," I managed to say. "The sharpest stuff always go on the highest shelves, it's a habit you have to get into when you've got little kids in the house, and I never got out of it after mine died.
"
"Oh. " Naruto was glum again.
"I'm really, really, really sorry about the ashes mister but look, look, they're fixing it, see. it's all gonna be fine, see, they're fixing it, ninjas are the best!'
This is why I hate everyone's kids but mine – wait, what are those doing there?
"Crow," the Third called.
An anbu appeared on bent knee out of nowhere. "Lord.
"
I blinked. His voice was indistinguishable but he was lithe and not much taller than the Hokage.
"Please take Naruto home. "
"But I wanna watch!" The boy whined, dropping to the floor with arms crossed. "You keep saying I need to be more responsible, that means I gotta stay and learn how to do this for next time!"
He's planning a next – gods, please no.
"Think of it as your punishment. Go.
"
Naruto jumped behind me to hide, but 'Crow' was already on his third afterimage and then there were two more fading out the open and shut window.
This power play was hardly necessary. Why even let this meeting happen at all if he was just going to get Naruto spirited away immediately?
I rubbed my face and looked away from the vanished Menace to… my urns. They were there on the table, all three of them.
Emptied. The new jar too.
There were two medic nin and a chunin all… doing something. Separating the dirt from the ashes somehow.
And… the ashes from each other? An earth technique and two glowing orbs of pale green light working in tandem to… was this really happening? How did that even work? "Can they really do that?" I asked quietly. "You're not just putting on a show, are you? Because if you are, I'll wait for you in the afterlife and… do things.
"
"We'd both best live as long as possible then," the Third said mildly, as if he didn't know how that sounded to the one with none of the power in this situation.
We stood there for a while until I was about to drop and a nurse offered me a chair, which I gladly took. My emotional composure was going on strike.
Also, I almost died today and a whole pint of my blood was feeding the cockroaches.
For some reason, the Third stuck around until the very end, when the three nin finished and the senior medic presented me with a box containing the freshly cleaned and refilled urns of my wife and children. "… Thank you.
" I thought I'd be more choked up, but maybe the blood loss had sapped me of that too. Or the hit to the head.
But no, it wasn't just that. It was everything catching up to me at once, robbing me of what should have been the deepest relief in years.
There was just so much, and for this amazing show of skill and goodwill… the things that had to happen… Even in the short time since I left home tonight…
The Third exchanged some last words with the medic nin and beckoned me. I quietly followed him to the entry hall, where I was confronted with the sight of my cart just outside, all fixed good as new.
It… didn't make me smile. My grip tightened on the box handles and I grimaced.
The Third watched me carefully. "You are still displeased?"
"I get that this is all in good faith, I do, it's just…" It's just that state spooks had gone into my house to take my most precious possessions and… do with them whatever they wanted. On a whim.
Without asking. Without me even knowing.
Even the sight of my repaired cart had a bitter aftertaste, just drove home that I lived at the sufferance of an absolutist police state. And where was that police state while the state's ward was bringing my workshop down around my ears? I sagged and smiled wryly.
"It was nice to pretend I had some control over who goes in and out of my home, for a little while there. "
"I see. " The Third seemed sympathetic, which I didn't appreciate seeing as how he wasn't going to act on it in any way, but it's not like I expected an absolute dictator to apologise for being an absolute dictator.
"Then it is a good thing this is not your compensation either. " The Hokage held a hand to the side.