A.N.B.U.

Chapter Thirty-Seven: TI's Doubts

As he entered the TI building he was immediately filled with memories of his interrogation... He did his best to push those doubts away and concentrate on why he was here.

As he walked the corridors to the common room, he wasn't even sure what time was. He looked up and saw he had walked right into a worried Inoichi

"You ok, kitsune? You seem off... You're seeing ghosts haunting us !?" His voice was tainted with worry hidden by humor.
"Nothing of the sort, Yamanaka-sama, just memories, ghost are too scared of me."
Our young hero answered, as best as he could. He did his best to stay quiet and not say anything worse as his brain was flooded once more with memories of his interrogation.

"Talk... It's a lot easier, don't you think... A looootttt easier. We just want to know more about you. Why don't you want to share more ?" The voice was punctuated with quick dips into the water.

The blond captain shook his head and closed his eyes when everything became too much. Once he was sure the flashback was gone he slowly let himself relax. He then breathed in and concentrated on the corridors. He didn't really know how he had even managed to get this far. He guessed the flashback had made him walk on autopilot and nobody had seen anything out of the ordinary. He passed by 2 other checkpoints before crashing on the TI breakroom's couch. Once he was on it he let himself fully relax as he looked around himself tiredly.

"You ok ?" A voice interrupted his musings... He looked up to see Ishi

"Yeah, yeah... Just some memories that can't seem to go away... And I can't do anything about them. They keep coming back even with the meds and I don't really know what to do about it." Our hero answered with well-practiced apathy... He was tired of dealing with people and just wanted to sleep, he felt safe here, in the middle of this chaos he felt like a constant and he felt like maybe he could finally rest...

As the hours passed he felt calmer and calmer until he finally could fall asleep and not think about much more of what was happening. He could almost think his Kage was sleeping and waiting for things to call down but somehow he knew things needed to be done... He knew he was going to be called back to active duty and that sadly he probably wouldn't see his "Jiji" for much longer... He felt bad but he knew he had to stand up and go back to just living as he lived before... However hard it may be for him...

"Fox? Care to tell me what the fuck you're doing on my couch?"
Ibiki tiredly asked as he sat on the table to start writing some reports...

"I'm not on YOUR couch ... I'm on TI's couch... And this is just the beginning of me sleeping here because my apartment isn't safe anymore, especially with the idiot Kakashi thinking I'm a traitor and that I'm a failure of a jinchuriki"

"Ok... Calm down... We have a mission for you. One that will get you away from Kakashi for a little while. But first, you need to pass a psych eval... Don't give me that look, we both know you can lie pretty well and we'll handle it internally in TI, so no risk of you seeing those idiots from Ghost"

As he heard the name of his interrogator squad he felt his eyes close as he was brought back once more into the room...

"Fox ! Fox!" Ibiki had been calling his name and pinching his arm for more than 20 seconds now... Our young hero was still unresponsive.

As he finally opened his eyes he saw that he was in TI's infirmary. He had no clue how he'd landed there but he was glad for the calmness in his head...

"You've not been taking your meds properly have you ?" Is musings were once more interrupted by the nurse.

"I have, dattebayo" He was too tired to mask...

"You'll never pass your psych eval in that state... Guess we'll need to send you to tsunade-sama for fixing" Dragon's voice was mildly amused... Why did our hero feel like all of this was somehow planned ?