Saints and Suffering: A Naruto Fanfiction

Chapter 38- Reunion

The next week flew past Yama as he hardly registered it.

Yama would show up in training ground 14 before any of his genin, and he would stay there long after everyone had left.

The first few days, some of the genin wouldn't take their training very seriously, but around day 5 there was a subtle shift in Konoha.

The drums of war started to fade into simple background noise, and all the reverie and novelty wore off as reality set in.

Konoha was going to war. People would die.

Yama didn't even need to threaten his ninja into training past that point. Whether it be from spontaneous crowd wide realization, or simple peer pressure, training ground 14 was full of motivated and disciplined ninja for the vast of the day.

Heguri stopped by to evaluate for a short time later in the week, and while he wasn't happy with the results, he would never be unless each genin magically became chuunin level overnight, Heguri was instead somewhat satisfied at the morale and progress of the Operations Division.

It seemed, to Heguri at least, that Yama was doing a fine job, whatever he was doing, and that the combat vet didn't need much supervision.

As the week progressed and the 450 genin took their training more and more seriously. Yama found himself with less and less to do.

Which was a terrible thing.

Yama was stuck in his thoughts all day and all night, sleep eluding him no matter how tight he grasped at it. His thoughts would simply never abate, and the expected call of night never visited him.

His body was rejecting the very notion of rest. Instead, Yama meditated each night, but found it harder and harder to slip into simple silence as the thoughts piled up and up.

  What exactly is happening?

  Why is it happening?

  What did I do?

  What can I do to stop it?

  Where is Kurama?

Kurama, the small silver fox that was called Ginou in public due to his childish dislike of sharing his name with strangers, was nowhere to be found.

Each night, as Yama meditated in the peaceful zen of the Hatake Courtyard, underneath the willow tree next to the koi pond, Yama would wait for Ginou.

Yama was left alone with his thoughts, and he needed to talk to someone, anyone and get some help.

Yama had experienced much, and he knew quite a bit, but one thing that was certain in his mind was that he was not a smart man.

The heavy thinking was often left to others, and what was left to him was the simple things, like fighting.

So 7 days after his assignment as the Captain of the Operations Division of the Genin Corps, Yama was quite relieved to be interrupted in his fitful meditation by the exact two people he was looking for.

It was early in the night, but the sun had set at least an hour ago, and with the sun hidden beyond the horizon, and a cloudy sky blocking out the moon, the darkness seemed to encroach on everything.

Yama opened his eyes and smiled at the two in front of him.

Both Ginou and Shijin were there, and Yama sighed in relief like the heaviest burden in the world had disappeared from his shoulders.

Shijin, emotionless as always, broke the silence.

  "I have heard much about what you have done in my absence. May we speak inside?"