A Lethal Weapon - ALW Saga Book 1 [REWRITE]

Chapter 9

"You won't guess who I was teamed up with," Itachi said once he and Hanako picked a table at the dango store. Hanako looked at him with curious eyes. "Who?"

"Tenma Izumo."

Hanako couldn't help it and let her jaw fall at Itachi's declaration. "Noooo, and what did he do when he saw you?" she leaned on the table, waiting for his answer.

Itachi just shrugged. "He didn't even look at me. Guess he still hasn't accepted me as an equal." Hanako chuckled at this. "Let him, he'll accept it eventually. What about your other teammate? And your teacher?"

"Shinko Inari is the other one. She is...nice I guess. And the sensei is... well, good I suppose." Hanako tore off small pieces of the napkin she was using and threw them at the boy in front of her. "Not at all what I was expecting," she commented.

Itachi smiled. "I met them today, what did you expect?" She shrugged. "Maybe not a blunt response."

He shook his head. "How about you, how is it like being in the Military Force?"

Hanako leaned against her chair. "They only showed me around the headquarters. I'm supposed to return in half an hour to get my duties and tutor assigned. Boring." She sighed. "I just hope I can jump to the interesting part like right now."

Itachi smiled. Right then, a lady came to take their orders.

Weeks passed before Hanako was assigned her first solo patrol at night. She was supposed to watch over the clan during the night, walking around the deserted streets as everyone slept. In hidden corners, she could distinguish small cameras, and wondered why the Police Force patrolled when they had hidden cameras.

Hanako saw something that caught her attention. She was sure something moved up in some trees, and when she looked up at it, all her strength drained from her. It was him. The masked man she had met the night she awakened her Sharingan. His hair had grown longer, and the mask was just the same.

Hanako blinked, and the man was gone. She felt herself losing balance, and fell on the ground into a sitting position. She saw him, but she wasn't sure she should report what she saw. What would she say? There was a man in the compound who just appears and disappears without any trace? They wouldn't believe her.

After a year, Hanako was finally relieved from her service in the Military Force. Being trained under Uchiha officials wasn't what she expected, she would rather meet with Shisui and Itachi. They made things more interesting.

Her first mission as a Genin was simple. She just had to capture a civilian who was pretending to be a Konoha Shinobi. She was temporarily assigned to Itachi's new team. When she heard about what had happened to Tenma, she didn't know how to comfort Itachi. She was aware of how close they had become in the last year, and Itachi didn't eat or sleep for a few days. His other teammate, Shinko, decided to retire from shinobi's duties, leaving Itachi alone with his teacher. Hoping it was best for them, the Hokage decided to change Itachi into another team, and assign Yuki a new batch of Genin. Now, Itachi was with Hanako, a boy named Hiroki, a girl named Koharu and their new sensei, Masaru.

Itachi had become silent. Hanako was worried he needed a little more time off duty to come to terms with his feelings, but the boy assured her he was fine. When he recalled what had happened in their mission to escort the Daimyou, Hanako gagged at how gruesome was Tenma's death. No one deserves such a horrible death, not even if they used to be jerks in school. But the worst part came when Itachi described his killer. A man wearing black clothes and an orange swirled mask. Hanako connected the dots, it was the same man that had attacked her no more than two years ago, and had been following her the night of her first patrol. Lately, this man was everywhere, and she suspected he had been following her all along.