We Really Need to Have a Chat [Yuii]

[Kagetsu Yuii]

Yuii made a strangled noise in the back of her throat that could have been a laugh when Susumu shouted about pizza. Leave it to kids to focus on their immediate wants and ignore the overarching danger about to affect them. His second question, though, that made her upset."Y-your dad?" Guilt stabbed at Yuii's heart as it hit her that she would be betraying Ayumu when she handed the kid over to the giant orange sleaze ball sitting in that stupid upscale apartment. Friends didn't screw with friends kids, and once she did this Yuii had to be prepared to endure Ayumu's full disappointment and punishment for the rest of her, likely, short life. They WERE friends by now, weren't they? It almost felt like a friendship, if she forgot he was her boss and often the core of all the problems in her life. They weren't close enough he would be forgiving of THIS, though, even Yuii knew she was crossing a massive line. Unfortunately for the world's worst Sennin, she had no skills in blackmailing or lying to get herself out of this massive mess and it was all too likely Ayumu would have her jailed indefinitely or force her to meet her ephemeral pals in the afterlife.

"Shit," she cursed under her breath, struck by a sudden wave of nausea. Yuii was turning into an awful person. The very thought of giving innocent little Susumu over to the sentient cheese puff made her want to vomit up the sixty odd cookies she had eaten. And for what? A pat on the head from the queen bitch? An escape from one death to only find another? Even if they succeeded in using Susumu to bring down Ayumu, Karma would find Yuii and see her punished and she would deserve it. Ayumu was the best leader for their village right now, and any changes the old had and the orange tang monster made would only be to the detriment of shinobi and civilians alike.

Osu and Saeko suddenly flew overhead with their small band of Chibi, placing themselves between Yuii and the apartment building and solidifying her assumption that one, if not both of them, were a no good lackey. By her guess, there was no way to get to the apartment building now without going past them.

The troubled woman sucked in a calming breath and turned to Susumu. She had to make a choice now; shed all scraps of integrity she clung to and deliver Ayumu's child to the machinations of the Tiny-Handed Tyrant or get Susumu to safety and meet the consequences of her over-active conscious head on. " I've got your best interests at heart, okay?" she sniffled, slamming her head once against the stone brick wall in a small show of masochism. It helped her think. "Just listen to me and we'll get through this."

--

"You two."

Yuii materialised suddenly with Ayumu's only offspring clutched to her side as both meat shield and gagged captive. In the minutes since their parting, Yuii was transformed from her scatter-brained and tolerant disposition to one of determination and authority. It was easy to forget, as she floundered through daily life as Sennin, that Yuii was foremost a well trained and otherwise exceptional shinobi. "Move," she ordered, materialising a single, vorpal blade from the spirit plane. She brought the tip of the blade to rest just below little Susumu's eye where even the slightest provocation would see him maimed or worse.

As is due all burgeoning baddies, Yuii wasn't satisfied with just her order. She had been- well not silent, but very patient she thought, and they needed to know she wouldn't be taken advantage of anymore. "I'm fed up with today. It was all great fun and all, a welcome distraction even, but now that I know what's going on the games need to stop. This is my life you're playing with. When they leave that apartment, your days go back to normal- but for me giving them this kid is the difference between life and death. I won't let you stop me, and I sure as hell am not sharing the credit so either leave or learn your places and walk with me." She allowed the dagger to puncture Susumu's cheek just enough to create a trail of blood, and hopefully scare all three into submission. "Otherwise, no one wins."

 

[Kogami Ayumu]

[spoilername="Meanwhile, Elsewhere..."]Ayumu looked down at his headset from which he had just somehow received a very strange and suspicious call from Saeko.
"The fuck was that?"[/spoilername]

Susumu sure as hell had no idea what was going on anymore. Yuii wasn't answering any of his questions and was still dragging him along like a dog on a leash held by an overenthusiastic child. The other two hadn't given chase as of yet which meant that if he was in fact being kidnapped by Yuii, his saviors had given up. All he knew at this point was that his dad trusted Yuii, and Yuii was telling him he was in danger. He didn't know the other two people at all, so he could really only trust her right now. The blue haired Sennin seemed conflicted and cursed under her breath as they stopped. Susumu refrained from reminding her that it was a bad word, given the situation. They paused just outside of a building as Yuii began collecting her thoughts. The other two were no where in sight and this building wasn't the Torre Celeste where his dad was waiting to help them. Had he made the wrong choice?

Suddenly, the missing two from before inexplicably sailed through the sky overhead into the building. As Susumu was trying to work out how the duo had managed to fly, Yuii was insisting that she had his best interest at heart before slamming her into a brick wall. The words were reassuring but the actions significantly less so. She told him that if he listened to her, they would be okay. Just what a kidnapped would say, but also what a savior would say. How was he to know? Susumu had his own decision to make now. Did he go along with Yuii based on the trust she and his father had, or did he scream bloody murder and hope some real adults came to help him? Right now he was wishing that he hadn't left the headset his parents had got him at home. Sure it wasn't the coolest thing to carry a headset and check in with your parents all the time, but right now he was missing it. Sighing uneasily, Susumu looked up at Yuii and quietly nodded.

--

A short time later, Susumu was bound and gagged by the very person he had just made the decision to trust. He had missed his opportunity to scream and now no longer had that option nor the option to flee. He squirmed in Yuii's arms trying to free himself, his irritated screams muffled by the gag. He looked, frankly, more pissed than scared at the moment but that changed when the blade made its appearance in Yuii's hand. His eyes followed the blade until it came too close for comfort and then winced in anticipation, only opening again when Yuii began talking. As she made her intentions clear, Susumu could only glance at Saeko and Osu with pleading eyes that were transitioning from defiant to fearful. He was at this woman's mercy and even the promise of pizza didn't make any of this OK anymore. As the blade pierced his skin he winced once more as tears began to well up in his eyes before cascading down his cheeks accompanied by muffled sobs.

 

[Osuteno]

What? Did... Yuii just slam her head against a wall?

What? Did she just summon a blade and put it in Susumu's face? This was suddenly a hostage situation now?

Osu slowly raised his hands above his head, not making sudden movements. While a shinobi was technically never really unarmed the gesture was usually calming and was symbolic of cooperation.

Osu winced a bit from uneasiness as he saw her draw a bit of blood.

"I hear you Yuii-Sa... Yuii. Your life is apparently at stake here. We can't understand what it must be like to be forced to betray a friend for self preservation. It must feel absolutely terrible. I hear you Yuii... Any way this situation goes you feel damned, so you choose to avoid the evil you know in the hopes the other won't be as hard on you. I can understand what it is like to be afraid of family... no not family, relatives. Real family wouldn't do things like this to you Yuii... to us."

Osu gulped a bit and felt his mouth getting a bit dry but he had to remain calm on the outside.

"Right now, despite that stern look on your face, you feel afraid... torn... I'm listening to you Yuii, and what I hear is someone forced into a terrible situation. I'm looking at you Yuii, and I see someone about to break from too much weight being thrust upon them. Right now you are trying to limit your own options so it will be easier to choose. You didn't really hold that blade to Susumu's face and cut his cheek to scare us, but to scare yourself. You are trying to scare yourself into thinking you have cut away the option of turning back, and I have done something similar before myself.

Right now though, I should tell you how I feel. I feel afraid. Not just for Susumu, but I also feel afraid for you, because even though I hardly know you, I don't think you can live with yourself if you continue along this path. I feel afraid for Ayumu, who would experience terrible loss and betrayal with a single stroke. I feel afraid for myself and my little family because I don't know what may happen to my wife and daughters. I also feel afraid for Saeko, but I doubt that would be a new experience for either of us."

Osu was wearing a tired smile now as his hands were raised, he was too tired for any of this, purely exhausted, but he had to stay on course.

"I also feel that today we have all been played for idiots. I can't really sugar coat it, the three of us have been moronic patsies dancing around unknowingly in the hands of schemers. And not particularly good schemers either from how this plan of theirs sounds, but we have danced to their tune anyway, never realizing it until things got out of hand. It is rather frustrating for me... Alright to be honest I am pretty angry right now, furious even. I want to go make juice out of this Dullard of Oranges or whatever his name is, and the only thing really keeping me from doing so is that it might cause a war for all I know, everyone seems to be intent on keeping me uninformed today."

Osu sighed, goodness he was always wordy when he was nervous.

“Please, you know you don’t want to do this. You know in that nervous part of your head you are trying to silence that this feels wrong to you. And you are not as cornered as you think you are. Let’s take Susumu back someplace safe… probably back to where that pizza for Susumu is since honestly I am a little afraid of being intercepted on our way to the Torre. Let’s call our big strong Raikage, for real this time Saeko,” Osu raised his voice briefly, “Admit to him how stupid we have been, that his son his safe and see if he can’t do something to help us all out here. And then-”

He suddenly had a direct call on his headset and Chiai’s voice came into his ear, rather loudly at that.

“I’m sorry Chiai, I’m in a bit of a delicate situation right… I’m sorry what was that?… That was your water breaking and those are contractions... How long have you… All day?! Why didn’t you!!!... I’m sorry why didn’t you call the hospital? What do you mean you didn’t know? The doctor told you what to… You never really listened to the doctor…”

Osu was becoming extremely pale and was beginning to sweat quite a bit. “So… they are coming… The twins are coming… You are in the process of giving birth to our daughters.” He looked at the situation he was in, looked at each person individually for a moment, looked up at his apartment where his wife was… And he sort of just froze. His mind went blank. He had… What was he supposed to do right now?

He was so confused, everything was happening so fast. So fast in fact that his author just realized at this moment that he never took Osu out of that transformation so this entire time he has been the little girl looking character with tanuki ears and a cutely, nasally little girl voice.

 

[Takaki Saeko]

Blessed Shinbatsu's Member, this is like the second time I've vomited today! "Osuuu!" I whine, clawing pitifully at my doctor-friend-tenant's yukata. "That was horrible and we should never do it again! Flying fucking sucks!" Abruptly, my gut tightens and spasms again. Well, that makes three times, now. The sensible thing to do would be to lie down and beg for death. But the very fact that we're chasing after my boss for abducting her boss's kid from our clutches is proof that this whole situation is anything but sensible.

Still, Osuteno has grown into a truly fine young man, despite never shifting out of his initial cosplay girl transformation. Instead of throwing up his hands in despair or wallowing alongside me, he does the exact opposite: he gently but firmly takes my hand and pulls me to my feet, dabs the puke off the corners of my mouth with a kerchief, and tells me to get my shit together and follow him. In this moment, he's gone from a blushing trap to a glowingly dominant shoujo-manga prince (female) who won't take "no" for an answer. I hate to admit it, but right now I'd probably drown whatever stood under my legs. "Okay, but s-stop confusing m-me!" I protest. "I d-don't need a new fetish!"

Of course, it all goes to shit the moment we catch up with Yuii. I thought I was prepared for anything--hell, I'd even snagged a nice respirator on the way there so I could speak like Bane and protect my gullet from another cookie onslaught--but not for this. Shinbatsu's Golden Scrotum, did she actually cut the Raikage's kid on his little face?

Osu's shoujo-manga princeliness kind of collapses under its own weight and he starts blubbering. And when I say "blubbering" I mean like, literally spewing enough verbiage to insulate the largest of whales and provide us all stinky-smelling lamplight forever. I get that he's trying to both support her and be rational, but come on, dude. Rationality went out the window a long time ago.

It's finally come to this. I'd long wondered when Yuii would finally make her move for real. I'd even, to my shame, grown slightly suspicious that she never would. In the back of my head, I'd danced around the possibility that perhaps she was just Ayumu's loyal lapdog all along. Or even worse, that she truly lacked ambition: that her true desire was to laze around on the couch all day eating bonbons and smothering that huggy-pillow of hers (Sunuke). But now I can see that she's the exact opposite. In fact, that her drive and ruthlessness puts her in the top tier of villainy, somewhere between Yukimura Enishi and Mike Pence. I crack a desperate smile and let out a chuckle.

"Osu, there's no need to call the Raikage at this point. We're already surrounded by his personal killers. Right now, there's a team in the opposite building training a rifle at each of our heads, and a squadron hiding in optical camo less than ten meters away, ready to rush in and put their knives up our asses the moment we drop our guard." I stare at a seemingly empty space beside Osu. "Isn't that right, Shashu?"

For the briefest of moments, I can see the subtle distortion in the air that might be a nod. "All we have to do is back away, and Yuii's cherry pie is gonna splatter all over our nice apartment building that costs way too much every month. Oh, we two will live, of course, but Yumers will slowly destroy us and make sure that we truly understand the depths of our failure. When it is done and Gotham is ashes, only then we will have his permission to die." I slowly, deliberately draw one of my pistols. "But I say screw that!"

Before Osu or the ANBU can react, I level the barrel at my own head. "Hey, Anboobs! I've got a big confession...for you! Well, it turns out that a month or two ago, I realized that Kouin had never actually paid his fair share of the rent! He was supposed to foot the gravity bill, but I did some digging and found out that there is no such thing! Gravity is a natural consequence of the curvature of spacetime caused by the unequal distribution of mass and energy! Basically, it's a free service provided by the planet! Kouin had never paid a red cent for anything! So what was he doing with all his time and money? Why...assembling a neutron bomb that's located right in the middle of our apartment! It's primed to go and has a radius of sixty kilometers! That's enough to kill every man, woman, and child in this village but leave the valuables intact for Leafies to pick through with their grubby hands!" I let out my best villain laugh.

"Yes, yes, Shashu, I'll get to the point. Anyway, look, the damned bomb has a dead man switch on it, which I carry around to prevent anyone from setting it off by accident. But if I die, then boom! Thing goes off and we all turn to sludge. So if anyone tries anything, I'm crashing this plane with no survivors! That's right, I'm taking myself hostage! Sennin-sama! Let's go to the apartment and hand the kid over like you want to! And Osu, you'd better follow along, too. If you miss the birth of your children, your wife is gonna fist us to death, and not in the cringey Amy Schumer way, either."

With that, I usher us all through the doors. We spend a few uncomfortable minutes riding the elevator up to the sounds of acid jazz. This is probably not the best time to talk with Osu about the need for another roommate (given Kouin's disappearance and scofflaw status), but he seems open to the idea. I mean, he's not really saying anything against the idea, or anything at all. I almost ask Yuii if she wants to move in, but she'd probably want Sunuke to come along with her, and we don't need yet another non-paying missing-nin tenant. Sorry, I'm just so done with those right now.

Along with the three invisible ANBU who'd snuck into the elevator with us (they're awfully accommodating about being squished against the walls by our butts), we march out to the apartment and knock on the door. From inside, we hear rhythmic chanting and what sounds like a woman screaming in labor. The pulsing energy of a god assuming avatar form hits us across the face like a microwave without its safety door on, and we start to sweat. I turn to Osu, gun still leveled at my own head, of course. "If I get knocked up, I just want a C-section, kay?"

 

[Kagetsu Yuii]

"I don't have to scare myself to do the right thing," Yuii growled in reply to Osu's veritable diarrhoea of words. She was starting to get irritated with it all. Who did Osu think her was, her psychiatrist? And had he REALLY just called Kogami their 'big strong Raikage'? That was all sorts of wrong that she couldn't even begin to get into because suddenly Osu was getting a call and his hostage negotiations were put on hold.

Which was exactly when Saeko decided to interject and drop one hell of a twist. "She's right," Yuii sighed, well aware of the shadowed ANBU and their readied weapons. If they even sneezed funny they were dead, which made Saeko's announcement all the more troubling.

"You have a wh-" Gravity, the missing Anbu Sennin and unpaid rent somehow lead to there being a very real and armed bomb in the apartment? Oh dear sweet Shinbatsu, if Yuii wasn't in the middle of bartering with Ayumu's kid's life she may have given birth to a litter of kittens right there. How on earth had the components been assembled for a bomb? She could only pray that Saeko was bluffing, but how could anyone tell? Yuii was starting to realise Saeko wasn't exactly the most reasonable kind of people, and nothing exactly normal had happened to them all day. Her danger went well past the daddy issues Ayumu had told her about. It was awful when the first time she actually felt in control of the situation was with Susumu at knife point. At very least Saeko's aura of insanity was on Yuii's side along with her hopefully not real threat to off herself and a sizeable portion of the village.

"Thank-you," she managed to squeak out as, beyond all logic Saeko got them all into the building and pack in the elevator.

Calling the situation tense was an understatement.

Except Yuii wasn't all that troubled, in fact, she cracked a smile when the doors closed and sighed in relief. "Hold on," she sang, guessing that her mirth would be taken poorly. The blade in Yuii's hand dissipated and she pulled the sock out of little Ayumu's mouth. Except, he didn't really move anymore and had a perfectly placid face like a child's doll. "He's a clone," she explained curtly, snickering quietly as if she'd told the world's best joke. The ANBU would know shortly that Susumu had arrived safely back at the tower, transported via tiger. The ones still around were there to work out the situation, and now that Saeko had threatened to blow up part of the village they were sticking around to arrest her at a moments notice.

It was good to know where they all stood now.

There was no doubt in Yuii's mind that Ishiyo would have left the premises by now. Their botched kidnapping wouldn't interest her now, not with the ANBU involved. She wouldn't want to be tied to anything to do with the apartment. In fact, Yuii suspected she would pretend to have never been there at all, even with Yuii. They had not met and Yuii couldn't prove she had actually heard her clan head. There was still the Donaldo to deal with though. "We can trade the clone to Donaldo and the Chigokai if they're been stupid enough to stick around." Yuii explained, hopefully filling in some blanks for poor Osu, "It will incriminate him, and we might just salvage some good from this mess. Once I lose eye contact I won't be able to control its emotions anymore, but the mirror image is pretty great isn't it?" The little clone made Ayumuesque sad eyes at her command and held the face.

"Good bluff, by the way," she added, staring down Saeko. If the psycho woman had any sense of self-preservation she would agree and put the gun down to salvage the situation. That was unless she wanted to sit in the under prison because threatening to blow up the village was definitely how one went about that.

 

[Kogami Ayumu]

--At the Torre Celeste--

Susumu reached up to the handle on the door to his dad's office, pulling it down and back to open the door. Ayumu looked up as the door opened unexpectedly, spotting Susumu as he peeked around the edge of the door. "Susumu? What are you doing here?" Ayumu asked, confused. He was still trying to figure out what was going on with the call he had received a short while ago. Beyond that, there were reports that some people had been accosting a child in the park and one of them, the description of whom had sounded suspiciously like the Sennin, had run off with the child. ANBU had been called and were on scene investigating now checking in occasionally. Quietly, Susumu approached Ayumu's desk and slipped a small folded piece of paper onto it.

Sighing, Ayumu took the paper and unfolded it to reveal a note:

I told you so.
--Yuii

Beyond confused now, Ayumu was baffled. Setting the note down, he looked at Susumu. "Explain."

[Topic Left]

 

[Osuteno]

Someone wasn't at all a happy camper. Someone was a very nervous, impatient and on his last nerve camper. Someone was in a weird headspace between feeling relief, snapping on someone, and worrying himself to death while the elevator was taking far to long it felt. He was quite irritated with both women but this wasn't the time to lose his cool... He couldn't stops drumming his fingers against the door and tapping his foot. Hurry hurry hurry hurry you damn contraption. Why were elevators so slow? He could have walked up the side of the building in this time. It was because of these two... uncommunicative lunatics! Why all of that drama! Were they shinobi or performers in some Cirque de Guignols!

When the elevator dinged and opened Osu was already at a dead run to the apartment ANBU or not. He had to get Chiai to the hospital and he would kick someone out of an or if he had to. What was this... week 36?! damn it, why wasn't he ready? And if she started having contractions and he water broke... how many hours ago...

Osu nearly kicked the door in then more reasonably got the key out and quickly opened the thing. The last thing he wanted right now was to trip the burglary alarm and create a racket. It wasn't even a second after he opened the door to find Chiai looking terribly uncomfortable in the living room with some...

"We are doing a terrific job here young lady, just terrific. You couldn't pick a better man for the job. No one knows as much about a woman's vagina as I do. Am I a doctor? I am according to this degree I have from my very own university. Am I a medical doctor, who's to say, but me and my very large, very masculine hands can surely handle your vagina very well."

Somewhere in Osu's mind there were a few little voices saying things like how this was apparently one of the most important people in the country, that just because his voice seemed to grate on him like nails on a chalkboard didn't really mean anything about the person himself, that he himself was a bit stressed and maybe a little aggressive currently, that maybe what the man said wasn't anywhere near as creepy as it seemed, etc.

The downside to not having a centralized brain was that your mind could be on several things at once, such as seeing that aside from discomfort of his wife he could see she was very obviously disgusted by the man but was crushing the sofa arm to maintain her peace. Seeing his wife’s great effort to not cause trouble moved something in Osu, so Osuteno decked the creep while still convincing himself not to act rashly. Not hard enough to kill mind… the man might need some reconstructive surgery, but he would live… he should live. Honestly if Chiai had lost her patience first she would have held back less, so this was probably the best outcome. Come to think of it had anyone yet told him exactly what that man’s position was in the government? Thinking on it the most he could remember was saying the man was elected?
Still that was far from the most important thing on his mind as clones popped into existence and started getting things ready to leave as he squeezed his wife’s hand and…

Osu’s frown deepened as he checked Chiai’s progression.

“What’s the matter? Is something wrong?” Chiai asked in a stern voice but she had adopted the same frown Osu had.

Osu corrected the frown on his face and gave a bit of a nervous smile. Okay a very nervous smile. “Quite the opposite actually. Did you happen to start feeling the aching last night before you went to bed?”

“It was a bit annoying but I have slept through worse. It didn’t really become all that bad until a couple of hours after that weird crap came out, about breakfast time. Hurts as bad as my worst training days right now and I feel like I am going to start vomiting any minute now. Just wave after wave and I will probably start screaming any minute if it gets much worse.”

“Well that would be because you are almost done actually. 10 centimeters, they will basically be ready to come out whenever you feel the urge to push…”

One of Osu’s clones that was putting the hospital bag together dropped it at these words with a look of shock and nearly collided with the other running to the bathroom to grab towels. It was a bit surreal to watch two of his clones try to work out who was doing what. Ah goodness what a silly sight, he thought partially wanting to escape a little. Chiai for the first time in a very long time looked… well she looked less than completely assured. She usually had a sort of boundless and baseless confidence but right now that didn’t appear to be the case.

He had never delivered a baby before. Much less twins. His own twin daughters. Hell, this was supposed to be a C-section! “Alright do you remember those breathing techniques?” At the very least he had to pretend to be calm.

“Uh Osu, wha-what about the epi thing or you know the hospital? They can delay this sort of thing right?”

“Well we kind of missed that window… It would take a good 15 minutes for me to run you to the hospital right now and… well that… If I had known you have…” He was trying to avoid saying if she didn’t power through all the signs as simply annoyances like she would a few stab wounds since the night before and told him this would be a much safer procedure in a much safer environment. He was a little frustrated with her but more than that he was frustrated with himself and worried about her and the children. “Well no need to worry,” He said as his tendrils slipped out and began lifting her up gently into his arms and maintaining a comfortable position. He was worrying enough for both of them.

He carried her to their bedroom where one of the clones had already removed the sheets and laid out a few layers of his calligraphy paper with a layer of clean towels. An… interesting setup but seeing as his clone was seeming to be panicking more than he was, he let it go.

“Alright Chiai, look at me Chiai. We are going to breath together okay? I know you are in a rather rough place right now but we can’t rush the girls out. We will just breath together and when you feel them trying to come out during your contractions just help them along. When they relax try to relax with them, it isn’t a race and will probably take a while.”

“Osu.”

“Yes?”

“It isn’t as convincing when I can see those two in a panic over there,” Chiai said nodding towards the clones who were…

“You two… we will be taking them to the hospital after this. Stop trying to put the crib together. You call the hospital, and you bring me the towels and the bag from the top of the closet.”

“You always talk too much when you are nervous, think too much as well. You are going to need to break those habits if you want me to let you keep ohhhhh...”

“Alright less chatting, more breathing. You act far too tough when YOU are nervous.”

Chiai didn’t seem to hear him though. Well that wasn’t entirely uncommon… Actually…

“You two finish gathering things and shut that door,” Osu told the clones.

Then Osu stepped in the doorway of the room, “And by the time we are done in here all of this mess,” Osu started gesturing towards the unconscious person, the files everywhere the ANBU just sort of hanging around, “needs to be sorted out.” Osu returned to his wife and the clones soon followed behind with what seemed to be every medical bag in the house because for some reason they decided they would be incompetent today and closed the door on the rest of them to handle this mess on their own for a while.

 

[Takaki Saeko]

I flip the safety on my pistol and put it back in the holster. "You got me there, Sennin-sama. Although I can't guarantee that there isn't a neutron bomb in Kouin's room, since I've never really gone in there. I tried, once, but...I got scared and turned back. Everything--the walls, ceiling, and even floor, was plastered in pictures of anime girls wearing maid outfits and cat ears! I felt like if I went in further, I'd turn into a smelly NEET." I glace at her Susumu clone, which stares blandly back at me until I look away. "Can I speak freely, Sennin-sama? I feel like...like I don't understand you sometimes. Like, with this plan you devised. You had the perfect opportunity to strike and make the village yours. I might not have wanted any harm to come to Yumers's kid, but I would've still supported you, even if you'd turned him into pickles. But instead, you acted heroically and in the best interests of the Raikage." At this point I can't help but sniffle and hold back tears. "I almost feel as if...as if you're not really an ambitious villain, but rather just someone who wants to take it easy and avoid responsibility. That scares me, Sennin-sama! It scares me to my core, but...I should shut up. It's not my place to doubt you and I know that. I'm just glad that senpai noticed me a little today."

The crash of Osuteno kicking our door open snaps my attention back to reality. "Dude, what the hell? You have a key!" I snap at him, but he's clearly not listening. After I charge in after him, though, I stop dead in my tracks. When I'd left the apartment earlier in the day, the collected nobles, ministers, ambassadors, clan heads, guild masters, and spiritual leaders of the nation--a good chunk of the people in control of our daily lives--were happily enjoying a humdrum tea party in my co-opted space. But right now, the entire scene looks like something out of one of those horror-themed FMV games from the nineties. In fact, the entire place looks like it's been remodeled into a circle of Hell, complete with sacramental basins of blood, demonic stalagmites everywhere, and enough flickering torches to void my fire insurance policy ten times over. All of the important people have changed out of their normal clothing and into tattered robes, and are wildly prostrating themselves before a central altar while wailing things like "Hail the Dark Lord!" and "we're not worthy!" Laid out on said central altar with her feet propped up in obstetric stirrups, Chiai writhes around with her vajayjay out for all to see, while Donado of Oranji tries to convince her that he has the best hands. Beautiful hands that everyone talks about. It's gonna be yuuge!

"My security deposit!" I gasp, and fall to my knees. "It's totally gone!"

Of course, things quickly get worse. I look up from hyperventilating about three months of lost wages only to see Osu's fist rearrange our orange Chancellor's face in front of God and everyone. Or would that be in front of Jashin and everyone? "Osu, no!" I moan. "I don't have any kind of homeowner's insurance! He's gonna sue us every last penny out of us! Shinobi work doesn't pay enough to cover that kinda debt and I don't have any marketable skills!" Any emotional reserves I might've had simply dissolve now and I break into heaving, blubbery sobs.

"There, there, my child," one of the figures says. I recognize him as one of those dark priests that have been constantly coming around to drop off gifts for Chiai since the later stages of her pregnancy. He drapes a tattered robe around my shoulders and gives me a friendly squeeze. The hellish garment smells like sulfur and brimstone, which doesn't stop me from blowing my nose into it. "Cry no more, for the moment of salvation is upon us," the priest says. "Our Lord has come to walk the earth and usher us all into a glorious new dark age, and furthermore, he has chosen to occupy two vessels at once! Such an auspicious event may only happen once in many aeons!"

"That...that's nice and all," I blubber, "but my apartment's a mess and Osu just assaulted the nation's second most powerful man..."

"Indeed, and his penance will be severe," says the priest, cackling and stroking his beard. "A punishment worse than death, and sure to bring ruin and despair lasting a lifetime. I speak...of parenthood!"

"What?" I scrunch my brow. "It can't be that bad, can it?"

"Having a kid means basically saying goodbye to all your time and money forever. Also, good luck trying to have sex on the regular," the priest says with a sigh.

I gulp and shudder. The old man has a point. Come to think of it, I've been starting to feel the pangs of the "baby crazies" myself. I've started to envision Tomo bouncing our kid on his knee in my daydreams. Are we all condemned to a life of poverty and sleeplessness by our biological drives? Is this inexorable fate at work? It seems like a grave injustice--a cosmic joke in bad taste. I clench my jaw. Perhaps I should just get my tubes tied before I go and do something really dumb...

The sound of a crying pair of tiny voices washes across the room and plunges the assembled worshipers into sudden, awed silence. For what seems like a blissful eternity, we all join in that primal communion--that collective witnessing that unites all humans across all walks of life--that marks the start of new life on this world. From the back, a cheer breaks out, and the room goes ecstatic. Caught up in the moment, I also raise my arms and pump my fists. "Hail Jashin!" they chant in joy. "Hail to the Dark Lord! Hell hath come to Earth!" The ecstasy is pretty infectious, and I join in. "Hail Jashin!" I shout, giving Osu a thumbs up. "Hail Jashin! Hail Jashin!"

My place is still a mess, my security deposit's probably gone, and Donado of Oranji's out cold, but for the moment, I feel like everything's going to be alright.

* * *

Epilogue​

Shortly after the birth of Osu's twins, the gathered worshipers all vowed their eternal allegiance to the new avatars. pledged their loyalty to the side of darkness, and renewed their declarations to advance the agenda of the Jashinist shadow government that apparently runs the country. Then, they all changed back into their usual clothing, packed their things, and headed off to their ministries, guildhalls, cathedrals, and banks to resume the work of preparing Lightning Country to become the next duchy of Hell. Of course, they didn't clean up, offer to pay for any of the food and drink they'd enjoyed at my place, or even give me so much as an offer for a shitty, unpaid internship anywhere.

Which left me in more or less the same position in which I'd started--hurting for funds, in trouble with my boss, and with an even dirtier apartment. I guess the only good thing that came of it all was that Donado of Oranji had suffered a bad enough concussion that he'd forgotten about Osu decking him in the first place, and attributed his new bruises to a vigorous golf session at Mar a Lago. The ANBU also took care of retrieving all the paperwork I'd left in the apartment and introducing it to gasoline and matches. While they were running their sweep, however, none of us could stay in the apartment, so we had to find alternate lodging for the night. Chiai had to stay in the hospital for her aftercare, so Osu joined her. Yuii had her own place (complete with live-in NEET). And for me...

"Shashu, I need to be in jail for a while," I said to her, as I handed her my weapons and headset.

She merely gave me a confused look.

"Yes, yes, I know I'm not actually under arrest, but there are things...things which everyone would feel better about if someone just spent a few nights in jail. I know I'd feel better if I spent some time in the clink. If you want to, we can have a slumber party or a movie night, but it's got to be in jail. Now, be a good girl and put my cuffs on."

 

[Tsuirakuya Shashu]

Well, this certainly isn't how I expected to spend the day, Shashu thought to herself, stowing away Saeko's gear inside one of her armor seals. All told things hadn't really turned out that bad. A potential threat to the village had been largely averted...somehow...by the spastic fumblings of Saeko, Osu, and Yuii, Susumu was safe, and she'd gotten to watch a tiny...girl? deck a guy who desperately needed to learn what real hair looked like. The clone she left with Susumu hadn't even been needed, though the ANBU presence it had called in certainly sped things up. And that wasn't even mentioning the bit of, ah, sightseeing she'd gotten in.

"Well, your choice I suppose. You know, this all could have been solved a lot cleaner if you'd just let Tiny-Hands McGee go ahead with his plan, or even just tipped me off. You know full well how close an eye I keep on Susumu. Not even Sin itself could take him under my watch." She produced a set of cuffs from a seal, ANBU issue chakra blockers, and twirled them thoughtfully around a finger. If Saeko insisted on jail, appearances had to be kept after all. "That said, perhaps it's better this way. I mean, how fortunate is it that we caught them in possession of all that stolen paperwork right? Wouldn't do to let our orange friend abscond with all that oh-so classified information, now would it?" She added with a wink as she slipped the cuffs over Saeko's wrists and led her off, waving away one of the ANBU who offered to take charge of the 'prisoner'.

"I'm actually kind of glad, I've been dying for a movie night. I can even dust off one of those posh diplomatic cells for you, Yevon knows they could stand to actually be of use once in a while. Did you know they come with a mini-bar? Fully stocked even! Diplomatic privilege is such a...."

[Topic Entered/Topic Left w/Saeko]