Naruto: Dreaming of Sunshine

One may go a long way after one is tired. ~French Proverb

.

.

There were a few conference rooms in the tower big enough to accommodate a group of twelve. Not the kind with a table and chairs, but there was floor space and a pile of seiza cushions to kneel on.

It felt weirdly formal, but this was a mission briefing, so maybe the weirdness was that I was used to them being informal?

The atmosphere in the room was more boisterous than tense, however. There was a bit of wild speculating going around – I wasn't the only one who thought that getting these four teams together was a sign of something big – but no one had any more information, or was willing to share if they did.

"Ah, damn," Kiba moaned at me. "That's the last time I come to you for information."

I rolled my eyes at him. "I only found out this morning, same as you did," I complained back. "How am I supposed to know more?"

"I don't know, but you always do," he said. "Come on, Shino, back me up." He nudged his teammate with a shoulder.

Shino shifted his glasses in a move that seemed to convey mild exasperation. "It is illogical to assume that Shikako would be privy to more information than we are in possession of. Why? Because the rapid assemblage of multiple teams indicates an emergency response."

I smirked at Kiba. "I think that means he's on my side. And it's good to see you again, Shino. It's been a while."

"Yes, it is pleasing to be involved this time," Shino said. And wow, that was a little passive aggressive, wasn't it.

"Hey, you know you were the first one we asked for last time," I said, because being left out of the group sucked. I knew that. "And I, for one, would have really liked you to be there. There was a particular giant spider I would have left all for you."

"Hey," Kiba butted in. "I thought we'd agreed not to mention that." In his jacket, Akamaru made a sad growling noise at me.

"Sorry, Kiba. I'm bad at secrets." We shared a smirk, because the back and forth banter was just so easy.

"Then I will endeavour to be around in future," Shino said, looking pleased. "In order to protect you from spiders."

It startled an actual laugh out of me. Shino's sense of humour tended to take people by surprise. "Now there's a promise I can accept," I said with amusement. "Careful, Shino. You keep sweet talking like that and you'll have a fan club the size of Sasuke's."

Shikamaru slouched in nearly half an hour later, a sheath of papers held loosely in one hand. "Everyone's here?" he asked rhetorically, running a hand through his hair. "Great."

"Oh, don't sound so enthusiastic!" Ino said irritably. "You better not have been keeping us waiting just so you could dither around-"

Chouji wrapped an arm around her shoulder to stop her from getting up and possibly assaulting our team leader. I would have wondered if Ino was on edge because this was her first mission since her injury, except that was actually fairly normal Shikamaru and Ino interaction.

Beside me, Naruto muffled a snicker.

Shikamaru sighed, and rolled his shoulders back until he looked at least vaguely at attention. "Alright, everyone pay attention. This mission comes direct from the Hokage. It's A-rank, classified, and extremely sensitive."

Several people straightened at the information. Naruto perked up. Even now, the promise of a high ranked mission was like candy to him.

"It have anything to do with those explosions last night?" Kiba asked, guessing what we had all suspected was the reason for this meeting. "Village security went up another level this morning, too."

"Yeah." Shikamaru gave a brief nod in his direction. "Just let me explain. The explosions last night were part of an Anbu operation to bring in a fugitive who had infiltrated the village. He evaded them for a while, but was eventually cornered and refused to surrender, setting off a bunch of explosive notes. He was pronounced dead at the scene."

There was a shift of confusion amidst the teams.

"I do not understand," Lee said. "If the target is dead, then what is our mission?"

"I'm getting to it," Shikamaru said, eyes dropping to his papers for a second. "As far as I know, the Anbu had him under surveillance for about two weeks and the reason that they attempted to bring him in last night was that, last night, he finally made a move. He broke into the construction company headquarters and made off with a bunch of important blueprints."

Oh, shit.

I wasn't the only one that seemed to be thinking that.

"I don't get it," Naruto said, looking around at the rest of us. "What's so important about a bunch of blueprints?" He frowned, turning slightly towards me and Sasuke, but it was Neji who answered him.

"If Konoha's enemies got their hands on those blueprints, it could be disastrous," Neji said, and he didn't sound at all put out about having to explain something that should have been obvious. "Once they have a detailed analysis of the structures within the village, it would be a simple matter to find the most efficient way to break in or cause harm."

Realisation stole across Naruto's face. "Oh, yeah. That would be bad," he agreed.

"The Anbu searched the blast site," Shikamaru continued. "But they concluded he was unlikely to have been in possession of the plans at the time. Which is where we come in."

"Can we be certain that the blueprints are still within Konoha?" Shino asked quietly. "Because the most logical conclusion is to assume that the reason the infiltrator was not in possession of the plans is because they have already been delivered."

"No," Shikamaru said seriously. "We can't. We can only hope that the plans aren't already in the hands of our enemies."

That was sobering. The last thing Konoha needed right now was a gigantic hole in our defences. If Hidden Cloud were serious about attacking us, then that would be an opportunity that they simply wouldn't be able to pass up. We would have an invasion on our door step in weeks.

I'd never known anything about another invasion, but after Gelel, I was reluctant to assume that meant anything at all. I didn't – desperately did not – want to be wrong.

"Additionally," Shikamaru continued. "This guy has a reputation for setting some pretty nasty traps, so we're likely to run into some during this mission. Keep your eyes open."

"Understood," Ino nodded firmly. "Just tell us where to start looking."

"We'll start by heading to the construction HQ," Shikamaru said. "They've put together a list of plans that are missing, so we know what to look for." He handed out the pages that he was carrying. "This is the dossier for the guy. He came into the village a few months ago, in the guise of a carpenter."

"No!" Naruto protested loudly, shooting to his feet. The dossier page was clutched crumpled in his hand. "This has to be wrong."

I shared a glance with Sasuke, then grabbed one of the pages myself. At first glance, I couldn't see anything wrong. The photo was nigglingly familiar for a few moments, before I managed to place it.

"The old man from the ramen stand," I said with resignation. "You know him, Naruto?" Of course he did. That was another layer of complication to a mission that didn't look simple to start with.

Naruto nodded vigorously. "Old man Genno doesn't have a mean bone in his body!" He said. "There's no way he's some kind of imposter ninja."

There were other people trading glances too. They did not seem overly supportive.

"Maybe that's what he wanted you to think," Kiba said with a snort. "Sure looks like it."

Naruto glared. "No. I knew him, okay?"

"Maybe you didn't," Sasuke said quietly. "Sometimes you don't." He wasn't looking at either Naruto or the information page, and the comment wasn't even that loud.

I sucked in a breath, the words I was going to say getting caught in my throat. I could see so much meaning behind those words.

Sasuke, are you-

"I did," Naruto insisted, steamrolling right over the protests with sheer bullheadedness. "And I'm saying that he wouldn't do something like this. There's a mistake."

Shikamaru sighed. "Come on, Naruto. He might have seemed harmless, but it was an act. He wanted us to let our guards down. And it worked."

Naruto clenched his jaw, ready to burst into another round of protests. I could see the divisions in the room forming, of people siding against him. Hinata was nervously twisting her fingers, glancing between Naruto and her team. I could see she wanted to believe him, but wasn't convinced of the logic of it. Lee, maybe, could be swayed by Naruto's sheer conviction, but Neji looked surprisingly thoughtful too.

"Either way," I said, hastily, because we didn't want to start this mission a team divided. "We have to investigate this. If you're right, then we should find some information to exonerate him and prove that he wasn't involved, right?"

We didn't need to be all on the same page about why we were looking, as long as we kept looking. Maybe it was even better to have a doubter involved, so we didn't interpret information in the light that we wanted to. That was a problem when you had your conclusion long before you found supporting evidence – you tended to try and shove puzzle pieces together to make them fit the picture you wanted.

"Or find he did," Kiba muttered.

I hoped someone stood on his foot. I was too far away to do it myself.

Naruto held my gaze for a long second. I tried to look as calm and as serious and thoughtful as I could – it felt like sinking into mission mode, like gearing up for a fight.

"You're right," he agreed, almost grudgingly, before throwing himself into it. "Let's go and find out what really happened!"

Personally… I wasn't sure where I stood on the matter. On one hand, I didn't want Naruto to be wrong. On the other… well. It looked pretty likely.

I trusted Naruto but he wasn't exactly known for being observant.

.

.

"I can't tell you how ashamed I am that we did not guard those blueprints properly," the foreman of the construction company repeated for probably the third time. "I can never face Tsunade-sama again."

The construction foreman seemed very like a normally stable man reduced to a state of flustered shock. Given what had happened and how badly it was likely to reflect on him and his company, it was understandable. Also, it was highly likely that we weren't the first ninja to knocking on his door today – and I suspected that the others had been Anbu. That would make anyone flustered.

But, it wasn't actually our job to pass judgement on any of that. We were just here to find the missing blueprints.

"I need you to tell us everything that you know about Genno," Shikamaru said. "Where he came from, what he was doing here, everything."

"Well," the foreman said. "He came to the village about three months ago, with a letter of recommendation from a master carpenter in the Land of Wind. I'm sure you're aware that there's a bit of a construction boom in Konoha at the moment; every local carpenter has all the work he can handle. We desperately needed more skilled hands, so we took him on. He was an adequate carpenter. Nothing special. I didn't see any reason to offer him a permanent position, but like I said, we needed all the hands we could get. He took his job seriously, showed up on time, always did as he was told. After he was here for some time, I discovered that the letter he'd given me was a fake. I don't know if it'll do any good, but here it is."

Not exactly good news, but not unexpected either. We already knew he was an infiltrator.

"How'd you know it was a fake?" Naruto asked, puzzled, as Shikamaru looked over the offered letter.

"I was going over my records, and I found another record from the same carpenter. When I compared the two, I found that the handwriting didn't match." He shuffled through his papers, and frowned. "That's odd. I can't find it. To be honest," he admitted. "We didn't really care that the letter was a fake as long as he kept his nose out of trouble and did his work. Now I realise that that was a mistake. I never considered that the old man could be a shinobi."

And that, right there, was the number one problem with any security system. The weakest point was always, always the people involved. They'd let something slide, because it didn't seem important and then bam. Trouble.

"Do you have a list of the missing blueprints?" Shikamaru asked, moving away from that line of questioning. "Which of these sites did Genno work on?"

"None of them," the foreman said. "The structures on that list involve the safety of the village. An outside contractor would never be allowed to work on something so important, even if we are so shorthanded."

That at least was security conscious. Didn't make up for what had happened, but hopefully reduced the risk quite a bit.

Shikamaru sighed. "We still need to check these over and make sure he didn't slip inside to set traps anywhere or sabotage the construction. Neji, Hinata; we'll need your Byakugan for that. Take …" his eyes scanned over the group, selecting and discarding options, "Lee and Tenten with you."

Both Hyuuga gave curt, professional nods, and took half the list each.

"Yosh," Lee said, bouncing to his feet. "Hinata and I shall finish our half before you and Tenten, or I shall do five hundred chin ups!" He pointed a finger at Neji.

Neji ignored him. "Do not over exert yourself, Hinata-sama. Don't rush or … allow yourself to be rushed." The statement could have seemed harsh, especially given what I knew about their relationship, but it seemed more like well intentioned advice than censure.

"I will be thorough," she said quietly but with certainty.

Neji left the hall, Tenten shadowing him on his right.

Hinata stood gracefully and bowed slightly to the rest of us. "Lee," she said softly. "We should hurry if we want to finish before Neji-niisan."

Lee might have actually swept her off her feet in his rush to get going, but all I saw was a blur of green, so I couldn't actually say.

"Also, there's a chance that Genno was able to hide the plans before the Anbu cornered him," Shikamaru said, glancing towards Kiba and Shino.

Kiba smirked. "And you want us to think like thieves and figure out where, right? No problem, leave it to us. I'll have all his hiding places sniffed out before it's time for lunch."

"Alright. And Sasuke. I need you to liaise with the village patrols to see if you can work out what happened last night. No doubt the Anbu have already covered that angle, but it can't hurt." He cracked his neck. "Ino, you need to talk to the Hospital and see if they've learnt anything from the body."

Both of those were good choices – Sasuke had been working with the patrols recently, so he'd know who to talk to, and either Ino or I would be mostly likely to understand what the hell the medics were talking about.

"Shikako, I want you to go over the records here. Maybe see if you can find that other letter. Or whatever."

I nodded, wondered if Shikamaru was giving me the easiest, safest assignment and was abruptly angry with myself for even thinking that. He'd given everyone tasks they were suited to, and I couldn't argue that this wasn't well within my abilities. Who else was going to do it, Naruto?

Whatever was going on between us, whatever we were arguing about – this was a line I didn't want to cross. I wasn't going to bring this kind of ill feeling into a mission. I wasn't going to doubt legitimate orders just because I wasn't happy with the person giving them.

And it was Shikamaru. I still trusted him. I still thought he would have the best plan for dealing with all of this. How could I not?

"Naruto, Chouji and I will go and investigate his lodgings and talk to his co-workers. See if we can learn anything."

Everyone moved out.

I turned to the foreman, feeling calm and settled. I was on a mission. I knew what I had to do. "Do you have a record of Genno's work history? A list of the sites he was working on?"

.

.

"That's not a face that tells me you have good news."

I held up a hand, forcing Shikamaru to wait while I finished making notes. My hand was starting to cramp, and the entire page was filled with a list of tiny writing. "That's because," I said. "I really don't have good news."

He sighed. "We're updating the Hokage in five. Neji and Hinata are done, and Kiba and Shino admit that they're stumped."

I nodded, standing and stretching. "Find anything?"

He shook his head. "'suppose it's something," he said, hands in his pockets. "We didn't actually want the Hyuuga to find things."

It meant that Genno hadn't left any traps behind. Or, more pessimistically, he hadn't left them anywhere we could find.

Tsunade was waiting for us when we got to the tower, and we filed into her office. It was a little crowded, but we spread out in an arc around her desk.

"We conducted a background sweep on this guy, his place of residence and recent known locales," Shikamaru began without preamble. "The fact is he was remarkably unremarkable. He was an average carpenter; did his work, never stood out and never made any big mistakes. He didn't have any friends but didn't have any enemies either. He was the kind of person that if he disappeared one day, no one would miss him. He could just … fade away. His undercover technique was so good it ought to be in the shinobi textbooks."

I winced. That was not a promising opening.

"The only person who seemed to think he was something special was Naruto." Shikamaru jerked a thumb in his direction. "His apartment was empty, he wasn't involved in any clubs or groups, and the only places he ever seemed to go was out to eat. His entire stay here is a carefully constructed dead end."

"We also agree with that statement," Shino said. "Why? Because even Kiba and I were not able to find any trail more recent than twenty four hours old. Unless he maintained a frequently visited hideout inside Konoha, we are unlikely to be able to retrace his last steps."

"Yeah," Kiba agreed, frowning. "I can find you every place he visited in the past week, but sometime yesterday the trail just stops cold. I don't know what kind of scent blocking technique he used, but it's good. I couldn't even find the scent of things he was wearing and carrying. Usually people pick up the scent of things they interact with and you can track those for a bit, but I got nothing."

Tsunade nodded, but looked a little grim. Fair enough, those were the two best ways to go about finding an imposter and both had turned up nothing.

"In contrast," Neji said. "I can report that the structures that Hinata-sama and I examined were not trapped or tampered with in any way." Beside him, Tenten sighed in apparent relief, though she clearly already knew that.

"I've got a general timeline of events from the on duty guards and patrol units," Sasuke said. "Between the initial alert, and the explosion detonating, there's a gap of two and a half hours, which is when we presume Genno hid or exchanged the plans."

I made eye contact with Ino, asking if she wanted to go first or I should. She looked reluctant, and tilted her head slightly to the side.

Me, then.

I took a deep breath. "Bad news," I said, apologetically. "Those blueprints aren't the only items missing."

There were several hissed breaths.