Uchiha Clan, Elder Kaede's House
The house was steeped in the kind of quiet that had less to do with peace and far more to do with absence when Elder Kaede finally let himself in.
Mikoto rose from the low table, abandoning a half-finished cup of tea.
"Grandfather," she said, studying his weary expression. "You look tense. Did the Hokage reject the proposal?"
Kaede didn't answer immediately. He crossed the room, lowering himself onto a cushion, and reached for the tea.
"You should go out more," Kaede murmured instead. "Attend the clan meetings. Speak to people of your own age." his eyes fixing on her. "You cannot spend the rest of your life drowning in Ren's memory."
"I am not drowning in anything," Mikoto replied evenly. "I just don't particularly enjoy going out." A heavy beat of silence passed. "Besides... I doubt he would even remember me." Her voice dropped to a near whisper on the final admission.
Kaede wasn't fooled by the deflection or the self-deprecation.
"Mikoto. Find a man. Get married. Let an old man die in peace without worrying about what will become of his granddaughter."
"If that is the condition," Mikoto said, her voice flattening into an unyielding wall, "then I won't marry at all. That way, I can stay with you forever."
Kaede set his cup down with a soft clack.
"You don't understand," he said, the gruffness fading into gentleness. "Ren can never come back to Konoha. Not after everything that happened. That door is firmly closed, Mikoto, and it is never going to open again, no matter how long you stand there waiting for it."
Mikoto offered no argument. She simply retreated into a impenetrable silence that communicated perfectly well that she had heard him, and had absolutely no intention of agreeing.
Kaede watched her for a long moment before letting out a slow breath. Some battles couldn't be won in a single evening.
"There is a clan meeting at Naka Shrine tonight," he said, rising slowly to his feet. "You are coming with me. It is a critical one. It is going to decide this clan's future."
The Senju Compound
Tsunade's laughter echoed through the hallway before Jiraiya had even finished kicking off his sandals at the door.
He found her in the sitting room, already several cups deep into a bottle of sake. She poured herself another round without bothering to offer him one.
"Thank the gods I turned Sensei down," Tsunade scoffed, amusement swimming in her amber eyes. "Marching over to the Uchiha compound with half the village's clan heads in tow, just to remind them how incredibly small they are."
"This isn't something to laugh about, Tsunade." Jiraiya's voice was devoid of his usual levity as he stepped into the room. "The tension between the Uchiha and the village has escalated past the point of reason. And if it keeps building, you already know exactly what their final option looks like."
Tsunade didn't bother looking up from her cup. "They'll try to contact Ren Uchiha."
"And do you understand the what would happen if they actually manage it? Jiraiya's expression darkened, his jaw tightening. "If the Uchiha clan ever uncovers the truth about what Danzō actually did, the relationship between them and Konoha becomes instantly irreconcilable."
"Are you afraid of Uchiha retaliation, Jiraiya?"
The new voice slithered from the doorway. Orochimaru stepped into the room, moving with fluid grace, and settled beside Jiraiya as if he had been explicitly invited.
"I am afraid for the Uchiha clan," Jiraiya corrected, glaring at his former teammate. "If they make contact with Ren, they will be forced to choose between maintaining the status quo or inciting an open rebellion against this village. And you know as well as I do even if Ren, Satoshi, and Kaori all join the clan's cause, it is still just three people against the entire military might of Konoha."
"Just three Uchiha," Orochimaru agreed, his tone almost lazy. His pale, golden eyes slid toward Tsunade. "We have Nawaki, who wields the very Wood Release that once brought Madara Uchiha to heel. We have Minato Namikaze—the greatest civilian-born prodigy this village has ever seen, who has already mastered the Flying Thunder God. The exact technique Lord Second used to defeat Izuna Uchiha." A faint, venomous smile touched Orochimaru's lips. "And, he also happens to carry half of the Nine-Tails."
Orochimaru leaned back, assessing the room.
"But Konoha has far more than just those two.
Orochimaru's gaze locked onto Tsunade. "Sensei's confidence in his ability to suppress Ren Uchiha, his parents, and the entire Uchiha clan is not baseless. Neither is Jiraiya's"
Tsunade ignored him, reaching for the sake bottle instead.
"Did the two of you come here just to ruin my evening?" she muttered. "If so, you're both welcome to leave."
"No, no, no," Orochimaru raised a pale hand, his smile widening. "I actually came bearing news. About Ren Uchiha."
He let the silence stretch for a fraction of a second.
"The Land of Rain has officially joined the Alliance. A coalition that now includes the Land of Rice Fields, the Land of Hot Water, the Land of Frost—and as of recently, Amegakure."
Naka Shrine
Naka Shrine was already filling by the time Kaede arrived, Mikoto a half-step behind him.
One of the prominent Hawk elders caught sight of her near the stone archway. He inclined his head, an uncharacteristically warm expression crossing his stern face. "Mikoto. It has been a long time."
She offered a polite, shallow bow, choosing to say nothing.
The elder's attention snapped immediately to Kaede, his tone sharpening. "So. You received your answer today." He let the weighted silence hang in the damp air. "What have you decided?"
"You will hear it in the meeting," Kaede replied flatly, brushing past him to take his seat.
The hall filled the rest of the way over the following minutes.
Fugaku rose to open the meeting formally.
Before he'd gotten further than the first sentence, Kaede spoke.
"We should establish contact with Satoshi."
The hall went silent — a full, held silence,
Then, the Hawks answered. Nearly as one unified voice.
"We agree."
It spread from there in a wave that barely needed a second round. By the time a count would have mattered, there was no meaningful count left to take. The voices in favor were overwhelming; the voices openly opposed numbered zero. Only few remained silent altogether, neither agreeing aloud nor raising a single word against it, and even their silence, in a room like this one, read as something very close to consent.
Fugaku raised a hand, and the hall fell silent again.
"Do you understand what you're suggesting?" he said. "If we do this, it will be considered treason against the village. Ren and his parents are rebels. They killed more than two hundred Konoha shinobi."
Another Hawk elder rose. "The village hasn't left us any other option." He paused. "And Fugaku — don't you find it strange? As far as any of us remember, it was Ren, Kaori, and Satoshi who killed those two hundred men. But the official record from that same period has Ren traveling with the Hokage, Danzō, and Sakumo, negotiating Suna's surrender after their defeat in the Second War." He let that sit. "So which is it? Did Satoshi and Kaori kill two hundred men entirely on their own — or did Ren never actually go to that negotiation at all?"
The hall had gone very quiet.
"And if Ren never went," the elder continued, "there was no reason for the three of them to stay behind at that camp afterward. They could have come home with the rest of the Uchiha, the same as everyone else did." He shook his head slowly. "Ren, Satoshi, and Kaori had no reason to defect from this village. Something happened that day that was never explained to us. The Hokage has never once accounted for all of it. Nine years, and we still don't have the full story."
One of the elders who had stayed silent through the vote finally spoke.
"Whatever the truth of that day is," he said, "it can't be denied that they killed more than two hundred of Konoha Shinobies. Including Dan Katō — whose body was never even recovered." He looked around the hall. "After that, there's no possibility of this where they simply come back to Konoha."
"And there's no guarantee Satoshi would help us even if we reached him," Fugaku said. "Or that he could."
"We're only proposing we establish contact with Ren," came a quiet voice. "For now."
It took the hall a moment to place it as Mikoto's.
"Who knows," she said. "They might have a way to help us. Or at the very least — we might finally learn what actually happened that day."