Over To Us.

Part 1; Part 2; Part 3; Part 4; Part 5; Part 6; Part 7

The people chose to call Thunderclash to get a sense of his mental state.

 [CONTENT WARNING:  This installment deals with a character experiencing voices other people can’t hear, and an open question about whether the voices are real.]

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“Ultra Magnus is right,” you say, trying to ignore Skids shooting you a startled - and hurt - look.  “Before we decide anything else, let’s hail the Vis Vitalis.  We should at least find out where we stand.”

You silently hope Skids will understand.  You want to help Gleeerboo, and hopefully you can - but you’re not going to be of any help if you charge in without gathering all the information first.  You still don’t know what’s happening with the planet, or with Thunderclash, or how (or even whether) they’re connected.  And if you insist on just going to the planet without even checking on Thunderclash, odds are that Ultra Magnus or Perceptor will have a lot of questions for you.

Besides, Thunderclash is your patient, and that has to take priority.

Ultra Magnus hails the ship, and you wait.  And wait.

After a much longer pause than you’d normally expect, an image finally flickers to life on the main screen… but it isn’t Thunderclash.  Instead, you recognise the softly rounded features of one of Thunderclash’s subordinates.  You seem to remember that this was the Vis Vitalis’s second lieutenant - he came aboard the Lost Light when you last encountered Thunderclash.  You recall that he was a bit quiet, but then, it was probably easy for him to get lost in the flood of adoration directed at his commander, and then the high drama of then-first officer Paddox’s betrayal.

You wince slightly, still remembering the full-body ache after Swerve swung your alt mode into Paddox so hard that he shattered into his component beings.

“This is Ultra Magnus of the Lost Light to speak to Captain -”  Magnus is cut off.

“Oh, thank you, Primus!”  The young officer peers anxiously at you all.  “Please - we need your help.”

Magnus looks less than impressed.  “State your designation.”

The officer straightens up, although his expression still betrays his worry.  “Second Lieutenant Sparker, sir.  Please, I - I formally request assistance.  Captain Thunderclash is behaving extremely strangely, and I’m afraid he may be in danger, sir.”

“We are aware of the situation.  I am accompanied by Rung, one of the Autobots’ leading psychiatrists.”  You give a solemn nod when Magnus gestures in your direction, and you school yourself not to smile in greeting; in situations like this, many people prefer a serious expert to a friendly one.  “Captain Thunderclash himself contacted us, so if you could simply connect -”

“I can’t, sir!”  Sparker bursts out.  “The captain locked himself in the shuttle bay ten minutes ago, and he won’t answer his comm!”

Turning away from the screen, Skids murmurs, “Do we think he’s planning to -”

At that moment, a siren sounds on the Vis Vitalis.  You can hear a muffled voice in the background shouting, “Unauthorised launch!”  Sparker mouths a curse, and then disappears from view.

“We do,” Perceptor answers Skids coolly, and puts the view of the Vis Vitalis in space up on a split screen with the still-open comm link to the ship’s chaotic bridge.  He zeroes in on an even tinier dot that’s moving away from the Vis Vitalis at speed.  “I surmise that this shuttle contains Captain Thunderclash, and, further, that his trajectory is towards the planet.”

“Hail the shuttle.”  Magnus turns to you.  “Rung, you may be best suited to talk to him.”

You’re prepared for the hail to go ignored, but to your surprise, Thunderclash responds.  He looks haggard, hunched over the controls of a small shuttle.  There’s a grey tint to his facial metal, and his colours seem muted - a sign of stressed systems.  His optics, though, are blindingly, worryingly bright.

“Thunderclash here,” he says.  He isn’t looking at the screen, and he sounds distracted as his fingers fly over the controls.  As you watch, Thunderclash suddenly winces and clutches his head.  A second later, he seems to shake it off.

Naruto's plea to the raikage is actually surprisingly eloquent. I was wincing when he starts out with, basically, "I want you to give up on killing Sasuke because he's my friend!" but in the end, the fact that the widely acknowledged Hero of the Leaf is kneeling, sobbing, in the snow because he doesn't want to see his village and the Cloud get caught up in the endless cycle of revenge, once again - that's powerful. All the more so because there's no posturing to it. Naruto isn't threatening revenge; the raikage isn't going, "Heh, come and try, you wouldn't be able to touch us!" - both of them know that the cycle would take over, and know how destructive it is, regardless of who wins. It's a deep-seated truth of the shinobi world, and it's one that Naruto is now challenging head on.

After all that, it feels disrespectful to say this but I HAVE to salute the fact that the raikage is braving the snow fully tits-out. :D Now that is commitment to a Look.

The show toys with us in a fun way by having Danzo seem to react to Sai's message, then brush it off to his followers as a "routine report" - exactly what he would say if Sai told him about Naruto OR if he didn't. :)

We get another intriguing glimpse at the cultural differences between the Leaf as it is now, and the rest of the ninja world. Tenzou reminds the raikage that the Leaf "swallowed our tears of blood" and sacrificed Neji's father to avoid war, as Kakashi asks whether Naruto abasing himself for his friend, for the future of Leaf and Cloud alike, really hasn't moved the raikage at all. But to the raikage, concessions are a weakness, and you don't honour a friend if you kneel to try and protect them. War, to him, is a constant, not just of the ninja world, but the human world.

Sasuke and Team Taka are hiding in the kage summit venue in dark cloaks, peeping cautiously over the edge of a balcony to see what's going on, and meanwhile Zetsu's just like... standing up. Stark white and half-naked, just up on the balcony, for anyone to see. C'mon, man. :D

Sasuke repeatedly makes a big point of needing Zetsu to identify Danzo for him, even threatening him if Zetsu dares to lie about this. Sasuke. Hon. Danzo has a massive hokage hat.

I'll say it, I'm a sucker for the elegant, understated ceremony of the Five Kage Summit. The room, bare apart from the characters representing each nation's element; the advisors from each delegation hidden away in the gallery; the simple table with these five incredibly dangerous people around it talking sweet poison to one another. It's hitting all my diplomacy nerd buttons. :D

Speaking of sweet poison - the tsuchikage has it out for Gaara. Maybe he's just getting the measure of him; maybe, at his age, he's mortally offended by the existence of such a young kage. :D But Gaara's basically said two words before the tsuchikage tells him, "Despite your father's no doubt brilliant tutelage, he failed to teach you any etiquette." (Granted, I don't know whether the tsuchikage fully understands what an asshole thing that is to say - he might just mean it casually, like, "Didn't your parents teach you any manners?" - but... I dunno. This guy must have worked with Rasa for years. I think he's probably got some sense about how Rasa treated his notorious youngest son. At the very least, he's probably aware that Gaara was very much not groomed as Rasa's successor.) Kankuro and Temari both look about to leap down and murder the man on the spot, but Gaara just levels a stare at him and replies, "Probably. That's why I was appointed kazekage." Because Gaara is the KING. <3

I'm also fucking punching the air watching how masterfully Gaara handles this summit in general. He's not necessarily diplomatic as such, but he's incisive, honest in a way that's disarming. He's very open about what the Akatsuki did to him, and the fact that he went to all of the kage for help and only Tsunade offered it. The others are all talking airily about the strategic uses of jinchuuriki, and Gaara's just slicing through, reminding them that for some of the people around the table, this conversation is not academic.

And THEN the tsuchikage turns that around on him by saying how rare it is for a jinchuuriki to truly master their Tailed Beast, "isn't that right... Lord Kazekage?" Oh man. I think I hate this guy.

Someone dares to even speak Killer B's name, and the raikage straight-up punches a hole in the table, and meanwhile my boy Gaara is fielding all the deeply shitty insinuations being thrown at him without even raising his voice. Can you imagine how much it took to get from murder baby to this? I'm proud of him. <3

Mifune is already sighing and honestly, I feel that in my bones. Guy has got to be wondering whether whatever fee he gets for hosting these summits is actually worth it. Plus he's probably got to replace that table every time... :D

It is very funny that when the raikage punches the table, all five kages' guards leap down to shield them - then everyone calms down, and the guards go back to the gallery - and then someone flips a switch and the dramatic lighting of the chamber resumes. Implying that someone took the time to turn the full lights ON in the middle of everyone bracing to attack each other. Man, these Land of Iron samurai are really on the ball. :D

It's also amusing me that the raikage makes exactly the point I did a couple of reviews ago - the Akatsuki has membership from the Sand, Leaf, Stone, and Mist, but not the Cloud. Although he's less smug about that than he is pissed...

Ooooooh, it turns out all the kages have used the Akatsuki at one point or another - and when Gaara expresses shock at this, the raikage tells him the Sand are among the most guilty of it. Drama!

... oh, turns out he just means Orochimaru's attack on the Leaf. You know. The one after he'd already left the Akatsuki. Carry on, then. :D

(All of this is just reminding me of the absolutely bonkers fact that Sasori apparently helped with Rasa's assassination, despite the fact that Orochimaru had been out of the Akatsuki for years by that point, Sasori was actively spying on him, and Orochimaru knew Sasori was actively spying on him. I feel like the fandom is kind of sleeping on the relationship between these two, because it must have been WILD.)

All of the villages except the Cloud turn out to have some kind of relationship with the Akatsuki, and while the mizukage is remorseful, the tsuchikage is just like u wot mate, yeah, I'd fucking do it again. I've known the tsuchikage for like ten minutes and he is already The Worst. Any chance Sasuke could knock him off while he's killing Danzo? :D

Also how does it supposedly help a hidden village to hire the Akatsuki to do their ninja-ing for them??? Sure, it's allegedly cheaper and faster than training your own ninja, but getting the resources to train and take care of your own ninja is supposed to be the point of the hidden village system. The last thing you want is to demonstrate to your daimyo how much cheaper outside mercenaries are! This is like a union hiring its own scabs!

We also get the intriguing fact that the Akatsuki may have been manipulating the Fourth Mizukage (who was the three-tails jinchuuriki, iirc). Which is... interesting, since Kisame apparently recognised Madara as mizukage, and called him Madara. Maybe Madara revealed his plans to the Seven Ninja Swordsmen but no one else?

Speaking of Madara - Danzo name-drops him and the show does these dramatic telenovella sweeping closeups to capture each kage's shocked reaction. :D Man, it is embarrassing for the Leaf that Gaara - you know, the child who didn't attend school and was basically raised as a walking nuclear bomb destined to one day detonate, so I can't imagine he was getting that much political education even as a kage's son - knows who Uchiha Madara is, and Uchiha Sasuke doesn't.

I'm realising that, because the focus of the summit is on the Akatsuki as a whole, not Sasuke, it will be very easy for the assembled kages to come out with a resolution declaring all of the Akatsuki legitimate targets, and for Sasuke to be included in that without most of them even clocking it. Gee, Naruto - maybe while you were tracking down the one kage least likely to listen to your pleas, you should have taken ten minutes to send a fucking messenger hawk to your bestie Gaara and explain the situation. Because I'm not sure Gaara even knows about Sasuke being Akatsuki! Maybe he'd accept a request to shield Sasuke, or maybe he'd feel that joining the Akatsuki was a step too far for Sasuke to ever come back from - but if you never even asked then you didn't give him a chance to make that choice.

Mifune deciding that the hokage should be the commander of the allied shinobi forces plays so neatly into Danzo's hands that I'm starting to wonder if it's a stitch-up - or if Danzo just managed to manoeuvre everyone into exactly the right position to hand him what he wants without his having to say it.

However it happens. A piano falls.

Friend (black) wants me to let you know they wanted to roleplay as a cartoon Light Yagami

This is SPECTACULAR. :D The ivory teeth took me out. (Much as they did Light, I guess!)

I love the little glimpses we get into ninja politics so much - like here, when Kankuro asks why he and Temari are going with Gaara to the summit, given that Gaara doesn't exactly need bodyguards, and Temari says their job is to make sure the other leaders take the young kazekage seriously. Which is great, because it very much lines up with what Kankuro, especially, has been doing in the Sand Village these past few years - working behind the scenes to shore up support for Gaara and make sure no one's about to backstab him.

(Although - Kankuro, my guy, I'd think you'd be a bit more open to the idea of Gaara having bodyguards, given he was kidnapped and murdered a few months back. He's powerful, but he's not invincible. I would have thought you'd still be hovering protectively, to be honest, but your faith in your baby brother is actually pretty sweet.)

(It's also sweet when you think about the fact that, until only a few years ago, Kankuro and Temari were forced to go everywhere with Gaara as his minders - trying to make sure he stuck to the mission and didn't do TOO much recreational murder while he was at it. The fact that Kankuro trusts Gaara to protect himself is only half the story; he also trusts Gaara to navigate the world without getting violent. <3)

We finally meet the last two kages! First up is the tsuchikage, an unbelievably elderly man who describes himself as "the fence-sitter of the Hidden Stone". Um. That is. That is not usually a compliment. Though I guess he's maybe like the Third Hokage, and just more honest about it. :D

Man, I WANT to like the mizukage; I do! She's effortlessly elegant and combines real kindness towards her more insecure bodyguard with the capacity to terrify her cockier bodyguard into submission with a word. But... her entire inner monologue is taken up with fretting over not being married yet, and wondering if she's too old to get married, and wondering if other people are judging her for not being married, and this is going to be a whole fucking Thing, isn't it?

(Also, shame we never had any interactions with this mizukage while Tsunade was actively in charge of the Leaf - two female kages circling each other would be awesome. Maybe later?)

The more insecure of the mizukage's bodyguards, btw, is one of the Seven Ninja Swordsmen of the Mist, and he's honestly kind of adorable. I'm assuming he's part of the newer generation, like Suigetsu. Good; the Mist could use a few more legendary swordfighters who are less megalomaniacal.

WHAT THE FUCK

NO WAIT WHAT THE FUCK???

Danzo has a sharingan. Danzo. The persecutor of the Uchiha. Has a fucking sharingan. Did he - oh fuck - did he harvest that on the night of the massacre? Was that part of his motivation?

After roping a very reluctant Tenzou into accompanying Naruto to go see the raikage, Kakashi responds to Tenzou pointing out that they don't know where the raikage even is by clapping him on the shoulder and going, "I bet you can help with that! Anyway, see ya!" As always, it is a tribute to Tenzou's superhuman restraint that Kakashi is still alive. :D

We get another really sweet moment when Kakashi tracks down Sai to ask him not to rat Naruto out to Danzo, and Sai, hurt, observes that Kakashi still doesn't trust him. Kakashi points out that Sai is Danzo's agent... but then adds gently that he's also a member of Team Kakashi, so Kakashi believes in him. And Sai gets honestly the exact same look on his face that Gaara gave Kakashi in the flashback arc - the look of a child who's not used to having an adult trust him and like him. A child who isn't sure how to process this, but also doesn't want it to ever stop. Awwww.

It's interesting to see the political threads running underneath the ostensible purpose of the five kage summit. It's about Sasuke and the Akatsuki, sure - but underneath, it's as much about proving himself as a kage for Danzo as it is for Gaara. More so, even. (Probably for the mizukage, too, since she's relatively new as Madara's successor. Would have been nice to have had THAT in her inner monologue instead of all the "haha old maid" bullshit.)

Danzo also delivers a little speech about how ninja used to be ascetics, and to be faceless was a virtue - but actually, being a good ninja means controlling what people do see as well as what they don't - that can honestly go in the annals of some of my favourite bits of spymaster philosophy in fiction.

I love Kakashi beaming as he watches Naruto praise his "rival" Konohamaru - and Konohamaru light up in response. No doubt Kakashi's thinking of his own eternal rival, but probably also of Sasuke. In Konohamaru, Naruto has a rival dynamic that's much closer to the wholesome rivalry Kakashi has with Guy, and that Kakashi always wanted for Sasuke and Naruto. <3

The use of Middle Eastern musical motifs for the Cloud Ninja theme is interesting, given that I've always thought the Sand Village was more Middle Eastern coded. It's very pretty, though.

"Despite my demeanour, I am actually very good at tailing people." Tenzou, your demeanour is about 80 percent looming silently and menacingly out of trees, sometimes literally. How... how do you believe you're coming across...?

It looks like our new Ninja Swordsman of the Mist might also have slightly sharky teeth? That's interesting - obviously, Kisame and Suigetsu share that trait (though I'm not sure whether Suigetsu did pre-Orochimaru's experiments on him), but both Zabuza and the guy from the Curry of Life filler arc looked pretty baseline human. Is there some shark-person lineage in Mist that has ties to the Ninja Swordsmen, but doesn't make up the whole seven? (Actually, now I'm wondering if Zabuza kept his mouth masked in bandages because he didn't have shark teeth and that was embarrassing. :D)

Very cool touch that the Land of Iron is samurai country, where ninja are normally prohibited.

So - Suigetsu and Karin look fully healed after the Killer B debacle, but Jugo is... just going to be a kid... permanently? I dunno, I feel like I'd be more worked up about that if it happened to me. But then, Jugo's always hated having uncontrollable power; being in a smaller, less imposing body might feel like a little bit of relief, even if his powers are intact.