"Yeah? What about you? Any luck getting out that stick you have rammed up your ass?"

Though a shameless provocation as they came, he didn't exactly think he'd be in the midst of someone the Chinoike were distantly related to, of a clan that shared similar blood-bending abilities as the Kurogane purportedly did. Not that Jun'ya really cared much when he personally saw their dojutsu as being the superior one between the two. After all, they could make whole people explode like it was nothing; what else could really compete with that?

“Hm, you look better like this, Ka~ga~mi.”

Jun’ya’s voice lilted mellifluously as he presided over the Uchiha after binding Kagami’s wrists behind his back and had blindfolded him, moistened lips traced by one of Jun’s rough fingertips soft compared to his own callused skin. Of course, just because he looked pretty like this didn’t mean Jun’ya intended to be soft and sweet. He intended to make a bloody, enraptured mess of this man. To stain that snowy skin with the redness both of their clans prized so highly. 

          “ Hardly. ” Granted, she had been on the verge of retaliating herself, calmly setting her drink down on the counter and nonchalantly rolling her wrist to peel away the underside of her glove. Whoever this scum of the earth was, he must have thought that his persistence would pay off; if not with one woman, then whoever else caught his fancy he scoped the joint in a half-dazed, drunken stupor. She was about ready to rake her claws across his face, preparing to lunge and swipe at him in the blink of an eye as she flexed the rigidity from her fingers, when the man suddenly had his head slammed face-first into the bar by someone else entirely.

          Stunned, while albeit a little disappointed that she didn’t get to have the finishing move, she slipped her glove back on without drawing more attention to the situation. If anyone had spied more than a glimpse of her extended claws or the brand she had conspicuously tattooed on the back of her left hand, it might raise more suspicion towards her than she bargained for.

          After all, keeping a low profile was one of the cornerstones that paved the way towards any successful hunt.

          “ Unless you’ve deigned to take his place? Chivalry will only get you so far… but you did save me from having his blood on my hands. At the rate he was going, even his blood probably stunk of alcohol. Definitely not something I would have looked forward to scrubbing out. ”

“Eh, don’t sweat it. Besides, I think this makes up for it nicely,” Jun’ya replied breezily as he rooted through the unconscious man’s person and emitted a pleased sound of discovery as he found the miscreant’s wallet. Judging by the hefty ryo notes and other forms of identification, he seemed like someone of enough influence to carry so much cash on his person flagrantly. Whatever the reason, ever the vulture when it came to situations such as those, Jun’ya had no compunctions in scavenging and looting as he pleased. Pocketing the money and other valuables, the Chinoike rose to face the woman he’d been antagonizing before Jun had stepped in and knocked his lights out enough to take what he wanted. 

“Chivalry?” Jun’ya parroted with a snort. “I’ll put it this way--douchebag became all douchey basically put a target on his own back, thus making him open season for friendly opportunists like me. Besides, you don’t look like the damsel-type. It works out either way.” Despite his flippant explanation, he probably would’ve genuinely swooped in if there had been any real danger, but being a career criminal that he was, his own selfish, personal-gain spoke over his moral compass.

More like an immoral compass, he amended with a faint smirk. 

perhaps  it  wasn’t  the      smartest    decision      to  use  hirudora  ,  he  might  as  well  leave  his  signature  on  the  scene  of  battle  .      and  the  explosion  was  visible  even  from  a  great  distance  .        many  were  after  his  life  ,  and  they  wouldn’t  miss  the  signs  .       gai  didn’t  care  though  ,  he’d  let  himself  fall  and  not  resist  the  urge  to  lose  consciousness  ,  neither  did  he  fight  the  sensation  of  the  jutsu  he  was  caught  in  .        for  the  first  time  since  his  father  died  over  a  decade  ago  ,  gai  was  just  so  fucking  tired  .        he  knew  once  he  regained  consciousness  ,  nothing  would’ve  changed  .   lee’d  still  be  a  jinchuriki  ,  he  might  even  be  dead  .    and  tsunade  -  sama  would  not  be  pleased  with  his  actions  ,  even  if  he  just  did  the  ANBU’s  job  for  them  .     for  now  he’d  rest  in  blissful  ignorance  as  his  body  was  healed  , though  .

for  a  while  there  was  only  nothingness  ,  gai  saw  strange  shapes       &&      colours  ,  muffled  sounds  and  dull  pain  overshadowed  any  other  sensation  he  might’ve  felt  .          he  couldn’t  distinguish  what  was  real  and  what  was  his  mind’s  fabrication  .     because  he  was  CERTAIN  he  felt  lee’s  hand  holding  his  ,  and  that  surely  wasn’t  real  .      (      how    did    he    know    it    was    lee’s    ??         he’d    recognize    the    touch    of     these   cute    ,    smaller    bandaged   hands    anywhere      )      unless  both  of  them  were  dead  .     and  ,  pitifully  so  ,  gai  found  himself  not  minding  if  they  were  .    he’d  introduce  lee  to  his  grandfather  ,  gai  had  so  ached  for  his  two  most  important  people  to  meet  for  such  a  long  time  now  .

he  also  found  himself  hearing  jun’ya’s  voice  ,  he’d  regret  accidentally  killing  his  comrade  .     maybe  he  didn’t  make  it  out  of  the  afternoon  tiger’s  range  after  all  .     but  as  the  minutes  dragged  on  ,  gai  regained  more      &&      more  consciousness  .  he  was  walking    ??        his  arm  was  drapped  around  something  .          he  began  to  combine  the  puzzle  pieces  ,  realizing  what  was  going  on  right  now  .               ❝    yeah    .    .    .    ❞        gai  spoke  softly  .

❝    i’m    fine    .    ❞        the  pain  ripping  through  his  body  was  bearable  ,  gai  has  opened  the  gate  of  joy  often  enough  that  the  pain  afterwards  didn’t  completely  immobilize  him  .         it’s  the  pain  in  his  heart  that  was  so  much  worse  .      equally  piercing  yet  hollow  .       what  now    ??        brutality  and  death  only  got  him  so  far  ,  he’s  facing  a  dead  end  .

“Man, if this doesn’t get you in the running for ‘Dad of the Year’, I’ll personally help sue,” Jun’ya quipped as he’d since helped patch up the worst of Gai’s injuries, but the way he saw it, damage from the Eight Gates themselves would take far more than just a quick once-over. In the dim plain where the sun began to crest the horizon, the brooding clouds that had swathed the horizon had been vaporized by Hirudora as if they’d never existed at all. It was immensely powerful, which meant the healing time extolled would need far longer, and that was what he could just surmise by looking at him. Coming from a clan of healers on his mother’s side meant he knew enough to pass as a med-nin even if he’d never touch the institution with a thousand-meter stick. What mattered then and there was getting the man back to Konoha and ensuring he could see his kid live to see another day, even if Jun’ya doubted it’d be a happy reunion when he could already see the endless red tape that would try to prevent the Jonin from seeing the boy. Sure, Jun’ya would likely be spared some flak since he was stateless, but the consequences would remain to be seen.

It was an agonizingly slow week as the pair trekked from the Land of Lightning to the Land of Fire, then into the heartland where Konoha was. With his dojutsu and ability with genjutsu, it at least meant he could erase their tracks with relative impunity instead of leave a trail behind his comrades could sniff out and possibly interfere with. As long as Gai’s semi-comatose state prevented him from verbalizing what he wanted to have happen in the wake of their assault, the least he could do was create a ground zero that would both be mostly untraceable and able to be dealt with later. It preoccupied Jun’s thoughts in between nursing Gai back to health, but by the time Konoha’s massive gates loomed into view, he seemed to have recovered enough to travel on his own without much assistance despite Jun’s hawkish surveillance of the Maito who was too proud to be anything but the helper versus the helped. 

Though questions abounded, one of Jun’ya’s relatives was able to speak on his behalf and circumvent the bureaucracy that would’ve deterred them otherwise and allowed Gai access to the Hospital first where he received a thorough check-up by one of the Medic Corps members before being sternly told he needed to rest and take it easy, though the Chinoike snorted at how unlikely that would be to have happen which elicited a derisive glare from the med-nin who’d overlooked Gai’s diagnostics. Once that was over, well--

“Oh, well, I was just wondering, ya know…” Obito is more than satisfied with this answer, he was starting to have doubts. 

He lets himself be scooped up, it’s always a good opportunity to lay his head on Jun’s chest. 

“Okay but more seriously… Will it ever happen or…?” 

Well, that genuinely surprised him for a hot second, too distracted by how cute Obito looked. 

She shrugs. “I’m used to it.” But Obito’s lines are especially bad. He has quite the talent! 

“This again… Why are you obsessed with my position in bed? Is that a hint that you’d like to try it or something? I wouldn’t mind topping you, just say it, gee…”

im simply existing here

“Why do you always show up at my weirdest moments? Is that a secret ability or you stalk me waiting for it to happen?”