Chapter 32.2- One Thousand Hands

Twelve Shinobi: Three Jounin, Two Special-Jounin, and Seven Chunin to delay a force of thousands. This was going to be an interesting mission, no matter what.

“Welcome everyone. Thank you for volunteering. As explained earlier, you will be expected to delay the Suna advance from reaching Konoha’s borders and allow the main force to mobilize with the aim of pushing Suna back into their desert. While few in numbers, I have the utmost faith in your ability as a collective to harness the will of fire and achieve victory in the name of Konohagakure no Sato.” The Hokage said, spreading his hands over us as if in a prayer.

“Go forth. Go with the will of fire. May it burn in your hearts and may it burn your enemies” He said finally. With those words, we nodded, and jumped out the window that was set aside for those leaving on urgent missions. I found myself taking point in our wedge formation with the Uchiha cousins by either side of me. Behind them were Toshiro, Kizuru, and Omoikane. Shika alone brought up the rear. I flared my chakra to get everyone’s attention and then began to make signs at a rapid pace. I’d raised my hand so it was within their view, of course.

The message? Full speed out of the village, meet to strategise at the spot. “The Spot” was not really an official place. It awas just a clearing that all twelve of us were intimately familiar with as a result of our academy days. Whenever we’d left the village: be if for survival training, or hunting, or whatever, this was the spot we would be expected to rendezvous at. It took us virtually no time to reach it, moving as quickly as we were. I had to give it a few seconds for everyone to settle down, but once I was sure everyone had taken their places around the clearing and were listening to me, I began.

“Yo” I said, cringing internally at the terrible beginning even as Izuku and Toshiro failed to quite hide their smiles. Somehow, that reaction stabilised me. These weren’t strangers, these were my peers. My friends, even. I could trust them to have my back, and I could afford to just be myself with them.

“So you heard the Hokage. We will be working to stall Suna. Presently, I have a plan that should tide us over with achieving our goals, but to be honest, that plan was made with the assumption that I would be receiving some no-name chunin and Jounin. Obviously, that is not the case here. With you all, I already get the feeling that I can be much more ambitious with the goals I set both for us as a team both in terms of what your roles will be and what we seek to achieve” I said.

“What do you mean?” Inukuro asked in a deep baritone that shocked me to hear. If my eyes didn’t deceive me, the baritone shocked everyone except his genin teammates who just smiled at everyone’s surprise.

“Watcha looking at me for?” He asked next, and the white dog at his feet growled in irritation. Oh the gods, Shiro barely even qualified as a dog anymore. In the office, he’d been more subdued, but here I could see how he reached up to Inukuro’s chest and was almost as tall as Uraume. He looked more wolf, than dog, and he knew it.

“Nothing. I just think we’re a bit shocked by the voice. Moving back on track though, I mean that we were ordered to halt Suna’s advance, and that is what my plans were previously aimed at, but I think with the twelve of us working together, we can toss them right back into the deserts ourselves” I said, feeling a sharp grin build on my face to match the one Inukuro was sporting.