Saiken waited until the group left, listening to the ding of the doorbell.
He left through the backdoor, he was expecting the blonde kid to forget to actually talk to him later, he didn't look the smartest.
But he wasn't going to let him just walk away, if he knew about his Father's eyes, then that meant he either was a Jinchūriki or someone who had met one.
Although just meeting one of his siblings or having one sealed into them didn't mean they would know that fact, because he knew his siblings well, and none of them would willingly tell their Jinchūriki about their Father.
...
Actually, Shukaku might accidentally slip up, but besides him, no one else would say anything.
So, he quickly dashed out of the back door, and jumped over the buildings in a single leap, landing in front of the 3 Shinobi.
The pink haired girl tensed up and fell into a fighting stance, and the boy took a step backwards.
"Hey." He called out. "I said I wanted to talk with you."
The one eyed man raised an eyebrow, and the blonde one relaxed when he realized what Saiken wanted.
"Uh... Sure? But I'm not sure what you want from me." The blonde shrugged slightly.
"I need to talk to..." Saiken stopped himself when he realized he probably shouldn't reveal his identity in public, and saying 'my sibling' might be very telling. It might lead to people trying to seal him again, even if he was much weaker than he used to be.
"... your passenger." He decided to say instead.
"Um, ok?" The blonde seemed confused. "But how?"
They both looked blankly at each other for a few moments.
"Can't you just tell me what they say?" Saiken asked hesitantly.
"...Yeah, that's definitely not happening." The boy said after some hesitation. "He is very angry right now."
They went back to staring at each other blankly.
"Well, if you two are done with whatever this is, then we can go and rest." The one eyed man said cheerfully.
The blonde shrugged, gave him a nod and left.
Saiken watched him leave, feeling disappointed.
Oh well, he could talk to them in a few decades anyways, he was enjoying himself here.
He turned around and walked back into the restaurant, nodding to Sasuke and picking up the dirty dishes that they left behind.
Sasuke himself seemed better, which was good, he had been pretty distracted over the past few days.
***
6 MONTHS LATER
In Kirigakure, Mei Terumi stared at the people filling into her council chambers, she knew this was going to massively suck.
Ao entered the room, giving her a polite nod as he passed by, but offering nothing else in terms of support.
It was, to the day, 6 months since she received her ultimatum, and she was not comfortable testing the waters on this.
So today, about half the council would die, she had done her best in thinning the numbers as discreetly as possible, replacing them quietly and killing those that left themselves open to attack.
But none of the poeple on the council got there by being dumb.
Uncaring? Greedy? Shortsighted? Yes, yes, and yes.
But they also weren't idiots, with a few exceptions.
"Welcome." She said calmly. "You might be wondering why I called you here today."
She glanced around the room, most of the faces were serious, some looked annoyed, which made her feel better about the whole thing, once they had realized she couldn't remove them forcibly, some had gotten cocky.
"The reason is simple." She said calmly. "We are here to insure the survival of Kirigakure."
And with that, her most loyal ANBU moved, in less than a second, three men were dead.
She herself jumped forward, dashing across the table and slicing through the throat of another Councillor.
As the room descended into chaos, she internally sighed, knowing this was not going to go down well in history.
But her duty was to the survival of Kirigakure first, and her reputation came second.
***
The sounds of combat faded away, replaced by silence and the sounds of heavy breathing.
Mei surveyed the room, seeing who had survived and who hadn't, the ones loyal to her had all hunkered down together in one corner, as she had instructed them too.
Those that weren't responsible for the Invasion but still opposed her were also alive, although they looked understandably concerned about their situation.
The rest were dead, half the council room was covered in blood, 7 of her ANBU were also dead, dead in the fighting, Councillors were mostly Shinobi, after all.
She calmly walked back to her seat, stepping over the corpse of the Councillor that used to sit beside her chair.
"If you are alive right now." She said, meeting every Councillors eyes. "Then congratulations, you were smart enough to avoid almost destroying Kirigakure."
There were some looks of disbelief at that declaration.
"What are you talking about?" A Councillor spoke up, the head of the Academy and one of her most vocal critics. "You've just killed half the council! What justification do you have for this?"
Mei's face remained calm, she had already predicted everything, it was not hard to see how the ones that weren't aware of her plan would react.
"The meteor that struck the south sea 6 months ago was not a natural occurrence." She explained calmly. "Before the Invasion of Wave started, I received an ultimatum, all the ones responsible for the Invasion would die, with or without Kirigakure itself dying along with them."
There were more looks of disbelief at that, even from her supporters.
"I was given 6 months to kill the members responsible, today is the last day." She finished, before waiting for reactions.
The council chamber erupted into noise again.
She sighed, out loud this time, and stared at the ceiling.
It was going to be a long day.
***
I looked over the clusterfuck inside Kiri's council chamber.
And seeing all the dead bodies and blood, all I felt was satisfaction.
That was that cleared up, it was hard not to feel good about this whole situation, Kiri was firmly under control now, with no one to oppose Mei Terumi, and with her thoroughly afraid of Wave and me in particular, there was little chance of her acting against my interests.
Konoha was also now firmly allied with The Order, and with Danzo dead since a few months ago, there was little internal opposition to the alliance.
Suna was following Konoha's lead as usual, so they had been quick to establish connections to Wave.
It helped that Rōran was recognized as an independent City-State again, and they had allied with The Order too, with the Land of Wind and Sunagakure very interested in trading with them.
The Minor Villages and Lands were not a problem, none of them had the strength to truly threaten The Order.
So the only three problems that remained were Iwagakure, Kumogakure and Obito, but even that was not a long term issue.
The two Great Villages were scrambling to figure out what the hell was going on, the Invasion of Wave had turned into a bogeyman story for their Shinobi.
As far as the stories went, 1000 Shinobi had walked into Wave, and none had ever been seen again. The country itself looked pristine, and there was not a single indication of any kind of war taking place anywhere in the country.
And Obito?
He was focusing on being quiet and efficient, he didn't poke around where he didn't need to.
So his days were numbered, he was gleefully chasing an impossible dream, Black Zetsu was pulling him along on strings, and he was completely unaware of it.
And in a few days, my teleportation network would come online, The Land of Demons, The Land of Waves and Rōran would be fully connected, civilians and The Order would be free to move between them at will.
I couldn't help but feel proud.