Being locked in a killbox had not been good for Kagome-sensei's nerves. It made sense that he would be a little more cautious than usual when doing seal research. Indulging him was the best way to help him relax and get past the trauma. It was fine, really.

Those thoughts became Hazō's mantra, repeated over and over during the days of his punishment detail as Kagome-sensei made him build a veritable Doom Fortress of Five-Seal-Barriered MEW, Force Wall containment barriers, foxholes, kawarimi targets, and traps with which to 'boom, squish' any horrible monstrosities that might come forth from the nether realms to consume the faces of incautious seal researchers.

Eventually, however, even Kagome-sensei was...well, maybe not satisfied, but at least in recognition that lillies could only be gilded so many times.

"So, I was thinking of doing some seal research tomorrow," Hazō said casually, not looking up as he poked at the embers of the fire with a stick.

"And with these words did the End Times begin," Noburi intoned, stretching his feet towards the fire a bit more. He was wearing his slippers, as his shoes had gotten soaked playing ocean tag earlier and were now drying on logs near the flames. "What do you think, Keiko? Is that the most terrifying phrase you've ever heard?"

Keiko frowned, giving the issue serious thought while carefully turning toasting her third chakra-squirrel kebab. "No," she said at last, "I believe 'hey, everyone, watch this' surpasses it."

"Me, I'm going with 'here, hold my drink'," Inoue-sensei said, sipping from a skin of sake she'd produced from somewhere. "You would not believe some of the stupid stuff I've seen jōnin get up to after saying those four words."

"I hate you all," Hazō grumbled.

"You're all wrong," Kagome-sensei said with regal certainty. "None of those are terrifying at all when compared to the true Phrase of Doom."

"Oh?" Inoue-sensei said, looking over in curiosity. The firelight sparkled and danced in her hair, throwing her face into chiaroscuro relief. "What is the Phrase of Doom, then?"

"'What's the worst that could happen?'" Kagome-sensei said calmly.

"Oooooh," said Inoue-sensei, Keiko, and Noburi simultaneosly.

"Yep, you win," Noburi said, tipping an imaginary hat to the sealmaster. "Still, you have to admit that Hazō's is pretty good too."

"You mock me," Hazō said, his voice low and mock-dire. "You all mock me, but I'll show you! I'll show you all! Mwahahaha!" He waved both fists in the air.

Inoue-sensei looked lazily up into the tree canopy above them. "Really just isn't the same without a proper bit of lightning and thunder." She shrugged and took another sip of her sake before waving the skin at him. "Also, the laugh needs work. Try again. Remember, more from the diaphragm...like this. Muahahaha!"

Hazō took a breath and scowled, shaking both fists. "Mwahahaha!"

She waved a hand in casual dismissal. "No, no. That was terrible. No more maniacal laughing over dinner until you can do it properly. Now, you were saying something about research?"

"Yeah," Hazō said. "We've got a lot of seals that we've picked up along the way that we haven't had a chance to research. I'd like to start on them tomorrow, and I was wondering about timing. How long did we plan on staying here?" He carefully didn't look at Noburi.

Inoue-sensei shrugged and shifted slightly so she could plump up the pile of leaves that she'd jammed under her bedroll as a cushion. "I'm not in any hurry to leave." She turned to look over at Noburi. "Noburi, part of the reason I brought us here was because I thought it would be a good place for us all to decompress, but also so that you could continue your training with Hashimoto if that was something you wanted to do. Is it?"

Noburi pondered that one, feeling the insides of his mostly-dry sandals as he did. "Not just yet," he said finally. "She's a total pain in the neck, and she's already done what she promised Jiraiya she would do as far as teaching me. I'm going to need to figure out how to bribe her or charm her before she'll teach me anything else and, to be honest, I just can't bring myself to give a damn right now. I just want to lie on the beach for a while longer before I worry about it."

"I as well," Keiko said, nibbling on her squirrel kebab. "Although I really should go back to the Summon Realm soon; it is well past time for me to seek out Panchipāma and attempt to mend our relationship." She sighed. "I was thinking of going in the morning?"

Inoue-sensei smiled at her. "We won't stop you as long as you promise to come back quickly."

Keiko ducked her head so that her bangs fell forward around her face. "Yes, sensei," she said. The darkness and firelight hid what was almost certainly a blush. "I promise."

A moment's embarrassed silence hung in the air, which Hazō hurried to jump into. "So! How about that seal research? I was hoping you guys might have some suggestions on what to work on first—want to hear what I've got?" He pulled a thick sheaf of paper out of his shirt pocket and held them up hopefully.

Keiko studied the papers thoughtfully. Noburi groaned at the sight of how thick the stack was. Inoue-sensei flopped dramatically backwards, arms out to the sides in a gesture of despair. Kagome snatched the papers from Hazō's hands and tilted them to the firelight so that he could read them as long as he practically shoved his beaky nose against them.

"Macerator version two, of course we do that first," he muttered, casting the first sheet aside and forcing Hazō to scramble for it. "Have to finish what you start. Unknown seals from the casino? Hah!" More pages went flying. "Unknown stuff from those Isan stinkers? Harumph!" Throw, toss, hurl. "Confusion seals? Bah. How are you supposed to squish someone with those? If you're throwing seals at him you should be killing him. Clusterbombs? Hmph." Without looking away from the papers he reached inside his jacket and tossed something to Hazō.

Hazō caught the object carefully. It had come from Kagome-sensei, which probably meant that it exploded, cut people in half, or did some other form of grievous bodily harm if misused. (Or properly used, come to think of it.)

It was about the size of his fist and consisted of a series of small wooden tubes and bits of metal haphazardly stuck together with clay. Inside each was another blob of clay with a small twist of paper sticking out. With a start, Hazō remembered watching his teacher make the pieces back in Isan, what seemed like a lifetime ago but was really only a few months.

"Grapeseed bomb," Kagome-sensei grunted, continuing to look through the papers. "Center tag is small, just enough to throw the rest in all directions. Outer ones are bigger, get the job done." He tapped his finger on Hazō's clusterbomb design. "I like this. Complicated, though. Bigger than a grapeseed bomb, couldn't carry as many. Got a few issues, like the ninja wire. Too strong, means the trajectories of the parts are unpredictable. Use cord, maybe? Something that'll break easily when the blast hits. Maybe just twine. Yeah...." He stared off into the darkness, wearing a smile that fit somewhere in the space between 'dreamy' and 'creepy'.

"So, how about those other ideas?" Hazō said desperately, after it became clear that Kagome was thoroughly lost in his obviously-murderous musings and was not coming back any time soon. "How about the Skyhopper?"

"Huh, what?"

"Skyhopper seal?" Hazō said, gesturing to the array of papers stick clenched tightly in the man's ink-stained fingers. "It should be next on the stack."

"Huh." Kagome leaned a little closer to the fire for better light and gave the paper a furrowed-brow scan. "Huh."

"I am quite certain I will eventually regret this," Inoue-sensei said drily, "but what is a Skyhopper seal?"

"Hrmph," Kagome said, waving the paper around as though it offended him. "Bouncing on air? Really?"

"Pretty sweet, huh?" Hazō said, grinning widely. "Just think—we could be our own air force! If we wanted to get away from people we just bounce up into the sky!"

Kagome frowned, fingers twiddling in the air as he mapped things out to himself. "Good idea. Useful. Wouldn't work, though."

Hazō's face fell. "Why not? I thought the Air Dome was immovable, and strong enough to support us? If it isn't—"

Kagome waved a hand impatiently, flicking the details of the Skyhopper aside in favor of the next sheet. "No, it's plenty strong. Not the issue. Timing, that's the issue. You can jump while you're standing on the dome, but then you have to leave the seal behind you. No way you could reliably jump and deactivate the seals at exactly the right moment to avoid tearing the seals and plunging to your horrible screaming doom."

"Plunging to your horrible screaming doom sounds bad," Inoue-sensei agreed. "Also, jumping on top of an invisible dome and not sliding off sounds risky. Can you use chakra adhesion on air?"

"Sure," Kagome grunted distractedly. "Besides, just put it upside down. Easy to stand on the bottom of a dome. It's flat, after all. Like standing on a log. Except the log is flat, so not really I guess. Can still adhere, though. Have to, in fact. Move too much and you'd disrupt the seal, which would— What kind of stupidheaded insanity is this?!" He turned and waved the next two sheets at Hazō.

"Um," said the novice sealmaster. In the poor light he couldn't tell which sheet Kagome-sensei was waving at him.

"Sky Walking seals?" Kagome-sensei said, shaking the paper clutched in his right hand at Hazō. "You want to modify the Five Seal Barrier to use only one seal? And you want to modify my Lesser Barrier Formation?! Madness! It's obviously madness and craziness and—" He paused, head cocked in thought. "Well...I mean...hm. You could dampen the harmonic on the...no, that wouldn't work. Maybe if you deconvolved the...no, no, no, that might just turn your brain inside out. Ooh, you could...no, that would be stupid. Hm." He pulled a bit of charcoal out of the fire, flipped Hazō's notes over, and started scribbling on the back in complete obliviousness of the genin's horrified look.

The entire group stayed silent, watching with a wary amusement as Kagome scribbled on the paper for several minutes.

"Ha!" he said finally, sounding thoroughly satisfied. "I was right: it's obviously madness. Not going to happen." He waved the sheet at Hazō dramatically. "This? This crazy idea on how you can get rid of four of the seals by decohering the resonances through the fifth and twelfth dimensions? Ridiculous! Absolutely ridiculous! Don't you think people have thought of this? Of course they have, and most of them got turned into goo, or eaten by tentacular horrors from beyond space and time, or both! People have wanted a one-seal variant on the Five Seal Barrier since forever! If it was as simple as decohering the resonance on two dimensions, don't you think someone would have thought of it? It's obviously wrong! Obviously!"

Keiko coughed, interrupting Kagome's tirade and making him glance over at her in surprise. "I will note, sir, that it took you four minutes to determine that this was obvious."

"Hrmph," he said, glaring at her before turning back to Hazō. "Still bonkers. Besides, why do you want to mess around with the Five Seal Barrier for this? Just use the Air Dome. Put that on your shoes, then—"

"Third sheet," Hazō said.

"Huh? What?"

"Third sheet down," Hazō repeated. "Assuming I kept track of where you are in the stack, anyway."

Kagome flipped two sheets aside and skimmed quickly over what was written on the next. "'Put Air Dome seals on shoes, upside down, modified to be activated by chakra adhesion. Activate them in turn while running, using the chakra adhesion to stick to the Dome so the seals do not become misaligned.' Hrmph." He glowered at his student and hrmped again.

For just a moment, every dictionary in the Elemental Nations rewrote itself to say: "smug; adjective. See 'Kurosawa Hazō'".

o-o-o-o​

"Doitagain, doitagain!" Kagome-sensei urged, clapping his hands and staring gleefully at the badly torn up trees downrange.

Shrugging, Hazō scooped up a fist-sized chunk of granite from the ground—the detritus left when sufficient numbers of explosive tags were applied to a MEW—and tossed it into his newest seal. It was absorbed with a noise that was entirely too much like chewing for Hazō's comfort, followed by what was all too clearly a burp.

Carefully, he held the paper up, seal facing away from himself and Kagome-sensei and fingers carefully out of the way. A brief pulse of chakra activated the seal and an instant later pebbles the size of his thumbnail shot out, slamming into the trees and knocking divots of wood flying.

"Yesyesyesyesyes!"

For just a moment, every dictionary in the Elemental Nations rewrote itself to say: "manic: adjective. See 'Kagome'"

o-o-o-o​

"Agggghhh! It's aliiiivvvveeee!"

o-o-o-o​

"Ugh. So close."

"Don't touch it."

"Wasn't planning on it."

o-o-o-o​

KABOOM!

"You're not dead, right?"

"No, sensei."

"You sure?"

"Yes, sensei."

"Really, really sure?"

"Yes, sensei."

"And I'm not dead either, right?"

Sigh. "No, sensei."

"Just checking. Let's go rebuild the testing area."

o-o-o-o​

Mari was lounging on a raft that she'd had Hazō put together during his unendingly amusing punishment period. She was wearing her red swimsuit and had her sunhat pulled low over her eyes. The sun was warm, the waves were rocking her gently, she had a waterskin next to her that had been half-filled with ice before going into the storage seal...life was good.

The light changed suddenly and she pulled the hat back to make sure that it was just a cloud and not a stooping chakra hawk...only to find that it was neither.

"What are you two doing up there?" she asked calmly. Her most promising yet troublesome student stood forty feet above her, his sealmaster teacher standing beside him and both of them wearing insufferable grins.

"Giving us the option to escape from any pursuer ever?" Hazō asked brightly.

"Giving us tactical positioning so we can squish the stinkers!" Kagome said, smacking right fist into left palm.

"Revolutionizing warfare for the next century?"

"Letting us see the sunrise and sunset better?"

One delicate eyebrow rose; that was a substantially more poetic answer than she'd expected from Kagome.

"...so that we have a better angle to spot anyone trying to come at us with the sun behind them!"

Ah, there we go. All was right with the world again.

"Okay, I admit that that is seriously impressive," she said. "But, and I hate to say this, you both look a little ridiculous." Laughter bubbled in her voice; troublesome they might be, but her boys were still adorable. Their respective grand dreams and cheerfully psychotic pragmatism combined to make something greater than the sum of its parts.

And it was true that they looked ridiculous. They stood with feet spread wide as though straddling a barrel, and paper seals covered in bright red and light purple inks had been carefully glued to the bottoms of their sandals. The colors stood out starkly against the otherwise drab shades of a ninja's standard uniform.

"It's a work in progress," Hazō said blithely. "This is just the prototype."

"Uh-huh. Let's see you come down."

Hazō looked uncomfortable for a moment, but he squatted down and reached under his feet so he could touch the seals. Carefully putting all his weight on his left foot he lowered his right a few inches, then shifted his weight and repeated the process on the other side. Very, very slowly he duck-walked down out of the sky, nearly falling over twice when he didn't manage a transition quite right. Eventually, however, he stood only a few feet above the surface of the waves near her raft.

"Okay, there is no way that I'm using those," Mari said, laughing outright. "I refuse to waddle my way to safety."

"It's a prototype," Hazō grumbled.