After being led through underground paths and forced to swim underwater again and again, eventually the blindfolded Konoha team wound up on a shore outside once more judging from the sound of birds and open air… which were basically telltale signs that you were back outside.
The blindfolds were taken off of the eyes of the drenched foreign shinobi as they were able to look around. There was a massive lake and the biggest tree that any of them had ever seen in their lives dead center in the village as the lake flowed out down a huge waterfall at the edge of town.
The portion of Takigakure that was lived in by the general populace sat around the outside edge of the lake, with trees and buildings, which were of course dwarfed by the size of the main tree of the village that seemed like it could fit all of the settlement inside of it, using either its width or its height.
Really, enough couldn't be said about that goddamn tree. It was absolutely gargantuan. Bigger than anything in Konoha by far, even the Hokage Monument. It had to be at least a mile in circumference around its base.
"So." Naruto said as everyone on his team with the exception of Lee seemed to be irritably trying to dry themselves off, "Do all of you guys have to do that every single time you leave the village? That whole swimming thing?"
None of the Taki ninjas said anything in response, instead continuing to lead the Konoha team across a long bridge built over the lake to the island that the great tree was situated on.
Lee leaned in to Tenten who was still rather upset about having to swim just to get into a village as an ally, "That probably means no." He whispered to her way too loudly to be the least bit subtle.
"Uchiha." The leader of the Taki escort team said to the apparent leader of the Konoha visitors, something Naruto was still stewing a bit over, "You are aware of just what the situation our village has asked yours to interfere in entails aren't you?"
"That if we're unable to find the real source of the upheavals around Tsuchi no Kuni's borders you're probably going to have to go to war with Iwagakure." Sasuke said bluntly, "Yeah, we know."
As callous as it sounded, what did they expect or want him to do, freak out and panic? Sound timid about it? No. There was a problem that they'd been called to look into, and that was what they were going to do. They would search as hard as they could, and they would come back with what they found.
It was information-gathering. A 'gimme' mission that had been given to Naruto and company in order to get the former away from Killer Bee, something that they were all just now realizing after the run-in outside of the village. Technically the only possible way to fail this mission was for all of them to die so that no one came back to Taki to give any kind of report at all.
Barring that vastly unfortunate outcome, there was really no possible way to screw the pooch on this one. It was almost idiot-proof as far as B-rank missions went.
Well, it was B-rank in Konoha's listings because while it was dangerous and required actual ninja work, its consequences wouldn't affect them to an extremely heavy degree… as far as a war occurring between an ages old enemy and an ally would anyway. For Takigakure, due to the sensitivity of the mission content and the potential fallout from its outcome far outweighing how it would affect Konoha, it was A-rank.
So while there was no way to really fail without the team being annihilated, depending on what they came across the consequences of their work could have been huge.
Strangely enough, Sasuke's no-frills attitude didn't ruffle any feathers amongst the Takigakure escorts. In fact, seeing someone so down to business and ready to roll made them feel better than the originally disjointed feeling they'd gotten from the visiting team.
They would have felt a bit more confident if the team didn't consist entirely of teenagers, but hey. They didn't request any names when the mission request went out, so that was on them.
"Why couldn't Neji go on this thing with us?" Naruto asked the remaining junior members of Team Gai. When he'd recruited Tenten and Lee he expected Neji to come along for the whole combo package, but he was unable to join, thus he grabbed Sasuke who was pretty much down for anything with action, "I mean, not that it's not great having Sasuke here and everything-."
"Hn."
"-But he was really vague about why he couldn't come."
"Oh-ho." Rock Lee just waved the whole thing off as normal for how things sometimes went with Team Gai, "Neji had to bow out because of 'clan responsibilities.'" They were very used to that, as ever since becoming a jounin, even as a Branch House member, Neji was rather important to Hyuuga Clan inner workings now, "He is required to do so from time to time."
"Clan responsibilities?" Naruto asked with a raised eyebrow, "You can use that as an excuse to not do stuff?" And Shikamaru hadn't been trying to abuse the hell out of that little loophole to get himself out of doing missions and other things since they'd come back? Outrageous.
"Yeah, as far as I know." Tenten said with a shrug. She wasn't a clan child so she didn't have any clue as to how they worked outside of what she already knew from interacting with Neji, "It has to be legit though. You can't just say it, you've got to be excused and the time off has to be applied for by the head of the clan I think."
"Well I'm technically Uzumaki Clan Head aren't I?"
"You're the only one."
"Right. Uzumaki Clan Head."
"…Naruto, you can't knock off from work and say that it's for clan business."
"But it is! I've got property to fix up and a ton of weird masks to figure out what some of them do!" And after finding out what one of them in particular did, it was probably for the best that he got to the bottom of that as soon as possible before someone got hurt. More than likely him if he were to be honest about it.
The last part got Sasuke's full attention though, "Wait, you're still going to fool around with those masks after what happened the last time?" He asked with a smirk, remembering how Naruto hightailed it out of the temple as fast as he could after they all saw the shadow of the Shinigami behind Naruto's clone, "Playing with fire aren't we?"
Yep, because nobody paid attention to the fact that he ran away too. And man did he run away. If Naruto was perceived as being in the lead it was only because Sasuke Shunshined out of dodge before Sakura or Chouji saw the yellow/blue/orange blur bolting through the door and followed suit.
"They're there for a reason, so I'm gonna find out what they can do." Naruto replied stubbornly, "If any of 'em can even do anything else at all that is."
"Well look at you, all proud of your clan secrets." Sasuke… was he actually trying to razz someone? Holy crap, someone was feeling loose today if he was willing to joke around like that. He normally didn't give a damn about anything going on around him, but apparently having another last survivor of a long-gone clan made him more cordial in regards to Naruto?
It was the leading theory that the others were working with at least.
But for the time being during the walk across the large bridge it had to be noted that Takigakure was absolutely gorgeous. Pristine, crystal clear water. And it was probably a D-rank mission to tend to the tree and to the lake because Sasuke could see tiny specks on the tree moving around as well as on the far shores.
Actually there was one coming their way.
And it was glowing green.
And it had wings.
And it had dropped him seven stories through a canopy of trees before.
…And it was coming their way. Was that established already?
Chunin exam flashback aside, Sasuke found that it wasn't him that wound up being plowed into by the flying figure. Naruto was, putting Lee, Tenten, and even Sasuke on instant guard until they heard Naruto actually yell at the person, "Don't drop me! This isn't funny Fuu, I swear I'm gonna-!"
"Yeah, yeah…" Takigakure's resident jinchuuriki said with a roll of her eyes as she carefully landed and dropped Naruto to the surface of the bridge once they were low enough to safely do so, "You still love to run your mouth don't you? I thought you liked trying to hug me."
"Not death hugs a hundred feet in the air!" Naruto bellowed at the lithe girl. She hadn't changed a bit from the last time he saw her, and flying still wasn't as cool as he thought it would be years ago before he'd actually experienced it several times. No thanks, "I'm meant to stay on the ground! If someone wanted me to fly, that's what my powers would be!"
"Yes, because I'm such a fan of being hugged with a chain." Fuu replied, hovering in circles around them, "You can stick to me like flypaper anyway so it's not like you'll ever fall off. And even if I dropped you, your powers would probably let you live through it."
The Takigakure ninjas were rather stunned at seeing Fuu get along so well with someone. She was more approachable than she used to be years, and had developed a bit of a personal sense of humor, but that went past grabbing up random foreigners and scaring the hell out of them.
Then Naruto started yelling at her while using her name and it became apparent that they knew each other, "Oh, you two are already introduced?"
Fuu flittered around momentarily before shutting off her chakra wings and landing on the bridge, hands on her hips, "Yeah, remember when sometimes I'd get to go on vacations and leave the village? I was going to help this guy with some things."
"Freelancing missions were you?" That was something highly illegal for a ninja loyal to a village to do.
"What?" The mint-haired young woman recoiled in shock at first before recovering, "No! I was training him! He's a jinchuuriki and my control is better than his." Speaking of which, Fuu gave Naruto a stern look that seemed to be expectant in a way, "Now, are you any better than that pitiful mess that almost wiped a village off the map trying to use four tails?"
"Yes." Naruto grumbled under his breath, "Just because you're older than me doesn't make you a better jinchuuriki you know." He thought that he'd been doing rather well with only three years to learn how to work with his biju.
"It kind of does since you didn't know anything about it until you were twelve." Fuu pointed out, "That put you behind the curve straight out of the gate. Others start training as jinchuuriki the second they're able to. If you don't have something about you right off the bat to help you along it takes a long time to master it."
Naruto looked around at the other Takigakure ninjas that had been escorting them and saw something that he hadn't seen the last time he'd been around Fuu and other ninjas of her village.
Pride.
A smile came to his face at the implication. The last time they had been afraid of her, even scorning her presence even though she was the strongest of them and loyal to the village. Apparently Fuu's bit of an attitude adjustment had done more than just made her easier to be friends with. She'd managed to turn the corner so to speak.
Even just now when the apparent Taki ninja in command had chided her for perhaps freelancing missions outside of the village on her own time, it had been done in good-natured jesting.
"Come on." The lead Taki ninja said with a smile that he quashed behind a veil of business, "Let's meet with the village leader and you can be fully briefed on all you need to know to run your mission."
XxX
(With Shikamaru – Konohagakure no Sato – Ninja Academy – Hokage's Office)
Shikamaru couldn't help but be scared to death of what he was about to do. Walk into the Hokage's office and present a case to him. He needed the man to help fill in any of the blanks that he might have had left, but he needed a few more things confirmed to complete the blank spots in the case that was Yakushi Kabuto.
This wasn't his thing…
He didn't go out of his way to do things like this. He'd worked for the Fire Daimyo, yes, but he'd never actually done anything to interact with the man or put himself out there any more than he needed to amongst those in higher stations.
If he was serious about this, he probably should have taken it all to his dad Shikaku, or to Asuma. Someone, anyone but just as long as he didn't wind up doing it himself.
To hell with it. He'd come all that way, and it would be a real drag to have to go back after gathering up all of the relevant paperwork and records he could find to argue his case. And then he'd have to explain to whoever he chose to act in his stead what he wanted to convey to the Hokage.
…Actually, doing this himself would probably be much less work all things considered, even if he was uncomfortable with it.
"Damn it." Shikamaru muttered to himself, knocking on the large doors in front of him. He steeled himself as he heard a muffled, yet powerful grant of permission for him to enter. Taking a deep breath he entered the office and found the regal old man in charge of Konoha painting a portrait, "Hokage-sama."
"Ah, Shikamaru-kun." Hiruzen said, greeting the young genius with a smile, "What can I do for you?"
"I just needed you to clarify some things for me." Shikamaru said, standing off to the side as Hiruzen continued to paint, "Ever since… the spy incident, I've been trying to put together the pieces of just how this happened. You know, so that maybe the next time the writing is on the wall we can see this sort of thing coming."
He had expected the Sandaime Hokage to be more cross when the situation with Kabuto's spying came up, but he was entirely calm and understanding.
"Hindsight is oftentimes the most humbling teacher." He said, taking a moment from painting to empty out his pipe and put in more tobacco, "But if you fail to heed its lessons you are doomed to repeat the same mistakes over and over again." Sparing a glance in Shikamaru's direction he bid that the young chunin come closer to talk, "I am by no means a perfect Hokage my boy, your sensei will be the first to bring that up. By all means, speak."
Okay, so Shikamaru had been given the green light. Time to bring this whole thing home. Hopefully he wouldn't have to write an actual report afterwards, because it would prove to be a long one.
"Alright, the rest is on record. I've got a friend reassessing all of Konoha's permanent records right now keeping the things I've dug up on hold for me to get back to if you want to see it, but for now I'll just get to the things that are relevant to the heart of this." Shikamaru said, trying to keep his nerve and sound as official as he could, "Yakushi Kabuto. His records show that he was adopted by Yakushi Nono, but these things don't show up on her record. In fact, her record is sealed two years before he was said to be adopted."
Which was something strange in of itself.
"Ninja records aren't sealed in the village with the exception of those worked into rotation in ANBU, and those are only for the duration of their tenure there." Ninja records for ANBU closed until their stint was over, and they reopened when a ninja rejoined the conventional forces, "So if her records never reopened she either died in ANBU, or is still part of them. But that can't be either, because Nono is officially listed as M.I.A., and she has been since two years prior to Kabuto's adoption. What do you think so far?"
"I think I need to start cleaning house in the village's records department." Hiruzen grumbled bitterly, "Unacceptable. Continue."
A smirk came to Shikamaru's face despite the situation. Knowing that Hiruzen was seriously taking stock of what he had to say was starting to loosen him up a bit, and it was clear he cared about the content of the conversation. That was good. Maybe something could get done after all.
"I went to the Konoha Orphanage to see if anyone remembered Kabuto and Nono. They did." Shikamaru said, "Kabuto was taken out of the orphanage at the age of five, but didn't show up in any record until he was enrolled at the age of nine. We were already told that this was a ploy by Orochimaru, but we're going past that. Nono vanished two years after Kabuto was taken away. This is where I'm hitting a wall."
"Allow me to break that wall down for you Shikamaru-kun." Hiruzen said, his gaze hardening and the puffs of smoke coming from his pipe growing more and more angry in the cloud formation as he listened and stitched parts of his own knowledge into Shikamaru's report, "You've done such a good job, and I think I can fill in the gap here. Yakushi Nono I believe was taken into a sub-division of ANBU. I believe that Kabuto was as well."
"They have that?"
"They did. They still do, but I've outlawed it."
"Then how does it still exist?"
"Because I never controlled it."
Shikamaru's mouth was stuck wide open upon that admission from his village leader, "What the-? How could-?" He didn't know what to say. What could you reasonably say and not get punished for it? There wasn't anything, "…Why?"
"Remember that I told you about hindsight? I always felt that foresight was the much more desirable teacher, but he's more fickle in his choice of student." Hiruzen said cryptically, "I made a mistake. I felt that my top rival Danzo, who is a worthy ninja in his own right, shared the same desire to protect the village as I do. And he does, but his methods do not coincide with our Will of Fire. By the time I ordered Root to be disbanded, it was too late. They are trained only to heed his command, not mine."
Not unless their orders from Danzo were to listen to him, but that would be too easy.
"So why not do something about it?" Shikamaru asked. This was the Hokage he was talking to here. Put some heads on some sticks damn it! This was basically treason they were talking about here, "You've got the entire village behind you."
"Things aren't that simple Shikamaru." Hiruzen said with a frown, "As simple as that would be, Danzo is not a weak man, even in his current state, I'm certain of it. If he didn't possess the power to back up his actions from the shadows he wouldn't have risked maintaining Root. Not only that, but these are all shinobi trained like ANBU. And from the sound of things he's recruited orphans. Children no one would miss."
"He could have gotten to Naruto." Shikamaru soberingly thought aloud, "If he was recruiting orphans and got Kabuto from the orphanage that Naruto was in-."
"He would never have laid a hand on Naruto and he knows it." Hiruzen stated firmly, "It's why he's never tried to. There's a reason Naruto refers to me so fondly. Because I kept him close when I could. I kept close when I had the time to, and when he was old enough to enter the Academy, they did it there in my stead. Naruto's a more public figure than you know, and Danzo could never have gotten Naruto without letting the whole village know that he did."
"But that still doesn't explain why you can't do something about Danzo."
"He has always had heavy supporters all throughout the village, all throughout clans in our village. Your clan more than likely has its share." Hiruzen explained with a sigh, "They believe in his way of operating when things go wrong for us, and he could easily drum up a civil war whether I kill him or not. My support is waning in my twilight years, and with recent events it has more than likely decreased further. As the Hokage I do have absolute power, but with that absolute power there are many pitfalls."
Danzo, the man knew the atmosphere of the village. The man knew human nature. The man was also convinced that after surviving three world wars and seeing the ideals of the men that led the village in those times, those ways simply did not work in ensuring Konoha's prolonged safety and prosperity.
No one respected the foundations lain down since Konoha's founding days more than Hiruzen did, so he hated to admit it but Danzo had a point.
He allowed Root to exist despite the order over fifteen years ago to dissolve it. Sometimes there was a need to do the jobs too dirty for Konoha to be affiliated with. Danzo was his chief rival and his best friend in previous times. His love for the village rivaled Hiruzen's, and he picked out the missions that Root took, knowing full well that conventional Konoha forces could not be found involved in these things.
His methods left many holes however, and the plausible deniability that Hiruzen had that kept Konoha from being considered responsible for Root's actions also meant that he wasn't privy to many of Danzo's methods. Deep cover spies were always the sort of thing that Danzo adored as far as usable resources went.
But with the utilization of children in the manner that he used them, that was a sticking point. Before he couldn't prove that this was what he was doing. He steered clear of village orphanages to recruit, except for this instance with Kabuto.
These methods seemed to have created a monster that struck at Konoha's vitals, parasitically leeching info out and off to Orochimaru. No wonder the man had managed to always be one step ahead no matter what, because he managed to turn a Danzo-trained double-agent spy to his side and use his own reach inside of the village to place him in prime position back within Konoha.
"So you either need a replacement or something big to turn public opinion if you want to get things to build against Danzo." Shikamaru mused aloud.
Telling them that Kabuto was originally Danzo's fault wouldn't work because Root wasn't commonly known enough in the village. A handful of ninjas would get the reference. To the rest, ANBU was ANBU, and there were no subdivisions.
Hiruzen was impressed by Shikamaru's knowledge of the political climate of the village. Apparently he'd picked up more than just fighting skills by working in the employ of the Fire Daimyo.
Shikamaru hadn't even noticed Hiruzen stand up from where he'd been sitting until the old man set his hands on his shoulders gratefully, "I can see why Asuma grew so fond of his team so quickly, with children like you, Naruto, and Ino to take care of." The surprise on Shikamaru's face at the praise couldn't be schooled, "Please, keep up the good work."
Really, this boy was so intelligent that Hiruzen was finding it prudent to award him with promotion of some sort. Not a full jounin promotion, but a specialist promotion. A tokubetsu jounin promotion. With his intellect there were plenty of positions that could do with that kind of talent. He clearly had a knack for investigation, and recent events showed more than anything else that they desperately needed someone that could see past the b.s. and get to the real.
It was hard for Shikamaru to not be taken aback at directly getting praise from the Hokage. That wasn't supposed to happen for a guy like him. He was supposed to fly under the radar, be strictly middle-management and retire just around the beltline of the ninja organizational system.
Guys like that weren't supposed to be given props by the Hokage. They were important cogs in the machine for sure. Necessary parts, but they were parts that were supposed to be nondescript and replaceable.
All Shikamaru could really do was walk out of the office after nodding slowly.
Damn it! He was aiming for mediocrity! Lead or get out of the way, and all that jazz! Well in this case he just wanted to get the hell out of the way, and he was screwing that up!
…He blamed Naruto.
XxX
(Meanwhile – Outside the Gates of Konoha)
It was now Asuma's turn to stakeout Killer B.
Seriously, he had better things to do than have a staring contest against perhaps the biggest threat to stand at the gates of Konoha since the Head Ninja of Kumo waltzed in and thought it would be cool to leave with a Hyuuga souvenir.
"This sucks." Asuma muttered, not caring that Killer B was well within hearing distance, less than ten feet away, "Look, you might as well go home and we can work this all out some other time. I'm not letting you kill my kid."
"Mr. Nine's your brat?" Killer B questioned in a rhyme, "I ain't seein' that."
Oh, he hadn't been taking him seriously when he said that Naruto was his kid did he? No, no, no. Only one man could really claim to be that kid's father, and he wasn't nearly fast enough or blond enough, "Well no, he's not really my kid, but it feels like he is a lot of the time. I'm proud of the little shit. I'm proud of all three of the kids from my Team 10."
"I was proud of Omoi too, but then he ran into your little dude."
"Naruto's not little, and he didn't start that fight." Asuma asserted, "He just did what I taught them all to do." Asuma's first rule of being a ninja was to do no harm… unless you mean to do harm. Then do LOTS of harm, "I'm not going to sit here and tell you that you're wrong to be looking for a fight from him. I would if I were you. I'm just saying that unless you plan on going through me, at least three other top jounin, and maybe the Hokage before you get it, you're not getting it."
Killer B shook his head resolutely, "You're hurtin' my head with your weak-ass prattle. Mr. Nine don't want you fightin' his battle." He'd met Naruto before, and he never forgot another jinchuuriki, "This ain't about Kumo vs. Konoha or nothin' like that. This is just between him and me, got it?"
"That's not his choice and it sure isn't yours, to just fight like that."
"Why the hell not?"
"The both of you have responsibilities. Big responsibilities. And you want to throw it away for a stupid fight?"
At that point, Killer B grinned, but it wasn't exactly in joviality, "The only responsibility either of us have to anybody else… are the biju we've got stuck inside, right?"
"What does that matter?" Asuma asked, "It doesn't change anything."
"Yeah it does." B insisted, "'Cuz if we didn't have 'em, nobody'd be tryin' to stop us if we wanted to get at each other's throats if we really wanted, ya dig?" He had a point and he was set on making it, "It'd just be two ninjas out for a scrap, instead of all this political crap."
It was hard to get to past all of the slang and bad rhyming, but Asuma was a particularly smart guy and eventually cracked the code. Killer B had a point. The only reason this was some huge issue was because he and Naruto were jinchuuriki. If they didn't have biju inside of them, this wouldn't have been half of the big deal that it currently was.
It was only a matter of time before A sent someone to get B away from there, but they wouldn't be able to budge him either. Not unless A came himself and Iron Clawed him away from his waiting spot.
So was Killer B saying to Asuma in so many words, that for all his talk of seeing Naruto as one of his kids he still saw Naruto through the glass of labeling him a jinchuuriki before he labeled him a ninja?
Oh, that was a cigarette-worthy remark. Asuma had to pull the last one in his pack out in order to calm himself down before he felt the need to do something dumb about that. Talking the guy out of camping in front of their gates to wait for the resident Kyuubi jinchuuriki to return apparently wasn't going to happen.
At that point, Ino, Kurenai, and Hinata began walking into Killer B's sight from the village gates. He regarded the incoming ladies for a moment before returning to his patient and stubborn display of waiting Naruto out.
"That's really Killer B." Kurenai said as she and Ino drew closer, "Kumogakure's perfect jinchuuriki."
"Perfect jinchuuriki?" Hinata said in a questioning tone, "…Kurenai-sensei, just what does that mean?"
What it meant wasn't really a pleasant thought as far as the most experienced of the kunoichi there could figure. These girls had never seen a biju in full attack mode, but Kurenai had. It wasn't really the sort of thing that you could ever forget, and anyone that ever lived through one could never undersell just how awesome the power of one could be, "It means that he not only has full access to the power of the Hachibi, he can draw upon it whenever he wants. He can even transform into it if he felt like it."
Killer B was notably good with the abilities granted to him by virtue of his mastery over his biju's powers, and he had a reputation even outside of Kumogakure for being extremely reckless in battle with that power. So much so that legend had it was the only rule the Raikage could truly grant B was that he was expressly forbidden to transform within the limits of Kumo.
Hinata's pale eyes went wide before she drew upon her Byakugan to check him out for herself. She'd never seen that much chakra in any single person before in her life. The only person she'd ever find a close comparison to would be Naruto.
Ino scrutinized Killer B as closely as she could from where they were walking over to him from. Her sensing ability wasn't nearly as strong as Naruto's as she hadn't finished all she needed to learn from Inoichi yet, so while she knew that he had a lot of chakra, she couldn't feel just how deep the ocean of energy inside of him ran.
"This is Killer B?" Ino said quietly as they got closer to where Asuma was sitting, "He doesn't seem scary. Not like Fuu used to seem. Not like Gaara still does seem."
Kurenai just shook her head, "I can honestly say with full confidence that Killer B is more powerful than both Gaara and Fuu. He could probably handle both of them at one time if he had to." He had more experience than both of them combined and had actually fought during the last world war, "A fight with a jinchuuriki is like a battle against no other force on this planet."
"Just being a jinchuuriki doesn't make him scary though." Ino said, explaining her previous statement, "If it did then Goldie would be absolutely terrifying because he's got the strongest one inside of him doesn't he? But he's not."
Even in the creepy-intense red fox shroud he used to blow Darui off the map, she was never afraid of Naruto. Someone with a lot of power wasn't something to be afraid of just for the power itself. What was worth being feared was the kind of person behind the power.
Finally reaching where Asuma was situated, a bag containing food was set down at his side, "Oh hell yes. You're an angel Kurenai." Asuma said, putting out his cigarette as his stomach sounded off from hunger, "Did you bring me any more cigarettes?"
"I'm really not going to facilitate a habit that I hate Asuma."
"Damn." It was worth a try to get more nicotine though, "So what are the girls doing here?"
"Both of them kept me company and they've been arguing on and off about the godmother thing all day long." Kurenai whispered to him quietly so as not to rouse another fight between the two kunoichi, "So how is it going so far?" She then noticed the empty pack of cigarettes on the ground next to him, "…Nevermind."
Asuma just grunted in return before turning his gaze to Ino, "Hey." She was still observing Killer B intently, forcing Asuma to whistle sharply to get her attention, "Hey, Ino. Did he make it to the border?"
Knowing who Asuma was talking about despite her temporary lapse in concentration, Ino smiled and nodded, "Actually, he made it with the others to Taki by now. I'd let you talk to him for a progress report the way he talked to me, but they wouldn't let me borrow a chakra transmission comm. device to bring out here. I can't find him from this far away without one."
"You can't play with all of the toys the Intelligence Division made just because your old man's one of the top brass." Asuma said, waving off her reasoning for not trying to establish telepathic contact with Naruto, "Thanks anyway though."
"Yamanaka girl." Killer B said, privy to the entire conversation, "You've got that telepathic stuff right? Well tell your boyfriend we've still gotta fight. He can run, he can hide, he can flee, but he can't duck the Killa B!"
Ino slowly turned her head to Asuma who had 'busied' himself by digging intently with his face inside of the bag of food that had been brought for him. In his defense he'd been out there for a whole day and things were boring, "…Asuma-sensei did you-?"
"Naruto-kun is not her boyfriend." Hinata emphasized, arms crossed over her chest, glaring daggers at Ino. It was amazing how quickly she could flip the switch of her personality when it involved Ino, "He's her teammate."
Kurenai didn't know if it was a good thing or not that Hinata had found a rival in Ino over the years due to Naruto. It made her more decisive in her actions, broke her significantly out of her shell, and somewhat gave her the defiance she needed to break through and become a chunin.
The female jounin just looked between Asuma who seemed to be trying to disappear into his takeout bag, and Ino who was doing her best to hide her face from Hinata, more than likely due to the expression she had of a cat that had devoured the canary, "I feel like the entire point of what's supposed to be important about what he said to Ino just went over everyone else's head. Come on girls. Be careful Asuma."
She planted a kiss on her man and with that, she and Hinata headed back to the relative safety of the village gates, the latter shooting a look at Ino's back that meant there would be some man-related arguing going on once they got out of sight of the super strong foreign ninja.
Making sure that she was outside of Kurenai's sight, Ino slid over to Asuma and quickly dropped a twin pack of cigarettes into his bag before moving past him. When noticed what he'd received, he just looked over at the retreating Ino and grinned victoriously.
"And that's why you're my favorite." Regarding Killer Bee once more, Asuma held up the spoils of his female student's grace for unsaid explanation, "Sometimes you've got to enjoy the little things."
XxX
(Disputed Border of Tsuchi no Kuni and Takigakure-held Lands)
"It's just creepy." Deidara said, waiting along with Sasori in an area full of large spiky rock formations for one of Sasori's spies, "Your sleeper agents I mean. To think, you had one in Orochimaru's employ for all these years? Why didn't you use him to get Orochimaru's location any sooner?"
"Because he oftentimes wasn't with Orochimaru." Sasori said in return, "He was a spy for Orochimaru in Konoha, so they were rarely together routinely enough but he is Orochimaru's right hand man, so he does know of important locations and other things that have kept us on his heels."
How else would they have found out that Orochimaru had been in possession of the Sanbi to begin with? That wasn't really information that someone like him would have let leak lightly. It was how they sent Itachi and Kisame to Mizu no Kuni to find the exact location.
They found out because Kabuto had told Sasori that Orochimaru had his hands on a biju of his own.
And speaking of Kabuto…
The purple-clad medic appeared in a bow right in front of Sasori, his head lowered, "You cancelled your jutsu Sasori-sama. What do you need from me this time?"
"You're back with Orochimaru aren't you? Tell me where he is."
"You couldn't have picked a better time to go after him given the situation." Kabuto reported to Sasori, "Shortly after my return he quickly switched bodies with his handpicked Sanbi jinchuuriki."
Deidara heard this and punched a rock near where he was sitting, "Damn it! If he's already got it that just makes him way more dangerous than he already was, un!" The chances of capturing him without killing him so that they could extract the Sanbi had dwindled extensively, "So now what?"
Kabuto spared Deidara a glance before returning his attention to his master, "This could be the chance you need though. Orochimaru-sama is new to the body. As it is now, you would have the advantage if you took him on now. He has the remainder of the Sound Four protecting him due to his vulnerability in his state of adjusting to the switch to Yukimaru's body."
"And?"
"That's it. He has Oto's other elites spaced out across his holdings." Kabuto said, "Otogakure is expanding and gaining more influence than just in Oto no Kuni." Which was a feat in of itself. He had enough power as it was to depose a daimyo and take over a country as his own, and this was before now when he had even more power.
Sasori's eyes narrowed behind the veil over the lower portion of his face, "Show us where he is."
"Of course." Kabuto said before jumping off to lead the way to Orochimaru's currently occupied hideout, "It's not far from here."
Allowing his sleeper agent to lead the way, Sasori turned over to Deidara, "Come on. Let's get this over with. You know how much I hate wasting time."
Deidara got up and stretched before following along, "…Those sleeper agents are really creepy, un."
Something about Kabuto just didn't sit right with him. He had confidence in Sasori's ninja mastery, brainwashing of his subordinates obviously included. It had never burned them before, but there was just something he couldn't put his finger on when it came to the silver-haired medic.
XxX
(With Konoha Team – Near the Border – Pass of Tranquil Respite)
With the request from Takigakure to add an observer of theirs onto the hired team to make sure that Taki's best interests were kept, Fuu had been allowed to tag along and aid the Konoha team. It wasn't just as an overseeing position. Due to her knowledge of the area it was good for everyone that she was there, and the fact that she had a positive relationship with one of the team members in Naruto would ensure that everything went smoother.
"So you're sure?" Fuu asked, noting an area pointed out on the map as a great place that could or would be used as a hideout, "I mean, with this border there's a lot of ground to cover. How could you narrow it down to here in particular?"
There was a mightily scarred piece of the terrain marred from battles past sitting below them off of the elevated position they were scoping out the landscape from. Never recovered skeletons clad in ragged uniforms, temporary encampments, moss growing over every rock, tree, and transport cart that hadn't been moved in almost twenty years.
If you stood on that hallowed ground it was as if you could feel the ghosts of the departed still issuing orders and battle plans to their equally deceased comrades. Saying that it was haunted wouldn't have gotten you an ounce of derision in either Taki or Iwa, which was another reason why no one went there.
The place that had been agreed upon as the first checkable location for Orochimaru's base was an old site of a battlefield from the Third Shinobi World War that was now a veritable graveyard. It was an untouched monument to the losses suffered from both Taki and Iwa during the last major war that had engulfed the ninja world.
Taki, Konoha, Iwa, Kusa, all had spilled blood on the field this day. Some more than others.
It was taboo to be used as a passing area, or any sort of border point between the local ninja powers. Out of respect for the sacrifice of both sides from the battle it was to be left alone and was given the name the Pass of Tranquil Respite; for all of the souls that had gone to rest after their deaths there.
According to Fuu when it had been brought up on the map, this fact was what made it the single most likely target for a place where Otogakure would establish a hideout. It was clear by now that inviolable matters and things that were meant to be sacred really didn't mean much of anything to Orochimaru, and that trickled down to his underlings.
"Well…" Naruto said, stroking his chin in thought, "…It could be the fact that experience tells me that the last few times I had to deal with anything Oto-related in a country with ninja villages, as a Guardian Ninja and a Konoha ninja, it always happened around the border and they always stay around the place that the ninja forces on both sides of the margin won't fuck with even if they already know they're there somewhere."
The last time they had a badass hideout island mixed in with dozens of other potential smuggler's cove hideout islands in territory disputed between at least three different countries. And none of the countries could be caught touching that zone unless they were spoiling for a war with the other countries. That kind of made it easy for Oto to do whatever they wanted in those places.
That was kind of extra-lengthy to say though, so he didn't, but Fuu was still certain that there was a second part to that, "Or?"
"-Or the fact that Sasuke's been looking at a fucking forest fire at the back end of this place all the way from here ever since we stopped, and I can sense the chakra flying off of it without even trying to feel for it."
Fuu turned her head to look off of the cliff that she and the Konoha team had taken a short rest and noted that indeed, miles away on the horizon she could see smoke drifting into the air. She had to squint to see it. Since they were extremely elevated, Naruto's sonar-esque sensor jutsu had a clear path to feel the fire that made it, and that it was from chakra.
He could have said it in less of a blunt manner. Nicer or not, friendly love of Naruto for making her mellow and getting her started on the path to being respected in her village or not, she was kind of tomboyish about getting shown up and she still had a nasty tic of a temper
Giving Naruto a saccharine sweet smile, the seven-tails jinchuuriki pointed over to their left in the opposite direction of the ledge, "Hey, do you see that mountain over there?"
Naruto turned and squinted his eyes appraisingly before grunting, "Uh… that seems more like a plateau to-." THWACK!
Sasuke, Lee, and Tenten just watched without flinching as Fuu effortlessly backhanded Naruto hard enough to send him flying off in the direction of the none-too-nearby mountainside… err, plateau-side. And nobody really cared that much.
Whether it was wrong or not, seeing Fuu hit Naruto to vent her own temper gave Sasuke an easy feeling in his stomach. If he could live vicariously through another person for a split-second he would have chosen to live through Fuu right at the point that her white-clad arm collided with the unsuspecting Naruto. It was beautiful.
Because he'd wanted to do that every day for as long as he could remember. He couldn't though. It wasn't very becoming of his image, because real talented shinobi didn't need to hit people when they were annoyed.
When Fuu noticed Sasuke looking at her she stood up and put her hands on her hips, "Yes?" She vaguely remembered dropping him several stories at a high speed at some point in the past.
"I know you almost killed me before and everything…" Sasuke started to say, standing up from where he'd been crouching to look at the map, "…But I honestly would have paid someone money to do that to him, to hit him that hard, and you gave it to me for free. Thank you."
That was the most he'd said to someone he didn't really know when it wasn't necessary for him to speak in quite some time, so it was clear that Sasuke was really quite happy with her, even if he completely refused to emote.
"Are you sure it was such a good idea to hit Naruto-kun?" Lee asked, trying to gauge just how far Fuu knocked him, "The mission has just begun for the most part. He could have been hurt." It was generous to say that he 'might' have been hurt. It was common knowledge that Naruto's head was full of concrete and other heavy building materials, but by now everyone remembered just how devastating Fuu's strength could be.
Fuu just grinned and held up the back of her hand, "I kept an open hand. He's fine." To emphasize this point, Naruto returned to the party a matter of moments later, thus showing off one of the reasons that Fuu liked him. He was damnably tough.
"Ah, you bitch." Naruto said, walking back to his teammates, wincing at Fuu's swatting of him, "That really hurt. That was like a 3.6 out of 10 on the Tsunade-scale." He wasn't sure how far he would have gone if a gigantic rock face hadn't been in the way of his trajectory.
"See?"
"Alright that's enough of that." Tenten said with a sigh. She'd already checked through every scroll she had on her person and was more than ready to roll, "We still haven't proved that Oto is the cause of the disturbances until we get some solid evidence so…" Without saying anything else she dropped off of the side of the cliff and ran her way down the side.
"Tenten is right!" Lee exclaimed, "The fate of a village is in our hands and we cannot fail!" Following suit, he swan dove off of the edge and freefell for quite a ways, "Watch me Gai-sensei!" He said, flipping through and planting his feet on the side of the wall to sprint his way down similarly to Tenten.
Naruto and Sasuke looked at each other for a moment before Naruto shrugged and offered a suggestion, "I'll take the high road."
"I'll take the low road." Sasuke said in return, "…And I'll finish this mission before you." Naruto responded by maturely flipping him the bird.
Sasuke just rolled his eyes and vanished in a Shunshin while Naruto dropped his machete at the edge and used his connected Chakra Chain to bungee his way down. Any effort to show off was quickly outdone when Fuu let her chakra wings sprout from her red cylinder on her back and just flew her way down there.
Nothing beat the power of flight when it came to cool methods of transportation.
They were meant to split up and search the area. Everyone was meant to rally upon the agreed place after finding the base, making contact with the enemy, or after three hours no matter what. In case of problems, flares were meant to be fired.
XxX
(With Sasuke – Battlefield Lowlands)
Sasuke was considered a genius sort of ninja as far as his generation was concerned. He was smart, knew enough about fighting and operating in all kinds of conditions under any kind of pressure, and was perhaps the most versatile ninja out of his extremely talented graduation class.
The thing was, while he didn't let his emotions get to him very much, when something really irked him or got to him one way or another he was slow to forget, and was quick to react to it in some way, usually violently.
He remembered every person that ever defeated him or wronged him in some way. The reason he was able to let it go with Fuu was only because Taki and Konoha were supposed to be friendly, and because Naruto and Fuu were rather close.
So when he started seeing spider webs bigger and neater than anything that could have been created in nature, he instantly remembered the time years ago when he and his team had been attacked by a group of four Otogakure shinobi that had hurt Sakura and Chouji, as well as branded him with the Cursed Seal of Heaven.
One of those pricks apparently made webs that couldn't be cut. Kind of like these.
It would be prudent to allude back to Sasuke's elephant-like memory when it came to being wronged. Because when Sasuke held a grievance with someone he also had a propensity to make poor decisions.
Once again, these poor decisions oftentimes circulated around the intent to commit violence.
"Huh." Sasuke progression in his area of the old battlefield came to a halt when he felt that he'd walked directly into where his enemy would have wanted him, "You know, this is enough evidence to me that Otogakure is the cause of the problems in this area-."
He then expertly dodged six large golden blades thrown at him with acrobatic dexterity.
Landing on the ground, Sasuke's face barely registered that he had to do something combat-related, one hand carelessly on his hip as he finished his thought from before, "-But I think I'd rather bring back a corpse for good measure."
Several double-layered complete spider webs flew through the air at Sasuke who once again dodged them all, letting them splat and stick to the walls of the canyon-like area he was confronting his enemy inside of.
From deep within the canyon area, the tan-skinned, six-armed Kidomaru had a clear line of sight on Sasuke from a long distance. To get to him, Sasuke only had the option of coming straight ahead, making him an easier target as the canyon narrowed the closer the path went to reach the spider of a man.
"Ooh, someone leveled up." Kidomaru said after watching Sasuke confidently avoid his ranged attacks, "It looks like I can enjoy this more than the first time when I beat on the pink-haired girl and the fat kid. It was like playing through a tutorial." As he spoke, his cursed seal began to spread over his body,
"You can't kill me apparently." Sasuke said, staring straight through the darkness with his red Sharingan activated to accentuate his glare as he dodged another quick barrage of webbing and weaponry from his enemy, "Tch."
"Orochimaru-sama doesn't need you alive anymore." Kidomaru said, his hair growing wild and white with his skin growing dark red. He pulled away the headband he wore to reveal a third eye on his forehead, "He could still use your eyes though. I'm gonna get so much XP after finishing this quest. Kumosoukai (Spider Web Unrolling)!"
After activating the second stage of his Cursed Seal, Kidomaru used four of his arms to instantly throw out a large spider web in front of his own location, meant to keep Sasuke from doing anything to get to him even if he did get close enough to harm him in the slightest. Simultaneously, he expelled golden webbing from his mouth that he manipulated into a large bow, using multiple threads of webbing attached to the walls to give extra tension to the weapon.
Sasuke came to a stop in his rush upon seeing the web. Apparently neither Sakura nor Chouji could break it with their conventional methods, but that had been back when they were genin.
As Kidomaru formed a golden arrow from the same material, he used all eight of his limbs to aim the weapon. It didn't matter where Sasuke went to in the canyon, there wasn't anything he could do to get out of his line of sight, "Alright let's see if you can set a high score here in dodging these shots."
He neglected to mention that he had never missed a target with his arrow.
SQUELCH!
With the shock of horrible, piercing, splitting pain, Kidomaru was brought back to the land of reality harshly. Genjutsu was a terrible thing.
Sasuke stood directly in front of Kidomaru's protective web, five meters away. He had aimed a long blade of blue lightning through the holes of the web, not even bothering to waste time cutting through it to kill him.
"Chidori Eiso (One Thousand Birds Sharp Spear)." As Sasuke spoke, Kidomaru gasped in pain, losing the grip on his bow and squirming around in his firing position. Sasuke kept his hand up, keeping the extended blade of electricity right in place. The chirping noise of the jutsu muffled his death throes, "You lose."
"H-H-How!" And he wasn't talking about the jutsu. He wanted to know what Sasuke had done to get the drop on him that quickly.
"Sharingan genjutsu." Sasuke said, not that it mattered now, "Anko was right. The cursed seals really do rot your brain if you thought for one second I hadn't learned new ways to deal with people like you."
"H-Hax! I call hax! Where's the admin? I need a patch!" The ranged specialist of the Sound Four sputtered bloodily until Sasuke forced the end of the jutsu to branch in several different directions, effectively silencing him forever in gory fashion, "K-Kkkkkkkhhh!"
Sasuke held the jutsu until he saw the light fade from Kidomaru's eyes and his cursed seal recede, turning his features back to normal. Huh, was he smoking too?
Now that felt like gratification. Nobody fucked with Team 7 and got away with it, even more than three years after the fact, and no one stuck a demonic hickey on Uchiha Sasuke's neck without paying the price. They were the reason he was introduced to Anko, and that was reason enough to extract his pound of flesh right there.
Pulling his arm back, drawing the Chidori Eiso out of Kidomaru's chest, Sasuke cut through the webbing and walked into Kidomaru's hiding spot. He reached down and grabbed the headband with the musical note on it for proof of Oto's presence, "Hn."
Before leaving the lowlands and proceeding to the rally point, Sasuke spared Kidomaru a partial glance before going on about his way. The look of alarm permanently frozen on Kidomaru's face was duly noted.
"…Well don't look so shocked."
XxX
(With Naruto – Moss Rock Road)
People had strange reservations that were completely unreasonable, illogical, and unexplainable.
Moss creeped Naruto out. He didn't know why, but it just did. So when he found himself on a portion of the landscape that was completely covered in moss, it kind of made his skin crawl. Every tree, boulder, cliffside, and stretch of dirt had moss all over it.
"I hate doing missions that have to do with Otogakure." Naruto said to himself as he searched around, trying to get himself the evidence he needed to avert a war between two hidden villages, "The places they pick give me the creeps."
The fact that the place might have been haunted wasn't exactly helping either.
"So you're the loser that killed that mindless piece of trash Kimimaro. Come to think of it, thanks a lot for that. The rest of us hated that bastard." A disembodied voice echoed out in the open air from seemingly nowhere, "I know it'll probably get me in trouble if anyone hears it but you, but you're going to die here anyway so I guess it doesn't matter."
Naruto's hands fumbled for his machete before he let go of it in a bit of a panic, "What was I thinking? You can't kill a ghost with steel." Laughter echoed out over Naruto's apparent fear.
"How'd you ever beat Kimimaro? Did he trip and fall on his own sharp-ass bones? Did he sneeze and stab his own brain? Hahaha."
Naruto kept things going this way before he suddenly felt a nibble at the end of the line so to speak. He dealt with the condescending laughter until finally rolling his eyes and sharply yanking his own arm at the wrist, "Setsudanki Kujo (Slingshot Extermination)!"
Literally ripping his target from an elevated rock wall, a target that screamed all the way down, Naruto twisted his body and slammed the hidden Oto figure all the way down to the ground, hard enough to smash a crater into the moss-covered path.
Yeah, it was hard dealing with being laughed at, same as it always was, but it helped when you were the one that was in on the real joke. The one that ended with you dragging your enemy out of their hiding place and dropping them on their head.
But it didn't really kill this guy. As the smoke from the newly created hole cleared, Naruto saw a white-haired, pale-skinned guy with dark lipstick wearing beads and the tunic with the purple rope belt that most high-ranking Oto shinobi wore.
There was more though.
Protecting him from the attack, were a pair of hands and legs sprouting from his back, helping him brace for the impact and negating most of the damage the move would have done. Freaky, "And how exactly did trash like you manage to get one over on me?"
"I knew you were there jackass." Naruto told him with a wide grin as he retracted his Chakra Chain. Seriously, it didn't matter what you'd done in your life; become a chunin, live for three years as a Guardian Ninja, kill the top-level bodyguards of your enemy's leader. If you acted a little strange or like an idiot, no one would take you seriously until it was too late, "You used chakra to throw your voice."
Even when he concealed himself inside of rock, he gave up his location the moment he had done that neat little voice-throwing chakra trick that tons of ninja knew. He hadn't done a bad job in concealing himself, but his overconfidence in thinking that he could taunt Naruto that way was his folly.
"Well aren't you just special?" The odd-looking Oto ninja stood up with a sneer on his face, "Brother, I guess we haven't taken enough out of Konoha for their liking. It looks like they want to just give us their heads now."
A second twin of the strange man stood up from the crater as well, "Shut up and kill him already Sakon. You can preen when his team is dead. Konoha ninjas never come alone."
"You're always so boring Ukon." The first brother, Sakon, said as he let his cursed seal take over his body, "Kabuto got to lead these puppies around by the nose for over ten years. We can't take our time and have our bit of fun with them?"
Upon being reminded of Kabuto, Naruto's body went still while the strange brothers argued about the merits of taking their time with him or wiping him out quickly.
Iruka, and all of the other people that had more than likely suffered when they'd gotten too close to the truth of Kabuto's cover. All of Naruto's friends that had gotten close to Kabuto and who had considered him someone trustworthy, one of them even. And he just spit in their faces. Waited until he was behind closed doors so that he could laugh at them for allowing him that close.
Slowly, Naruto shakily placed a cigarette in his mouth and lit it, the sound of his lighter flicking getting the attention of both Sakon and Ukon once more, "You see? And here he waited so patiently for us to finish fighting, just so we could-."
"Enough!" Ukon said, advancing his cursed seal to its second level, giving him red skin, plated scales covering the left side of his body, longer white hair, and a horn on his forehead, "It doesn't matter if Kabuto did this or that with them. Kill him already."
Naruto reached into his travel bag and held the warning flare device in his hands, pondering if he should use it or not.
…Nah.
In the time it took him to decide on firing the flare or not, Sakon and Ukon surrounded him on both sides, both with a fist cocked back to take his head out with a punch. Having held his breath from a deep inhale, Naruto spewed forth a plume of ash from his mouth that concealed his body, "Moegara Nagare no Jutsu (Cinder Stream Jutsu)!"
Both brothers immediately dodged the scalding hot material by the skin of their teeth, "So this is the one Guren told us about." As they moved away, they noticed a chain surrounding their position in a circular pattern, "Brother, don't touch that chain!"
Good advice. From the way that the weapon sharply shortened its circumference inward, either or both of them would have been cut into two segments had any part of them touched it.
Running back in the direction of one another, the bodies of both Sakon and Ukon merged and jumped straight up to avoid the chain closing around them. That sprang the trap of several Naruto clones using that opening to attack.
Gritting his teeth, Sakon grew two extra legs from one of his own, courtesy of Ukon inside of his body before spinning and kicking with all of the force that their combined legs could muster with the addendum of the cursed seal, "Tarensenpuu (Multiple Connected Whirlwinds)!"
The fierce short-term cyclone deflected Naruto's incoming clones and dispelled them, revealing some of them to be the trap Ash Clones that he utilized in tandem with his Shadow Clones at times.
"Numbers don't matter with us!" Sakon bragged after killing off Naruto's clones. Looking down he could see three clones surrounding the position they were going to land inside of, "You one-trick pony!" A shadow covered him from above, prompting the Sound Four member to turn his body and react, "This is just getting repetitive!"
"Is it?" Directly over Sakon's head, he saw the original Naruto, grinning up a storm, fingers held in the bird seal, "Sorry about that."
The banter was a distraction to allow Naruto's clones three clones to distribute their Chakra Chains amongst each other under the surface of the mossy ground in a triangle pattern with one hand, and throwing their respective machetes into the air at the original Naruto.
Confused, Sakon had no idea how or why the chain-connected blades didn't clash off of each other or skewer Naruto. In fact, it seemed that he was able to set his hand safely on the three of them once they stopped in midair, "Fuuinjutsu: Sanhou Fuuin (Sealing Jutsu: Three Directions Seal)!"
Eyes wide, Sakon landed on the ground and saw a spiral marking and a sealing formula underneath his feet, "Damn!" He quickly tried to free himself from the seal interior, but found a white translucent barrier repelling him and keeping him from leaving, "What is this?"
Naruto balanced himself in a crouch atop the tetrahedron comprised of his clones' chains as they diligently maintained the connection, one hand on the ground and one in the air, "Sealing jutsu. It'll last until I break the linking points, but when that barrier disappears, so does everything in it."
He had to dispel all of his clones at once instead of one at a time, otherwise it would simply let Sakon go instead of seal him away.
"You trash!" Ukon roared with a wall of spittle flying from his mouth as his head appeared from Sakon's neck, "Someone from a softhearted village like yours doesn't-!"
With a hand-seal, Naruto dispelled his clones and their chains in unison, ridding the dimension of the two brothers and only leaving a large triangle marking on the ground where the seal had been established.
Naruto had used clones in the past to test the airless void that he wound up condemning folks to with that jutsu. It made purgatory look like a waiting room. Sakon and Ukon, the poor bastards. It almost made Naruto feel bad, but a battle was a battle.
Chakra Chains were so useful. They were versatile weapons in pitched battle, and since he could form them into patterns they could be starting points for sealing arrays. Maybe with enough practice he could make them in the air instead of needing a surface?
Wait…
"Fuck! I just sent my evidence to another dimension!"
BANG!
In the sky a bright flash of an exploding flare went off and Naruto bit his lip before taking off in that direction. There wasn't anything he could do about causing Sakon and Ukon to fall prey to his seal now. He'd caught them and finished them. Now all he could do was move to assist whoever was calling for help.
XxX
(Elsewhere in the Pass of Tranquil Respite – Skies Above the Battlefield)
This was officially the worst-case scenario as far as Fuu was concerned. After being repeatedly warned for years by Jiraiya and Naruto that the Akatsuki organization was after jinchuuriki and could attack her at any time, that had manifested itself in the form of an ambush.
She had been trying to case the area from the air, allowing everyone in her team to cover all bases. Seriously, she wasn't expecting to run into anyone else that could actually fly as well. Especially someone that wore a black cloak with red clouds on it.
"So you're the Nanabi jinchuuriki?" Deidara asked, sitting on a giant clay bird in the air, Fuu hovering in front of him with her wings out and beating, "Look at this. Sasori no Danna came here looking to kill a snake and I found a beetle."
When they'd found the entrance to the hideout, Sasori had demanded that he be allowed to handle Orochimaru by himself, basically ordering Deidara with threat of death that he remain outside and let two old teammates hash out their issues from the past.
Fuu had shot off her flare when she realized that she was being tailed. No one would be able to get through the air to help her, so if this turned out to be more difficult than she could handle she had to find some way to goad Deidara to the ground.
"Get bent." Fuu said, eyes glowing green as she rushed forward with all of the speed her wings could put behind her, "Keshi Gomufera (Eraser Blow)!" Leaving a green streak of her chakra in her wake, she lashed out with a devastating power punch that missed when Deidara jumped off of his bird, allowing it to dive and enabling both to avoid her harsh taijutsu.
Falling through the air only to be caught by his bird, Deidara turned his head around with a grin and formed a half-ram seal, "So easy. Katsu." With that, a small clay insect he'd dropped on Fuu after dodging her punch detonated on the red cylinder on her back. The blast covered her body, but her body didn't fall from the sky, "Ooh, she's pretty tough."
Fuu jetted out of the blast cloud in hot pursuit of Deidara, "You have to hit me harder than that to even put a scratch on me!"
"Haha! You shrugged off the C1!" Deidara shouted in excitement, "Finally! I love fighting against jinchuuriki! I can start showing you the real limits of my art, un!" After all, she was durable enough to take it, "Let's see what you've got!"
A determined look came to Fuu's face as she formed a tiger seal to build her chakra lethally, "Suiton: Mizu Kamikiri (Water Release: Rising Water Slicer)!" Shooting her hands out in two knife-handed thrusts she shot off two separate lightning-quick jets of water to try and cut Deidara out of the skies.
He was able to direct his clay bird out of the way, allowing the water jutsu to fly past him. Down on the ground, he saw them effortlessly raze down a row of trees where they made contact. That would have effortlessly ripped his bird and him apart if it had touched him. It was a straightforward jutsu, but with enough power behind it to clear a forest.
"What an interesting girl." Deidara remarked to himself, the mouths in the palms of his hands chewing up more clay for devious usage, "This is going to be a worthwhile display of my art."
"Fine." Fuu said, finding Deidara's bird to be extremely fast for a hunk of clay. Shutting her glowing, solid green eyes momentarily to focus, she sprouted two more wings, giving her a grand total of four to boost her speed two-fold, 'Okay, it looks like it's time to put this control to the test, so let's make this happen Chomei.'
XxX
(With Naruto)
Swift healing from dangerous injuries was a nice trait to have, and it had honestly saved Naruto multiple times. As a matter of fact, it was a highly contributing factor to why Naruto was so tough and lived long enough to get as strong as he did. It was easier to fight through the pain of devastating wounds when you knew you were going to bounce back from almost anything within a handful of days.
Hell, aside from that, Naruto had probably the strongest voice in the Elemental Nations as well. A strong enough yell from him when drawing upon the Kyuubi's power could destroy things with varying degrees of severity. Along with that, when Naruto put his wind mastery to use along with the powerful chakra that came with his biju he could honestly see where the stories of flattening mountains and causing tsunamis with swings of its tail came from. He wasn't even using half of the chakra that the Kyuubi had at its disposal and he could still wreck some extensive amounts of space.
Still though, whenever Naruto compared his abilities to those of other jinchuuriki…
Gaara had complete control over sand and an automatic defense that could stop almost anything, and it was still getting stronger. He could also fully transform and use Shukaku's miniature and giant-sized forms. Fuu's biju granted her a minimum level iron-hard carapace, super-strength that didn't seem to have a limit to it, and the ability to fly.
Naruto didn't even want to start with Killer B.
Contrast those with super 'getting-your-ass-kicked' powers, and sometimes it made Naruto feel like he'd gotten the short end of the stick. He wondered if all jinchuuriki did that, matched up their powers to those of others.
It was an especially prominent mindset when Naruto was currently tapping into the Kyuubi's chakra just to keep pace on the uneven, rocky ground with Fuu and whoever she was fighting in the air. Damn, he wished he had wings.
"I'll remember that the next time someone fillets you like a river bass." The Kyuubi said inside of Naruto's head, "I'm assuming that as usual you're lacking a plan."
"Well gee, how the fuck do you expect me to reach her?"
CAW!
From behind, Naruto was swept up onto the back of a low-flying gigantic hawk being directed by Sasuke, "Need a ride dobe?" He asked smugly as they swung upward into the sky to try and give chase.
"…Toads are still cooler than hawks."
"Whatever you've got to tell yourself."
Had… to refrain… from punching the smug. It was not the time for it, "Where are Lee and Tenten?" Naruto asked, staying on topic despite the fact that he was pondering the merits of strangling Sasuke with his Chakra Chains from behind. Just a little bit.
That was a good question coming from such an idiot, and one that Sasuke couldn't aptly answer. He hadn't seen them while flying on his hawk to react to Fuu's flare, and he'd been scanning the ground looking for teammates so they could all link back up together, "You think they're alright?"
"They were supposed to stick together, so I'm not worried about them." They had better teamwork than any other combination of the current squad, so if anything befell them they would either be just fine, or make a big enough ruckus that they would have been easy to find. That being said, his previous statement was a lie, "Can you help Fuu? That guy's Akatsuki."
"Sure." Sasuke said, able to somewhat analyze the aerial battle as they started getting closer. He could definitely make out the black cloak with red clouds, same as Naruto obviously had, "I'm warmed up enough for a real fight."
And he was motivated as well. Akatsuki, the same group that his brother Itachi was a member of. He was going to take that son of a bitch down and plug him for all the information he had on the wayward Uchiha.
Oh, and he'd help Fuu too. That was supposed to be important.
"They're all supposed to be badass." Naruto warned Sasuke, preparing his Chakra Chains for a sudden departure, "If he fights anything like Itachi did-."
"He won't fight anything like Itachi does. He's too flashy. I can see that from here." Sasuke said, cutting the blond off with a narrowing of his eyes, "Just get off before I kick you off."
"Ooh, did I insult you? I didn't know you were that sensi-TIIIIIVE!" A barrel roll from Sasuke's hawk sent Naruto flying off of the back of the summoned creature. Luckily he had prepared his chain for his safe descent by that time, "Ha! Next time you try to kill me, bring your A-game jackass!" Naruto taunted on his way down to the ground.
"…Moron." Sasuke said before turning off to head in the direction of Fuu's ongoing conflict with Deidara.
Now, the smartest thing to do would have been to fight just enough to free Fuu up and then leave.
Leave.
Leave, because there was no practical reason to fight this battle or even stay in the general area. But in the panic he had failed to inform anyone else that he had their physical proof that Oto was responsible for the regional upheaval, that they could have gone back to Taki, and then could have gone home.
If he hadn't been blinded by the sight of the telltale cloak he could have told Naruto where they stood mission-wise before they'd split back up, taken Fuu and then run, with Naruto more than likely able to find Lee and Tenten in a timely manner. They all could have regrouped and left together, or at least caused Deidara to rethink the prospect of fighting two jinchuuriki, two Konoha chunin, and an Uchiha that could outfight a run-of-the-mill jounin without extreme difficulty.
Hence a reason that Sasuke had not been promoted to jounin yet despite getting the nod for chunin on his first opportunity years ago. He was a highly talented shinobi, with the potential to become one of the best to ever hail from the leafy green village of his birth. He was intelligent, and had a mind for combat. He knew what he was doing as a ninja.
…But when Sasuke was coaxed in a direction due to anything having to do with his own personal grievances, none more personal than the one that Deidara was indirectly connected to by virtue of his Akatsuki attire, he tended to get tunnel-vision (ironic due to his kekkei genkai) and make bad decisions.
Staying in the Pass of Tranquil Respite any longer than they had to for any reason whatsoever would later serve to go down as the absolute worst feasible thing that could have happened. To most of the people present in the minds of those that were there for the following events and survived it.
XxX
Kabuto had been true. He'd led Sasori right where he needed to go. Straight through the front door, no warning for Oto, and no surprises for him. He was quite destructive at the entrance. A good number of those fires probably hadn't gone out yet, but that wasn't his problem.
That wasn't to say that there was no opposition. There just wasn't any significant opposition as far as one of the most powerful shinobi ever produced by Sunagakure was concerned.
Sasori led the way in, and thoroughly painted the walls of the base red with the blood of every fool Otogakure ninja that felt the need to try and impede his path. They battled desperately to keep him from reaching their master, his former partner. Unfortunately, nary a scratch was laid upon him.
Stepping over the fallen bodies of dozens of dead men and women, Sasori continued to be led all the way to Orochimaru's room by Kabuto, who merely stood aside to keep from getting in Sasori's way during the slaughter.
"Orochimaru has garnered himself some loyal pawns since his departure from Akatsuki." Sasori commented, a steel scorpion tail coated with blood hanging in the air from beneath the back of his Akatsuki robe, "No sense of self-preservation amongst the lot of them."
Kabuto didn't answer, instead leading Sasori to a single door along the corridor, "Here."
"Stay out of the way Kabuto." Sasori ordered, causing Kabuto to move far away from the door. And it was a good thing that he did, because the moment he was a distance that could be considered clear, a blade skewered its way through the door from the inside and straight through the face of Sasori, pinning him into the far wall of the hallway.
"Kukukukuku… I do love having company. And an old partner to boot." Orochimaru's voice echoed from within as the sounds of his footsteps echoed out in the dark, candlelit room, "Sasori; still wearing that ugly puppet armor as your skin are you?" With a twist of the handle he effortlessly popped the head of Sasori's durable puppet armor off, dropping it to the floor in a lifeless manner, "I did always hate that form."
Remaining still on the ground for only a moment, the back of the puppet opened up and from within came a young-looking man with messy red hair and calm brown eyes, wearing an Akatsuki robe; Sasori.
Despite getting his primary puppet's head obliterated, he didn't seem to be extremely out of sorts, "You always did have a trick up your sleeve Orochimaru. But it ends here."
"Oh I don't think so." Walking into clearer light, Orochimaru's face was covered in bandages that he pulled off to reveal his usual pale skin and yellow eyes, "Unlike you and your disgusting human puppet technique, I've finally made the true stride to my immortality. A body powerful enough to house my soul forever, and enough chakra to allow me my goal of obtaining the Sharingan without requiring a living Uchiha. I am just a fingertip away from becoming the perfect being."
"You're weaker now than you ever have been before." Sasori pointed out, "Even in a jinchuuriki body, you're not used to it. All of the chakra. You don't know how to control it."
"Hmm." A dark smile came to Orochimaru's lips, "If only, if only." He said sardonically, "If only the body I'd taken over had been particularly selected to be a jinchuuriki due to the way its latent chakra resonates with the Sanbi. Now that would be a fortunate turn of events wouldn't you say?"
"You're bluffing." Sasori produced a scroll that he planned to use in order to summon something.
"Am I?" Orochimaru's tongue extended from his mouth in an eerie fashion as his normally yellow eyes gave off an ocean blue glow, "Look into my eyes Sasori. The truth is, I have full control." It wasn't the usual air of smugness one could perceive from Orochimaru's words, the kind that he was willing to back up if pressed to do so. This was different. He wanted to back it up, "You weren't sent here to take the Sanbi from me. The only thing you were sent here to do… was to die."
Sasori's face actually showed a significant semblance of annoyance at Orochimaru's, "You always did like to waste time talking."
"You can still help me though." Orochimaru assured the puppet master, "I find myself in need of a proper test. A test of just how far my limits are now." And he only had one question as his peculiar grin spread across his face and his body became swamped in visible blue chakra, sickly wafting off of him, "Will you help me… my old friend?"
Omake: Out of Body Experience (Hour 2 – Shikamaru Side)
'Okay, so I've already checked Ichiraku, the view spots for the Hokage Monument, the top of the monument, our training field, doubled back to his apartment, and he hasn't been to any of those places yet.' Shikamaru thought to himself while still in Naruto's body, now fully clothed once more, 'So he's definitely going to try and screw me over if he hasn't already.'
Did he really deserve to have to fight this struggle?
Well he did bestow the feminine trifecta from hell upon Naruto at the same time with the cheerfully homicidal Kotoko, the obsessive Naho, and determined Shizuka back at the capital. That might have been a toe over the line. And then there was the time he convinced Jiraiya that it would be a great idea to take noble women back to Naruto's room for some adult activities since he didn't have his own room when he was there. Oh, and the time he laced Naruto's hand-rolled cigarettes with Ino's psychotropic serum and recorded the aftermath for posterity.
…Oh yeah, he needed the full-court press on this one.
Nothing he could do in Naruto's body would make him waste enough chakra to end the jutsu sooner, but there was one jutsu that they had shared knowledge of. One that Naruto couldn't abuse in his usual manner due to the lack of chakra reserves Shikamaru had.
"Kage Bunshin no Jutsu (Shadow Clone Jutsu)." Five clones popped into view, and Shikamaru didn't feel the slightest bit of pull on his chakra. If he'd have done that many in his own body he'd have been sucking wind and would have felt lightheaded by that point, "Find Naruto. Search everywhere, flush him out, I don't care what you have to do to do it. Dispel when you see him. I'll do the rest."
Until then he would continue fighting fire with fire and keep up the war of attrition with Naruto. He just needed to think of something effective to follow up with. And think he did, scenario after scenario. He just wasn't expecting to hear anything back.
"What the hell is with all of this noise? I can't sleep with all of this thinking! SHUT UP!" Shikamaru froze in place at the deep growling voice in his head until it stopped and one of almost astonishment took its place, "Oh this is just great. The wrong monkey is driving the ship. Fucking fantastic."
Oh shit.
"I should have known it wasn't Naruto from all of the activity in here. He doesn't even think this hard during a fight. Eh, this could be entertaining. What's your story?" Shikamaru didn't know how to respond to the nine-tailed biju, especially out loud, "…Use your thoughts, not words. I can hear everything you think genius. Now why are your minds switched?"
'To fuck with Naruto?'
"Oh. Excellent. Go ahead. Just so long as you don't do anything I have to heal." It was as if Shikamaru could see the image of a mighty fox lying down inside of his head, "I thought this was actually going to be dangerous for a moment until I realized it was you."
'You know me?'
"Naruto sees you almost every damn day. Of course I know you whelp. Anyway, if you want ideas I'd love to see the little bastard suffer."
'…I'm listening.'
"Step one, tap into my chakra. Treat it like reaching out for my hand inside of your head, and just tug. It's easy."
'…I'm not going to do that.'
"Right. Even though you're lazier than hell you're the smart one that won't take my power without any consciousness along with it to control it." Shikamaru would definitely be the one to look that gift horse in the mouth unlike most jinchuuriki, "Nevermind then, not breaking out today. And stop all of that goddamn thinking! It echoes in here!"
"I need my body back." Shikamaru said to himself as he walked along more hurried in his steps than before his conversation with the Kyuubi, "I need it back right now."
(Hour 2 – Naruto Side)
"I'm a jerk." Naruto said to himself as he stuck an extremely large roll of duct tape into an inside pocket of Shikamaru's jacket. He could see why Shikamaru walked around in it all the time. It was durable and really useful with all of those pockets, "But he fired the first personal shot. Let's see how he likes coming home at the end of the day."
Naruto had done enough on Shikamaru's home turf for now. Messed with his room, booby-trapped his personal items. Basic opening salvo stuff. He had one last whammy for later revolving around Shikamaru's home life, but that would be kept in the holster until the very end. An absolute last resort.
Shikamaru knew exactly what this day was going to consist of when they'd switched bodies and Naruto had taken off. He wasn't a fool, which was why he took the time to make a preemptive strike. Word travelled fast in a hidden village, and within minutes Naruto had already heard that Shikamaru had stripped naked in his body and walked through town with his business swinging for the world to see.
Son of a bitch, it was so crude and simple that Naruto never figured Shikamaru would do it. It just didn't seem to be his style. He probably planned something more complicated and it backfired, so he went with the easy ploy to get something on the board in a hurry. It was not effective however.
Big deal. So the village saw him naked and now knew how on-point his body was? It wasn't even that embarrassing, especially if he wasn't even there at the time. Shikamaru was missing the point. That wouldn't linger. Not in a way that would actually resonate. People wouldn't care about that by tomorrow, especially if he just owned up to it.
That was Shikamaru's problem. He was wonderful at planning elaborate ploys, but when it came to what the end results of what those ploys were supposed to be he was an amateur.
No, Naruto was trying to think deeper. The things that he did today were going to affect Shikamaru for at least the next week in one way or another. Shikamaru's strike was preemptive and he drew first blood, but everything Naruto did on this day would be precise, and would run deeper than just embarrassing him for a few days.
He tried to keep a grin off of his face, because Shikamaru didn't grin, but it was just so hard to do.
"Hey Shikamaru." A random Nara Clan ninja greeted as Naruto (still in Shikamaru's body) made his way through the clan-owned grounds, "…Did you just come from tending to the deer?" He sounded suspicious of him.
And then Naruto realized that being in Shikamaru's body and doing so much as walking around the village in too many different places could be a problem. Shikamaru didn't do things. Ever.
What would Shikamaru say? Think, "Yeah…" Naruto drawled with a sigh, "Mom said I do too much of nothing on my days off. I mean that's what they're for right? Tch."
That seemed to do the job, as Naruto was allowed on past. He fought the urge to click his heels together in midair at dodging that bullet. He was feeling so good, he figured he was untouchable from that point on.
Before he could ponder what other plans of action he could enact without violating the bodily harm rule of engagement, he then came face to face with a gamebreaker as he reached the Nara Clan meeting house on his way out of the clan grounds.
The scar-laded, goateed Nara Shikaku, Shikamaru's father. And he wasn't fooled for a second, "Really?" Shikaku said in a dry tone of voice, "This is what my son lets happen to him on his days off?"
"I have no idea what you're talking about dad. Are you feeling alright?"
"Shikamaru would have just said whatever and left, so you're definitely not him even if you're in his body." Shikaku said, "I know what this is. Inoichi did the exact same thing to me and Choza back when we were younger to test that Shinkoukanshin no Jutsu (Mind Body Exchange Jutsu). Choza wasn't ambitious or malicious enough to take off in a joyride in my body though."
And Naruto thoroughly broke. Damn that deadpan stare. It was like looking into the blackest pit in existence.
"It's for a good reason." Naruto said hurriedly, face thoroughly reflecting that he knew that his divine mission of vendetta could end right there, "Shikamaru has this coming, he's an evil mastermind, and this is the only way I've got a shot at ever getting him back for all of the shit he did at the capital. I'm not gonna do anything that'll actually hurt him, I swear to Kami."
Fuck.
But Shikaku didn't say a word to expose him to the rest of the clan, instead taking the time to contemplate his actions before gesturing his head to the back of the room to a board on the wall of the Nara Clan meeting house that depicted jobs that were supposed to be done by different clan members.
And there were quite a few vacancies for the next week.
On another wall, Naruto found a display case full of stamps with the kanji of Nara Clansmen names on the bottoms. This was almost too good. But Shikaku couldn't be… could he?
The elder Nara just smirked and walked past Naruto, "Ah, my arm is tired from assigning jobs for the week to the rest of the clan. This job is such a drag. You mind taking over for me son?" And like that, Nara Shikaku was officially Naruto's hero for the rest of the day.
"Meh, if I have to." Naruto said in Shikamaru's dull tone, but he couldn't keep the Cheshire grin off of his face as he searched for the stamp that had Shikamaru's name on it. The dirtiest, heaviest, most time consuming jobs on that board were calling for blood.
As Shikaku left Naruto to give his son undoubtedly the most difficult jobs in the most quantity of any other member of the clan, he could only chuckle victoriously to himself.
If Shikamaru wanted to think that he could use the fact that Shikaku was whipped by his wife to his advantage, and then make fun of him about it like the teenager that he was, Shikaku had no problems with letting Naruto exact his own measure of vengeance and living vicariously through him.
Especially since half of the jobs he'd wind up giving Shikamaru were ones that Shikaku would have had to do himself.
"WHO TAPED ALL OF THE DEER FOREHEAD-TO-FOREHEAD BY THE ANTLERS!?"
"SHIKAMARU!"
Before the echo of the Nara Clan member from before even stopped reverberating through the forested area, Naruto ran out of the meeting house with only Shikaku seeing him and ran for the exit of the clan grounds as quickly as Shikamaru's feet would carry him, "Shit-shit-shit!"
Shikaku couldn't do anything other than stare until he vanished from sight, "…I can't help but think about the frightful headway that kid would make for the village if he put that sort of energy into actual sabotage." He then noticed one of the other younger Nara clansmen reading something with interest as he walked past, "What's that?"
"They were giving copies of this away for free all over the place." The Nara teenager said, "You want to see? I know people that would pay money for this."
Shikaku took the small paperback book and read the open page that was available only to find himself staring in disbelief at the sheer audacity, "Naruto's going to have to hit a little bit harder next round."
That was just not fair son.
(Hour 2 – Ino's Side)
After hearing about the chain of events that had been set into action by Ino wanting to improve upon her jutsu she'd recruited not only the help of the only adult she could find that could actually get both Shikamaru and Naruto to listen to her in Shizune, but also someone that could help her find them both in Kiba.
Kiba's reason for joining in was purely out of self-preservation. If he was as close to Ino as possible, he and Akamaru wouldn't be targets when the two of them really started to cut loose on ruining village life for each other by antagonizing the general populace. Whatever kept him out of the crosshairs when this got out of hand was right where he wanted to be.
So Ino had the voice of reason, she had the tracking specialist, and now she needed to know if there were any tricks she could use that would actually stop them without having to hunt them both down. The only place to go for that was the man that had taught her the jutsu in the first place; her father Inoichi.
"You're telling me that there's no trick to actually stop them?" Ino asked, following her father through the halls of Konoha T&I Headquarters as her enlisted comrades followed behind, "What are we supposed to do daddy? Track them down and catch both of them to keep them in the same spot?"
Inoichi spared Ino a side glance as he was on the way to another meeting and Ino had caught him just leaving his office, "Honey there's no trick to this that I didn't already tell you. If Naruto split and Shikamaru did as well, that's your only option other than waiting out the jutsu's limit."
"That's not an option."
"What do you really think they'll do with five hours left?" And to be clear, yes he'd already heard about the giant shadow terror attack and the Naruto walking around naked thing. Now it was starting to make sense.
"I'll answer that question with an observation daddy." Ino said perkily, "Goldie-kun is more motivated than he usually is to get Shika back for whatever he did to him while they were Guardians, and Shika is a genius with all of Goldie's chakra… and he can make clones too so him actually having to do work isn't a problem today. Now you tell me how dangerous the both of them are."
When she put it that way… it sounded pretty bad. But they were just two chunin.
A worker in T&I ran up to Inoichi at that moment in a panic, "Sir! Every Academy textbook was replaced with copies of this!" He handed Inoichi a modest-sized paperback that was entitled 'Modern History of Hi no Kuni', much to everyone's confusion, "…And I think they're on display for free in retail stores."
Inoichi raised an eyebrow and opened the small book to a random page, going wide-eyed as he went back to the first page. Apparently there was a table of contents, "Um, did Naruto ever say that he was going to produce memoirs of his time working as a Guardian Ninja?"
Alarms went off in Ino and Shizune's head from that moment, "…No. Naruto doesn't write anything unless it's a seal. Ever. Why?"
"Well it's not so much that this was written than compiled." Inoichi said, bracing himself for the quite understandable wrath that was to ensue from his daughter. Normally he'd stop her, but he wasn't sure if he'd be able to this time, "It's basically random embarrassing pictures of Naruto, and the back and forth letters you wrote each other over the last three years."
He barely finished his sentence before Kiba snatched the book out of his hand and started reading for himself, much to Ino's chagrin and to a lesser extent Shizune's, "Oh man. Oh man. Oh man. Shikamaru is a horrible person." He said, descending into almost evil snickering, "I need to show this to Hana. She'll never let Naruto live this down when she sees him again if she gets her hands on this." A bark then came from Akamaru, "Oh, and Hinata! Oh, that's going to be great. Man, you're so screwed Ino."
Needless to say he was enjoying this thus far, and he knew that he'd made the correct choice in getting involved. He'd been looking for something useful to get into today anyway.
"Oh wait, listen to this." Kiba said, curbing his laughter for a moment in order to read, "This is epic, from last year, September 23rd. 'Hey Goldie. It sucks that you and Shika weren't here for my 15th birthday, but you were really on the ball making sure your gifts got to me early. I really appreciate just what kind of exotic stuff you can get anytime around the capital, but if I had my choice of present it would have been you here, all wrapped up just for me in a-.'"
"-And that's enough of that." Inoichi said, snatching the book back out of Kiba's hands, "I knew I should have screened those damn things coming in and out of my house."
"All of Naruto's are totally innocent." Shizune assured the father, "Only a few of Ino's are even slightly suggestive and since they weren't blunt they went straight over his head, bless his heart." Ino turned to her dangerously with the obvious question hanging, "…I might have read some of them when I took them back and forth to make sure either of you weren't writing something you shouldn't." Ino just groaned in exasperation, "How did he even get any of them?"
If staring at an object could cause it to burst in flames for her clan, Ino would have set that book ablaze in the middle of Kiba's readings, "When I find you and switch you back you're a dead S.O.B. Shikamaru." Ino said, grumbling to herself as she stormed her way out of the facility with Shizune and a still laughing Kiba following, "Not cool."
Actually, instead of switching him back she'd rather switch him with a rat, or preferably with something small, slow, and defenseless that she could easily step on the spine of.
"And things are going to get worse?" Shizune said quietly as they started to follow Ino over the rooftops.
"I'd say they're going to get better." Kiba said with a grin as he moved forward to take the lead and search before Ino could yell at him to do so, "This is going to be the best day ever." Akamaru agreed with a loud bark.
Ongoing Stats (Out of 5)
Takigakure Shinobi
Fuu
Ninjutsu: 3.5
Taijutsu: 4
Genjutsu: 2
Intelligence: 3.5
Strength: 5
Speed: 3.5
Stamina: 5
Hand-Seals: 3
Total Score: 29.5
Akatsuki
Deidara
Ninjutsu: 5
Taijutsu: 3.5
Genjutsu: 3.5
Intelligence: 4.5
Strength: 3.5
Speed: 4.5
Stamina: 4
Hand-Seals: 3.5
Total Score: 32
Sasori
Ninjutsu: 5
Taijutsu: 4
Genjutsu: 4
Intelligence: 5
Strength: 3
Speed: 4.5
Stamina: 5
Hand-Seals: 4
Total Score: 34.5
Otogakure Shinobi
Kidomaru
Ninjutsu: 4
Taijutsu: 2.5
Genjutsu: 1.5
Intelligence: 4
Strength: 2
Speed: 3
Stamina: 4
Hand-Seals: 4
Total Score: 25
Sakon
Ninjutsu: 4
Taijutsu: 3.5
Genjutsu: 2
Intelligence: 2.5
Strength: 4
Speed: 3.5
Stamina: 4
Hand-Seals: 4
Total Score: 27.5
Orochimaru
Ninjutsu: 5
Taijutsu: 3.5
Genjutsu: 5
Intelligence: 5
Strength: 3.5
Speed: 4.5
Stamina: 5
Hand-Seals: 5
Total Score: 36.5