Tad Too Toady
No. It can't be. Please. Please no. She began to look up slowly at who the splattering footfalls had brought.
"Hiya!" She cringed and looked down at her frozen hand and pencil. Why me, Sarutobi, why the heck me? She forced herself to finish the mission outline in choppy, rage-damaged manuscript. Go away. Go away. Silence. "Hiya!" Aaaaaaagh. Just ignore him… count to ten…1…2…3…Splat. Splat. 4…come on…5…6…Silence. Silence. 7…8…9… "HIYA!" She bit her cheek and jerked her head up.
"Oh! Hell-o. Can-I-help-you?" she forced each syllable and smiled painfully wide. The little toad's eyes arched merrily and he smiled earnestly in return. The silence stretched, and stretched, and stretched, and, "Yes?" The fat cheeks grew larger as the smile expanded. Blink. Squint.
"HI!" She let her head collapse in her crossed arms.
"Where's your summoner, Gamatatsu?"
"I'm lost!" The toad pulled a weepy face and looked ready to burst into tears.
"Let me help you find Ji-"
"But I can stay with you now! Right?" Winning smile.
"Well, see, I-" the smile faltered. "Riiiight," Tsunade tapered off, looking for an escape, some alibi. None. Damn. This was the start of a terrible day.
"Uhh…" he sat up and tussled his mane of hair. "Wha?" he picked up the offending veritable boulder that had sent him flying into unconsciousness. Suddenly, he started and scrambled around his messy hotel room. Where was it? Where was the toad? "Gamatatsu! GAMATATSU!" Jiraiya swiftly righted himself and tore through his piles of discarded clothes. He'd summoned the thing to train with Naruto. POP! There it had been and they'd talked as he got dressed. It had gone outside via window for air and when he'd turned to the window again the damn thing had flown toward him with a rock. And knocked him unconscious. How humiliating. "Where could he have gone? GAMA-" he froze. "No. He wouldn't. No…GAMATATSU!!!" he dropped the robe he'd been looking under and bolted from the room, slamming the door behind him.
"I know that one too!" Tsunade groaned as the toad indiscreetly gestured at a kanji on a D rank mission scroll. "And that one! And that one!" She busied herself with the client stats under the mission desk for the sixth time. Shinobi and villagers alike had stared as she stalked from Hokage tower attempting, in vain, to outwalk the orange menace who sang a raucous ballad about a noble shinobi who summoned toads and was in love with a golden-eyed kunoichi. All the way there. It was an improvised and original ballad. She sighed, rising and determined to shut the thing up just in time to receive a hug to the face.
"AAAAAAH!" screamed the tiny clinging toad. "AAAA-"
"WHAT THE HE-"
"AAAAA-"
"GET-"
"AAAA-"
"THE HELL-"
"AAAAA," she wedged the terrified creature off and stopped her sentence.
"Uh, He-hello, Shino!" She smiled bashfully at the silent Chunnin before her.
"Can I…" she waved vaguely at the scrolls before her and cast a deadly glare at the now gaping toad. Shino moved forward, hastily removing his alarmed expression and reverting to his usual controlled countenance.
"It's a stranger!" declared the toad, apparently after much analyzing and considerable study.
"Shush!" Tsunade snapped. "That's rude. And he's not a stranger he's just Shino and you haven't met him ye-" she realized just barely too late. "NO!" But the tongue had already shot out to ensnare one bug of the mobs moving to retrieve Shino's chosen mission. Gamatatsu swallowed. Tsunade stared in horror at the stupidly grinning toad. Shino froze in shock. "You-you-THOSE ARE PART OF HIS BODY, YOU DOBE!!! THEY FEED OFF HIS- but how would you know? Augh. Shino, I am so, so-" He raised a hand.
"Nothing lost, Lady Hokage. They respawn swiftly enough."
"Shino, I'm sorry, here, I'm so sorry. Thanks for the mission. Your client's over there, I'm sorry." He nodded in forgiveness as he left and Tsunade turned on the illogically still smiling toad.
"Respawn, huh?" Are you going to respawn with someone?" She forgot her reprimands at this random inquiry.
"Wha-what?"
"You know, have tadpoles with a guy?" She slumped in defeat.
"No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no," she sank and slouched against the desk. Jiraiya you are so dead!
"You're joking. No? Oh god. Well, thanks, Shizune. Sorry to bother you."
"Never a problem, Jiraiya-sama!" She frowned as he muttered a stream of curses and walked briskly out of the Hokage's office. I wonder what the trouble is…
"Jiraiya-sama likes that ramen! He likes that sake, too! Geez, he even likes this restaurant!" Tsunade's chopsticks broke unevenly.
"You sure are talking a lot about Jiraiya today." Ignoring her, Gamatatsu continued energetically.
"And he likes the color green, and he likes steamed vegetables,"
"Please, stop."
"and he likes writing, and he likes reading,"
"I don't really care what he likes, please shush."
"and he likes women, especially you, and he likes-"
"WHAT?!?" He is NOT.
"Yep. He likes you a lot and-"
"Did Jiraiya ask you to tell me this?" The toad shook its small head in an exaggerated manner.
"Nope!" Tsunade squinted. It was difficult to tell whether the thing was just obnoxiously truthful or bad at cover-ups. She testily took a bite of her lunch as the toad continued listing things she, Jiraiya, and most people preferred. He better not be hitting on me through his toad…
"Hey, Iruka!" The Chunnin turned around, eyes wide.
"Oh! Do you need a mission?"
"No, thanks…" Jiraiya came level with the desk. "Are you closing up already?"
"Yes, it's lunch break."
"Damn!" Jiraiya turned to leave but thought better of it. "Do you know where Tsunade-sama went for lunch?" Iruka frowned in concentration.
"Oh! Yes. That dumpling shop you like by the-"
"Thanks!" Jiraiya walked and then broke into a trot as he headed across town. Strange.
"No way!" Tsunade gaped at the coins trickling into the tray of the slot machine.
"That took a looooooong time!"
"Hush toad, I'm busy!" She ignored his comments about buying things for people and Jiraiya liked blah blah at the gift counter. This was her break time. Work was over. The fun had begun. "Yeah, yeah, I'm not buying anything for Jiraiya. Come on, come on…" she pulled on the trigger. Toad. "Okay, one more…" Seven, X, leaf symbol, "Gotcha!" Another toad. Deep breath. "Alright, last one…" Yank. "Ohh…Seven." She deposited more coins and glanced down to check on the toad. "Uh…Gamatatsu?" Oh no. I lost the damned toad. "Gamatat-"
"Want some ice cream?!!" She turned to her other side and saw the strange image of a toad holding a vanilla soft serve.
"No…thanks," something was wrong with this picture…he didn't have thumbs? That didn't matter…were toads lactose intolerant? She didn't think so… "Hang on…" she squinted, turning back to her coin tray as Gamatatsu added,
"You did pay for it so it's mostly yours."
"NO!" Tsunade leapt out of her seat, mortified and enraged beyond belief. "YOU DEMON FROG, SON OF A-" Gamatatsu apparently knew when he was in trouble and fled for the stairs that lead out of the gambling hall. "OH, NO, YOU DON'T!!! THAT'S MY MONEY YOU'VE GOT IN YOUR FILTHY HANDS!" Tsunade tore after him. To his credit, the toad was quite fast especially considering his ice cream cone. Passersby stared and gamblers barely had a chance to dodge the creature and the furiously bellowing woman pursuing him. Across the street, Jiraiya noticed his missing summon as it reached the main road and bolted towards it.
"GAMATATSU!" Jiraiya barely had time to fathom why the toad side-stepped him before he collided straight on with a familiar bust and was knocked out into the road. The two Sannin skidded briefly before stopping in a painful heap in the middle of the evening commuters.
"Ahhh…" Tsunade lifted herself from the groaning Jiraiya.
"You-"
"Huh? Tsunade! I've been-"
"you-"
"Wait!" SMACK!
"YOU PERVY!" SMACK! "IRRESPONSIBLE!"
"TSUNADE, PLEASE!"
"DISGUSTING!" SMACK! "STUPID!" SMACK!
"TSUNADE!!"
"OLD!" Jiraiya grabbed her wrists and flipped her on her back, mounting her and pinning her legs with his own. "GET THE HE-"
"TSUNADE, I NEED TO EXPLAI-"
"-LL OFF OF-" Jiraiya, having no spare limbs, used the next best thing and pressed his mouth to hers, stopping her mid-yell.
God, I know what this looks like… "Okay, shut up and let me explain!"
"He knows me, by the way, don't worry," she snapped at a nearby observer, keeping her death glare firmly on Jiraiya. He glared back and then sighed.
"Tsunade, I'm sorry, I never saw this-"
"Oh trust me, I never thought you'd sink this low either. Sending a toad to hit on-"
"I did not send Gamatatsu and he better hope he didn't hit on you because I told him-"
"Told him what exactly? Told him I was free and he could practice-"
"Tsunade! I am not that insensitive. This morning Naruto left early to see Hinata before training and Gamatatsu wanted to know what a girlfriend was and if I-"
"you told that toad-"
"no, I did not tell him you were my girlfriend, I told him I didn't have one." They stared at each other and breathed heavily for a minute.
"Well, good because that's true-"
"I told him I used to have a crush on someone." They were quiet again.
"Okay…" Tsunade eyed him warily.
"And that she didn't want to be my girlfriend, more specifically, you didn't want to-"
"Jiraiya! We're in-"her eyes widened as she glanced at the surrounding crowd.
"And I told him it wasn't a big deal, that it was a long time ago and-"
"Jiraiya-"
"not to worry about it. But he got really upset and decided, presumably, his new reason for existence was to hook us up." Jiraiya paused for a breath. There was a brief moment where Tsunade's hands slipped into his, her legs tensed as they brushed against his own, and they pressed gently against each other. "And it apparently worked, " Jiraiya shattered the instant, dismounting Tsunade and turning to the smiling orange toad. Where Gamatatsu had sat there now lay a melting vanilla soft serve. The Sannin screamed in unison,
"GAMATATSU!"
