For roadkill2580. Better half a year late than never, eh?
Sasuke woke with lungs saturated in fermented orange. Nothing seemed to have been damaged. His sword remained within reach. He felt nothing below the neck but rage such that he hadn't felt in a while. He was in a cheap inn he didn't remember checking in, the window making creaking sound as night breeze teased it - it should have been sunset.
The cloying after-taste triggered a dry heave. Between desperate attempts to cough out the taste, he remembered: a sweet drink, and the most enchanting woman he'd ever laid his eyes on. He had taken a whiff and, despite his paranoia, despite his distaste for both alcohol and sweets, had accepted her offering. She sat by his bed, watching with naked malevolent glee that, to his dismay, only seemed to enhance her beauty.
"Those eyes of yours are useless against olfactory genjutsu, eh?" The Godaime Hokage said, accenting his name with something he couldn't place. "Uchiha."
Just as she had (temporarily? permanently?) paralysed him, his birthright remained inert. He glared anyway. She got his message and waved impatiently. "I had to be sure this place would remain intact. Relax, you only lost an hour at most.
"Though I must say, you weren't terribly hard to find. Didn't exactly make yourself forgettable, going through every settlement in a straight line. Even the daimyo's tax-men exercise less due diligence, but then..." Her eyes roved over his lanky form, his empty sleeve, and finally resting on his eye. He would gladly give her the black flames she so clearly desired, but alas. "... that's about the extent of your diligence, isn't it? You should be grateful it was me."
"Is it Kakashi or Naruto."
The answer, delivered under a delicately raised eyebrow, had him frozen faster than a dewdrop in winter. "It's our other mutual acquaintance." And to froths as she cackled. "Good heavens, you do care for her. No, not Sakura, it's our other mutual acquaintance. Does the name Orochimaru ring a bell, hm?"
"You work for Orochimaru," Sasuke said after a gaping second of waiting for the punchline.
Her lips broke into a predatory smile. "Of course. The five genin I threw to their deaths for the sake of retrieving your renegade hide, the monumental hogwash I spouted to get the Raikage off your pretty neck - of course my intention has always been to hand you to Orochimaru myself."
Sasuke watched helplessly as chakra-laden hand descended on his forehead. Tsunade's chakra was cold under his skin, in his bones, and it was everywhere as Sasuke went numb. And then he could move. He flexed his limbs, conscious of the vile woman watching him. Brown eyes met red without flinching. He broke the contact first, flickering to stand behind her.
Without turning around, the former Hokage said, "Here's the deal: as of now you're hired."
The sword rattled menacingly in his white knuckles.
"Would you rather a formal mission contract? You, Uchiha Sasuke, probationary Konoha-nin on a long leash, will help me find Orochimaru, and I, your client, will compensate accordingly. Everything else is according to the standard terms and stipulations of Konoha's mission regulations, blahblah. Is that amenable?"
Sasuke waited. She still hadn't contracted a single muscle - the Sharingan would know. "You're serious," Sasuke spat.
"You could have saved yourself the paranoia with but three additional words."
Sasuke very, very reluctantly kept the sword sheathed. Several seconds passed before he rolled his eyes and grunted.
"Since I don't speak young, I'll take that as a yes. So!" Tsunade twisted and threw her legs around the chair's back. Chin propped on tented hands, she said, "Where do we start?"