Hello everyone :D
The idea for this story has been swimming about in my head for a looong while but I didn't know how to write it: a chaptered fic like 'Things Happening To…' would've been too long and a one-shot has proven too short – not really, but a 6000 word one-shot didn't sound appealing :P – so I'll probably divide it in a two-shot…
I have to thank Lerryn because the original planning of this came up in one of our conversations and now is the most appropriate time to put it down, with Danzo's death and whatnot I thought a 'tribute' was a must to show all my respect for such a selfless person, don't you agree? ^_^ *please note the HEAVY sarcasm*
This is dedicated to Sasuke— *gasp! She dedicated this to Sasgay!!* Yes, as ashamed as I feel, I have to thank Sasuke for having done ONE good thing in his whole life: killing Danzo and rending the post of Rokudaime Hokage vacant for Kakashi to take!! *cheers* That said, I hope Sasuke will die soon. Soon.
Disclamer: not mine, else a couple of people would not be still. alive. Dammit. ù.ù
Ja ne,
Temari 88 XD
A 'TRIBUTE' TO DANZO
by Temari 88
In the slowly rebuilding village hidden in the Leaves, these last few days had been quite chaotic (the reasons were obvious: with only the Hokage Mountain to symbolize Konoha, the population was busy picking themselves up), so no one really noticed a lone figure dressed in a black-and-red cloak and wearing a lollipop-like orange mask materialize somewhere in the middle of a street – what was left of a street – looking around and dropping something on the ground before disappearing with none the wiser.
It just so happened that the place where the figure had appeared was actually in the center of a number of tents set up for the injured… so eventually someone was bound to come across the thing blocking the way—
"Gaah!! Ouch!! The hell is this?!"
— and trip over it, if they didn't pay attention. Shizune, sitting up facing the offending thing was now glaring at it; she would have remained there for who knows how long, if she hadn't remembered she had a patient to take care of, so she carefully approached the thing – which so happened to be a black bag like the ones used for corpses – and, after making sure it wasn't some sort of trap, she began dragging it towards the tent she was headed to… at the other end of the largish camp-hospital…
"Damn it…!" she cursed halfway, the thing sure was heavy! "I should've left it there!— NO!! What am I saying?!? It could be something dangerous!!"
Better if it was her, who found this unbelievably annoying thing; she was a shinobi and a medic so she could take care of whatever was inside the bag… what would have happened if this was some explosive and a civilian had tripped over it?! Shizune shuddered at the thought before gratefully letting go of the plastic: she had reached her destination – Tsunade's tent. The two ANBU guards standing in front of the entrance stared at her skeptically (even if, wearing the masks, of course you couldn't tell).
"Shizune-san…?" asked Tiger, his voice expressing the part of the question left unspoken.
"… Uuh, I found this thing in the middle of the path at the entrance of the camp…" she explained. "I haven't opened it, but I checked for traps – it's safe. I'll leave it here for a minute: I have to find a Hyuuga so we can see inside before opening it…" the guards nodded and she left.
"Do we really have to wait?" said Wolf, eyeing the object laying a couple of feet away.
"What question is that?! OF COURSE we have to wait! We're shinobi, we're ANBU! We follow the orders, Wolf, so we'll watch over the plastic bag until Shizune-san returns." answered Tiger in a stern voice – he was the superior, he was older and more experienced: he had to make sure his subordinates listened to orders – that left out any complaints.
"Aww…" whined Wolf. He was decidedly younger than the other ANBU (around eighteen years or so while Tiger was twenty) but he knew what the motto of the Black Ops was – "We do what we do because they tell us to do it, but we don't really know why we do it, we just do." - yet he was cuuuurious! "But, Tiger-taichou, aren't you even a little bit curious?"
"…… I never said that……" Tiger was extremely grateful he had a mask on right then. In truth his hands were itching to pull the zip down and peer inside the black bag but he couldn't let the other know that; they were supposed to be an elite group of ninja: they couldn't let their curiosity take the better of them so Tiger just pretended he was on a mission. "Yes, I have to keep watch over a scroll of great importance; I have to guard it even without knowing what's written inside. I don't have to open it. Scroll… scroll… scroll…"
It was a good twenty minutes, before Shizune came back; alongside the medic were running a random Hyuuga chuunin, Shikamaru Nara and Hana Inuzuka with her two dogs (well, running might be exaggerating a little… okay, a lot: only Shizune and the Hyuuga were running, the other two were leisurely hopping).
"Hana-san, Shikamaru-kun, please hurry up." was saying the medic kunoichi, looking behind her shoulder.
"Yeah, yeah, Shizune we're coming. You should chill; it's not like we know nothing of that thing, y'know…" replied Hana calmly.
"But we DO know nothing about it!" countered Shizune, blistering.
"That's not true: we know that there's probably a corpse in there and that it's not an explosive something. Besides if there was that possibility, do you think I would have come…?" said Shikamaru.
"Ah, right Shikamaru-kun, I wouldn't have come either in that case." agreed Hana, two barks backing her up. Shizune's left eye started to twitch.
"Then why did you come?! I asked only for a Hyuuga!"
"Nothing better to do." answered both the Nara and the Inuzuka shrugging.
Just then, the four of them stopped in front of the tent inside which Tsunade was still deep into her coma; the ANBU standing guard were stock still, aloof but alert at the same time, careful to respect what they had been told and not touch the potentially dangerous body bag – they were trained shinobi after all, they did not let a mere thing such as curiosity rule them! Shizune was impressed by Tiger and Wolf's self-control so she send them a small smile.
"Good. Now, I finally found a random Hyuuga with nothing to do so we can see what's in there." explained Shizune, completely ignoring the shocked and offended face of the chunnin standing behind her. "Please, Hyuuga-san, can you activate your Byakuugan?"
"Yes, please, Random Hyuuga-san, activate your eyes and just get this over with." prompted a bored Shikamaru, his pinkie finger stuck in his ear.
"Random Hyuuga-san, we need your help." smirked Hana.
"Wha— hey! Stop calling me 'Random Hyuuga-san'!! I have a name, I'll let you know!" said Random-san, irritated. "Plus, I can't really help you… I might be a Hyuuga, but I don't have the Byakuugan…" the last part was mumbled so low the others almost didn't hear it. Almost.
"WHAT?!" shouted the ANBU – they hadn't been able to refrain themselves, it had been a shock! They coughed and recomposed themselves. "Sorry…"
"But, seriously, WHAT?!" said Hana, helpfully. "First off, God I pity you: you're a Hyuuga chunnin but you DON'T HAVE the Byakuugan; second off, why the hell you didn't tell us sooner?!"
"How could I?! Shizune-san literally dragged me here without letting me speak!!" Random-Byakuugan-less defended himself, turning an accusing stare toward the medic, who looked outraged by the accusations. Random Hyuuga-san was not finished, though. "Oh don't give me that look. We Hyuuga Do. Not. Have. foreseeing abilities. Remember that, Shizune-san."
"So we need another Hyuuga, possibly one who can use their doujutsu…" summarized Tiger.
"… How about Hinata…? She should be around…" proposed Shikamaru, now seated on the ground near the two ANBU with his eyes closed.
"Well, I guess we don't have much choice." concluded Shizune before turning toward Wolf. "Go fetch Hinata-san and be quick about it."
"Seeing as I'm useless here, I'll take my leave." Random-san turned around and walked away immediately after the ANBU had disappeared.
Ten minutes later Wolf and Hinata stopped in front of the black plastic bag and the group gathered around it. Thankfully the ANBU had already explained the girl what she had to do, so after a minute to regain her breath – she had not yet fully recovered from the wound Pein had given her – Hinata activated her Byakuugan to look down.
"Gah!" she jumped back a little from the surprise. Shikamaru woke up at her yelp, raising an eyebrow. "T-there is a-a-a body i-in there…"
Shizune sighed quietly. "Yes, Hinata-san, we thought as much… can you tell us if you recognize the person and if there are hidden traps or whatever?"
"U-uh… there a-re no traps, it seems…" the Hyuuga explained. "The person is male, h-he looks fa-familiar but I don't know h-his name."
"I think we should open the damn thing. I'm getting tired of stalling the matter." came Hana's bored voice.
The group looked at each other then, with a collective shrug, they inched closer to the bag and Tiger was ordered to pull the zip down slowly. "Why the hell has to be me?!" he cursed in his mind but proceeded to do as asked. He reached forward cautiously, gloved fingers closing on the metal as he started pulling the zip down; everyone's breath catching as a tuff of brown hair was revealed, then a pale forehead stained with blood, closed eyes - one of which had a lid forming a dimple, as if it was empty underneath – and an obviously old face with age lines and the signs of a fight, a mouth distorted in an ugly grimace.
Thump.
Hinata fainted.
The others glanced at her, rolled their eyes and turned their attention back on the corpse. The body was now completely visible and it was clear the old man had recently been in a fight, a quite fierce one at that: he lacked an eye – the right one – and an arm – the right also – and the upper part of his kimono was torn and bloody. On a closer inspection, Shikamaru noted a piece of paper with something scrawled casually on it.
"Hey, look at that," he pointed at the paper so that the others would notice it too. "what's written over it?"
Wolf picked it up and quickly read the note before cocking his head to the side and repeated the words written out loud. " 'Hello! I didn't really want to do this at first because, you know, I'm supposed to be evil… but then I thought, hey! They deserve to get back at him too and I've taken what I wanted from him, so why not give the corpse back to his 'companions'? I'm sure you'll know what to do with him…! Enjoy this little present from me, okay? And remember: Tobi is a good boy, or is he? n.n' "
"What the hell…?" "How the fuck did an Akatsuki member sneak in here?!" "Who's this dead old man?" "How could you read 'n.n'?! That's not a word!!"
The group asked each other questions no one was listening or giving answers to. Once everyone was done talking over the others, Shizune finally said something resembling a name—
"Motherfucker…"
— Or maybe not. She seemed to realize her slip when eight pair of eyes turned to stare at her (Hana's two hounds were still there too), she coughed a bit willing the slight pink raising to her cheeks to fade as she rubbed an arm with a hand in embarrassment. She was suddenly glad that Tsunade was out cold, otherwise the older woman would have risked to break a rib from all the laughing she would've done… really, Shizune embarrassing herself was a priceless show to witness.
"Ah! Uuuhh… I mean…" for a brief moment, Shizune resembled Hinata – that deeply flushed look in her eyes and the forcefully stilled hand that was dying to rub her arm – before she regained her usual self-assurance, straightening her back. "That is Danzo-san."
The two ANBU visibly stiffened as their breath caught in their throat: of course they were informed about him, as loyal servants to the Godaime Hokage they had been warned about the conspiracy-plotting old man, they didn't like him even though they had never met him in person: knowing he had been appointed Hokage was enough; Hana had heard about the man too, although she merely knew he was a bit too power-happy for anyone's tastes; Shikamaru remembered that he had been the one to declare Sasuke a missing-nin and cause the enormous chaos within the 'Rookie Nine', a good half of whom were now out of the village to supposedly help Sakura 'get rid' of the revenge-obsessed Uchiha (though they all knew the pink-haired girl had no chance against Sasuke: he was – besides an idiot, easily manipulated, decidedly emo, stuck up in a way it made everyone wonder how he was capable of walking straight with that pole in his ass – strong and she was still hopelessly in love with him… her death was as certain as Konoha's destruction around them); Hinata knew barely what his father had told her, which means not much.
"Shizune-san." Tiger broke the silence while still staring at the corpse. "What's Danzo-san doing here, and in a body bag no less…?"
"Yeah, shouldn't he be participating to the 'Kage meeting?" added Wolf, straightening up.
"The hell I know." came Shizune's answer, while she shrugged. "He's obviously dead."
"Duh-uh." deadpanned Shikamaru, a bored look on his face; when the medic nin glared at him he simply raised his hands as if to say 'well it doesn't take a medic to see that the guy is dead', which was pretty much what everyone else was thinking. "I mean, he had clearly fought a hard battle, from the looks of it…" he added trying to distract the woman.
It worked.
"Yes. It seems Danzo…-san's enemy was pretty strong to give him injures this relevant…" commented Shizune, observing the severed arm, the numerous gashes, the signs of some illusions and what was certainly the final blow – a rather deep stab-wound - that went all the way through the chest.
"So… what should we do with it?" asked Wolf.
"Maybe w-we should pr-prepare t-the funeral…?" proposed Hinata, finally coming around. But the weight of the stares from the others caused her complexion to lose a shade or to and turn Sai-like, which was not good because she looked ready to faint again. "W-wh-what…?" she whispered.
"… Hinata-san" Hana Inuzuka sighed lightly. "it's too soon to prepare a funeral; Danzo's corpse should probably be inspected by either Shizune or some other medic – an autopsy is in order, I think… plus we'll have to see what the elders'll decide on—"
"Ah, wait Haha-san." interrupted Tiger, holding up a hand. "It seems the elders Koharu-sama and Homura-sama did not survive the attack…"
"What?! How's that possible?!" that was Shizune, shocked. "I thought everyone got back to life after Pein was defeated!" she was a proof of that: she had been dead, after all.
"Maybe dying and getting brought back to life was a little too much for their old hearts." stated Shikamaru.
"In the end, I do believe we should put this thing in a freezer until Kakashi, Yamato and the gang that tagged along come back to decide, and to hear what went on during that blasted 'Kage summit…" decided Hana; all the others nodded and the two ANBU picked up the bag to dump it into a freezer-like cellar.