Tsunade stared out the window of her office looking over the once beautiful village of Kohana. How could so much have happened? The lives of so many people, and all the what we have fought for... lost. How much more could be lost in the battle ahead?
Tsunade turned from the site of the poor city that was struggling to survive. Kohona had barely survived the last battle. How could they fight another?
Tsunade sat heavily in her chair and slumped against the table allowing loose strands of hair to cover her face. She leaned her head against her hand starring into space...
Orochamaru in his new body had become so much more powerful... He now craved more power driven by the madness of his new power that he could not control. The new power he now sought, that cursed power that the good people had been fighting for years, was going to be unleashed upon an unsuspecting world...
"Old man... what would you have done? Tsunade turned to the window to face the chipped image of the one that came before her. A sad ironic grin crossed her face.
"If only I could do something, anything, to change the future that lies before me..."
But there was nothing that she could do now. They now have gone beyond the point of no return. There was nothing she could do now to make things right. Everything lay in the hands of
One small boy and all odds were against him. How did things get this way? Was fate truly working against them?
Turning back to her desk, Tsunade idly selected a book and dragged it from its pile. She opened it and flipped through the pages lifelessly.
If only she could have done something to change what had happened...
The pages stopped slipping through her hands. Tsunade gazed at the open pages before her. The thought "If only" ringing in her head like a horrible throb that was echoed in her heart. Her eyes flashed dangerously. This was it! If there ever were such a time surely it was now.
Tsunade rose from her desk and left her office. She strolled down the now rundown hallway with grim determination in every step. She came to a set of double doors and pulled out a key. The doors creak open, and dust fell gently into the darkened room. Tsunade went to one shelf of books and started selecting book after book thumbing through the pages looking for something. Finally, in the fourth shelf the one farthest from the light in that dreary room, she found it.
"Humph" Tsunade smiled.
The old man's thoughts always seemed to dwell on the fourth... She would have to remember that next time she needed to find anything so important.
She brought the book back to her study. She leaned back into her chair and gently skimmed over page after page until she came across a page that had figures and paragraphs of details. In those pages was placed a small dark thin envelope that looked newer than the book.
What they truly needed was in here, or referred to in here. But it was a starting point at least. That long forgotten and far longer forbidden Ninjitsu.
"The Ninjitsu of Time..." Tsunade breathed
