A/N's: This is a joint project by both Harmony Rose and Lady Kaliska. This is our attempt at a humorous fic aka crackfic. Also, a big thanks to Popping Fresh for beta'ing this!
Disclaimer: Neither Lady Kaliska or HarmonyRose own Naruto. Can you imagine what Naruto would be like if we did? It would be completely AU, highly ironic, and all the commas would be in the wrong places.
Story Description: Out of desperation Tsunade uses Konoha's city funds to pay off a gambling debt or three. To cover it up, she sends Team Seven and Team Gai on a "mission" to make up for the lost funds. Will the teams find themselves prepared for what awaits them?
Dissonant Chords: Chapter 1
Bang! There was a solid knock on the door and for once Tsunade wasn't hung over (enough) for her to cringe in pain at the sound, but she would soon remedy that. Her hand went to her forehead to cradle it against the dull throb, focusing on the objective at hand. She pasted a wan, thin smile on her face as several shinobi entered her office. Inside, she was chucking madly to herself, but she needed to keep up the appearances. Being the gullible little shinobi that these two teams were, they wouldn't know what hit them until it was far too late for them to back out.
Team Seven and Gai's squad were watching her silently waiting for their orders. They seemed a bit surprised to see their two teams in the office together. The two groups felt rising excitement at the prospect of the challenge of an impending mission. If Tsunade had summoned both teams, then maybe they would be lucky enough to embark on a dangerous S-Class mission. They hadn't done one of those in a long while and both teams were hungry for a new challenge.
And they would be getting an S-class mission, just not one that they would be excited about when they knew all of what it entailed. The sly grin on Tsunade's face widened as she greeted them, her voice taking on the strict note that came naturally when divulging a mission, "I have a mission, an S-Class one that requires two teams."
The blonde woman folded her hands under her chin and leaned forward as if to stress the importance of the mission, "This mission comes with a nice bonus if you complete it to the client's satisfaction. It is a dangerous mission and you must take it seriously." What she didn't add was that it would be much more damaging to their pride than their physical bodies. Had the shinobi in the room been able to foreshadow the horror that was to come, they would have ran for their lives (and possibly mental health) out of the office faster than Tsunade could say the word sake, which was pretty fast--except of course when she was drunk.
Naruto's orange clad body quivered with excitement. The motion reminded those in the room of his infamous pee-pee dance but no one commented on this. He ecstatically threw a hand up in the air, pumping his arm as he did so, "Alright Baa-chan! Finally a mission that sounds exciting for once!"
Sasuke turned his uncaring gaze to focus steadfastly onto the Hokage and waited calmly in the usual Uchiha manner for her to continue as she was delivering the mission in a seemingly over-dramatic way. But perhaps that was just his imagination... if such a thing actually existed in his head.
Tsunade shot a glare at the exuberant blond, irritated at him and yet expecting his reaction. Shaking her head she continued to explain, ignoring the suspicious looks of the gathered shinobi, "As I was saying... this mission is S-Class. You are to go to Onagakure and meet the contact who will divulge the rest of the mission... the address is in the scroll." She leaned over the desk and handed the parchment to Kakashi.
Kakashi who was never one to rush to open a mission scroll or actually be even in a slight hurry to do anything, found himself rapidly opening the scroll. If he could find something to object to in the scroll he wouldn't have to take the mission. However, as he unrolled the parchment he saw that there wasn't anything to object to, as the scroll was nearly empty. On the top in messily scrawled (in other words drunken) handwriting was the title "Missing Person's Case" and under there was simply an address.
He was sure that this was some sort of trick, for there wasn't enough information on this mission scroll. Tsunade obviously knew more about this mission than she was letting on. She wouldn't just randomly send two of her best jounin teams on a very vague, perilous and mysterious mission. Something was up and he didn't like the feeling he had about this.
Tsunade continued with a wave of her hand, "I do not know all of the details, which is why I'm sending your teams to inquire further," which was not entirely true but the blonde ignored this little fact as she asked, "Any questions? Or objections?"
She didn't stop even a moment before she began to shoo the nine ninja out the door, cutting off her pink-haired protégé's inquiry about the fishiness of this mission.
In the hall they all exchanged confused glances, except for Naruto who was excited by the thought of this new 'challenging' mission and Sai who never looked like he ever cared about anything in life to begin with.
Gai broke the silence by exclaiming a youthful challenge to his rival, "Kakashi my hip, cool rival! Whoever has his whole team at the gate ready and packed to go first wins this awesome, awesome challenge and the loser will have to set up both team's camps all by themselves in under 6 minutes and 27 seconds! My personal record..."
Kakashi merely smiled beneath his mask, knowing that no matter how he replied, Gai would go ahead and continue with this 'contest' with or without anyone's consent. Kakashi dipped his chin shallowly at the green clad male letting him interpret the gesture however he wished. Team seven, minus Sai flinched at the loud whoop that came from the other team's sensei. Team Gai, not including Lee, was glaring at their sensei already irritated by his antics. Not that their sensei even noticed said annoyed looks.
They couldn't believe they had to put up with this and frankly both of them wondered why they hadn't gone insane yet. A thought struck Neji, what if he was insane already and he just wasn't aware of it? The Byakugan-wielder shivered minutely in mental distress. "Oh please no," he whispered almost inaudibly.
His female teammate heard him and questioned him, arching a brown eyebrow at the usually stoic male, "Please what? You actually want this challenge? Oh no, now I'm the only sane one on this team."
Everyone stared at the coffee haired male a moment wondering what had him hyperventilating, only to find themselves a bit disturbed by it. Naruto interrupted the sudden silence, "YOSH! So, I'm going to go pack. The last one to the gate is a rotten Akatsuki member!" With that said, the male was gone in the blink of an eye, thus leaving the rest of the two teams to disperse at their leisure.
Gai-sensei and Lee took off running in a blaze of kicked up dust, while Kakashi reached into his back pocket and pulled out Icha Icha Make Out Tactics Volume 37 and began to read, hiding the small, mischievous grin under his mask.
Sakura glanced back as she strode out of the hall flicking her gaze in her sensei's direction and had to suppress the urge to roll her eyes. Instinctively she knew that this was going to be quite the odd mission, especially if she knew that look on Tsunade-sama's face as well as she thought she did.
Back in her office, Tsunade was feeling very self-satisfied, she'd managed to pull the wool over several of her finest shinobi's eyes, besides, this really was an important mission...sort of. Okay, not really. Admittedly, she shouldn't have participated in that one bet yesterday or the one last week, or the two the week before. (Was it two or were there more?)
Honestly, the pay for the Hokage wasn't all that great. She'd paid with her salary at first, but when she realized she wouldn't have enough, she was unable to resist the temptation of 'borrowing' from the Konoha coffers. After her drunken haze had worn off, she realized what she'd done.
Of course she regretted it, but she knew that should the temptation rise again, she would probably do the same. Thinking about this from an outsider's standpoint, Tsunade realized that almost anybody could track the missing assets back to her and that this was undeniably a weakness where other countries and enemies could exploit her weaknesses for their own benefit.
So she contacted an old connection and luckily he'd needed help and was willing to pay the fee for three S-Class missions. Not only would it cover the missing amount, it would line her pockets nicely as well. Of course this 'mission' wouldn't be in the official records. All she needed was a week. Hopefully those old bastards of the council didn't figure out what she was up to before then, otherwise, she might have to plot murder next. Now THAT would be a drag.
It seemed her wish was not to be fulfilled, as there was another sharp knock on the door. Tsunade answered the knock with a bellowing, "Just come in already!" Unfortunately she soon wished she hadn't because there, standing on the threshold of her office stood two prominent members of the council. Hopefully they didn't know yet...
Tsunade was minutely relieved when it wasn't the old bag and the lanky elderly man who was often spotted following the old crone around like a lost puppy. Sighing she folded her hands and set her elbows on the table, focusing her honey brown eyes on them. She did her best to sound polite, "What can I help you with today?"
"As much as we appreciate your politeness for once, we have a very serious issue to talk to you about," the older man, whom Tsunade previously didn't bother to learn the name of, spoke authoritatively.
Tsunade kept her cool, knowing that if she reacted they would definitely know something was up, "Oh?" letting out a breath she nodded her head, "What is this 'serious issue' that you want to discuss?"
The second old man attempted to level Tsunade with a look, but she continued to play it cool, even raising a honey blonde eyebrow at his forbidding expression. "I think you know what we've come to talk about," the older man once again spoke sternly.
Tsunade shook her head, her bangs swaying with the movement, "Frankly, I do not. If you have nothing to report to me than you are wasting my time." The attempt at being polite was gone with a flare of impatience, "I have a lot of paper work to fill out today and I would rather not be disturbed...if you have something to say...say it now."
The properly irritated younger council member (although he still appeared to be in his late 400's) responded, "We have noticed a certain amount of 'misplaced' funds. Perhaps you might have seen them? Or maybe given them away?"
Tsunade did her best to look innocent, but she only aroused more suspicion by the unusual behaviorism. She adopted a thoughtful look and lied outright, "No, I haven't. However, I will have Shizune look over the records and have the report sent back to you by the end of the week." Then she smiled, "I'm sure there's a mistake in there somewhere."
The two council members gazed at her suspiciously. They didn't believe her crap for even an instant, not with that innocent expression. She obviously knew or had something to directly to do with the missing funds; otherwise she would have sent them flying across Konoha for trying to falsely accuse her. They knew she was up to something all right; they were just biding their time waiting for her to mess up.
Tsunade could see the suspicion on their faces but she held her stance, "Now gentlemen if that is all..." she picked up a stack of papers and clapped them against her desk, "I have a lot of work that needs to be done."
They two men looked as if they were thinking something over and then the one that was the self proclaimed leader of the duo pointed a bony finger at her, "I know you're up to something but we will be generous... you have one week to set this to rights... not a day more." And in a swirl of gray and black robes the elderly council members exited her office with a slam of the door.
Tsunade sighed deeply in relief and hoped that those two teams didn't encounter any problems and preformed their jobs correctly; otherwise, she'd be in trouble of gigantic proportions. A devious smirk lit her face, she couldn't wait till she got their mission reports, and hopefully they would have good, juicy details. Naruto's would be especially good since he tended to over-exaggerate all the action and leave out the unimportant details that related to the mission itself.
Oh well, all she could do was wait at this point. Tipping her now nearly empty bottle of sake into her cup, she lifted it staring into its silvery depths. She swirled the contents lost in thought for a moment, a slow smile spreading across her face. Yes, she was definitely looking forward to those mission reports.
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HarmonyRose and Lady Kaliska