Chapter eleven: Meeting of the Kages

-A day back, around two in the afternoon –

It was very noisy in the conference room of the Hokage building, first floor. The large shiny stone table in the centre of the round room was surrounded by several large chairs, made from the same material. Most of these chairs were taken by men and women that looked important, and all of the ones that sat on the chairs were accompanied by two others standing behind the chair. Tsunade sat on one of the chairs, with just one person behind her: Shizune.

Tsunade's eyes snapped to Kankuro and Temari, who both stood behind a very empty seat, looking tensed. And that was exactly where all the others were talking about.

Gaara wasn't there.

"Temari. Kankuro. I ask you once more," Tsunade said, her voice tired. "Where is Gaara? He is supposed to be here, and if I'm not mistaken then he was with you this morning."

Temari shrugged, her eyes continuously flying from Tsunade to the door. "I… I don't know, Hokage, I really don't. This morning, at breakfast, he was still with us. But… but he left for something in town and… and he didn't come back, so we thought he was here…"

"…but he isn't!" Tsunade yelled, getting up from her chair. "The fact that he isn't a Kazekage for that long time doesn't mean that he can just not show up on meetings."

Temari bowed her head. "I'm terribly sorry for my Kazekage's behavior," she whispered, her cheeks pink of shame. "But I just don't think there's very much we can do about it."

"But that's simply insulting, un," a broad shouldered and dark haired man spoke, his small but intelligent eyes looking hard. His beard and hair was a bit fuzzy and his skin was dark from the sun, although his speech said that he was indeed from the northern countries. "It's not easy being a Kage, un, but he should be here. He insults us all by not showing up."

"I agree."

"So do I."

Temari's eyes widened. Baka Gaara, she thought, slightly scared. If this is going to cost our alliance with Konoha then he wont have an easy time when we get home. And that doesn't only count for the councils, hmpf! "As I already said," she muttered, trying to silence the kages and their people. "I offer my apologies for his bad behavior and-"

A loud bang made everyone in the room look up. Temari shut up, slightly shocked, when the doors flew open and a very angry and stressed Gaara came striding in, eyes dark and a large bloody stripe going from his left cheek to his left shoulder. When his eyes met Temari's, she knew she shouldn't say a word to him. Like he was now, he could explode any minute.

He sat down while all the others still stared at him, most of them with open mouths and puzzled looks on their faces. You could nearly hear them think: how did a Kazekage get hurt? But they were all too afraid to ask him.

After a while Gaara sighed. Temari let out her breath that she wasn't aware she had been holding. It seemed like it was safe for them to speak again without him destroying the room. Even though he was finally rid of his Shukaku, his mood could swing from happy and friendly to "explosive: DANGEROUS" within merely seconds. Silently Temari blamed his lack of sleep of this.

"Did I miss anything?" Gaara asked with a tone that said so clearly and-don't-you-dare-say-I-did-miss-something that everyone quickly shook their head. Even the tough looking northern guy didn't say anything but merely looked at him. "Then let's start. I would like to know why I was called here."

And there Gaara found some support. The northern man nodded his head in approval, and so did the one next to him, a very thin and long woman with sharp features and a slightly bluish skin. "Yess indeed," she said with a whistling s. "It wass a long journey and I would like to know the reassson for being here."

Tsunade nodded, and then placed her head on her intertwined hands like she always did when she was going to explain something. "At first I want to thank you all for getting here so quickly. I'm really glad to be able to discuss this with you." The others nodded to sign that she continue. "But the reason that we're here together does not concern a war or food shortage, like normal. The reason lies deeper."

Kankuro poked Temari in the side lightly and the blonde looked at him. "What?"

"Why isn't that pink medic ninja here?" her brother asked, a frown etched in his face. "I thought that she had a pretty high rank here in this city. She should be here, don't you think?"

Temari looked at Tsunade and then her jaw dropped. "My god, Kankuro. You're right!"

Her brother sniffed. "That does tend to happen sometimes, you know."

Temari didn't react on this retort. Her brain was working top speed. She didn't see Sakura very often, but she and the medic got along pretty well and it was indeed strange that Sakura wasn't present at the meeting. She was disturbed in her thoughts when Tsunade started talking again.

"I take it that you are all well informed about the organization Akatsuki?" Tsunade asked, and the others nodded. Temari noticed that Gaara clenched his fist and sweat dropped. She had to stand ready to hold him back. Whenever someone spoke of the Akatsuki, Gaara got angry like hell, and she couldn't really blame him. After all, one of them killed him once.

"We managed to capture one after he made a failed attempt to kidnap our city's Jinjuuriki, Naruto Uzumaki. There's only one problem about this kidnap."

"Then what is it? You've captured an Akatsuki member, so you should be able to interrogate him and then get the information you want, right?" Gaara asked, his voice slightly higher pitched than normal, signing that he was definitely accelerated about the subject. "and if he doesn't speak then you just torture him. It's not like he wouldn't do that to you if you were captured by them."

The Northern nodded. "That's right, un. I do not see the problem."

Temari bowed forward slightly until she was nearly at eye level with Gaara. "Gaara," she whispered. "Perhaps you better remove that bloody stripe on your cheek. It kind of… distracts the others."

He gave her an angry glare but did remove the stripe by wiping it away with his sleeve, not paying attention to the blood that had now officially ruined the Kazekage robes.

"The problem lies in the fact that we can't torture him to get the information, and he wont speak out of free will." Tsunade sighed. "In order to get him here safely, one of the ninjas that captured him chained herself to the Akatsuki to bring him here."

Temari looked up. Had she just said she? A chilly feeling clamped itself around her chest. There was only one female ninja that was good enough to compete with an Akatsuki member, and that was Sakura. She had proven that once, so it would only be logical if she was the one to capture the Akatsuki member. But… why wasn't she here?

"And there's a problem with those handcuffs," Tsunade continued. "I did some research but I cant seem to find them. Does the name Glass Chain say something to you?"

The slim blue woman gave Tsunade a shocked look. "Glassss Chain? Are you ssure?"

Tsunade nodded. "Positive. After the kunoichi in this case chained herself to the Akatsuki, the chains started to act odd. They connected the two to each other in a way we cant break, and the chains link their chakra systems and nerves to each other. What means that we cant hurt the one without hurting the other, and vise versa."

Gaara let out a groan and everyone looked at him. "So that's why they fought together," he muttered, looking extremely pissed off.

Tsunade raised an eyebrow. "Fought?"

The redhead nodded slowly. Temari tensed immediately and slid her hand around a kunai in her pocket, just in case. Gaara raised his hand. "No need for that," he said, and Temari got a color and quickly let go of the kunai. Her brother indeed was a very skilled ninja. "I fought with the Akatsuki member you are speaking of," he said to the others. "…twice. The last time was about half an hour ago."

It got very silent. Tsunade frowned and Gaara continued. "He challenged me to fight him hand to hand, nothing else." He smirked. "He didn't stand a chance. But there was this other ninja that was there too. A female one, with pink hair."

Temari froze. Now there was no exception. Sakura had chained herself to an Akatsuki member and linked them in a way that there is no escape! That was horrific!

"I had to fight both of them. I didn't know why, and I didn't care. I wanted revenge for him beating me once." He grinned. "And I succeeded."

"But who is this Akatsuki member, un?" The Northern shrieked, not following the conversation, which was understandable. "And what does my country have to do with it?"

"It's Deidara," Tsunade said, feeling that she was loosing her grip on this conversation. "Deidara from your country. He's a missing ninja that fights with-"

"...explosives, yes." The Northern closed his eyes and leaned back, a sad expression on his face.

"Dotongu-san," Tsunade asked, calling the Northern by his name. "do you know him?"

Dotongu nodded slowly. "He was a very talented and gifted boy. Always cheerful, in for a joke. He made fireworks once and that was a real blast – literally, un." He sighed. "I even thought he might have been able to become a kage one day. Until those Akastuki lads showed up in town, un. They got him with them and ever since he's gone, un." He looked up at Tsunade. "If you would accept it, Tsunade-san, I would like to see him once, un."

Tsunade nodded. "I see your point, Dotongu-san. I'll talk about it with them. Because that's what I wanted to discuss. Does anyone know what to do with these chains? Do you, Mizura-san?"

The slender woman shook her head. "I'm afraid that I don't know a lot about it at the momenthh. But I could asssk for some booksss from my country. After all, thossse chainsss were made there."

Tsunade smiled. "That would be wonderful. You see, the chained kunoichi is one of my subordinates and probably one of the best medics ever. I would like to free her from the situation she's in."

They talked about the subject for quite a while. The other Kage's asked a lot questions about the current situation and about the Akatsuki, and Tsunade willingly answered them all. Gaara didn't say much, merely listened, and Temari tried to catch anything that was said about Sakura. Suddenly the conversation started about it.

"… before we end this meeting I would like to say one more thing about the Kunoichi, Haruno Sakura," Tsunade said, and Dotongu and Mizura both renewed their interest. "In order to get information out of Deidara we tried to interrogate him and we went as far as possible with torturing as possible without harming Sakura. That was unsuccessful."

Dotongu nodded. "Deidara is indeed hard to break, un."

"My point is, that I asked Sakura to get information out of him." The hokage suddenly became silent and everyone felt that it was hard for Tsunade to say what she was going to. "She's quite the attractive young lady and Deidara is a young man, and… well, we all know what young men think of..."

"NO!" Temari blurted, as she suddenly realized what Tsunade was steering onto. "No, you can't make Sakura do that! That's inhuman! Gross!"

Kankuro placed a hand on Temari's shoulder and pulled her back. "calm down sis," he hissed in her ear. "You're scaring the living daylights out of everybody here."

"Let go of me," Temari snapped at him and she pulled away, staring at Tsunade. "Please tell me you didn't… didn't ask Sakura to…"

"I'm afraid I did, Temari," Tsunade sighed. "Don't think it was easy for me. Indeed I asked Sakura to get intimate with Deidara to get information about the Akatsuki. I asked her merely four days ago but there will probably be some progress in the near future."

Dotongu cleared his throat and Tsunade looked up at him. "Something wrong, Dotongu-san?"

He nodded. "I just wanted to add that there's probably a problem with that technique, un. Ever since Deidara was a little boy, he… um…" he licked his lips and took a deep breath. "Well, there's no easy way of saying this, but, all evidence always pointed out that Deidara… well, that he's gay."

Tsunade choked on a bit of leftover tea in her teacup and spat it all out on the table. "He's WHAT?"

It was silent for just a second.

Then Dotongu suddenly started laughing like a madman, smacking his fist on the table and laughing so hard that the tears ran down his cheeks. "Gotcha! Wohahahaha! That look on your face, un!!"

Tsunade quickly recovered from her embarrassment and then slapped Dotongu right in the face, an annoyed and above all very angry look on her face.

"My god Dotongu-san! And then you complain about Gaara-san to be late!"

Mizura giggled, a hand in front of her mouth to hide the emotion on her to that far emotionless face. Even Gaara's always impassive face showed slightly signs of humor as the corners of his mouth tugged upwards slightly. Meanwhile Temari was still half in shock as the fact that Dotongu, a Kage for god's sake, just played a trick on Tsunade, while they were discussing something quite important.

I wonder, Gaara thought as he watched the heavy build man. Are they all like that in the Northern countries? I remember that that Deidara guy was even sarcastic and a prankster like this Kage. He shook his head. Boy am I glad I'm from the south.

"Well then," Dotongu said, getting up from his chair. The atmosphere was completely different from the start of the meeting, and it could even be called cozy and friendly. "I guess that this was it for today then. Tsunade-san," and he looked at the Hokage. "I'll be staying in Konoha for the next four days, un. I would be delighted if I could speak to Deidara-kun."

The usage of the kun behind Deidara's name surprised the Hokage slightly. "He's no boy anymore, Dotongu-san," She whispered as they left the room. Mizura had left before them, after promising that she would send a messenger to get information about the glass chains. The others had left earlier.

"And I would suggest that you wouldn't talk to him like he is one, too."

Dotongu smirked. "Something wrong, Hokage-san? I can handle a boy like him, un. He's good with explosives but disastrous with his temper. Besides," and now the Kage was nearly snickering. "He thinks his art is the absolute end, un. Throw one insult on being an artist or about art and he'll rip you to pieces." He gave Tsunade a side glare. "Not that he'll succeed on me, un."

Tsunade smiled. Even though the Kage had played a sick trick on her just a few minutes ago, she had started to like the way he could lightly talk about subjects and other serious things without making them heavier than they already were. She looked at her feet. Somehow he remembered her slightly of Jiraya.

"I'll be staying in this hotel," Dotongu suddenly stated and Tsunade quickly stopped walking to make sure that she didn't bump against him.

"Konohagakure?" Tsunade read the name of the hotel out loud. "Good choice. I'll speak with you tomorrow, then."

Dotongu smiled and then they said a quick, formal goodbye and Dotongu disappeared inside the hotel, leaving Tsunade behind. She found herself staring at the door and sighed deeply. She hoped that Sakura was able to get the information needed out of Deidara before Mizura came up with a conclusion for the chains.

I don't think we'll be able to get the information out of him by force. Not even if we can torture him to a level on which every person would simply submit. She looked up, at the sky, and saw dark clouds packing together in the east. And as soon as we can interrogate him with force, Sakura won't stand a chance in getting information. Perhaps… perhaps it's better not to have a way out.

Her eyes widened for a second the moment she thought that. She shouldn't have thought that. Sakura wasn't made for this kind of living, staying inside all day and sit around lazily. Nor was she destined to lure an enemy into telling information by using something else than her common sense and brains.

But, as things looked right now, the only way to obtain information about the Akatsuki, and thus the only way to stop them from taking over the world or whatever else bad they were planning on, was to have Sakura seduce Deidara. Even though it was awful, and horrible because they might have a solution, Tsunade decided not to tell Sakura about the results of this meeting.

I might as well tell the other Kages that are still in town about this, she thought while walking back to Konohagakure. Only Mizura and Dotongu are staying, so that shouldn't take too long.

Before she entered the hotel, she glanced over her shoulder, to the Hokage tower. I'm sorry Sakura, she thought sadly. This is the only way.