Chapter 11: Strip Poker
Author's note: About the last two sentences, they weren't my idea. My girlfriend suggested it as soon as she got out of the shower and I just put it in there without thinking. Actually I can't remember what it was that I wrote I just know someone told me they didn't know whether they should be flattered or a bit unnerved.
"So what do we do about finding them," asked Kankuro.
"It's a 400,000 ton ship in the freaking desert," exclaimed Shinji. "It's not like we're looking for fucking Waldo, the damn ship is going to be out of place."
Shinji was knocked over by a vicious kick to the spine by Tsunade, who was fed up with his vulgar tongue that spewed obscenity after obscenity from its tip. Kankuro laughed as he saw the brilliant inventor on the floor in pain for lacking the ability to hold his vulgarity in his mind instead of letting it run freely off his tongue. Kankuro, in turn, found himself lifted off the floor by little sand butterflies that dropped him into the fountain. Do to the winter cold, the fountain was about as warm as a freezer in the middle of the North Pole.
"I will not have that mouth of yours run my guests away," said Tsunade, her tone leaking threats of an untold magnitude. "If you wish to speak like that then you can go outside and speak such words to the trash can where those thoughts and words belong."
"I don't think you have to worry about driving guests away," said Shinji. "Not since you have a poker game going on later, I'm sure no one will leave till afterwards."
"And just what are you implying," asked Tsunade.
"I'm simply referring to the fact that the only gamblers you have a chance against are five year olds. Really if you might have more guests if you were to do strip poker and so off that body of yours. I know I'd be quiet if you were going to have strip poker."
"I'LL KILL YOU!"
Tsunade grabbed Shinji by the neck and proceeded to throttle him, shouting up a storm of obscenities and threats that is still somewhere over the Village Hidden in the Waterfall. More importantly, Shinji was still taunting her while his neck was still in Tsunade's iron grip, which scared some to no end, including Jiraiya who had once been in said grip. Eventually, some of the jonin of Konoha and Suna were able to pry Tsunade from Shinji, who had become bored with taunting Tsunade and was now explaining the theory behind his new invention, the chakra cannon.
"Why do you rant about things for no apparent reason," asked Naruto.
"I find I can deal with pain and panic when I taunt or explain my theories," replied Shinji. "I have always found these techniques to be quite useful for the battle field."
"But your technique almost got you killed if you hadn't noticed,' said Naruto.
"Well the possibility of someone of her political status killing someone of my political status is very slim. In fact I think she held back on purpose."
"No she held on to you on purpose, we held her back on purpose," said Naruto accenting the "we" to so that he was annoyed at Shinji's apparent lack of observation.
"But you didn't feel it," said Shinji in the same manner a teacher would speak to a student.
"And if you could feel it when you said that your technique was so effective then how do you explain that," asked Naruto.
"I can get your question even though it doesn't flow quite right, but I could feel it. In fact, now that you mention it, it did hurt like hell. Funny, I guess she's more aggressive than I gave her credit for. I would have never had the balls to kill someone if I was in her position. I'll go apologize to her."
To his utter surprise, Tsunade had challenged him to a game of strip poker, which took the respect that Shinji had recently had for Tsunade and cut it to little bitty pieces and set those tiny pieces on fire. She's off her fucking rocker, thought Shinji. I'm the fucking champion of poker in half of the villages in the whole damn world! It was true; the other half he'd fallen second to Gaara, who needless to say, had the best poker face in the history of poker faces.
"So are you man enough to accept my challenge," said Tsunade. Shinji just laughed his ass off. "Laugh while you still can, but I just know I'll win this time!"
"She's right," exclaimed Shizune. "I can feel the wind of change and I'll also get in on the stakes."
"So you'll be stripping to," asked Shinji with an evil grin. His mind was devoid of pure thoughts. "How about we make those stakes higher?"
"Go on," said Shizune.
"If I can make you both strip down to being entirely nude then I'll get to have one night with the two of you. But if I lose, the most unlikely scenario to say the least, then I will have to wear a dress and…doo-doo-doot-doo-do, um…let's say I have to allow all women in this village that I've had a one-nighter with, to beat on the back with bamboo sticks."
"Are you a masochist or something," asked Shizune. "I mean you want to lose your dignity and then you want women who you've been intimate with to hurt you. You need some help."
"Sounds like you don't have that much faith in dear old Tsunade," said Shinji in a taunting voice. "Well maybe Sakura would do it, I mean she is about to take your place as Tsunade's favorite student"
"I'm would love to make you eat those words," cried Shizune.
"Then accept my bet and then I'll let you be one of the women whose beating me," said Shinji.
"Fine then," said Shizune. "I'm in."
"Well Baa-chan, are you in or out," asked Shinji.
"I'm sorry is that a trick question," asked Tsunade in a sarcastic tone.
Gaara looked at one side of the room and then at the other side of the room. On the left side was the man he'd given the title "Weapons Master" to not too long ago. On the other side were the Godaime, the beautiful Tsunade, and her assistant, Shizune. Finally, to Gaara's right was their number one fan, Haruno Sakura, and the girl that Gaara was head over heels in love with, but that wasn't what was on Gaara's mind at the time. The thing on Gaara's mind was the question, "how the hell did things come to this."
"I guess shit just escalates to this," said Naruto to no one really. "But this is a problem for Tsunade and Shizune."
"Not really," said Gaara.
"Tsunade is the Legendary Sucker," said Naruto.
"That necklace is bad luck, but only to her family and not you," replied Gaara. "The truth is, without the necklace, she is the only person who's ever come close to beating me."
"WHAT," shouted Naruto his eyes were white and the size of dinner plates.
The match ended in a landslide victory in favor of none other than Tsunade and Shizune, both of which hadn't discarded so much as a sock. Naruto and Jiraiya both had to have their jaws shut for them, but both had different reasons. Naruto was in a state of shock from actually seeing Tsunade win, while Jiraiya was disappointed at the fact that he didn't get to see Tsunade naked. Tsunade could tell that was the reason why his jaw was hanging so she shut with a force so powerful that sent shock waves through his body.
"Damn it woman what was that for," shouted Jiraiya.
"For those perverted thoughts," said Tsunade as she cracked her knuckles.
"Hey wait, can't we be reasonable," asked Jiraiya nervously as he was slowly being backed into a corner.
"No," said Tsunade coldly. She then proceeded to nearly kill Jiraiya.
"So I guess you'd want the women first," said Shizune.
"Yeah, I feel like dying," said Shinji a little depressed.
"Hey you named the stakes," said Shizune, a bit miffed at his down mood.
"It's not the stakes, I already lost my dignity losing to the Legendary Sucker," said Shinji. "For two years, poker was thing that kept me from going broke and paying for the materials for the ships. I began to take pride in my ability, but then I lost to Gaara and I've been working myself ever since to be better, but now I know that I'll never beat him. Losing to her proves it."
"Cheer up," said Shizune smiling. "You're not dead just yet. As long as there's a breath in your body, you'll always have a chance."
"Okay I'll cheer up if you never give me one of those cliché cheer up speeches," said Shinji.
Shizune led Shinji to his humiliation and his inevitable doom by the hands of the angry women of Konoha. The hand contact was noticed by one chunin, Iruka.