Chapter 25 – The New Mission Begins
Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto or Bleach, and frankly I'm glad I don't own Boruto.
[Mission Assignment Room, Konoha]
Several days after his encounter with the Zombie Duo, Naruto returned to Konoha along with the rest of his team and Team Guy. They actually came back a few days ahead of schedule, despite the delays caused during their time escorting the caravan, and like professionals they immediately made a beeline for Tsunade's office.
As they got there, Sarutobi, now the former Hokage (again), was just exiting the office. "Oh hi my boy. Have you been working hard?" He asked, eyes going directly for Naruto.
"Have you been smoking hard?" Naruto jested. "But on a serious note, you might want to go back in there."
"Why?" Sarutobi asked, raising an eyebrow.
"You want to hear this." The whiskered blonde answered simply.
Considering what Naruto had wanted him to hear in the past, the old Sandaime was inclined to agree, and reopened the door to his former office before letting Team 7 and Team Guy go in before him.
"Ah, good to see you all, and ahead of time. How went the mission? I imagine something important if Hiruzen-sensei is here to hear it." Tsunade greeted.
Naruto stepped towards Tsunade's desk before he placed the scroll that he took from the Akatsuki on said desk.
"I encountered two members of the Akatsuki. As you can clearly see, they did not succeed in their goal so don't worry about that. They were able to escape, but I managed to take this from the contact they were meeting with. I've already seen what's inside and I'm sure that you'll see why I asked him here when you read it."
Tsunade looked at the blond boy then she looked to the scroll and back again, almost like she was playing poker and had a bad hand, and not doing a good job of hiding it. Fortunately, the slug sannin was so far proving to be a better leader than a gambler, making him glad she had been chosen for the job.
'I guess being in a position of leadership really can cause people to change. I just didn't think she would adjust this quickly.' Naruto thought to himself, watching Tsunade take and open the scroll with her sensei looking over her shoulders to see what was written on it.
When the two read what was in said scroll, Tsunade nearly dropped the item in shock. "Are... are you sure that this... information is accurate?"
Naruto nodded. "I can't prove it, but the Akatsuki did send two of their most powerful members to retrieve that scroll. Unless they're stretched thin doing who knows what, I doubt they would do this if they didn't have reason to take this intel seriously."
At this point the rest of the group, minus Kakashi and Guy, were now even more confused than they were before they were forced to come back to Konoha. Confusion seemed to be becoming the default emotion to feel around Naruto lately.
"What information? What's going on?" Sasuke asked, not liking being left out of the loop.
Naruto, knowing that this was going to come up eventually, turned to the young ninja in the room. "The scroll contained the location of a former Konoha-nin that the Akatuski are trying to recruit into their ranks. I'd say the odds of that person joining are most likely nonexistent. However, Akatsuki won't like being told no. And considering who this person is, it's very important that we find her before the Akatsuki does."
The rest of the Konoha 12, as the younger members of Teams 7, 8, 10, and Guy were now known, had been informed about the Akatsuki's efforts to capture Naruto and, more importantly, why they were doing so. This meant telling all of them about what the Yondaime had done, how the Sandaime had tried to keep it under wraps, and how the village as a whole revealed they didn't trust either leader. Then he told them about how he got to Las Noches, who taught him, and that his sword was in fact Kurama given a new socially acceptable form.
At first none of the other Rookies knew how to react to this. None of them argued against him or expressed disbelief. Then Hinata stood up and came over to him, and with a deep breath hugged him and gave him a brief kiss. This got Sakura and Ino talking, and it broke the ice for everyone to say what was on their mind.
Sakura and Sasuke apologized for their initial dismissal of his presence on their team. Shino said he respected Naruto for having to endure such scorn for having something within his body. Neji admitted that if the Chuunin Exams weren't enough, this more than convinced him he didn't know everything and shouldn't act like he did, so this truly humbled him and made him respect the Uzumaki too. Tenten said she was still intrigued by his sword but wasn't going to dare ask to use it, something Sasuke told her was a good idea. Ino, Shikamaru, and Chouji assured him he could always count on them to have his back.
"Akatsuki is already looking to replace their dead member?" Sakura asked.
"That's to be expected. The hard part will be finding someone not only strong enough, but willing and capable of contributing to the team." Kakashi thought out loud.
"Who is this potential replacement? Why would the Akatsuki want to have her join their ranks?" Neji had asked.
Naruto sighed. "Her name is... Kazuko Uchiha." He paused for a moment to see Sasuke's reaction. His eyes widened and he jolted like he had been struck, but said nothing. "She's a former Konoha kunoichi who has been considered MIA for almost 13 years."
Right now Sasuke looked like even he didn't know what exactly was preventing him from collapsing to his knees. "U... Uchiha? But... but how? That's impossible. There can't be more out there."
Naruto sighed. "It is a surprise. Like I said before, she has been gone for almost thirteen years. So there's no way she could have been there the night of the massacre. I wouldn't be surprised if the ones guilty of the murder didn't want to go looking for her when they were done."
"Why was she gone?" Sasuke asked. "Why has she not come back?"
Sakura nodded. "Yeah, I mean, when Sasuke-kun was the last one here in Konoha, couldn't the hokage have recalled her here to help him deal with the trauma?"
Sarutobi felt a little uncomfortable at the looks everyone briefly gave him for that question. Knowing he had to cover this part, he cleared his throat.
"Just before the night of Kyuubi's attack, Kazuko Uchiha was considered the top suspect in a rather heinous crime I'd rather not go into details on right now. She was just ten years old, and before she could be interrogated she vanished. But the story doesn't end there. After the Uchiha Clan Massacre, when Anbu went over the crime scene, they found several documents that proved her innocence. Documents that the Uchiha police did not want revealed."
"Why not? Why would they intentionally hide proof of innocence?" Sakura asked, then answered her own question. "You mean they wanted her to be found guilty?"
"The clan framed one of their own? A child no less" Sasuke asked, angered. Considering what he had learned both about and from Itachi, this was no longer a major shock for him. As humbling as it was to accept, the Uchiha clan was not without its own skeletons in the closet. It just made him wonder how much he had ignored it before whenever he found another one.
"That appeared to be the case, and Itachi's work had spared us the trouble of dealing with the true guilty parties. Normally this would have allowed her to return to Konoha without any consequences... but we could not get ahold of her at that point." Sarutobi explained.
"But if this Kazuko was forced to flee when she was only ten years old, how was she able to survive all this time?" Sakura asked.
"That's a fair question, Sakura, but to answer it in its entirety would be to disclose some very sensitive information which I cannot do for now. I can tell you, however, that at the time Kazuko was the strongest child kunoichi produced by the Uchiha clan. At the age of ten she was an even stronger shinobi than Itachi was at the same age. Something that I think made Fugaku not sad to see her go. From what I remember of Kazuko she was also rational and did well on tests. In all honestly I would've been surprised if she hadn't survived for all this time," Sarutobi explained with a great deal of sadness in his voice.
Naruto realized how uncomfortable this topic was for the Sandaime and had to raise his spiritual pressure slightly just to prevent several of his peers from pressing the issue even further before he turned to Tsunade.
"Hokage-sama, I've heard most of the jounin and chuunin are currently busy getting intel on Akatsuki or securing our borders, routes, and supply stations. So, is it safe to assume that we'll have to be the ones to go and find her?"
Tsunade closed her eyes as if she was deep in thought, and after a few moments of tense silence the slannin opened said eyes and looked directly at Naruto.
"Not exactly. Kakashi and Guy are now needed elsewhere and since there's a risk of potential conflict with Akatsuki, I'm going to have to put you in charge of this situation, including the formation of a team for this mission. In addition you'll have to call back your Fracciones and have them stationed here in Konoha in order to deter any further infiltration into the village,"
The Uzumaki sighed at this. "If that's the case then I have to have the final say on who is to be on said team. Is that acceptable?"
After getting a affirmative response from Tsunade, Naruto exited the room with the rest of Team 7 and Team Guy following his lead; the young Uzumaki then left the group to prepare for the new mission.
[Akatsuki Hideout]
Meanwhile...
Pein, upon receiving word of Hidan and Kakuzu's return from their mission, called for all of the Akatsuki to convene at the hideout that they were in now. As opposed to their normal meetings, the entire organization was currently present in the flesh rather than using hologram-like apparitions.
Unfortunately for the Immortal Duo, this meant that they were in the presence of their leader who was less than pleased when they gave their report of what happened.
"Let me see if I got this correct. You're telling me that the jinchuuriki of the Kyubi somehow managed to stumble into your meeting with the first contact, killed the man, and took the intel on Kazuko Uchiha's location, then proceeded to defeat Hidan with a single attack before he let you both walk away with your lives?" Pein asked incredulously.
The figurehead leader of the Akatsuki was getting tired of this jinchuuriki, a 13-year old child no less, getting the better of the S-rank missing-nin that have the misfortune of crossing paths with the Konoha-nin. The only reason he wasn't considering confronting the boy himself was because he was not yet convinced that doing so wouldn't be a waste of his efforts. That and he had orders from Madara Uchiha, the true leader of this organization, to stay his hand from personal interaction for the foreseeable future.
It sucked to be hailed as a god but still forced to be a follower.
"Unfortunately sir, that is the truth." Kakuzu answered nonchalantly. "Hidan refused to take heed to the warnings that Itachi gave to us before we headed out, and when the boy managed to provoke my idiot of a partner he tried to attack the jinchuuriki head on. This led to the rag doll that you see before you now,"
"Who the [translated profanity] are you to [translated profanity] call me a [translated profanity] rag doll, Kakuzu?!" Hidan yelled in an irritated tone, a vein popping on his forehead.
After getting hit by Naruto's Gran Rey Cero, Hidan had about as whole as an Espada's mask. It actually took Kakuzu over an hour just to find the limbs alone, once he had time and peace enough to start looking. Once Kakuzu finally found all the parts of Hidan, though he wouldn't promise he had gotten every part after a blast like that, he created new limbs to replace the ones that were disintegrated by the young Uzumaki's attack hence why Hidan's limbs were now connected to his body with stitches. His Akatsuki coat, having been heavily torn by the cero, exposed the stitches on his arms for all to behold.
Before Hidan and Kakuzu could continue their argument Pein managed to get their focus to return to him.
"Since it's obvious we have no intel on Kazuko's location we have no other choice but to find a way to continue our plan with the manpower we have now,"
Before anyone could question the Ame-nin's decision the Akatsuki's meeting was suddenly interrupted when two shadowy figures suddenly appeared from out of nowhere in the center of the hideout, taking the group by surprise.
"I wouldn't be so sure about that, Pein-san." One of the figures warned.
[Aka no Uzu Harbor]
Several Days Later...
While the Akatsuki were busy trying to figure out what their next move would be, Naruto had already formed his team and was at the first major stop along the way to the location where Kazuko was supposedly to be found. For this mission Naruto had chosen Sasuke, Neji, who agreed without hesitation, and Shikamaru who needed a little 'persuasion'. After gathering whatever provisions they needed the group arrived at the main gate where Naruto gave the group a brief overview of their mission.
After that the group headed east towards the port where this entire situation started; not surprisingly Neji and Sasuke were surprised by this move on Naruto's part.
"Why are we here again, Naruto?" Sasuke asked.
Naruto sighed as the group entered the port town.
"As I've already told you, the scroll clearly states that Kazuko is somewhere in the former Land of Whirlpools. Since this is the closest port to that land this is the place where we're supposed to meet up with the boat that will take us there tomorrow. In any case I think we should find a place to stay for the night; when we get on that boat tomorrow I'll give you guys the full rundown on what you can expect."
Taking his advice the team found a small inn next to the harbor and checked out some rooms, all wondering how this would go. None moreso than Sasuke.
Next Time – Contact: The Worst Uchiha Reunion!