The Contract

Chapter 35

"Yo Baa-chan-!"

The drawled out greeting was cut short when a paperclip flying at supersonic speeds impaled the speaker.

Who promptly went up in smoke.

"Geez, if I didn't know better, I'd swear that you had that paperclip waiting for me to walk through."

"Of course I had it waiting." Tsunade replied nonchalantly, not even remotely bothered by the fact that she had just killed one of her shinobi via improvised projectile, shadow clone or not. "Jiraiya's got one too though, so don't even think of getting a big head over it."

Naruto, ever the jokester, clutched his hands over his heart and swooned terribly. "How could you, Baa-chan?! I thought I meant something to you!"

"Doesn't make you any less of an annoyance than the Pervert." Signing her name off a bill with a flourish, the last Senju finally set her eyes on her pseudo-son. 'Goddamn, it's like staring at Minato all over again!' That line of thought brought back memories of a certain Uzumaki challenging her to a no-holds barred spar over the heart of the soon-to-be Yondaime. It was especially funny when she recalled Kushina's stupid gaping when she casually turned the whole thing down with a few words:

"You can have him squirt. It'd be too weird to bang one of the idiot's students."

"But-but… you're always staring!"

"Of course I am dumb-ass! I've seen him naked!"

"Whu- what?! When the hell did you see my man na-"

"I'm the ranking medic in the Village."

"... oh…"

"Oh is right squirt. Anyhow, I may not be interested in a relationship -sexual or otherwise- but I can't deny the bod on that stud. Pretty sure gods would be ashamed of his… equipment…"

"Baa-chan? You there?"

The slight pressure of Naruto's hand on hers jerked her back to reality. "What?"

"You sorta spaced out for a minute there." Naruto said in a concerned tone as he returned to the seat on the other side of the table. "You're not pushing yourself too hard are you?"

"Nah, I've been resting enough and Shizune has been conscientious about feeding me since she knows its the only way I'll keep out of the bottle." The blonde Hokage sat back and smirked at him. "Honestly, I was just reminiscing."

"Oh~… lost loves?"

"More like lost lusts." She snorted. "Your mom once tried to fight me over access to your dad's heart." When his jaw dropped, she smirked and continued, "Yeah, Kushina felt I was a threat to her love life cause I was always staring at your dad. Of course, after seeing him in his birthday suit, it shouldn't have been a surprise." Deciding to prank the Master, Tsunade pulled every bit of acting talent she had to the fore as she sighed dreamily, her eyes gaining a faraway look. "Kid, I saw your old man naked and believe me, he was fucking ripped."

"You… what?! When?!"

The fact that he was almost croaking in shock while almost perfectly re-enacting his mother's reaction sent Tsunade into mental cackles. "Hello? Former head medic here? I ran a physio on him following a mission and I saw him nude. Talk about a sex god! His dick was-"

"Hell no!" He almost tapped into Kyubi's chakra to enforce is will as he leaped out of his seat with bloodshot eyes. "We are not talking about your crush on my dad and your cradle-robbing tendencies!"

The Hokage office was silent save for the sounds of harsh breathing and barely restrained laughter.

At last, Tsunade couldn't hold it in any longer and burst into almost maniacal laughter.

It took two solid minutes before Naruto connected the dots.

"You are evil, Baa-chan." He sulked as he collapsed into the seat. "Pure fucking evil."

"Please. You know what a well executed prank feels like." Tsunade smirked mid-laugh. "Now you know what it feels like to be on the receiving end of one."

"Are you kidding me?!" He yelled back in chagrin. "You not only scarred me, you have me wondering if all those back-rubs you offered aren't your twisted way of making up for lost time!"

"You would think that wouldn't you? Pervert."

"Coming from the woman who lusted after a guy who was young enough to be her baby brother?" He fired back instantly. "And saying it in front of said guy's son who looks pretty convincingly like his dad? Pot-kettle much?"

"Never said I wasn't a pervert brat." She rejoined with a smug grin that was instantly wiped off by Naruto's response.

"I wonder what Ero-Sennin would say about that admission…"

"He'd be saying condolences at your funeral while in a full body cast." She hissed viciously.

The two blondes glared intensely at each other for a few moments before bursting into laughter.

"Alright Baa-chan." Naruto said when he finally caught his breath. "What's so urgent that you dragged me away from my D-ranks? I've still got about a week of those left, you know."

The question prompted a change in Tsunade's countenance that had him sitting attentively without consciously realizing it. "I've got a mission for you. A- possibly S-rank, solo and situated right here in Konoha."

The revelation of the location drew his focus even more. "A conspiracy?"

"Nothing quite so serious." Tsunade amended as she stood up and walked to the window that overlooked the Village. "The rank is more in tune with the kinds of information you might end up dealing with.

"In the aftermath of the Chūnin Exam Invasion, Konoha was faced with the worst housing crisis we'd ever experienced, a problem that was exacerbated by an influx of new residents."

"New residents?"

"We were able to beat back an invasion force backed by a Major Hidden Village and a rising minor one while taking -considering the circumstances- minimal losses." She explained. "To the rest of the world, that just fortified our rank as the Strongest Village and, with rumors of war brewing, people flocked in accordingly."

"Oh…" The effects of battles, wars and reputation on a Village's population had been lightly touched upon in the Academy but it had always seemed more like an abstract concept than anything else practical.

Until now.

"Like I said, we experienced a population upsurge in the year after the Invasion." Tsunade continued as she returned to the table. "It stabilized by the second year, with the whispers of war having faded but the Housing Committee have been leaving reminders about how we can't deal with another such influx* and I've decided to do something about it that doesn't involve the level of construction that annexing the Village will. At least, in the interim." She pushed a file over to him. "We need to repurpose the lands that aren't in use right now and there's a huge swathe of land we've got tied up for no good reason."

A quick glance through the file had him sucking in air through his teeth. "The Uchiha Compound? Pretty sure there'll be a lot of bleating opposition."

"Perhaps." Tsunade admitted before gaining a steely eyed look. "Let them bleat. I'll shear their fucking coats off."

He arched an eyebrow at her. "You're oddly determined about this."

"I'm done playing the good shepherd." She growled. "I've already allocated a portion of the Senju lands for the same purpose to appease whichever fuck-wads think of using them against me."

"They'll try to claim cultural heritage or something along those lines."

"The draft I've prepared phrases this as a deal: Konoha leases the land until affected clans grow to the point of requiring their lands back at which point the Village relinquishes its ownership while the annual pay going into the clan accounts in exchange are cut off." She replied steadily. "Should the land remain unclaimed for over a hundred years then the Village retains full ownership of the land and the payment stops. If the clan accounts remain dormant that long then the Village reacquires their funds in those accounts as well."

He whistled softly. "Wow. You've got this all laid out."

"Damn right." She scoffed. "Like I said: let them fucking bleat."

He smirked at the phrase as he took in the scope of the mission again. "So, why me?"

"Besides the fact that you're a one-man army?" She sighed. "I trust you, Naruto. More than I trust damn near anyone else." She tapped out a specific sequence on the table and a small compartment popped up. "If this is to work then we need to verify that the compound has no hidden traps or Village secrets lying around." She reached into the compartment and pulled out what Naruto instantly recognized as a seal tag. "Jiraiya, Inoichi and Kakashi worked for a few months to create this marvel."

"What's it do?" He asked as he took the proffered tag.

"It emulates the sharingan's ability to see chakra."

He just about flung the seal away in shock.

Tsunade had expected such a response, though, so she was able to continue seemingly unperturbed by his reaction. "It can't do any thing else the sharingan does: no technique copying, no time dilation effect… nothing. The only thing it does is to allow the wielder to see chakra in much the same way as a born-Uchiha can. It'll allow you to see whatever might be hidden in the compounds as you go." When she noticed that he still seemed stunned, she decided to dump it all on him at once. "Jiraiya originally intended to create a full on sharingan tag but, according to Inoichi, the seal would have to perform some serious neural rewiring for the tag to work and, for all the incredible versatility of seals, surgery happens to be the one thing they can't do.*"

Naruto's brain finally came back online. "Baa-chan, I get that. Believe me I do. But a seal that allows the wielder to see chakra the way a sharingan does? God damn!"

"Do you now understand why I chose you to take this mission?" Tsunade asked, all hints of teasing gone from her features. "A seal like this being used to scan the compound of one of history's most powerful warrior clans…"

"There'll be tons of clan secrets lying around." He finished somberly. "Techniques, information, things that would either rocket a person to the top of the shinobi totem pole or provide the black market with the tools needed to trigger a new, devastating war."

Tsunade nodded.

The weight of the task set before him struck him at that moment and he all but shrank into himself. "But… why me? I mean, how do you know that I won't abuse this?"

The question tugged at the Last Senju's heartstrings and motherly instincts she rarely felt surged up. Never before had she so desperately wanted to comfort a person as she did right then.

Reaching out, she grabbed his hand and, when he looked up, she stared right into his eyes, the power of her conviction shining brightly. "Because I trust you, Naruto. No, more than that, I have the utmost faith in you. Yes, you made a deal with Kyubi and I should be scared that she might turn you into something else but I have the utmost faith in your ability to do what is right. Whatever your actions are, however they might seem, I will always trust that you are doing what is right."

They remained like that for an indeterminable amount of time: the old woman doing her best to project her conviction to the one she had come to see as a son while the young man, for the first time in his life, basked in pure, maternal love.

The moment was broken when he stood up, placed his right fist over his heart and took a deep bow. "I will not fail you, Hokage-sama."

'I don't expect you to, Naruto.' She thought with a smile as she watched him head out to tackle the task, greeting Shizune on his way out. "Shizune?" She knew the look In the young woman's eyes: something was terribly wrong.

"Tsunade-sama… Forgive me but I can't hide this from you any longer." The dark haired woman dropped to her knees and prostrated herself before her teacher, tears spilling from her eyes as she moved. "I'm so sorry…"

To say that Tsunade was stunned was an understatement; she had never been prostrated to before and the fact that it came from one so close to her had her terrified. "Shizune, what's wrong?"

Shizune couldn't speak; all she could do was present an ominously plain looking folder to her.

‹‹‡››

Right about then, Shio watched as Mitarashi Anko interrogated one of Sasori's identified plants, an administrative officer in the Missions Allocation department called Kaizuki Shinagara.

Under his dircetives, the infamous purple-haired interrogator had gone for a softer approach, letting Kaizuki know from the onset that they knew that he wasn't a willing spy and that they just wanted to know the extent to which his mind had been subverted.

It was just one of the many approaches they had going at the moment with more than twelve different interrogation rooms all active at the same time.

Not a single one had yielded any fruit.

"Have you not heard a word I've said all day?!" The brown haired chunin all but screamed at Anko, his bloodshot eyes growing just a bit crazier. "I have never done anything against the Village! I have never met any informants or whatever you are accusing me of! I've never even had the thought of betraying the Leaf!" The man was practically foaming at the mouth now as he charged toward a random wall and pounded on it violently, uncaring for how his knuckles splis and blood dribbled down his fist. "How the hell can I be a spy?!"

On the other side of the wall, Shio shook his head in disappointment as he watched the man experience a mental breakdown. It wasn't the first time; over the past three days, he had watched all of Sasori's plants ultimately devolve into this very state regardless of the approach they took, the only difference being how long it took for each person to crack.

With a sigh, he tapped the earpiece attached to his headset. "Put him down Anko; I'll let Yamanaka-san know to get his people ready. We'll start things bright and early tomorrow."

In the room, Anko sighed as she drew a kunai and prepared to knock the man down only to pause when she noticed that he had gone deathly still.

"Maybe we've caught a break after-"

"Hello Anko-chan." Faster than many shinobi could blink, she was in front of the raven haired chunin, the bladed edge of her kunai digging into his throat. "Not the welcome I was expecting from you."

"What the hell are you doing here?" She snarled, the only thing holding her back from simply carving his neck up being the fact that this wasn't Orochimaru. Not really.

"Well, for one thing, I'm wondering how you picked up on the fact that Kaizuki-kun has been a mole. Could myold home be wising up to my tricks, I wonder?"

"You just have shit luck as usual." She sneered venomously. "Your little bitch wasn't just a spy for you, he was also selling secrets to the Akatsuki and Iwa."

It was a carefully engineered lie; taking truths and mixing them with falsehoods to ensure that her old sensei would remain in the dark as to how much Konoha knew about his operations.

"Well, well… who knew little Kanzuki would end up being such a traitor?" A jolt of lightning ran through the 'borrowed' body, drawing his attention to the irate kunoichi before him. "Now now, Anko-chan, push too far and you'll lose any intel Kaizuki's got prowling around in his noggin."

"Talk."

"Alright then, you've always been a very down-to-business kind of girl." He sighed in a faux-saddened tone. "Well, please let Uzumaki-kun know that Sasuke-kun is ready to finish what he started at the Valley of the End. He's interested in a Team Seven reunion, too, so he would like to see little Sakura as well. Of course, seeing as three's already a crowd, no one else is allowed on this little excursion. Have them head over to the Valley; they'll get the exact time and address of this little soiree there." He stepped back and took a low, mocking bow. "But hurry. This little window will shut itself in six hours and they'll have to wait for years until they get this kind of opportunity."

And with that, Kaizuki's body dropped to the ground like a sack.

‹‹‡››

*- Shio means salt and is a little joke I tossed in for the members of the cryptanalysis department: their official codenames all have something to do with food. After all, who cooks meat (the ANBU codenames are animals after all) without spices? Sorry; just a random blurb kinda thing XD

*- Regarding the population thing: before you tell me that they can just grow houses please remember that the reconstruction after the Pein arc occurred on a barren area of land. In the aftermath of the Invasion, where the destruction was sporadic and individuals whose homes remained intact wouldn't have wanted their property touched, full scale reconstruction like that wouldn't have been possible with all the infrastructure still lying about.

*- Jiraiya, being the seal master, did the actual work on the seal. Kakashi simply provided access to a working sharingan and Inoichi bridged their minds so that Jiraiya could see what Kakashi did. The seal itself is basically a glorified filter like an infrared filter on a pair of binoculars, this allows the wielder to see the world through a 'sharingan' filter.' In my head, a byakugan sees chakra within the individual as tenketsu, reserves and pathways. A sharingan sees the flow of chakra both within and outside a body. It would explain why they can copy techniques: because they see how the chakra flows to create the technique where the byakugan only sees the burst of chakra usage instead.

So, if it wasn't obvious, this takes place three days after the last chapter and a few more secrets are revealed including Tsunade now getting to know what Shizune's been hiding.

Also: the challenge has been given and the gauntlet has been thrown down: the inevitable Naruto v Sasuke fight is upon us!

We'll have to see how that plays out in the coming chapters.

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