(A/N) Orochimaru! And the start of why they did not, infact, manage to go in and dismantle ROOT themselves for another 12 chapters. Can you tell I have the rest of this story planned out? Although for the record, I hadn't been informed of what they were planning with Orochimaru. This is the last chapter before November and Nanowrimo, so I won't be posting during then.
Kushina blinked up as Mito sighed heavily. "What's it now?"
"Danzo has deigned to inform us that Orochimaru's supposedly being suspicious.
Kushina puffed out her cheeks, getting up to also look at the paper Mito was making a valiant attempt to burn with her glare.
"You think he's trying to distract us?" Kushina wondered, scanning the paper, which was basically a long winded explanation of why Orochimaru was suspicious.
"Have you caught any sort of mention of Orochimaru before hand?" Mito asked in response. "I haven't caught any complaints about him before hand."
"I'll deal with him!" Kushina volunteered. She'd been getting antsy anyway. She needed some action! She'd been out of commission for long enough! Maybe she'd look into taking a mission or two if Mito was fine with being left with Naruto for the time it took her to finish them. Or maybe she'd have to wait until Naruto was older. Hm.
"Well alright. If you're going to confront him now, drop by the house to inform my original," Mito, who was a clone, reminded her.
"Of course!" Kushina chirped, bouncing out of the office.
"Excuse you, leave a clone for the paperwork, I will not do your stuff on top of mine."
"Oh yeah! Sorry Mito!" Kushina made a clone quickly, then turned and left again.
She'd seen Orochimaru going to the central stores around this time most days, mostly while she was out getting stuff with Naruto. As she was usually doing most of the shopping, being more familiar with the people of the village.
Kushina hummed cheerily to herself as she walked. It was always nice to get out of the tower once in a while. And not have Naruto on her back. She loved her son, she really did, but sometimes it was kind of nice to not have him.
It wasn't very difficult to find Orochimaru, he wasn't hiding his presence, and the snake sannin had a way of clearing out a crowd.
"Orochimaru! Just who I was looking for!" Kushina chirped, bouncing up to the snake sannin.
He inclined his head to her. "Hokage-sama. Did you require my presence for something?"
Kushina hummed. "Something like that! I need to clear a few things up, but we can finish your shopping before doing that."
Orochimaru inclined his head again. "I am not getting anything of any importance, merely taking a break from my experiments to check for any new shipments of my preferred tea."
"Oh cool," Kushina settled on. "This is not a conversation to be held in public, so a more private location would be best."
Orochimaru eyed her for a long moment, then nodded towards the side of the village she knew his house was. "My house is closest I believe."
"Wonderful!" Kushina chirped. "Onwards! We don't have all day!"
"Of course," Orochimaru agreed, falling into step a half step behind her. "You have paperwork, and I have experiments to monitor."
Kushna pouted. "Don't remind me of the paperwork."
"Apologies," Orochimaru sounded more amused than apologetic, but he always sounded amused, so Kushina left him to it.
They reached his house in short order, and Kushina settled down in the gestured seat while Orochimaru presumably went to make tea.
It was proven right a moment later when he came back with teacups. He set them down on the table, and settled in across from Kushina.
"What was this about?" Orochimaru requested mildly. "It's a rare thing a Hokage adventures out of the tower."
"Eh, I was getting antsy anyway," Kushina shrugged. "This, like so many other fairly unpleasant things is Danzo's fault."
Orochimaru raised an eyebrow. "Danzo? What did he do that has to do with me?"
"He formulated a very detailed letter about why he's suspicious of you," Kushina said, deciding to just get on with it. "Very long-winded and boring."
The other eyebrow went up. "All of my experiments were either sanctioned by the Hokage, which ever one was in power at the time the experiment was formulated, or by the R&D department's head. I fail to see why that would be 'suspicious'."
"Can I see a list of your experiments and who agreed to them?" Kushina requested. She hadn't seen any requests from R&D, or from Orochimaru himself, and both of those were under her jurisdiction.
Orochimaru inclined his head, getting up and fetching a scroll from a book shelf. He offered it to Kushina. "I keep track of such things meticulously."
"I expected nothing less," Kushina agreed. She didn't know the snake sannin very well admittedly, but she knew enough of him to know that seemed like something he'd do. She took the scroll, and scanned through it.
She didn't recognize any of the ones that had her name on them. None has Mito's name on them, so whoever had told him that they'd okayed it had at least known that Mito wouldn't be seeing that kind of thing.
"Did you directly ask the R&D director about the ones he okayed?" Kushina asked quickly.
"Yes," Orochimaru replied promptly. "Often ones okayed by him were spawned in discussions between the two of us."
"Well those ones are clear then," Kushina mused. "I don't recognize any of these that say they have my signature of approval."
Orochimaru suddenly looked extremely annoyed. "Danzo had informed me you had agreed to each of those. Most were suggested by him."
"Which ones did you come up with," Kushina asked, spreading the scroll on the table after moving the teacups out of the way.
Orochimaru pointed to three different experiments. "These."
Those ones Kushina would agree too, the others, not so much. "Don't continue with any of the others. I approve those three now, but stop all of the others immediately. And don't listen to Danzo. And for the record I will see you personally should you wish for a new experiment to be added."
Orochimaru inclined his head, summoning several small snakes. They left immediately, and Kushina assumed they were being used as messengers. "The experiments will be stopped immediately. Should you require any further information, it appears I will be more free in the coming days."
"Wonderful," Kushina chirped. "I should be getting back to my office! Come if you think of anything else!"
Orochimaru inclined his head. "Of course, Hokage-sama."
(A/N) For the record, I was like 90% sure we'd be brutally maiming or murdering Orochimaru. I was not informed of his imminent reformation until I actually sat down(metaphorically) to write this chapter. Ah, the things I do for my characters. And the things Kushina does to me. I should've known this chapter would go off the rails honestly, haha.