AN: Whoops! This has been 90% complete for months now, but I lost my writing groove for a bit and decided to just let myself get other things out of my system. I feel more settled now though, so back to my fanfic grind (for now, smh). Thank you for all the support!
When Senju Tsunade walked through the gates of Konohagakure, she expected many things.
She expected the tumultuous tumble of emotions that clawed at her insides and made her question why the hell she would ever return to this cursed village. She expected the abject shock that she received from the guards at the gate; two chūnin she didn't know the names of but who evidently knew her. She even expected the welcoming party – if you could call it that – that awaited her in Kushina's office.
She didn't expect to be smiling.
Maybe it was the proud, overjoyed smile that hadn't left Kushina's face in literal hours. Or the subtle shine in Shizune's eyes as she craned her head, trying to take everything in once they passed the village gates. Honestly, the sight sour, disbelieving expressions on Hiruzen-sensei's old teammates' faces were enough to power Tsunade's soul for months.
She was greatly looking forward to seeing Jiraiya's reaction, the next time he came back.
Once all the formalities had been attended to – reinstating Tsunade as an active Konoha shinobi, handing control of the hospital over to her, organising an assessment of Shizune's kunoichi and medical skills, etc – Tsunade excused herself and her apprentice from the Hokage Tower. Kushina waved her off with eyes full of understanding and an arm full of baby.
Tsunade pondered that as she led Shizune through the streets of Konoha. Her only experience with children were Nawaki and Shizune; although she had experience with helping to raise one from infanthood, Nawaki hadn't been solely her responsibility. Kushina had taken a gigantic load on her shoulders when she agreed to be Hokage on top of being a single mother to a new-born jinchūriki.
That Uchiha woman seemed to be pretty solid as an aide though. And her presence evidently displeased the Elders, so Tsunade wholeheartedly approved of her.
"Tsunade-sama?" Shizune piped up hesitantly. "Where are we going?"
Tsunade placed a gentle hand on the girl's head, feeling her throat tighten. "I thought-" she coughed, turning her head to the sky so that no water would escape her eyes. "I thought we might go and say hello to your uncle. And then, I wanted to introduce you to my brother. If you don't mind."
One small hand reached up to grip the one in Shizune's hair, squeezing tightly. "Of course, Tsunade-sama. I would be honoured."
The Sannin squeezed back, pretending not to notice the wetness of her apprentice's voice.
"Mou, Kushina-chan! I'm so glad you're back; never do that again!"
Kushina laughed, holding Naruto in her arms and watching her friend glare down at her with hands on hips. "Did they give you that hard of a time, Miko-chan?"
'They', obviously, being the Advisory Council.
"Oh, they were about as awful as expected," Mikoto said, delicate features twisted in a fearsome scowl. "They're just lucky that Shikaku-san was around to make sure I didn't kill them in their sleep."
Off to the side, Kakashi choked on a startled cough. Kushina just laughed harder; she'd had half-formed fantasies about coming back to find that Mikoto had solved that particular problem for her. It was a shame that she hadn't actually gone through with it, but probably for the best. Mikoto had far more important things to be doing than rotting in jail, or being executed for treason.
"We'll have to send Yoshino-san a gift, Miko-chan," Kushina said, eyes sparkling. "For lending us her husband in such a trying time."
Mikoto finally let the darkness slide from her face as she giggled. "I suppose we should. I did keep him here far past baby Shikamaru's bedtime."
That decided, the two women spent the next few hours catching each other up on the happenings of the past few days. Kushina rather thought that she'd caught the short end of the stick; while Mikoto got an epic tale of the quest for and battle against Senju Tsunade, Kushina got rants about paperwork and 'interfering old bastards coming in here and distracting me, Kushina-chan, it's like they want this village to crumble into nothing!'.
Also paperwork of her own; Kushina sent a silent commiseration out to Minato, who had taken the Hokage position at the end of a war. He understood her pain.
Just as she was about to throw down her pen and call it a day (even though she was barely halfway done), the door opened and the smell of something warm and delicious pervaded the room.
"Here, Kushina-nee-sama, Uchiha-san. Lunch."
"Kakashi-kun. Kakashi-kun, you're a blessing." Kushina looked solemnly up at the teenager placing bowls of takeout ramen on her desk. The tips of his ears turned red.
"It's nothing," he muttered. "I just thought you could use a break."
Kushina fiercely wished Minato could see his student now. Her husband had worried greatly about Kakashi after what happened with poor Rin-chan; his decision to allow Kakashi to join ANBU had tormented him daily. It'd been bad for awhile, with Kakashi taking mission after mission, working himself to the bone no matter what Kushina or Minato said. But then Minato had passed away.
And his last remaining student had been at Kushina's (and Naruto's) side ever since.
He looked healthier, Kushina thought. Despite the fact that Kakashi was once again grieving for somebody that he cared deeply about, he also looked a lot lighter than he had in a long while. Maybe it was because he was no longer drowning in the blood and darkness of ANBU, or maybe it was because of his proximity to Naruto's sweet, sunshiny self, but Kakashi's skin had regained some colour, he'd put some weight on, and just… his entire demeanour had changed.
Minato would have been so happy. He would've been so proud.
But since he couldn't – Kushina was more than happy to show it in his place.
"Ne, 'Kashi-kun," she looked up from her bowl of noodles, quickly slurping up her mouthful. "Remember what I said yesterday?"
Kakashi, who'd gone back to lurking in the corner like he was her actual ANBU guard, sighed. "You said a lot of things yesterday, Kushina-nee-sama."
She had, hadn't she. She'd meant all of them too. For now, though-
"I meant about the water dragon. Do you wanna learn it?"
The answer was obvious.
Deep beneath the surface of the village, Shimura Danzō was fuming.
Never in a million years did he think that Uzumaki would be able to pull it off, and definitely not on the first try. The Slug Sannin hadn't stepped foot in Konohagakure for years. What the hell had Uzumaki Kushina done to bring her back?
Neither woman had given it away when they returned; he would have to wait for his own agents to report back.
The Sannin's return was a blow to Danzō in two ways: first, the woman herself was a menace. Senju Tsunade held a lot of sway in the village, and, the two of them never having quite seen eye to eye, she was almost always of the opposite side of whatever argument he was having. Her strong will and forceful personality had made her a thorn in Danzō's side right from the word go.
Secondly, the fact that Uzumaki had succeeded in bringing Tsunade back had made quite an impact on Homura and Koharu. The two of them were, nine times out of ten, on the same page as each other, and generally made decisions together. If they decided to start supporting the Godaime, that would leave Danzō alone in his manoeuvring. Not only that, it would give Uzumaki two people in her camp with more insight into ROOT than anybody else alive.
They had nowhere close to the full picture, of course. But anything they did know, Danzō didn't want them passing it on to Uzumaki.
There was a knock at the door.
"Come."
A lone shinobi walked in. He was very unassuming; wearing standard shinobi attire, light brown hair cut close to his head, and a tanto strapped to his back. In fact, the only interesting thing about him at all was the white ANBU mask covering his face.
"Danzō-sama." The man dropped to one knee, head bowed.
"Report."
"The Sannin Tsunade challenged Uzumaki Kushina to a battle," the ROOT agent started, voice completely lacking inflection. "Wherein the Godaime was to take the Shodai's necklace from her possession. If she was able to do so, Tsunade would come back to the village."
Seeing as the blasted woman had indeed returned, Uzumaki had obviously succeeded.
"Give me all the details," Danzō ordered. He wanted to know just how the Habanero stacked up against one of the Densetsu no Sannin. "And then tell me what that Orochimaru's getting up to. He's been suspiciously quiet this past month."
Far away in the capital city of Kaminari no Kuni, Jiraiya had no idea that his wayward teammate had finally come home. He was completely focused on keeping atop the rumours flying around about the state of Konoha.
Currently, he was seated in a corner booth of a bar close to the Daimyo's palace. He'd been there almost all afternoon; flirting with the waitresses, writing his manuscript, and drinking his wallet dry. The staff didn't think his book would turn out any good at this rate, but what did they care, as long he kept buying drinks?
Jiraiya himself, who was hardly drunk at all, had actually given himself some genius plot bunnies for the erotic novel series he was planning on writing. He scribbled ideas down one after another, ordering drink after drink as a reward for his own brilliance.
Behind him, three shinobi were gossiping in low tones.
"Did you hear?" One asked, voice full of keen interest. "The Kyūbi no Yōko got loose in Konoha. Apparently their Hokage even died."
"No way!" Someone else laughed. "Wasn't their Kage called the God of Shinobi or something? We definitely would've heard by now if somebody that important had died. It's been weeks!" That person sounded decidedly young, to Jiraiya's experienced ears.
Another man, whose voice had the distinct rasp of a long-time smoker, clicked his tongue. "Keep up, Itsuki-kun. How could you forget about the Yellow Flash?"
"Oh. Oh!" The young one, Itsuki, sucked in a breath. "The Yellow Flash is dead?!"
Jiraiya's fingers clenched around his pen. Wherever he went, it was always the same. Amazement, awe, delight… For everybody outside of Konoha, it was like the passing of a demon.
"He sure is." That was the smoker, certain as the sunrise. "Got himself killed defeating the thing."
"The Yellow Flash defeated a bijū?!"
"God, can you get any louder?" The first speaker groused. "Yes, he did. And now he's dead, and I bet the Tsuchikage's never been happier."
Itsuki laughed. "Raikage-sama too!"
They weren't wrong. Jiraiya had been receiving reports of endless celebrations going on in Iwa from the moment the news broke. It was unfortunate, that information about the situation couldn't be contained, but there was just no way to realistically pull it off. Stories and rumours would always slip through the cracks; it was Jiraiya's job to keep on top of those rumours. If the Tsuchikage decided that now was the time to strike, to take revenge for the carnage that Minato had caused during the war, it was up to Jiraiya to get that information home before it was too late.
Thus far, he hadn't heard anything pointing to that, and he prayed desperately that it would stay that way.
The three Kumo shinobi didn't stay on the topic much longer. As they moved on to arguing about the strength of Kumo's current jōnin force, Jiraiya gulped down the last of his drink. He pushed back the long brown bangs that he sported in his current henge, hailing the very cute, very busty waitress for another cup. Tomorrow, Jiraiya would meet up with his spies from Kumogakure.
Tonight… tonight, he would try his luck at some international relations.
After being away from the village for so many years, Tsunade was surprised by how fast she reacclimated.
It'd barely been two weeks, and yet she already had the entirety of the hospital under her thumb (and was working on getting the civilian medical centres that way too). It was also incredibly gratifying to find that her pull in the village hadn't lessened in the least; not even when news of her haemophobia came to light. Standards appeared to have slipped some, but Tsunade was determined to bring everybody up to scratch in the shortest time possible.
Kushina had brought her back here for a reason, and by god, Tsunade was going to follow through.
She leaned back in her chair, recently installed in her fancy new office (pity how little she got to use it), casting a cool eye over the papers spread across the entirety of her desk. Come hell or high water, Konohagakure's shinobi forces were going to be the most medically savvy ninja on the damn continent.
"My my, do my eyes deceive me? Senju Tsunade, in the flesh?"
Maybe they weren't as close as they used to be. Maybe he had some creepy habits that needed to be smacked out of him. But Tsunade still found herself with a wry smile tugging at her lips at the sound of that voice.
"Orochimaru," she said, meeting his keen golden gaze. "It's been a while."
Her teammate slid into the room, closing the door softly behind himself. "I apologise for not coming by earlier," he said. "Had I known you were coming, I would have been waiting for you at the gates, bottle of sake at the ready."
Without her permission, the smile on her face turned fond. "I assumed you were buried in some new experiment or another. If you'd taken too long, I would have come to find you myself."
"That does bring back memories." Orochimaru laughed. "I'm told it was our dearest Godaime who convinced you to return, Tsunade. How on earth did she manage it, when neither Sensei nor Jiraiya could?"
Something in his face turned cold then, at the mention of Kushina, and it chilled Tsunade to her core. She couldn't explain it, didn't understand how or why- but all of a sudden, Tsunade understood that she was standing on the edge of a precipice. Her more ambitious teammate wore bitterness like a cloak, and seeing it made Tsunade mournful for their younger, more innocent days. She didn't know how far Orochimaru had strayed, wasn't sure if he was still capable of being saved. She didn't even know if she still had it in her to try.
Just another thing to add to her never-ending list of regrets.
AN: Welp, there we go! Y'all know the drill, thoughts always welcome!
- Kelly
