He completed his missions quietly. It was best he never took credit for anything. On his off time, he stayed in the small, cramped room the Kazekage had so generously offered him. While he worked well with his partner, he never once tried to get to know her. The Kazekage had not yet given him any other squad members, and the one he had did not seem to enjoy his company. He never ate with the other black ops' member, and never went outside without a mask.

Even he knew how poor an idea it was to show his face outside of Konoha.

Only one more year, and I'll be an agent of another country.

Three sharp knocks rapped on his door, dragging Sasuke out of his thoughts. He stood up and walked cautiously towards the door. No voices could be heard outside. Likely his teammate. He rarely had time off, for the Kazekage was running him into the ground with sensitive operation after sensitive operation. Sasuke never complained, he simply gritted his teeth and bore it. He had put himself through worse.

Sasuke opened the door, his mask secured around his face. His partner stood at the door. Her stance was hesitant, her breath not quite composed. Perhaps they had not been assigned another mission yet.

"May I come in?" She asked quietly. She seemed to by trying to control some unruly body language, possibly a nervous tick of some sort.

Sasuke nodded silently and stood aside to allow her entrance. She stepped forward mechanically, turning around and sitting at the foot of his small bed.

"You only have a year left in service, Sasuke-san," she began. He was surprised she even addressed him by his given name. She never really seemed to warm up to him. "You know what this is about.

Everything clicked into place. He did.

"I do."

"Take off your mask, please," she requested, already reaching up to remove hers. Sasuke did as she asked, staring into her eyes. It had not occurred to him in a while that he had never seen her face before. She was much softer and more feminine than he would have guessed. Her round, brown eyes complimented her mousy nose and soft lips. There was a small scar across her forehead that marred otherwise smooth skin. All in all, she was rather attractive.

This might have been why she was his only partner.

"Your eyes are interesting," she told him.

"They were gifts."

"So I heard."

They fell into silence once more.

"I was informed of your trial, and of its verdict. In truth, I was not thrilled to be chosen as the bearer for an Uchiha, especially after what havoc you, Madara and Tobi wreaked. You ended a lot of lives in that war, and you nearly killed my Kazekage," she admitted. He nodded softly. Sasuke made no effort to defend himself. He knew what he had done.

"However, this past year has caused me to…reevaluate my opinions," she murmured, looking away from him and drawing in on yourself slightly. "You are a good comrade. You knew I did not like you, did not trust you, but you worked with me without complaint. I would not have survived half of our missions had you not been by my side. You have been honestly trying to atone for your past, and I appreciate that. I am…proud to work alongside you, Sasuke-san," she finished with a small, honest smile.

He looked back into her eyes impassively. "Your ability to forgive me speaks of your character or your foolishness. I have not decided which."

"Perhaps both."

Sasuke cracked a smile. "Perhaps."

She dragged him gently down onto his modest bed, laying alongside him. He could smell the perfume she wore much more clearly. A light dusting of lavender and honey, mixed with something that his nose could not identify but the blood rushing to his lower regions informed him that it was most likely an aphrodisiac.

"You would be willing to do this with me, knowing I am a married man? Knowing I could not take care of our child? I may not see them for the first decade of their lives, if at all," he whispered to her. It took every bit of self-control he had to keep his voice from breaking.

"I would," she answered without hesitation. "You are sacrificing your marriage and your freedom to appease countries that hold no loyalty to you. If I could not sacrifice at least my body, what kind of shinobi would I be?"

Sasuke gulped, trying to hold back the tidal wave of emotions that attempted to push past his emotional walls now more than ever. Confliction ruled his mind, and he hated that his iron-clad control was slipping now of all times.

"I promise…I will come back. For our child. They deserve better than what I can give them. They deserve a proper father. I will…" Sasuke choked. "I'll rebuild one of the old compounds. The Uchiha will all be family. I will not make the same mistakes my family did." The tears threatened to break through, but Sasuke held them back. His children were not born yet, were not conceived yet. He did not deserve to weep for them yet.

"I'm sure you will make a wonderful father," his partner whispered in his ear, her hot breath making him shiver with pleasure.

"Thank you, Weasel."

"Please," she leaned in to kiss him. "Call me Matsuri."

Sasuke was learning very quickly how inexperienced a teacher he was.

He had led strike teams, raided bases, performed assassinations on multiple S-rank shinobi (his brother not least among them), and was an accomplished black ops commander.

None of these skills translated to teaching children.

"Shin, you have to coat your entire respiratory system with chakra to make sure you don't burn out your mouth or throat when you make the fireball."

"That's what I'm doing!" Shin whined at him, annoyed at both her lack of sudden progress and the burn marks that likely coated her throat.

"Then how are you still—" Sasuke stopped himself before he lost his temper entirely. He was realizing he had about as little patience with his students' progress as he did with his own when he was younger.

He took a breath and calmed himself. "Alright, I want you to do it again for me. I'll watch with my Sharingan so I can see what you're doing wrong." Sasuke's right eye warped into the familiar crimson pattern as he stepped back once more. "Go."

What he found was interesting. Shin was forming the hand seals, and then wrapping regular chakra around the fireball forming in his lungs, and then sending it all up her throat and out of her mouth. It was not the worst idea Sasuke had seen, and it might actually end up a little more chakra-efficient than the standard way, but Shin's protective chakra barrier wasn't strong enough, and ended up dissolving too fast and burned her mouth.

"I see. Shin, you have to coat your entire respiratory system with chakra just before or as you form the fireball. Doing it before takes longer, but it's safer. You're coating the fireball in chakra, so you end up having the fireball fighting against the barrier and burning it away," he lectured as gently as he thought he could manage.

He really wasn't prepared to be a teacher.

Sai had taken to the jutsu far faster than her sister had and had grasped the basics within minutes. Her chakra reserves were rather low, however, especially for someone that had legitimate black ops training. He would have her work on that.

Sasuke turned back to the older sibling, who was still having trouble with the jutsu. She was no longer burning herself, but could now barely achieve more than an ember, if anything at all. It was as if she was only half-forming the flame in her lungs, like shaking around a stray bit of burning ash in a can.

Sasuke studied the silver-haired girl, unsure on exactly why her flame was much worse than before. Maybe she wasn't putting enough chakra into it? She didn't seem to be petering out just yet. He stared deeper. The lungs and respiratory pathway were properly sealed with chakra, so she had that part correct, but her flame was so much weaker than before.

He had her run the drill a few more times, watching her chakra closely to see if he could discern the cause of her suddenly weaker flames, after a few more botched attempts, he saw something.

Shin grew increasingly more frustrated with her newfound setback, and finally lashed out with her chakra. The flame developing in her lungs grew exponentially in size, almost enough to be a real fireball, but her chakra insulation faltered, and she ended up coughing up the fire messily as she nearly scorched her lungs and throat.

He was upon her in a second, using both medical and water jutsu to cool down and heal her throat before anything scarred. She coughed up the water, desperately heaving for air, but he had to heal her before she could breathe properly.

"Stop breathing for a minute, you're making it worse. Let me heal the worst of it, then you can breathe again. You can't give the fire more oxygen, you'll only hurt yourself more," he murmured to her as he methodically fixed the damage she had done to herself. Once he saw no more major damage in her lungs, he stepped back and let her breathe.

She inhaled greedily, taking deep, gasping breaths to compensate for the minute or two she had to hold it.

"You're—you're okay," Sasuke told her hesitantly, out of his depth once again. "You'll be okay."

Thinking of how his mother would act often helped.

Once she had subsided, he quickly called it a day for both of them and forbade both of them from practicing jutsu for the rest of the day, to their vehement protest. However, they agreed to follow his orders, so they quickly found other ways to occupy their time, namely art.

Sasuke rested his eyes as he lay in the large hotel bed, content to listen to the soft sounds of calligraphy brushes dancing lightly over paper while he casually sensed the various people of the city mill about their day. He had always found it amazing what he could see once he bothered to look through a different lens than his doujutsu. The ability to understand what exactly people were doing in a three-hundred-and-sixty-degree range was an ability he took for granted when he was relying on Karin to track their targets, but once he managed to look past his own arrogance and sympathize with his chakra, what he found had astounded him.

It was humbling how small he was compared to the will of the living planet.

Multiple chakra signatures around the city suddenly shifted, stepping out of the comfortable patterns Sasuke was just viewing prior, as if given a sudden order.

As if given a target.

Sasuke opened his eyes. "We've got action, girls. Seems they found us."

Sai and Shin snapped to attention, their tanto held at the ready. "Hai!"

"Weapons down," Sasuke barked quietly. "If we planned to fight, we'd already be running. Other villages' spies are already having a field day because of ROOT, I can guarantee that secret is already out. We try running and every village will have us at the top of their to-do list in a day. We go in quietly, see what they want. If negotiations fail, then we wait for things to die down before we break out."

The sisters glanced at each other, unsure, before they hesitantly sheathed their weapons. They did not sit back down. He knew they would be unwilling to be in such a vulnerable position when possible hostiles were converging upon them.

Sasuke understood the feeling.

Within minutes, ANBU had surrounded the hotel, ready to breach his room.

Two by the door, two just outside the hotel entrance, four on the roof and four more in a loose perimeter around the block. Effective.

He could still make it out, but there would be a manhunt after him. He couldn't have information spreading too fast. He needed to be off the Akatsuki's radar, make them think he was still laying low after his fight.

If memory served him well, ANBU would only wait about a minute before the two breached the door, just enough time to coordinate with their commanding officer and talk timing and contingencies. If he wanted to put them on the back foot, he would need to act fast.

Victory without combat was not one of his specialties, but he would make do.

Sasuke crept up to the door silently, using as little chakra as he could to muffle his footsteps while still maintaining plausible deniability against any chakra sensors.

He held out a hand to his two charges, signaling them to stay put. Both children looked ready to jump into the fray on his behalf, but a sharp look from Sasuke stayed them both. He had to approach this carefully; maintain the upper hand without causing a fight. If they were to apprehend him, they would apprehend him on his terms.

Just before the two ANBU agents began to move, Sasuke swung open the door, giving the two his best impression of his mother's sternest glare.

"Excuse me, could you please keep it down? You're disturbing the children," he hissed as politely as he could before closing the door. The black ops agents had not even attempted to stop him. Sasuke allowed a small smile to come to his face. He hadn't messed with anyone like that in ages.

Perhaps he could see why Naruto enjoyed his pranks, just a bit.

Sasuke counted in his head how long it took for the agents to bust down the door as he walked over to one of the hotel chairs and sat down slowly. He gestured silently for the two girls to sit down on the edge of the bed, staring at the still-closed door as his charges complied.

…Eight...nine….

The two ANBU burst through the door with kunai bared like fangs, only to falter once more upon seeing the room's occupants all sitting peacefully. A slight twitch of the crane-masked kunoichi's head told Sasuke she was likely communicating with the bull-masked woman through the seals in their masks, or possibly talking to whoever was in charge of this operation. He needed to seize control of the situation quickly.

"You're here to apprehend us, correct?" he asked them. Their heads turned towards him slightly and Crane seemed to lift herself out of her hostile stance to answer him. Sasuke didn't give her the chance. "We will come peacefully, but we will not come in handcuffs. I need to speak with Hokage-sama."

"And why would we let you speak to her?" Crane responded challengingly, crossing her arms just under her modest bosom and jutting her hip out to one side.

Seems she still underestimates me. Best if I let her, I don't want to give them any substantial information to work with right now.

"Because Hokage-sama will wish to speak with me," he retorted confidently, his tone leaving no doubt.

The two agents glanced at each other for a few seconds, likely discussing it among themselves, before Bull turned and likely called the commander of the mission and filled them in on the details while Crane stepped forwards and sheathed her knives.

"Fine. You want your meeting? It'll be in a cell," she bit out. "The kids too, we know they're trained."

Damn.

It wasn't quite what he was aiming for, but he would have to make it work.

"I assume you kids know standard procedure for this?" Crane asked Sai and Shin. Both nodded quietly and exposed the sides of their necks for the ABNU to tag them with blindness seals, which Crane applied gingerly before moving over to him.

Sasuke held out his nape languidly, even now playing a dangerous game of shinobi politics against the agents. Every action he took was to show that he was the one in control, not them. Once the seal was applied and blindness overtook him, he snorted quietly, almost amused with his situation.

Blinded twice in a day. What are the odds?

He really needed to stop getting so involved in things.

ANBU really didn't operate all too differently from ROOT, Sasuke supposed. Another blind trip to another secret dungeon to meet another shinobi commander made for a rather monotonous day. Nonetheless, his pride refused to let him show any signs of impatience.

The blindness seal was only taken off once he was seated in a drab, concrete interrogation room in God knows where. The desk before him was an inexpensive treated wood, likely bolted to the ground if Sasuke remembered correctly. Impossible for anyone to use it as a weapon without the other party knowing. The chairs were the same, and rather uncomfortable to sit in.

He hoped they were treating the kids a little better than this.

Sasuke waited patiently for whoever was interrogating him to arrive. He knew Konoha's black ops playbook inside and out, they would send either a T&I specialist, a Yamanaka, or some ANBU operative to interrogate him, possibly some combination of any of the above. Meanwhile an ANBU captain and maybe the Yamanaka clan head would be observing him from behind the one-way window if he was deemed important enough.

If he was deemed seriously important, then the Hokage herself might be sitting behind that window. He doubted it, though. Busted black ops organization or not, they would underestimate him for being a man. They would take the illicit ROOT operatives' words with a heaping helping of salt; at most, they would think he was in some kind of henge or other disguise.

It would take him a bit longer to set up any kind of meeting with the big boss, but he had planned on that.

The door swung open, and Sasuke's visible eye widened sharply.

A lithe blond woman wearing a white and red haori over the standard Kohona military uniform walked in, raking a hand through her wild golden mane. Her small, gentle smile did nothing to soften her piercing blue eyes currently sizing him up as she sat down.

"I heard you wished to speak to me," the Yondaime Hokage said softly.

Of all the people he was expecting, Namikaze Minato was not one of them.

Sasuke forced himself to regain his composure. He couldn't afford to show weakness to the Hokage off the bat, but most of his plans were now out the window. He would have to negotiate on the fly now.

"I didn't expect to meet face-to-face so soon, Hokage-sama," he responded as coolly as he could.

"When I'm told that a man has busted an illegal black-ops organization that has been hiding under my nose, I think it is within reason to thank him myself," she responded almost kindly.

He could hear the words she did not say: to see whether or not he is a threat to Konoha.

"I assume you were told who was running it?" Sasuke asked her. She nodded gravely.

"If I knew Shimura Danzou was running something like this earlier, I would have made sure his organization was burned to the ground," the Hokage answered coldly, her eyes hardening to shards of ice.

Sasuke snorted derisively. "And how many civilians would have died in the process? Danzou would not have given up her power so easily. You would have your streets run red before you ever got close to her. She had agents in every sect of your military. She would have seen you coming."

"War is never without casualties," she responded calmly. The woman was no longer smiling.

"No, it is not," Sasuke responded mildly, giving her a small, wan smile. "But the point is moot now. How is the cleanup going?"

"It might go faster if we knew where Danzou's body was. If it still exists at all," Namikaze drawled.

"It does not," he confirmed. "She had some kind of four directions seal on a dead man's switch." The Hokage gave him a funny look, and he realized that colloquialisms might also be different in this world, given the different social dynamics. "I was lucky to be out of the blast radius when it detonated. It collapsed everything into some kind of hole in space."

Hopefully, she wouldn't put too much thought into the slip-up. Local turns of phrase were often what made or broke spies.

Sasuke glanced at the reflection of the shiny cement wall, thinking of who was on the other side of the one-way window behind him.

If the Hokage is asking me the questions herself, then she probably has a two-to-three man—er, woman—team backing her up. Probably communicating mentally with one of them via a seal or Yamanaka jutsu. A Yamanaka is probably leading the support team, with an ANBU captain and Torture and Interrogation specialist there to watch for any suspicious body language. I can't lie outright, either, I'll have to word everything I say carefully.

"Just to be clear, you are the one that killed Shimura Danzou, correct?" Minato asked blithely, disguising her confirmation as a baseline for the Yamanaka's lie detector technique.

Clever.

"Yes."

Minato was now very interested.

"Danzou may have been old, but she was no slouch. She was one of the most cunning people I ever knew," the blonde admitted, a mild grimace stretching across her face despite herself. "So, how'd you kill her?"

"I thought the Hokage would be less blunt with her questions," he shot back just to rile her a bit.

Minato snorted. "I thought someone who willingly turned themselves in specifically to speak with me would actually want to speak with me."

Sasuke shrugged. She had him there.

"She underestimated me. Let down her guard. I took my chance."

"So you did," she smiled humorlessly. "And why were you meeting with Shimura Danzou in the dead of night, exactly?"

"She wanted to meet with me."

"About?" she pried further.

"She made an offer to join her," Sasuke shrugged again. "I suppose she thought my genes would be useful."

"And then you killed her? Just like that?"

He nodded.

"What made you want to kill her? You weren't raised in the village here, so I can't see what kind of motivation you had."

"You know my name, I assume?" Sasuke asked her. Minato nodded cautiously in response, and he leaned in slowly, his visible eye boring into hers.

"Shimura Danzo killed my family."

Sasuke smiled mirthlessly at the shock that flit across the blonde's face. Silence stretched between the two for a bit. Minato was likely communicating with her Yamanaka friend, who could almost certainly tell if he was lying, but without uninterrupted line of sight, would not be able to invade his memories directly. Whether they really believed him came down to if they noticed he said Danzo and not Danzou, and if they believed the minor difference to be significant.

"I see," she finally breathed. "Why did she kill them?"

Sasuke exhaled lightly. "Shimura thought my family was planning to overthrow Konoha, establish the Uchiha as the ruling clan. I believe Shimura thought us Madara's heirs."

"Were they?"

He shrugged, uncaring. "I was seven when my family was murdered. I was not kept up to date on family politics. Even if they had, though, we were small in number. We would have only succeeded in our own demise. I would like to think the cooler heads in my family would have prevailed."

More silence. Minato's fingertips drummed on the table, tapping a steady rhythm.

"How did you survive?" She finally asked him.

"My older brother. If not for his actions, I would have died that night."

She smiled slightly. Sasuke knew little of the Hokage's family, but he was glad to see she valued it.

"Commendable. Is he still alive?"

"No."

Minato's smile faded once again.

"I'm truly sorry for your loss," she told him solemnly.

Sasuke smiled once more, a dry twinkle in his visible eye.

"You know, I think I've moved past it."

Minato did not snort, though he could tell she wanted to. Silence stretched a bit longer, only interrupted by the tap of her foot.

First fingers, then her foot, is she restless or sending a code? It's nothing I recognize, and I can't think of who she would send a code to, given she has mental communication ongoing with her team.

He would dwell on it later.

Her eyes met his once more.

"Guard down or not, I don't believe Danzou would have died to a man that she was maintaining eye contact with. Not only that, but the report I received stated that you single-handedly fought off an entire platoon of trained black ops assassins alone. Forgive me if I say it all sounds a bit suspicious," she stared him down seriously.

"You think I wasn't working alone." It was not a question.

"I think you're covering for someone else, yes."

Sasuke stared right back.

"I acted entirely alone. The only assistance I received in killing Shimura came from the agents that escorted me to her, on her orders."

Minato froze. Her eyes flickered to the right—no longer staring at him, but into the mirror. The whole team was probably having a meltdown trying to figure out how he pulled it off.

He had to say, it was pretty funny.

The Hokage forced her shoulders to relax. She stared him down once more. He did his best to keep his face neutral, but the enjoyment of running circles around an interrogation team was getting to him. A small smile broke past his uninterested façade, just for a moment.

Dammit.

"What do you want?" Namikaze asked him after another bout of silence. Sasuke let himself smile this time.

"I was afraid you'd never catch on," he taunted lightly.

"You certainly gave us the runaround," Minato smiled back politely. It did not reach her eyes.

"Then I'll cut to the chase," Sasuke replied. "I could be an incredibly valuable asset to your village. I'm entirely willing to become a citizen of Konohagakure, but I have conditions for my allegiance."

"I'll hear you out," she gestured for him to continue.

"I keep the two kids you brought in with me. We made a deal before you found us, I intend to honor it."

"And that deal was?"

"They help get me out of Danzou's labyrinth, I keep them by my side. If necessary, I'm willing to adopt them," Sasuke answered her seriously.

"Agreeable, but I want you all surveilled by ANBU for six months, and I want them in therapy twice a week."

"Done," he agreed. Keep only one team on us. The team you trust the most. I'm sure I'll be revealing things that I want as few people as possible to know, for all our sakes."

"Fine. Your other conditions?"

"I need to be free to come and go as I please. I understand I am not trusted, but I'm working on something extremely important, and if I'm hindered, it will only make my problems worse. For both of us."

"Absolutely not. You'll stay in the village for six months or until my ANBU deem you trustworthy, whichever comes last," she rejected sharply, her eyes narrowing at him.

"This is non-negotiable. Refuse this and I leave," Sasuke bit back.

"Then you'll be enjoying Konoha from a cell," the Hokage countered.

"You could try," he snorted.

"You truly believe you could escape from me?"

"I don't have to."

"I've never met such an arrogant man in my life," Minato smirked.

"Shimura thought so as well."

Her smirk vanished. She pursed her lips in thought.

"I'll consider it, but I want to know exactly how you killed Danzou and fought off her agents first."

"I'm willing to agree, but on one extra condition."

"What?" she bit out. Sasuke could tell he was trying her patience.

He never was the best negotiator.

"Keep your Yamanaka out of my head. All of them. I catch one trying, I'm gone."

Minato hesitated. She clearly wasn't expecting that to be a condition. Perhaps she was banking on him not knowing about them? Using them as a secret weapon against him, to dig up all his dirty secrets?

"What's stopping me from bringing them in and ripping through your head now?" she challenged.

"They will not survive long enough to tell you anything," he told her flatly.

Minato bristled, just for a second. "Fine. You tell me everything, I won't bring in the Yamanaka."

He smiled. Sasuke knew she would never agree to his second condition without some kind of proof. He would have to lay his chips down on the table, but he wasn't about to commit to anything while the woman across from him had a platoon of mind walkers at her disposal. He needed them out of the picture.

"When you asked me about my family, I answered under the assumption that you were asking if we were planning a coup, not if we were Madara's heirs. Was I correct in my assumption?" Sasuke asked her, seemingly out of the blue.

"I was purposefully vague. I wanted to see which question you were less willing to answer," she replied with a small, victorious smile.

Sasuke was taken aback, startled. He certainly had not expected her to be so crafty.

She got one over on me. I let too much information slip at once. I still have more to learn.

"I suppose I was," he drawled cautiously. "And you presume correctly. My family were the heirs of Uchiha Madara. I am the heir of Uchiha Madara."

"That does not tell me how you killed Danzou."

Sasuke activated his right eye, letting it lazily spin into the Mangekyou Sharingan.

"It should."