Chapter VI
A Dark Presentiment
True to her role as Hokage, Tsunade was busy filling out the paperwork that had piled up and never seemed to end, not to mention that the last month had been tiring, especially emotionally. With disinterest and weariness, she quickly read the documents of lesser importance before, yes or no, approving them. Even her disciple, Shizune, wasn't trying to push her to take her job more seriously given the circumstances.
In the corridor, the echo of running footsteps was heard and Godaime raised her head before the door opened wide; it was only then that the assistant imitated her. She recognized one of the breathless chūnins entering the room and she frowned, waiting for him to speak.
"Lady Tsunade!"
"What's going on?"
A brief silence, the time for the shinobi to regain control over his erratic breathing.
"It's… It's Uzumaki Naruto! He's back to the village!"
Tsunade got up from her chair and placed both palms heavily on the desk which caused a thud.
"What did you just say?!" she asked, raising her voice, almost screaming.
"He is currently in intensive care…"
"Lead the way," she ordered, cutting him off before waving at Shizune. "You come with me!"
The fiery-eyed man nodded and obeyed. In the race, all three took the road to the hospital. With a heavy and bruised heart, she couldn't believe it, almost expecting a vile joke from one of her ninjas. For a whole month, despite countless searches throughout the territory, nothing had been found, not the slightest clue. Regardless of the relief of knowing the young teenager alive, the worry was setting in. Several questions swirled in her mind, but the immediate remained the sapphire-eyed boy, the questions would be for later … at least, for now.
After a few minutes, they arrived at the building. Being a medical ninja herself, she knew where to go by heart and hurried through the intensive care unit. Quickly, she was greeted by one of the doctors who seemed to be waiting for her.
"Godaime, this way," said the young woman, telling Tsunade to follow her to the room where Naruto was.
She gave to the Hokage the health report so she could take a look at it—which she did. Passing through the doors, in spite of herself, her organ hammered her chest; at the sight of the boy, she had a bad feeling … but she could hardly understand why. Shizune, meanwhile, let out a breath of surprise.
Nevertheless, she approached the stretcher where Naruto lay and was about to be moved. Except for a cloth hiding his privacy, the medical team had removed everything to better examine him and provide care. His stomach wound had been bandaged, like the one on his right arm. He was on life support and a mask covered his face. IVs were installed in his forearms and electrodes were placed on his temples, chest and abdomen. In addition to these details which hardly alarmed Tsunade since he seemed stable, several elements gave rise to concern in her, similarly among the hospital service in charge of him. First of all, Naruto was just flesh and bone and he was excruciatingly thin. An almost oval diamond-shaped ebony mark in the form of a thin line with undulating fire like shapes above it adorned the centre top of his chest; to this, the presence of a tail of the same black, very long and thin with a bushy tip.
"What is that..?" she asked indirectly about the extra limb.
"It is a tail," replied the doctor, not at all serene. "But that's not all. After stabilizing him, we also saw that strange designs mark the entirety of his back, from the tail to the back of his skull."
Her words spoken, a nurse came to give Godaime a sheet; on it, a sketch on which the said marks had been drawn on the body of the teenager. Abstract and simple symbols, in a relatively mosaic-like composition, adorned his entire back which extended up his neck to get lost in the blonde mane; similar to tribal tattoos, spaces between the shapes were also present. Showing it somewhat crudely avoided having to move Naruto, always in a particularly precarious situation.
"We highly doubt those are simple tattoos…"
Fifth Hokage nodded to validate her thought. It was even stranger. Finding him seriously injured, perhaps, but like this? It was not part of her theories. At first glance, Naruto appeared to have been the subject of some experiment… Also, according to the report, besides having a somewhat alarmingly high fever above forty-five degrees and his body being relatively hot, he was as stable as if he had only a simple fever; this detail made her arch an eyebrow. On the surface, apart from the markings, the claws, his weight or the tail, everything was fine. However, that didn't rule out the possibility of a deeper issue… Her question was answered before it was asked:
"We've already drawn several tubes of blood for analysis," the doctor said.
"I see. You will tell the analysis directory that I will lead the operations myself…"
After leafing through the report and the sketch, she finally raised her head to look at the young woman.
"Dress him and put him in the observation room. His condition must be carefully monitored. If he wakes up or if there is any change, let me know immediately," Tsunade ordered before turning to her assistant to give her the said report.
Mechanically, Shizune took it to glance at it herself at the same time as following Tsunade who left the place with a determined step. In search of an explanation, she looked for the shinobis who had found Naruto to get answers to her questions tickling her, boiling her mind. Out of intensive care, they ran into Kotetsu and Izumo who approached her with a formal Hokage-style greeting.
"You are the ones who found Naruto?"
Both nodded.
"Affirmative," the two chūnins confirmed almost simultaneously.
"Where?" Tsunade asked, frowning.
The two exchanged a look, then Izumo decided to speak up:
"Actually, Naruto came back on his own. We were guarding the gates when we spotted him in the distance shortly before he collapsed to the ground."
A light in the nothingness gave hope.
"Lady Tsunade, since Naruto came back injured," Shizune elaborated. "Do you think he could...?"
"I think so," she guessed, crossing her arms. "We will be able to know more when he wakes up. He might be the key to solve all these mysteries. However…"
A silence, a wait and an unexplained fear.
"I don't know what experiments have been done on him… But all this does not bode well… We will discover more with the next exams."
"Indeed," her assistant said in a whisper, her head down.
Yet another silence.
"Shizune, make sure that the comings and goings in the hospital are strictly supervised and that no one from the outside enters the department where he is. If Naruto escaped, the enemy might try to recover him with similar techniques when kidnapping him. Likewise, assigns a special team ready to act if we are attacked."
"Understood!"
Tsunade swivelled towards the two shinobis.
"Return to your post and make sure no strangers enter. On further notice, Konohagakure is temporarily closing its doors."
As soon as she spoke her words, the Fifth Hokage turned on her heels to take over the analysis directory. Now alone, the two men sighed together; more exhausted and depressed about having to go back to their boring jobs.
"Looks like we can forget our holidays," Kotetsu quoted painfully.
