Otogakure was a weird village, Inari thought to himself, but it was practical and underground, which reminded him of home, the quiet and peaceful Root headquarters. The cool smooth stone walls and artificial lights were on a daylight cycle from what he could tell, and there were clocks, lots of clocks to keep track of time.
Finally stopping after marching behind their guide, Guren, they arrived at a set of double doors. Sai and Inari moved to each door independently, giving a push to open the doors, they saw the Otokage. Orochimaru was sitting in his chair, long straight black hair almost making his white skin and yellow eyes glow.
"Danzō, how nice to see you. Have you finally decided to come visit me again?" Spoke a voice that felt almost like a snake slithering into your ear.
Orochimaru of the Sannin, also known as The Snake Sage, was famous for his mastery of many complex techniques and prowess in the scientific arts. That reputation was sullied, however, by the body snatching and rampant human experimentation.
"You know how hard it is to get out of Konoha. I can only stay for the minimum amount of time, Orochimaru." You could see the calculations pass behind Orochimaru's eyes, but ignoring the issue, he proceeded.
"You bring guests and don't even introduce me? I'm a little offended, I must say. Why don't you introduce me to your two little helpers? Then we'll move to the lab." Looking like the snake that caught the mouse, he put his elbows up on the table and folded his hands together. Resting his chin on the linked hands, he waited for Danzō to speak.
"These are my guards and Root shinobi in training. This one will also be getting some work done on him." Patting Inari on the head to indicate.
Humming in acknowledgement, Orochimaru stood up from his desk and walked towards the trio of Root shinobi, stopping in front of the two smaller, yet still lethal ones.
"My, my, what do we have here?" Taking a hand and wiping at Inaris face, ignoring the flinch upon contact. "Oh? Is this the Kaguya clansman you were telling me about Danzō?. And what about this one, he should have something remarkable about him to get your attention, no?"
Sighing at the rapid fire questions he responded before more could pile up. "Yes, this is Inari. He is from the Kaguya clan, no we do not know if he has their kekkai genkai. That is Sai, his partner and excellent fuinjutsu user, he has the ability to articulate his ink and no it isn't a kekkai genkai."
"I myself will be having you implement these into my body." Grabbing the bag on the ground, he threw it on the table and opened it. Inside was a container of a greenish fluid floating in it was the body of a dark haired male in a fetal position, clearly dead.
"This is Shisui Uchiha, he tried to infiltrate our base but as you can see, that didn't turn out so well for him. I'd like you to implant his Sharingan to replace the byakugan I have covered. Sadly, he destroyed the other eye. Anything that you have to make using Shisui's Sharingan such a hassle would be helpful as well."
"My, my hasn't someone been busy kukuku. I see no issues with this but I must ask, if that's what's in one bag, what's in the other then? Because in one bag you have the recent Uchiha prodigy, and in front of me you bring a possible fix to the illness one of my best servants have.
Grabbing the bag that Inari was holding, he flopped this one onto the table. "This came from some white man-like creature that all our sensors kept saying they would see occasionally. We could only get the top half as the other half was...lost in the wall we'll say?"
Orochimaru could only raise an eyebrow at the last part, but who was he to question the results? He might as well leave out the fact that that's where he got the cells to make Mokuton, after all, that's only one group who can hand those out.
"Have you tested it for anything? Any qualities that deem you bringing it to me? You know I don't like my time wasted Danzō."
Sighing at the long exchange, he continued explaining himself. "Yes, we have tested it, and we found it has high regenerative capabilities when attached to someone. And you can thank missing-nin volunteers for the experiments."
"And you want to replace your arm, your right arm with his? And have Shisui's Sharingan replace your Byakugan? Then let's get moving, we don't have all the time in the world." Standing from his chair, Orochimaru started leading the way, through the endless corridors and maze-like turns.
"My last request is that you try to see if Inari has the Shikotsumyaku and remove his whiskers from his face, they make him recognizable." Orochimaru only nodded at this last request. Clapping his hands together, a few masked assistants came by. Lifting the white plant man thing's top half onto a trolly and beside it hoisted Shisui's corpse with the still fresh signs of Danzō's wind jutsu.
Inari and Sai only stood on the sidelines watching this whole debacle, seeing Danzō turn to them and he gave their orders. "Sai, Inari, you two will listen and treat Orochimaru as you would me, but if any order conflicts with protecting me or Konoha, disregard it. Am I understood?" Seeing the pair of nods he turned to leave into the operating room.
Being guided away from your lifelong fighting partner might be a little distracting to some in life, but those in Root are trained to work as multi, duo or solo units. The awkwardness that Inari was feeling from this situation was the fact that there was another person on a table beside him, completely covered in tubes and seals.
The occasional groan was let out from the body beside him, reminding him that the body was indeed alive. The doors opening warned him of someone coming in, before they could see him.
"Ah, I suppose we haven't met fully yet, I'm Kabuto. I'm an apprentice under Orochimaru-sama, although I bet you already knew that."
"I did know that, your comrade Guren had given us a quick rundown on who to and not to talk to," recited Inari.
"Well it's not my business who Guren does and doesn't talk to, but she should watch what she says. Anyways that's enough of the formalities. You see that body beside you? Congrats you just met another one of the last members of the Kaguya clan. It's like a family reunion."
The enthusiasm that rolled off of the last part was readily apparent to Kabuto and anyone else within earshot. To Inari, he just thought that Kabuto was happy for him.
"Thank you, family doesn't mean much unless they're Danzō-sama but the thought counts."
If Inari had to be honest, it felt like he was just beside a corpse. Inari could smell things better than most of his Root brothers and sisters, but he doubted anyone else would struggle to smell all the drugs and chemicals pumping, just to keep his fellow clansman alive. Only thing that told him otherwise, again, were the moans of pain.
"What we're gonna be doing Inari-kun is seeing if you have Shikotsumyaku, hiding somewhere inside you. I have a few questions before we start, firstly have you ever broken a bone?" seeing a shake of the head, he continued on. "Have you ever had any weird bone growths? And lastly, any pain in your bones?"
"None of those seem applicable to me. Does he know how he activated it?" The look of annoyance that crossed Kabuto's face while unexpected wasn't surprising.
"Well, I suppose it is time I woke him up, just don't expect a lot. He can't really do much right now."
The amount of switches, buttons, and nozzles that had to be flicked and turned off to wake his clansmen up was mind boggling. Wouldn't the cost outweigh the profit of keeping this person alive?
Slowly being raised up by the table folding, Inari was privy to seeing his although distant, family. The seals uncovered a young teen's face, pale as the snow and with hair to match. The same pair of dark red dots mirroring Inari, the most stand-out features were his eyes. His eyes were a darker shade of green, with the bags under his eye red.
Seeing him slowly wake up was the annoying part because Inari hated waiting, but it was to be expected after waking someone up from a drug-induced slumber.
"Kabuto-san, did Orochimaru-sama find a cure for my condition? Is this the reason you woke me?" You could hear the rawness in his voice from lack of use.
"Orochimaru-sama has found someone who might be able to help us make use of you yet, all we have to do is help him first. This is where you come In, you get to teach little Inari-kun how to use your bloodline, and he'll provide the base for what your body should be like. With that info, we should be able to extend your lifespan significantly, if not remove the sickness altogether."
With a whip of his head to the right, Kimimaro had started staring Inari down, in an attempt to make him squirm. Inari just sat there wondering if he was supposed to initiate the conversation.
"You're from the Kaguya clan I have been told, and can see," Kimmimaro stated while tapping the two dots above his head. "And you don't know how to check if you have Shikotsumyaku?...have you tried channeling chakra to your bones? That's all it took for me."
If there was any other emotion left inside Inari, other than love for his Root family and bloodlust, he would have been red with embarrassment.
"We had not considered that it would be so easy, I'll give it a shot here," holding out his wrist from his body, he asked again to be sure. "Just chakra? Any specific bone or way of adding chakra?"
Sighing, Kimimaro started explaining more. "Alright, so all humans have chakra going throughout our whole body, right?" Seeing a nod, he kept going. "This is the same for us, but if we add more and imagine the shape In our mind and mould the chakra to guide the bone growing. With imagination and chakra there's nothing we can't make out of our bones."
While understanding the premise, he was still hesitant. Well, it was better now than never he supposed, reaching out he tried as instructed. Adding what was a little chakra (to himself) to his right hand's index finger he pointed it at the wall.
Several things all happened at the same time. Firstly Sai had opened the operating room door to find his partner, secondly his fingertip had burst open from the inside out. Lastly to happen was an over usage of chakral making the bone he wanted to grow out about a foot long, grow several feet long instead and embed itself into the wall.
The silence only hung in the room for about five seconds before Kabuto started clapping. Turning to ask for help on how to deal with this, he could see that Kimimaro was already over the shock.
"Well I suppose congratulations are in order, but if you want to break down the bone, no you can't 'shrink' it down. You have to channel chakra with the intent of breaking down at a spot, try it now."
Looking chakra to the tip of the finger spear stuck in the wall, it essentially started to shrink. Holding up the now almost foot long bone growth, Inari tried breaking it down before the tip. Grabbing the end that fell off, he held it feeling only a little bit of ambient chakra, and fading fast, he tested the strength by trying to snap it.
The hollow sounding snap echoed throughout the laboratory. Turning to look at his clansmen about to ask a question, he saw that he had his hand held up, stopping Inari's questions before they could start.
"As much as I would like to go over the intricacies of our shared bloodline, I believe it would be best to let Kabuto-san continue with his work on us."
Stepping down from the life support machine that Kimimaro was hooked up to he started. "Always trying to be the gentleman, but he is correct Inari-kun I do need some samples from you. I'll be taking some bone marrow samples and seeing the difference between the two of you, now Inari our anesthetic won't work on you...so you'll have to tough it out."
Practically laughing that last line out was lost on only half of the occupants in the room, the other half just knew he was a sadist. The large syringe was off-putting to say the least, but if it's for Danzō-sama, no price is too large.
But that syringe was.
The process included sticking the needle in the right spot, which was rather quick, but annoying since he kept healing the whole time, making Kabuto have to restart.
"Alright that's about it Inari-kun, just go and play with your new bloodline for now, Kimimaro will be out quickly. He just needs a little wake me up."
Being no reason to stay, Sai and Inari moved out of the room, sitting on the benches directly outside of the room.
"Do you feel any different," Sai prodded. Giving Himself a once over mentally, he noted that he didn't really.
"I feel no changes in my body, unless I use the Shikotsumyaku, which I need to get used to. Did you know all I had to do was channel chakra to my bones?"
Emphasizing the point, Inari grew a spike out of his finger slowly, first watching as the bone pushed against the skin from the inside. The pressure seemed to build up, violently bursting out with a minute amount of blood spray, the wound surprisingly did not bleed around the bone growth.
"The amount of practical applications for growing spikes is very high. Is it very chakra draining?" Shaking his head in denial at the question, he broke down the bone.
So I can make any shape? Let's give it a try.
Starting with his fingertip again, which had already healed over, he grew two bone tips. Adding height while making them spin slowly, he formed a, while not perfect, double helix with no interconnecting bars. Trying to add the bars in between the two was the hard part, as the chakra already in the bone made it hard, but not impossible to do.
Instead of breaking down the bone, he tried the opposite. Pumping extra chakra to the inside of the bone, he imagined it getting stronger. Dissolving the bits that connected his hand to the helix, he removed it from his palm and handed it to Sai.
"See if you can break this. I reinforced it with chakra." Holding it, Sai thought about how to go about Going with the best solution at the moment, he placed it on the floor, thankful for it's not so perfect design as it didn't roll.
Deciding that stomping on it would be a good test, he gave it all he had, and all he got out of it was a sore leg. You could almost see the excitement light up in Inari's eyes if you looked deep enough.
"I finish my work with your master and you two are playing out here in the hall? What happened to being Root shinobi?"
Being reprimanded by Orochimaru wasn't a pleasant experience, but they had to treat him the same as Danzō-sama. Almost getting the words out of their mouths, they were cut off.
"I'm joking, of course, I know you're testing the limits. Here let me try." Picking up the helix, Orochimaru gave a small exhale of amusement with the shape. Giving it a quick once over, he grabbed it by the two different ends.
The snap that echoed surprised them both. The Sannin seemed to almost relish the stare they gave the bonework.
"We'll I can tell you're surprised, don't be. Kimmimaro went through the same thing you are right now. You see, even though you pumped this," throwing the pieces up, and catching them with one hand.
Full of chakra, it fades fast because it's not connected to you and your chakra, and its strength comes from?"
"Chakra," both of the operatives mirrored back at the same time. "Thank you for the knowledge Orochimaru-sama, this was very helpful."
"Now, now, all I did was tell you what I already knew, and you would soon too. Now Inari-kun, you and I have to go work on those whiskers of yours, so follow me, we'll be right beside your precious Danzō-sama. I'll leave a clone for Kimmimaro and Kabuto. So you can come too, Sai-kun."
"So how long have you been serving Root? Or are you not allowed to tell me?" The question while innocent to Inari had a lot of strings attached, and Orochimaru knew how to make someone dance with those strings.
"Danzō-sama told me that I was born into Root, and he personally saw to raising me. Danzō-sama told me that my parents died in the field for Konoha and such a death is something to be proud of."
Orochimaru knew the whole truth, he knew that this child on the medical table's real name wasn't Inari. He knew it was Naruto, Jiraiya wouldn't shut up about him when he first went missing. Did he care about who he was? No, not really. He just wanted to see how this all played out. It's just a pity that he was a jinchuriki and couldn't become his vessel.
He has Uzumaki blood, Shikotsumyaku and the nine tails? He could become a one man army destroyer one day.
"Really? How was growing up being raised by Danzō?"
"It was great, Danzō-sama taught Sai and I what it meant to be a real shinobi, to separate your emotions and act on orders only. He also taught us about his sensei, the Nidaime Hokage, Tobirama Senju."
"It all sounds very interesting, but I'm going to have to stop you there as we're at the part that's gonna hurt," stated Orochimaru calmly.
The metal table was the only solace Inari could find, the blinding pain on his face making his mind go blank. All for the sake of hiding his whiskers.
"You know, I heard a tale about a missing boy, about eight years ago. He was kidnapped in the middle of the Kyuubi attack, his name was Naruto Uzumaki, my former teammate, Jiraiya, was looking for him up and down." Staying quiet for a second, as he focused on the current movement of the scalpel.
After seemingly satisfied with the scalpel work, he continued his story. "Jiraiya looking for the missing child was how I got away so easily. No one bothered to look at what I was doing. Oh look at me rambling, well we're almost done here, Inari-kun, just bear with it a little longer."
The metal tools carving into his face distracted him from the words Orochimaru were saying, but a few of them came clear into his ears. Naruto Uzumaki, wasn't that the Fourth Hokage's missing son? Well, that's irrelevant news. Most of Root already knew about that.
The clink of the scalpels and knives being put down clued him into the fact that it was over. Seeing a mirror was offered, he took it. Looking into it, he saw his whiskers were gone, replaced by only slightly marred skin.
"Thank you, Orochimaru-sama you have done me a great service."
"Oh, I only did as agreed. Now Danzō should be getting out of his surgery soon too, I am, after all, the one doing it." Seeing the mini Root members head tilt, he continued explaining.
"I'm just a clone, the real me is working on your master."
Acknowledgement flew across Inari's eyes, and he moved to sit outside to await his master's surgery to be finished.
The hours that passed seemed to pass almost instantly, for the pair of mini Root-nin. But when the final minute passed and Danzō stepped out, they could see the difference in the skin texture and tone, from the new arm that was attached.
"Sai, Inari. Any updates you need to give?"
Standing at attention, the both of them prepared their individual reports.
"Hai, Danzō-sama, I have found out that I do in fact have the Shikotsumyaku. I will continue training with it until further notice."
"Danzō-sama, I will be learning cursed seals from Orochimaru-sama. He had a clone show me a few and can see the possible combat applications. They would be further augmented by my ink jutsu."
One could practically feel pride coming off of the leader, if you weren't a pair Root-nin that is. Glad to see that his shinobi weren't ones to sit around without orders, he started talking.
"Good, I'm glad to see that we've all gained from being here, come now, we have to meet Orochimaru again," starting to walk, he kept explaining. "The unfortunate news I have to give is that, you two will be staying here, as it's much easier for me to sneak back into Konoha by myself than it is to leave with the two of you. As such, you two will be coming back when the arrangements have been made."
"Who will be guarding your return?" Ever the loyal nin, Inari spoke up, worried for his master.
"No one will be, I'll be reverse summoned via summoning jutsu. Baku, my summons will be the one doing it. Tanuki's work on summons has come quite a ways."
Stopping outside of Orochimaru's personal office to straighten himself out, after all, you do have to look good for 'business' partners, lest they think less of you. The doors only made a noise against the door stoppers to signify their opening.
"Ahh Danzō, I trust the new arm is suiting you. Well? No burning or tearing feelings? Good, good well, let's get down to business then. Your little shinobi are fine to stay, as long as they don't cause any trouble and do as I ask, maybe a mission or two. I don't think that's asking too much, now is it?"
"I see no issue, as long as the mission doesn't hurt Konoha or Roots goals in any way. I'll be picking them up in a month's time so keep that in mind," turning to his trainees, he started speaking again. "I'll be sending your missions through Sais ink bird jutsu, so keep me updated on what you're doing."
"Hai, Danzō-sama!"
"Well I suppose that I'll be taking my leave, Kuchiyose no Jutsu!"
Expecting Danzō to be gone, they were all surprised when they saw a baby Baku instead, its tiny trunk giving a small toot. "Have me summoned to headquarters." Disappearing after being informed, it left a cloud of smoke. "I look forward to your progress. Remember one month."
And with a final poof, Danzō Shimura was no longer at Otogakure.
Turning to look at their temporary new master, they kneeled, awaiting instructions.
"Well aren't you two the ever loyal servants, I don't have a mission for you yet but let's get you set up in your rooms, shall We? Come now, I don't want to have to tell you twice."
The endless maze of twists and turns, while confusing the first time, was easier now that they could see the markings leading each way. Finally reaching their destination, they saw their lodgings for the month.
They each had the exact same matching rooms. The room was very barebones, a bed and a nightstand with a dresser against the wall.
"Thank you for the lodging, Orochimaru-sama," turning to his pale haired partner, he stared. "Thank you very much Orochimaru-sama, I hope that we can work very well together."
"Ah, thank you for the respect and manners, I'll send someone to come get you for dinner so be ready soon," taking his leave, Orochimaru thought to himself.
I wonder how those two will mix it up around here.
Haha I LIVE, uhh sorry this is late as of posting this I'm like a third of the next chapter done. this one was mostly a set up chapter anyways .But uh pls leave review makes me happy