Part Seven

Bodies Buried in Peace

(Plato of Your Kind)

Waiting was a torture. Naruto was at his absolute worse when he had to wait for someone - something. With as much on stake as it was, waiting for the signal to remain in spot for more than an hour was probably the worst possible thing that he could have been doing.

The Shelter wasn't as full as it had been the week before. Everyone who was considered in danger was sent through reliable channels out of the city, out the jurisdiction of the Mayor. Others, left on their own.

Naruto wiped his sweaty hands and glared at where Kakashi was calmly sipping his coffee and reading yesterday's paper. Behind him, the first light of dawn was breaking in though the holes in the old, ratty curtain. The Shelter was still in the old theater, so they were sitting in one of the changing rooms – the best one, judging by its access to natural light.

Iruka was napping on the couch. Neither him nor Kakashi seemed to have a problem waiting. Naruto wiped his palms again and started to glare at Iruka, just for a change. Stupid military and special forces and what-not trained veterans and their steely nerves! He was on the verge of starting to throw stuff at both of them, so they would stop acting like it was just any regular day.

It would have been better if it hadn't been so silent. He'd maybe mange to distract himself, not worry as much. He knew the people were ready. They were waiting in their cars, scattered throughout the city. That way, they were hoping that at least one group would be close enough to scout the place out before the body of the coup arrived. Itachi was also waiting, with his faithful Big Blue Kisame bodyguard. Naruto had seen him for a moment as soon as Kakashi and him arrived back to the city… which was almost two days before.

He'd ranted a bit, even after he'd seen that Itachi was clearly worried as well. Sasuke was stubborn and a grownup, but he was going to get his ass kicked all he way up to the North Pole anyway.

Sasuke had come up with an idea, and it was so stupid that Naruto couldn't wrap his head around the fact that the entire city's worth of (hastily assembled) resistance was going along with it. He was going to get himself caught.

Actually, he probably already did get himself caught.

Not just like that, it took some preparation – but they were relying on a lot of luck, too.

The idea was to spread a rumor that Sasuke had been in contact with Kakashi – as he, admittedly, had been, which was helpful in case the info was already in the hands of the Mayor – and that he had some sort of evidence that sent Kakashi straight to the Capitol. It was supposed to make the Mayor scared and curious enough to order that Sasuke was to be taken in alive, and taken directly to him.

It was one hell of a chance to take.

The second part of the plan involved burying a subdermal RFID device designed for tracking snakes in the wilderness under Sasuke's skin and beating him up a bit so that the bruised skin around the gadget wouldn't be revealing. Naruto felt immensely better about that part.

About six hours ago, Sasuke went out on the streets on his own. Naruto had no direct supervision of the signal after the fit he'd thrown early within the second hour of watching the blinking dot, so he had to wait for the second hand information. The agreement was, Sasuke wouldn't stay in place for long. If the signal kept coming from the same position for longer than an hour, the small army of people Kakashi had spent all his time gathering for the cause in the last week would drive there, forcefully enter the premised and…

Well, it was an assassination mission. The thought alone was filling Naruto's mouth with bile, but he'd known it would to come down to this. On some level, he'd known. That was how people were always dealing with tyrants, right? He'd prefer to wait if there was a chance to find another solution but it was much too late already. It was too late as soon as Sasuke so cleverly went completely behind his back and presented the idea to Kakashi and persuaded Itachi to support it financially.

Naruto stood up and started pacing. He'd tried watching television earlier, but they were bragging how their city was finally safe and without crime. The host of the rerun show he was watching was showing some kids playing around in a playground behind her and Naruto just barely resisted throwing the remote at her.

Generally speaking, the city was clear of crime. Itachi was likely the only guy who did seriously immoral stuff still around. But killing everyone you don't want about wasn't the way and even if Naruto couldn't explain it eloquently, he knew it in his gut.

Not every person conducting illegal business was evil – just look at Iruka.

Not every person that hurt or killed someone was irredeemably rotten.

And anyway, most of 'bad' people simply skipped town and went to be their evil doing selves someplace else. What kind of a solution was that?

Kakashi said, when Naruto ranted about it during their terribly long trip back, that maybe the Mayor was planning to do the same thing on the level of the country. People liked him, even if he was a little odd. He was charismatic and handsome, but not too young to annoy.

That was a scary thought. That was why they were doing all this. He had to go, before people started dying on his whim everywhere, for the sake of an old, impossible dream of having a perfect, peaceful country.

"Forty minutes," Kakashi said. Iruka opened his eyes and looked at his watch. Naruto stopped breathing for a bit. They wouldn't move unless Kakashi announced that an entire hour had passed since Sasuke changed location last, but he'd never stayed in place for more than half an hour before, so chances that it was time were great.

"Do we really have to wait for an hour?" he urged, standing close enough to peek over Kakashi's head on the screen. He recognized the area the small green light was flashing over. Konohamaru's family lived a few streets away.

"Probably not," Kakashi said. "But we will anyway, because that was the plan. You can get ready, though."

"I am ready."

"Where is it?" Iruka interrupted.

"Runaway Hill," Kakashi said with a little frown.

"I thought the Mayor didn't have a house there."

"He doesn't. I'm sure. It would have been much easier if we knew where he lived."

"It's too out of the way for Sasuke to be there by accident, though," Iruka added thoughtfully. "Perhaps he found a way to keep a house under someone else's name, or is just using someone's house."

"Forty-three minutes. Let's go."

Iruka stood up at once, not a trace of sleepiness on him. He adjusted his belt and waited for Kakashi to pick up the computer. Naruto was at the door already.

Traffic was practically nonexistent at that hour, yet by the time they reached outskirts of Runaway Hill, the hour had come and passed. And Sasuke hadn't moved. Perhaps one could argue he'd fallen asleep, but the neighborhood was unlikely to be his choice to relax. You couldn't even reach it without a car.

"Take a deep breath, Naruto," Iruka advised. "You're too tense."

"I'm worried," Naruto protested.

"You'll end up killing us all if you don't relax a little. You've been in worse situations in the last few weeks. This is nothing."

Perhaps it was nothing, but those situations usually snuck up on him, he hadn't gone looking for them. It made him nervous, and that was the least of it.

"He could be dead," Naruto offered, trying to breathe through his nose on purpose. Sakura had told him once it helped her when she'd get cold feet.

"He's not dead. If they wanted him dead so soon, they would not drag him all the way up here."

That did help. A little. Naruto kept breathing.

The automatic lights occasionally turned on as they drove by the tall iron gates, but it was morning already, it wasn't too noticeable. Only glimpses of houses could be caught from the streets, between the thick treetops. It was a really good, really rich neighborhood.

Their car was second to arrive before the right one in a line of gates.

"Unit three and four ready, west side," Kakashi said after getting off his phone. "We're waiting for the unit two to finish crossing the small lake behind the house. And what does Itachi think he's doing?"

Naruto looked away from the distant terrace on the house to the car parked across from the gate. Itachi and Kisame were sitting in them. He opened the door of the car as soon as they stopped directly behind Itachi's. Iruka and Kakashi followed him out.

The gate was high, it had a blinking surveillance camera in one corner and it would be ridiculously easy to climb over it. Naruto looked back. Kakashi was talking to Itachi through the open window in a low voice. Iruka was on the phone, ordering people to wait for the signal. The second unit had arrived, then.

So Naruto went up to the gate, climbed it as quickly and as silently as he could despite being acutely aware of the camera and jumped to the other side. He shrugged his shoulder as Iruka shook his head at him. They needed a distraction anyway, and Naruto couldn't wait any longer.

A set of steps was approaching at a running speed. Naruto took his gun out and slid sidewise into the thick shadows of the redish-brown line of bush threes. Two men's silhouettes showed on the other side of the pathway. Naruto stepped farther back through the shrubbery and thorns bit into his flesh.

The two men stopped in a momentarily confusion. Naruto, protected from their sight, raised his gun. Then Iruka swore like a deranged sailor and the crossfire that followed allowed Naruto to turn around and run toward the house, without worrying about being heard. He meant to be the distraction for the others, but this worked, too.

The fire stopped before he reached the end of the park. A movement caught something on his right – west side, unites three and four. They were sliding over the tall outer wall with the help of ropes. Naruto held himself still behind a sole spherical topiary as they turned the corner of the house. There were more than two people at the front door – maybe four, maybe more – and they were alert and quick. Another crossfire took place right before Naruto. He lifted his gun and helped this time, very effective from his hiding place.

He saw as the leader of this section spotted him and dismissed him as a non-threat for the mission. Kakashi must have had warned them.

As most of the group moved toward the cleared entry point, Naruto went past the guy behind the corner who was nursing his bleeding shoulder and along the west side of the house. The early morning light was still gray and dim.

Climbing a large balcony on the first floor wasn't nearly as easy as climbing the gate. There was nothing to hold onto, but the wall was covered with red brick for decoration and allowed some leverage. It still took a few long minutes. Sounds of guns going off again, somewhere inside the house, helped Naruto ignore his scraped fingertips.

As he jumped over on the balcony, the shooting continued. He broke the French window by throwing a heavy plant pot through it. The shattering sound didn't stop the noise in the house.

Naruto tiptoed inside, wary of the glass and of possibility of someone being on the other side. He was in a huge, luxurious and empty bedroom. The sound of firearm stopped, replaced with running footsteps. He couldn't tell who'd won, so he just opened the first door he found. A bathroom with two exits, empty. Naruto walked through it, then through another bedroom and into an office that…

…wasn't empty.

Sasuke was there, just sitting on a couch, half the face swelled almost beyond recognition.

His gun was on the ready and Naruto aimed at the familiar person sitting behind at huge desk. The wild, bright hair looked unnatural in the mixture of the light from the green desk lamp and dull morning.

"He's armed," Sasuke warned.

Of course he was. But Naruto couldn't see it. He asked, "You okay?"

No answer.

The Mayor didn't look like he was about to attack and Naruto was at a loss. He knew why he was there. An assassination mission. This person needed to die. His impassive, cold face and the complete lack of fear were unnerving. He stared right at Naruto, who swallowed.

What the hell was he supposed to do?

Sasuke wasn't moving. That was unnerving, too. But okay, okay. The plan was, get him out first. Have Sasuke safe. Then think about… the mission.

Naruto moved toward the little couch under the steady gaze of two people until he was standing next to Sasuke. No one else moved.

"Sasuke? Get behind me."

Sasuke moved a little, watching the Mayor carefully. There was no reaction, so he moved a little more. He leaned heavily on the side rest until he was on his feet, obviously hurt, but once he was up it wasn't so bad and he moved. He felt around Naruto's waistline with cold hands and he found a Beretta 9000s which Naruto had grabbed from Kakashi's storage to be his backup gun.

The Mayor calmly watched them as another weapon was aimed at him. Sasuke wasn't shooting him, though. Naruto half expected he would. But he wasn't.

It made him a little happy, inside.

"So this was a setup."

The Mayor's voice sounded rougher than Naruto remembered from television. There was no rage, no incredulity in it.

"Well," Naruto said, still at a loss. "You can't just kill everyone you dislike, you know."

That summed up his current situation quite well, really.

"It's not a matter of dislike."

"You still can't."

"Unproductive members of society are bad enough, individuals who actively disrupt order and law for personal gain are unacceptable."

"So you arrest them," Naruto suggested.

"I've tried. Tackling corruption is an impossible task."

Sasuke laughed at that, in crisp snorts. "So you took an easy way out. You tried to kill my brother."

The door opened, somewhere behind Naruto. He glanced back, hoping Sasuke wouldn't. At the door was Kakashi, armed and silent. He stayed there.

"Your bother deserved to die."

Sasuke inhaled loudly. But he didn't pull the trigger, thank God.

"Bummer for you I disagreed," Naruto shot back.

For the first time, Mayor's facial expression changed. His eyes, sharp as a scalpel, set firmly on Naruto's. He looked angry. Naruto wanted to laugh.

"You," the Mayor said like he was about to start a diatribe, but then he stopped. He closed his eyes, just for a second, and then added, "Time to finish this, then."

Naruto opened his mouth to ask something. He didn't get a word out. The Mayor stood up, making a very clear target of himself, with a gun in his left hand. Naruto had a second to admire the shiny beauty of it as the Kymber Eclipse went up to level with his face. Three shoots in a closed room, one of which his own, made Naruto deaf for a short moment and then the sound of a body hitting something solid came through a high whistling sound.

He saw it, though. In the moment of stillness, before the sounds came rushing back. He saw that he hit where he aimed, below the left shoulder. There was also a wound on the Mayor's chest, a little too low, just below the heart. And there was one in the middle of his forehead, clean and perfect.

The last one was the only one visible as Naruto approached. Larger caliber than the Beretta which Sasuke had taken from him, so it was Kakashi's shot. Sasuke aimed for the torso.

"Sasuke," Kakashi interrupted the group examination of the dead body slouched over the desk. "Think carefully about where you might have left your fingerprints and blood. Your situation is bad enough without the forensics linking you to this place."

Naruto twisted his mouth, "Can't we just – burn the place and go home?"

Kakashi actually thought about it. "They might decide it to be an accident."

"This couch here, the floor around it," Sasuke pointed. "The staircase – especially at the bottom. All over the small room next to the kitchen, they had me locked there for a while, so I was checking to see if I could get out of I had to. I think that's it."

"Alright. Naruto, get him out of here."

As Naruto saw earlier, Sasuke could walk. But he obediently put his arm around his waist and finally relaxed when he felt Sasuke's weight settle against him.

"It worked," Sasuke said, as they walked through the door into the hallway.

"You were lucky," Naruto answered quietly, not having the heart to get angry about it as the movement. "You were alone in the room with him, and he was armed. It was stupid. It was the most ridiculous plan in the history of mankind. He could have taken you hostage, or just shoot you. Or tortured you or something."

"It worked," Sasuke repeated, like he hadn't heard a word.

"Well… I'm glad he didn't. But it was a stupid plan."

Sasuke's hand squeezed his shoulder, but he didn't answer. They descended the large ornamented staircase slowly, together. At the bottom, Itachi was inspecting a small, drying pool of blood like he knew was his brother's.

Naruto left Sasuke to Itachi's searching look and hands for a moment and went to find Iruka. Kakashi would have said if something had happened to him, but it was different to see for yourself.

The quick hug was followed by a scorn, "That was dumb. You almost jeopardized the mission with your impatience."

"It was meant to be a distraction," Naruto answered, poking a blood stain on Iruka's arm. It was someone else's. "You were supposed to let them come after me."

Iruka shook his head. He didn't say anything. Naruto suddenly couldn't explain how he ever thought these people would use him as bait, even though they were supposed to, even though he never even left them a choice.

He should have had asked for their help sooner.

Naruto nodded, with as much gratefulness as he could put into the gesture and left Iruka to cleaning up the place.

He found Sasuke again in backseat of Itachi's car, which was parked in the same place where he had last seen them. Itachi and Kisame were both standing around, as if unable to settle down. Naruto could understand that. After such a short action, adrenaline couldn't just give in to fatigue.

He brushed deliberately next to Kisame, hand quick and easy, and said to Itachi, "Kakashi wants to see you."

Itachi, apparently, had no reason to think Naruto would lie to him.

"You'll be alright?" he asked Sasuke, who only made an abrupt shooing motion with his hand and closed his eyes.

Kisame followed Itachi toward the house. Naruto waited a minute and got into the driver's seat. He turned around to find Sasuke had opened his eyes and showed him the car keys he'd nicked from Kisame.

"Wanna get out of here?"

Sasuke nodded and closed his eyes again. "Why doesn't it surprise me you can pickpocket?"

Naruto started the engine. As Sasuke didn't look seriously hurt, only tired, he planed to go see Sakura quickly and then use the ruckus that would take place once the news about the Mayor got around to leave town and see his godmother. She was a doctor and she lived alone in a huge house. It was awhile since he'd last visited.

Then, once Sasuke healed some and rested, he'd go to see Jiraiya.

These vague plans in check, Naruto curiously looked at Sasuke through the rear mirror, "Won't you ask where we're going?"

"No," Sasuke said, his eyes still closed. He looked relaxed, with his badass bruises and hair a bird's nest. It made Naruto grin.

He let Sasuke nap, turned left at the end of the street and tried to steel himself for the first one of the three heavy tirades that waited for him. Sakura for to deliver first because she was the closest.

But Naruto, even though worse for wear and a bit troubled, wasn't worried – for the first time in forever.

The End

A/N: Well, it's been a while, huh? Two years for this little scrap. I can't say I'm not pleased it's done, though. :D

I hope you enjoyed the story, in all its OOCness and incorrectness and silliness. Please don't take anything I said about... well, anything, really, as true; it likely isn't. And thank you very much for reading.