Power has a feminine name.

So I was informed recently that I have a really bad, really revealing habit. My partner just goes all "You know every time you become all secretive and write on your computer you put your legs on the table you know?" I was unaware of this fact but now I am bafflingly aware of it. :/

Anyhow, I don't need a significant amount of reviews to continue a story. Thank you to those three kind souls that urged this story on.

Sandals were awfully unattractive she suddenly decided. Incredibly useful but why did they need to have such a hideous appearance? In addition, why on earth such a grossly revolting color? She really needed to buy new ones and decided promptly that after her visit here in her mentor's office came to an end she would stomp right up to the nearest market for shinobi attire.

"Would that be all?" Sakura finished her full report of the successful mission while making plans ahead of time. Tsunade's eyebrows furrowed into one of those ugly frowns that rarely meant anything positive. She curled her red painted fingers together, hunching over her desk and releasing a long tired sigh.

"Sit." She said. Sakura obeyed like the dog she had become and sat down in the chair opposite of her superior. Said red painted fingers made a swirl in the air, signaling for Sakura to make her barrier inside the room. Sakura submitted to the order and formed a soundproofed barrier inside the room, overlaying the walls, windows, ceiling and floor.

Tsunade opened her red lips and began speaking. "Sakura, I'm getting tired. I'm sure you have noticed by now but as much as it pains me to say… I'm considering resigning." Sakura had no idea how to reply to that. She however kept her lips sealed and keeping the eye contact with her teacher. "I know I should be able to hold the position for at least twenty years or so but… Ah. I know I'm of better use at the hospital than in this office." This times Tsunade's eyes revealed that she wanted an answer. Sakura gulped before answering.

"I agree." That was all the confirmation her mentor needed. They needed a Hokage like the fourth. A kindhearted leader that wanted nothing but the best for the village. An understanding character that could reflect the people's needs as well as the best intentions for the community. They needed a diplomat, with as much brain as muscle. Unfortunately, Tsunade's temper had left some scratches here and there and on several occasions ruined relations with villages, clans and federal lords the world over.

Sakura could see that her mentor was thinking the same thing as her.

"I have been looking for a suitable replace-"Sakura cut her mentor off right there. Feeling the urge to promote her friends ultimate dream. "Ma'am if I may, Naruto-"

Tsunade however returned the gesture, marking her authority over her student. "I was getting to that! You need to stop interrupting people Sakura." Sakura smiled in anticipation. She could not wait to see Naruto's face gleam with joy when he would receive the news for himself.

"I know what you are thinking. Moreover, no, I have given it a lot of thought and have decided that Naruto is not at the mental level for the job as of now. However, I will be assigning him as the next Hokage's apprentice because as much as it pains me to say. He will make a fine Hokage someday. But not yet.

Her anticipation suddenly turned into an emotion she hadn't felt in a really long time. Sorrow. She felt bad knowing that not only her but probably every country they were bordering to as well was anticipation Naruto to become the next Hokage.

"I really want a drink… How about you and I go out and train? We haven't done that in forever." Tsunade smiled, lifting her responsibilities off her shoulders for just a few hours to be with her best student.

Sakura beamed at the suggestion. "I would be delighted to ma'am."

With that, they both left the tower, walking side by side down the streets of Konoha in the direction of the newly opened west gate. The air was balmy this sunny mid-summer day; the aired bussed with life from habitants of peaceful Konoha. The shop Sakura had planned on entering came into view ahead of them.

"Those shoes are outdated Sakura, you need some new ones." The elder woman promptly stated to her student. Having already decided that fact for herself Sakura barely nodded before following her into the shop.

"Go find a new outfit while you're at it, I'll just have quick chat with the manager. She's a friend." With that Tsunade walked over to the cashier asking for her friend. Sakura looked around the shop. They had an arrangement of clothes, shoes, weapons and every thinkable gear a ninja would need. She really did not have style anymore, ever since she became Jounin, the standard issued uniform had been her everyday outfit. The dull green west and the blue shirt had became a part of her, perhaps she did need an upgrade.

Sakura walked over to a wall covered in a wide variety of mesh shirts, dresses and jackets. When she thought back at the previous uniforms, she had always liked red and the freedom of bare arms. However, the bare arms left room for any attacker to leave a mark and the red stood out too much. She flipped through the clothes and thought black. But then again she did not need to look like she was attending a funeral every day. Perhaps the dulled green of her west was not so bad. She could go for a green outfit, or blue for that matter.

"What about this?" Sakura turned around to look at her mentor. She was holding up a piece of cloth that did not tell Sakura much. Tsunade tossed it at her and nodded towards the dressing room. Sakura walked over to it and closed the curtain behind her. She stripped off her gear and pulled the garment over her head. Turning to look at herself, she was surprised to find that not only did it fit perfectly but also it was perfect in every way.

The shirt was a little too low cut for her taste but nothing a mesh shirt could not fix. Her arms were bare but not as much as they used to be. The sand colored top covered all the way down to the middle of her lower arm. Nothing bandages could not fix. This garment in total could be altered in any way suitable for her. She had a belt of red fabric tightened around her waistline, emphasizing the curves she had gained after her excessive training, plumping her chest in the process. Two wide shawls extended from the belt and reached her mid-thigh they could be proven worthy to conceal her precious weapons. The flap pf her stall suddenly moved and Tsunades arm shoved some more articles of clothing at her through the opening.

After dressing she assessed the outfit. She wore the top as well as a pair of black spandex shorts that reached the same length as the sash from the belt. The boots were open toed but way prettier than her former ones. Lastly, she looked at the gaiters covering here shoes; they were a thick brown leather and strapped closely around her ankles and upper shin with shiny silver buckles. On her sides, she had a couple of holes, but their purpose remained unknown. As if on cue, the manager of the shop reached through the flap and handed her a thick strip of worn brown leather.

"Um, what is it?" Sakura asked accepting the accessory handed to her and assessed it with wary eyes. "May I come in and assist you Miss Haruno?" The manager asked politely. "Absolutely" was her equally formal reply. Sakura moved to over for the other woman to step into the stall. The woman had thin brown hair tied in a high knot, the knot was held in place with what had to be probably ten chopsticks. Sakura instantly saw the resemblance to her upper-class men from back at the academy. "You're Tenten's mother are you not?" Sakura asked as the short woman fastened the thick leather to the holes in the sides of her warm beige top. "Indeed I am she's far off now though. She was posted on a guard duty on the border to Ame a few months back and will return this week actually." The woman wrapped the leather across her back and fastened it on the opposite side. "There you go; this really suits you Miss Haruno." Sakura could not agree more. She gave herself a once over in the large mirror and saw a 26-year-old woman; that finally looked the part.

She walked out of the dressing room and met her teacher's analyzing gaze. "Just one last thing." Tsunade reached for Sakura's headband and lifted it off the crown of her head. She then proceeded to retie it around her head instead. Placing the symbol of her home on her forehead instead.

"There you go! And look at the harness, now you finally have place to put all those scrolls you carry around everywhere." Tsunade remarked with a gleeful smile. Her mentor was right though; the thick brown leather strap was wrapped over her shoulders and crossed over her back. Firmly secured over her chest by the little holes meant for the buttons on the back of the harness.

"Just thank me when you are done gawking at yourself." Tsunade waved a hand dismissively and walked over to the cashier to pay. Sakura snapped away from the staring and proceeded to stop her mentor's actions. "Wait! No Tsunade I can afford this on my ow-"

"Oh shut up Sakura, let me pay for this and we will call it your graduation gift." Sakura stopped dead on her tracks at her mentor's words. "Wait graduation? What do you mean?"

Tsunade accepted the change from the cashier as well as a bag with Sakura's old clothes. She than gave her student a smug smile and turned to leave the shop. Sakura followed suit, determined to get answers. The two powerful woman walked side by side down the streets of Konoha once again.

"Is my training coming to an end ma'am?" Tsunade looked distant there beside her. She inhaled sharply before speaking up.

"I have taught you almost every skill and jutsu I know, I have taught you the importance of a diplomatic point of view. I have made a name of you, introducing you to powerful names across the globe and now at this point there is really just one thing I have not taught you. Well I have taught it to you but this is a little different. You remember when I taught you to summon Katsuya right?" Sakura nodded. "Well, it so happens that I have a summon just for you that needs some nursing and I think it will be in the best of hands with you." Who in the world could that be? Sakura had contracts with a variety of summons including Katsuya, the monkey king Enma and the great toad sage Gamamaru. Nevertheless, she rarely took use of their services as much as they took use of her healing.

"Not to mention Sakura, you have excelled in every way I have challenged you and I'm proud to know that I'll leave a successor like you behind the day I pass." They had stopped right outside training ground one. A training ground specifically reserved for the Hokage. Sakura thought she spotted a tear in her mentor's eye but it was gone as soon as it appeared.

"Thank you ma'am." Sakura spoke with gratitude, embracing her mentor and teacher. Tsunade exhaled, releasing her student but kept her hands firmly planted on Sakura's shoulders. "I know that you have changed Sakura. I know that you have taken an important vow but sometimes I miss the obnoxious, angry little spitfire you used to be… I'll pray someone will dig that part of you up some day." Sakura knew what her mentor was talking about and her words touched a part deep inside her, however her face remained carved in stone.

"Well than, I'm sure my speech of reasonability and using your power for the greater good is falling for deaf ears but please Sakura, be waned, this summon is powerful and you will have to practice containing it properly." Tsunade squinted her eyes and crossed her arms across her full chest.

"I understand ma'am."

"Well than, without further ado." She snapped her red-painted fingers and a scroll as tall as the Hokage appeared in a puff of smoke. The scroll was dark in color, ornamented with jade beads the size of fists. "You will sign the contract as you know how to do." Tsunade unwrapped the scroll on the ground in front of Sakura. There was only two name written in the slots within the scroll.

Uchiha Madara

Uchiha Obito

"Ma'am this can't be right? Madara's only know summon was the Susanoo of the sharingan. I can't possibly summon something of a bloodline limit. Not to mention the Susanoo is in all honesty a jutsu." Sakura questioned her superior.

"That's where you are wrong. Uchiha Madara planted his rinnegan in a young boy once known as Nagato. Alternatively, you may know him by the name Pain. Well Nagato had Madara's eyes or at least part of them so in return he could summon every contract with every summon he had ever contracted with. Although Nagato made some pretty severe alterations to the summons they were all originally part of the sage world once too." Sakura nodded in understanding and proceeded to bite her thumb after removing her gloves.

She carefully wrote her name down the page in neat kanji before preforming the necessary seals to finalize the contract. Sakura then began to form the seals to summon this animal she secretly died to meet. However, Tsunade stopped her seals by slapping her hands over Sakura's. "This summon is enormous Sakura it's from the Animal Path, you need to max your chakra output and for God's sake! Don't stand this close to the fence have you any idea how expensive they are to replace?"

Sakura ran over to a good spot in the middle of the field and began the ritual again. Her hands flew through every movement before she drew a line of blood in her palm and slapped it fiercely on the ground. "Summoning jutsu!"

Stripes and circles of an ancient language appeared on the ground, but of a much larger scale than she had ever witnessed. She pumped her enormous chakra into the seal, offering it to the summon. The markings stretched out a good meter around her and the bang of the summon appearing made her ears ring.

She felt for the ground but al she felt all of a sudden was soft warm fur, Sakura looked around herself and saw nothing but fur and… wings? She jumped up and looked for somewhere to step down from the creature. Walking over to a gigantic wing she looked down and to her utter surprise the ground was a lot further down than expected.

"Who dare summon me to this pitiful path?" An angry, raspy old voice of ear-deafening volume pierced through the air. Sakura quickly jumped fifteen stories off the summon and maneuvered through it giant legs towards her mentor. Observing the animal, it appeared to be a winged dog. However, what she did not expect was the ten heads the dog possessed.

"Well?" The gruff animal continued. Sakura quickly observed that the middle one of the ten heads appeared to be the one talking. The rest were arranged in a circle around the first one and they all growled with bared teeth in every direction around itself.

Sakura inhaled deeply, gathering courage and stepped out from underneath the animal and into it's many ranges of sights. Simultaneously every head snapped in her direction growling furiously.

"I did." Sakura started, staring the talking head straight on.

"I just signed your contract and you accepted my offering and chakra signature. Either way I have your attention now, so you have better listen to what I have to say."

The middle head laughed loud and provocative than. "You summoned me! Ha ha ha! Well this have better be a joke. You pitiful little girl. I bet I could breathe on you and you'd break in half."

.

A side of Sakura woke to life than, a side of herself that she had deeply buried in her heart in the promise to never retrieve again. It burst awake inside her surprising herself, the summon and Tsunade. She heard a voice scream with blazing fury before all her vision turned red. She felt every muscle in her body coil back with adrenalin and she suddenly realized that not only had the voice been hers but the ground was shaking with the force of an earthquake.

.

She collected herself, quickly snapping her head from side to side, assessing the damage she had done. The crater around her expanded far beyond the boundaries of the training ground but she was now standing levelheaded with the middle head of the large beast.

"That is the last time you will dare to call me pitiful" She took a long deep inhale of dusty air. "But if you do… remember that the ground will not take the next hit." She rose from her crouch and looked slowly up at the beast through her bangs.

The animal looked thoughtful; its nine mute heads had stopped growling and were promptly looking at her with curiosity. For the first time Sakura took notice of the painfully large spikes that pierced every head on the beast. Not only that but she instantly remembered it from when it had crushed her home to dust under its paws under Pain's attack. However, none of the heads wielded the rinnegan anymore as she had remembered them to. The twenty pairs of eyes directed at her were to her surprise a bright emerald color.

The head finnaly spoke than. "If I do accept my part of the contract little girl. What's in it for me?" Sakura then looked at her mentor who was still standing out of the beast's line of sight. Tsunade then pointed at her own nose and then lifted her glowing palm. Indicating something Sakura understood.

"I can heal your nose… noses. Everyone you have signed a contract with formerly are no longer a part of this world, and those bolts look painful. I have the power to remove them and heal the wounds. You will never have the use for them again and I have a strong feeling they were placed there against your will."

Tsunade gave Sakura a big thumps up from her place in the shadows. Miming a big cheer in the process.

The beast hummed in thought. The other heads responding in gestures. Did they have a conversation together?

"What guarantee do I have that you will be able preform such a grand procedure? Humans use an awful lot of time just healing themselves." Sakura opened her mouth to respond to the question but the Hokage cut her off when she landed beside her.

"Because she is my apprentice and making a contract with you was her final task before I have taught her everything I can possibly teach her." The beast stepped back in surprise.

"Well I'll be damned, the slug princess herself. Or the fifth Hokage as I have heard you are now called." Tsunade laughed, not one of those sly chuckles she uttered on occasion. No; this was one of those dominating, demeaning cackles she used when taking the upper hand in a conversation.

"I can guarantee her success in making you pretty again, but be warned that she has inherited my temper." With that, Tsunade took off, leaving the beast and Sakura to continue discussing conditions of the contract. In their rather hostile way.

"I can guarantee the procedure's success but I will not be able to give you a due date. Every creature of a path I have ever healed has either taken years to stich back together or minutes. It depends on the tissue I'm working on and the strength of the contract."

The beast replied instantly. "Hmm. So you are saying that you have healed other summons… I'll give you a chance, we have deal. I could make good use of your chakra."

"We have a deal than, Haruno Sakura! Nice to meet you." Sakura beamed at the summon. Grinning brilliantly from ear to ear, placing her hands confidently on her hips.

The beast huffed and sat down on the rumpled ground. "You may call me Todoroki. The infinitely headed hound of the Animal Path." Sakura sat down on the ground as well, relaxing the atmosphere.

"I kind of feel like calling you hell hound. How bout'it?" Sakura joked.

Todoroki stuck his noses in the air and huffed: "Out of the question, you should feel honored I allow you to even call me by my name." He looked surprisingly offended.

Sakura laughed and leaned back on her hands in the grass. "So Todoroki huh? I bet you don't have the name 'Roar' for nothing." Sakura smiled.

The giant summon laid down on its front paws, relaxing as well. "I'll let you assume whatever you want Haruno. You're not the brightest tower in the harbor are you?" Todoroki quirked an eyebrow at her, emphasizing his sarcasm.

Sakura gasped dramatically, playing offended by his insult. "Well mister for your information I'm actually happy, something I haven't been for the last seven years or so!" Sakura spat back with equal sarcasm.

"By the way you're beaming like an infant I would say you're about four brain cells short of being able to open a door."

Sakura was so surprised by how amusing this big, hostile creature actually was. This was without a doubt one of the most pleasurable conversations she had had in years. It was all true though. She hadn't really had a good talk with anyone for a really long time. Too long, and getting a good bump in the side with no other than one of the grandest creatures of the Animal Path felt great for a change. They continued their bickering and chitchat in blissful unawareness of the discussion occurring in the shadows of the forest behind them.

Ouu! Probably-the-worst-cliff-hanger-since-the-birth-of-mankind!

Remember to review! I take all criticism with a smile and do my best to improve.