Opening - Scarlet Knight by Nana Mizuki

Naruto let his sword drop limply from his fingertips, ringing as it struck the smooth, hard earth at his feet. Panting slightly, his left hand went to his right bicep where that arm had been severed a few minutes earlier. His Version Three chakra cloak crumbled away, revealing him in his boxers since the rest of his clothes had been shredded by the cloak as it formed.

After a moment, almost-invisible strands of faint grey smoke began swirling around him with increasing speed. This was the result of the unique fuinjutsu he'd applied to his clothes that allowed them to regenerate like he could. The first article of clothing to return was his pants, shortly followed by his scabbard and shirt. After that, his coat slowly began to grow back into place over his body.

He slumped into a sitting position next to Kouga's body, rubbing his newly grown right arm. "Damn... I don't think I grew everything back quite right..."

"Are you okay?" Hinata panted as the glow in her eyes dimmed, signifying that she was phasing out of Sage Mode.

"I'll be fine. I just have to..." he paused, and grunted in pain as bubbling red chakra flickered over his arm for a moment, "...make sure everything's working right. All the nerves and blood vessels are in the right place, the muscles are connected to the bones right... that sort of thing. I've never tried growing this much of a limb back before, ya know. The most I've ever grown back before now was my hand a couple of times."

Hinata nodded, and pulsed her chakra to wash away the coating of mud that clung to her. Her hand went to the shallow, stinging cut on her belly, and she winced. "Naruto-kun, could you, um..."

"Yeah." he laid a hand on her wound and began flowing his chakra into it, using its powerful healing properties to close Hinata's cut without even leaving a scar. "Better?" she nodded thankfully.

He glanced down at Kouga's still form, and closed the older man's white eyes sadly. "We... we can't stay here for too long. There's no way the battle is over yet."

She scanned across the village with her Byakugan. "You're right... there are still some Hyuuga fighting, and Gaara and Tenten are..." her eyes went wide. "Oh shit Naruto get ready!"

Instantly alert, Naruto cast his purple gaze around and shot to his feet, already drawing his sword. "Hinata, what-"

Himiko appeared in a cloud of smoke at the edge of the solidified swamp, covered in blood and barely putting any weight on her left leg. Her active Byakugan eyes were startlingly wide, and she was staring directly at them.

She screamed.

With her doujutsu active, she could very clearly see that Kouga's chakra wasn't flowing through his tenketsu, and it was rapidly going dim altogether. She could also see the two stab wounds through his torso, and his lack of a heartbeat.

Himiko moved. In spite of the fact that she had no movement jutsu to use, she still blurred out of Naruto's field of vision, reappearing to his right with her fist pulled back. Since Hinata was standing to his left, he couldn't use the Empty Wind to dodge because Hinata would be hit instead. With no time to activate his chakra cloak, he wouldn't have the strength to block or catch Himiko's punch, and his sword was sheathed so he couldn't cut her arm.

The thought of using Shinra Tensei to push her back occured to him a fraction of a second too late, and even then he mused that it might not have been enough, as he tumbled through the air away from Himiko, taking Hinata along with him. Long before they came to a stop, he fell unconscious, and Hinata skidded a short distance further with her barrier ninjutsu active.

She groaned and sat up, dazed but desperately trying to stand before Himiko closed in again. She only realized she was too late when she felt a hand clamp down on top of her head, cracking through her barrier and tightening around a fistful of her hair. She screamed in pain as Himiko hauled her to her feet in that grip, then pressed a kunai to her throat.

"...Damn... damn you... you killed him!" Himiko sobbed. "You fucking killed him!" Wreathed in a cloud of black sand, Gaara and Tenten arrived a safe distance away. "Don't come any closer!" she screamed, pressing the kunai through Hinata's barrier and pricking her neck. "I'll kill her, I swear to Kami!"

"...Hi...nata..." Naruto groaned weakly, surrounded by a partially formed Version One aura that was slowly healing his broken ribs and neck. With those injuries, he was unable to move, and instead he lay helplessly on the cold, stony ground. "...Don't..."

"Shut up!" Himiko snarled. "I swear I'll kill her if anyone moves!"

"Alright!" Gaara called, and sealed away his sand. He shuddered to think what would happen if Himiko made good on her threat. "What do you want?"

"I... You're going to let us leave!" she answered. "Me, and the rest of the Hyuuga Clan, and then..." Himiko stopped. "...No. Fuck that! I'm not running away! You bastards are going to pay for what you did to Kouga!"

Hinata flinched away as the kunai nicked her throat again. She considered stalling for time to enter Sage Mode, but she doubted that she would be able to withstand a stab to the throat from Himiko even then. "H-Himiko-"

"Don't!" the Elder spat. "You two and your fucking demons are going with the Akatsuki, and I'm going to be the new Hokage!"

Now healed enough to sit up, Naruto promptly did so. "That's insane," he told her. "There's no way that would ever work! There are too many loyal ninjas here; just let her go!"

"I said shut up!" she screamed again, and Naruto obediently did so, holding his hands up disarmingly with his eyes trained on Himiko's kunai. "Kabuto should still be outside the village! I'm going to hand you two over to him, and then..." she turned her gaze on Hinata with a deranged, wicked grin, and held the younger Hyuuga against her chest with only her right arm while her left dipped into her pouch, pulling out the Caged Bird Stele. "You'll be the first, you bitch, but you sure as hell won't be the last."

Hinata sharply drew in a breath as the cold band of metal was pressed to her forehead.

"Stop it!" Naruto reached toward her helplessly. "Himiko, don't do this! I'll do it; I'll go with the Akatsuki, just don't hurt Hinata!"

Himiko slowly began to roll the Stele horizontally across Hinata's forehead, marking her with the Caged Bird Seal, but halfway through the act, her hand froze.

"...W-What..."

The Stele fell from her grip, shortly followed by the kunai. The latter gave off a metallic clang as it struck the former. Himiko stepped back away from Hinata, allowing the younger girl to pitch forward onto her hands and knees.

Himiko turned her gaze toward Gaara and Tenten, noting that the latter was still holding Soujihonou, making her the only Konoha-nin present with a drawn weapon. In a voice that was very clearly not Himiko's, she said, "Kill me."

Tenten's eyes went wide. "W-What!?"

"Kill me, before she takes control of my body again! I don't have much time, so kill me!"

Realization dawned on her. This was the original owner of the body Himiko had stolen with Living Corpse Reincarnation, and apparently Himiko's destabilized mind had allowed her to force her way through to the surface for the moment. If that was the case, this Hyuuga girl was certainly right; she didn't have much time. The odds were astronomically against this happening in the first place, and Himiko would surely take her body back in a matter of seconds if she wasn't stopped.

Tenten blurred forward using her Kekkai Kokuei as a movement jutsu, unrolling a scroll mounted on her hip as she did. She allowed the paper to slip through her barrier-coated fingers for just over a second, then her grip tightened over a specific seal among the multitude of different ones covering the scroll. She slapped the paper onto Himiko's forehead, and watched the girl's body go limp.

"Like hell am I letting that bitch take even one more life with her when I kill her," Tenten snarled. "Oh, no. I won't settle for anything less than a perfect victory."

"Tenten... what...?" Hinata kept her palm clasped over the two small cuts on her throat, with a faint green light shining through her fingers. Her knowledge of the Healing Jutsu was limited, but more than enough to heal a pair of wounds this small.

"Paralysis seal," she answered shortly. She tore off the paper just past the edge of the seal, and allowed much of it to roll itself back up into the spring-loaded mechanism on her hip. "I'm going to do everything I can to take Himiko out of this girl's body. Now that I've thought about it, killing her any other way would mean killing the person she's possessing. And yeah, sure, she probably cooperated with the coup, but... she did just save you from getting the Caged Bird Seal. That counts for something."

Now fully recovered, Naruto flashed forward and wrapped his arms around Hinata, his body shaking with the massive dose of adrenaline coursing through it. "H-Hina-chan..."

"I'm okay," she answered, letting out a deep sigh of relief. "I'm okay; it's over."

X

In the wake of the battle, all but one of the conspirators involved in the Hyuuga Coup were killed in battle or captured. Mariko shivered under the heavy snowfall, watching the gates of Konoha from a safe distance. Kouga-sama is dead. It was all she could think about. He had taught her everything, given her everything... he was everything to her.

And now that he's gone... "What the hell do I do now?" she sighed, rubbing her arms in the cold.

"I have a suggestion."

Mariko whirled, wide-eyed, and found herself staring back into Kouga's own eyes, now marked with faint grey slitted pupils and set in an unfamiliar, grinning face. "...You. Kabuto Yakushi," she greeted him frigidly. "It's your fault."

"My fault Kouga died? Hardly. In fact, it's my 'fault' that he survived as long as he did, and came surprisingly close to victory."

"Surprisingly?" she repeated. "You expected us to fail!"

"That's right. But for me, the plan went off without a hitch." he pointed to his Byakugan. "As you can see."

"So that's all you wanted? The Byakugan?"

"Oh, not quite. I also acquired the Wood Release, and furthered my plans to weaponize four of the strongest ninja who ever lived." Kabuto beamed cheerfully. "I was expecting something to go wrong, really, but everything went perfectly. I've outdone myself today."

Mariko scowled. "Why are you here?"

"I just stuck around to gloat a bit before I head back to a meeting with the Akatsuki," he said honestly. "But then I spotted you, and I saw another oppurtunity to further my goals."

She raised an eyebrow. "Yeah? And what is it this time?"

"I'd like to offer you a place in my ranks, since there's nothing left for you here. In return... oh... I suppose you could teach me the Gentle Fist. That's not too much to ask, is it?"

After a moment, Mariko grinned.

X

"...ruto-kun... Naruto, come on." Hinata gently nudged him awake. "Naruto, can you hear me?"

"Mm... Yeah." he yawned. "What time is it?"

"We slept in a little," she admitted. "It's nine o' clock."

"...Dammit." He sat up with a groan. "Ah, I guess it's not so bad. I can get from here to the Academy in about three seconds with the Empty Wind."

Here, in this case, was the Hyuuga compound, specifically Hinata's room. She had yet to move into the clan head's quarters previously occupied by Hiashi, who was now set to take up a position as an Elder. Meanwhile, most of Naruto's belongings had been moved into the Hokage's residence shortly before it was obliterated, which left him with the Uzumaki manor without any furniture in it to sleep on.

It occured to him that by now, the children in attendance at the Genin Academy would be seated in their classrooms. Iruka would be just about ready to begin his first lesson of the day, and Shizune would be carrying a fresh mound of paperwork toward the Hokage's office-

He blanched. "Oh, shit."

"Hm?" Hinata blinked at him. "What is it?"

Naruto resorted to using his Empty Wind Jutsu already, flashing around the room to gather his clothes for the day. He changed into them hastily, not bothering to do so in private since the only other person in the room was Hinata, and he then blurred back to her side, stealing a quick kiss. "I gotta go, Hina-chan!"

"Wha... Oh." she realized what was wrong after a moment. "Well, um... good luck?"

He nodded solemnly. "Thanks, I'm gonna need it."

And with that he was gone, leaving her to get ready for her own long day.

X

Shizune yelped in surprise when Naruto blurred into his office through the window behind his desk. "...K-Kami!"

"Eh... sorry about that," the Hokage rubbed the back of his head sheepishly, then caught sight of the paperwork on his desk, and his face fell. There were four stacks of papers there, each almost a foot high. "This is gonna suck."

Shizune set down a fifth stack, and Naruto rubbed his forehead tiredly. "I'm sorry," she told him. "You picked a really bad day to sleep in."

"I know," he nodded. Most of the problems he would have to sort out today resulted directly from the all-out war that was fought in the village yesterday. "This... isn't all of it, is it?"

"No," Shizune shook her head. "There's more."

He groaned. "...Alright, I can do this. Bring it on!"

Shizune nodded with a sad, sympathetic smile, and left shutting the door behind her.

As soon as she did, a broad and wicked grin spread across Naruto's face, and he seated himself in front of his desk. He pulled out a blank scroll and pen from one of the drawers, then closed his eyes for a moment.

Kami, please let this work.

"Rinnegan. Empty Wind Jutsu."

Focusing chakra into his right hand instead of his legs, Naruto began to write a few random sentences. Satisfied that his writing was legible and the paper wasn't shredded by his rapid movements, Naruto stuffed that scroll back into the drawer and set to work on the mountain of documents resting in front of him.

Shizune returned three minutes later with a fresh stack of paperwork, and her mouth fell open when she saw Naruto looked glumly back at her from across a clean, open desk. The five finished stacks were laid neatly on the floor to his right. "Thanks, Shizune-"

"EHHHH!?" She shrieked. "That's...! That isn't... it's not..." He continued to stare at her as if he had no idea what she meant. "...Um. Okay then." she numbly set down the stack of papers in front of him. "How did you...?"

"How did I what?" he asked innocently, then glanced past her. "Oh, hey Sakura."

Shizune turned with a smile instinctively, then her eyes went wide as she realized that her fellow medic-nin was nowhere to be seen. She heard a loud, quick rustling sound behind her, and she whirled. "AHA!"

"Huh?" Naruto looked back at her blankly. "Aha what?"

The sixth stack had now joined the other five finished ones on the floor.

Not... possible...

"Shizune, are you feeling okay?" he asked her in a concerned tone.

"I'm fine!" she replied quickly. "I, um... there's a team of Genin that should be here to take away those," she pointed to the stacks of paperwork, "in a few minutes. A D-rank mission." Naruto nodded. "I'll... be right back with the next stack, then."

"Okay." he watched her leave and shut the door, then glanced around the room to his ANBU bodyguards. "Don't tell her," he ordered, chuckling.

"Yes, Hokage-sama," the four masked ninja echoed, unseen. He could almost hear the barely-suppressed laughter in their voices.

Several minutes later, she returned with a scroll in hand, and unfurled it across his desk to unseal a dozen more mounds of paper. His face fell as he heard the ancient desk actually creak under the sudden weight. She folded her arms and watched patiently as he took the first document from the first stack and began scanning through it, then he signed it and set it aside, moving on to the second paper.

The door to his office was pushed open quietly, but still audibly. Shizune turned away from Naruto again, meeting the gaze of a pale boy with black hair, dressed in a black and dark grey ROOT uniform with his belly exposed.

Fwathathwathoomp.

Sai's eyes widened slightly, but Naruto quickly brought a finger to his lips, grinning. By the time Shizune had turned around however, that hand was already reaching for the first document in the second stack, with the first stack now moved to the floor.

"You!" She whirled on Sai, pointing at him. "You saw! What did he do!?"

"He signed a few papers, and moved them from his desk to the floor," Sai smiled.

Shizune might've responded, but Naruto took the chance from her. "You're one of Danzou's ninja, right?" Still smiling, the pale boy nodded. "Come on in. What is it you wanted to talk to me about?"

"Danzou-sama requested that I talk to you in private," Sai glanced toward Shizune meaningfully.

"Right," Naruto nodded solemnly. "Shizune, could you...?"

"...Yeah," she sighed, and left the room feeling defeated.

Naruto took a few seconds to finish the other eleven stacks of paperwork, then chuckled. "I'm still the greatest prankster in Konoha, believe it!" Sai continued to smile politely, and Naruto subdued his vulpine grin as he addressed the ROOT ninja. "So, did Danzou actually tell you to talk about this when we're alone?"

"Yes," Sai nodded. "It seems that worked out well for you."

Naruto smirked. "Yeah. So... what does he want?"

"Danzou-sama has requested the oppurtunity to train Nawaki Senju in his use of the Wood Release."

"...Hm." The Hokage considered this. "I was already going to set him up with Tenzou... hell, I already have them working together to rebuild some of the buildings we wrecked yesterday, but..."

"Danzou-sama anticipated this. He has no objections to sharing this duty with Tenzou."

"...Alright," Naruto decided after a long silence. "I'll discuss this further with him in person, but it sounds good to me."

Sai bowed. "Thank you for your time, Hokage-sama." he opened the door, quickly exchanged pleasantries with an empty-eyed Shizune, and left.

She shuffled into the room and laid another stack of papers on his desk. "This is the last of it," she told him with an empty, emotionless voice.

"Thanks, Shizune." Naruto smiled. "This much paperwork would take baachan all day, wouldn't it?" she nodded. "Which means you were expecting to be here all day too, weren't you?"

Wham.

She blinked. "You... you mean...?" Her eyes widened with hope, and she began to smile.

"Seal those stacks up in the scroll," he told her, "and take 'em wherever this stuff is supposed to go, then take the rest of the day off. I can figure out where these go."

She nodded enthusiastically. "R-Right away, Hokage-sama!" she beamed, and sealed away the paperwork, quickly leaving the room with it. He then finished the last stack with his Empty Wind, stopping just before he was done all of it.

He grinned. The document at the bottom of that stack was what would give Tsunade authority over the village while he and Hinata went on a month-long honeymoon in the Land of Waterfalls. He took his time signing that one. I just turned baachan's worst nightmare into a ten-minute job easier than any D-rank, and now I'm going on vacation alone with Hina-chan for a month... I love my life.

And then, another idea bloomed in his mind, one that made him grin even broader. So before I head back to the Hyuuga compound to surprise Hina-chan... I'm going to visit Iruka-sensei, and do him a bit of a favor.

Before he left the room, Naruto donned the ceremonial red and white hat of the Hokage, while also covering his leather coat with a white haori identical to the one Hiruzen Sarutobi had favored. Hefting the stack of paperwork, Naruto carried it out of his office and into the hallway beyond his door. He made a beeline for one specific classroom out of all those familiar doors, and he knocked.

He didn't have to wait long. Sighing at the interruption of his lecture, Iruka called, "Come in."

Naruto pushed open the door. As expected, most if not all of the class whirled to see who had saved them from Iruka's droning, and they immediately fell dead silent.

"H-Hey, Iruka-sensei," the Hokage greeted sheepishly. "Sorry to interrupt, but I just got through signing all of this stuff and I thought maybe you could tell me where I'm supposed to take it..."

Iruka rubbed the bridge of his nose tiredly, right over his scar. "...Naruto, what the hell makes you think I would know that?"

"Because you're Iruka-sensei. You know everything."

The classroom turned back to face Iruka with awestruck, wide eyes.

"...Uh..." Iruka blinked back at Naruto, who continued to smile.

He was saved by one particularly plucky young ninja, an Inuzuka boy, leaping up out of his desk. "It's Hokage-sama!" he cheered, and made his way toward Naruto. "Hokage-sama's gonna teach us something awesome!"

That was all the incentive his bored classmates needed to mob Naruto, dragging him to the front of the class and depositing him next to Iruka. "Um.., Okay, okay. Yeah, I can teach you a couple of cool tricks, but," here he turned to his former teacher. "Only if Iruka-sensei is okay with me stealing his thunder, just this one time."

The class turned their wide, pleading eyes on Iruka, who hesitantly cleared his throat. "...Yes, well... I suppose it'd be alright... but only if all of you behave yourselves," he commanded.

The students hastily filed back into their seats, but one young boy raised his hand almost immediately. Iruka and Naruto exchanged looks, and the Hokage was the first to speak, albeit hesitantly. "...Y-Yes?"

"You're calling him Iruka-sensei," the boy noted. "Does that mean...?"

"Yep!" Naruto clapped Iruka on the back. "back when I was in the Academy, Iruka-sensei taught me more than any of the other teachers! He's great; you guys are lucky to have him!" A chorus of awe filled the room, and the class looked at Iruka in a completely different light. "So! It's time for lesson one! I'll keep this simple, so don't bother taking any notes, okay?"

The class nodded, and Naruto cleared his throat. "Okay! The first thing I'm going to teach you about... is this!" he held up his right hand to display a plain bronze ring on his middle finger. "The basic storage fuinjutsu!" The kids were completely silent. Whatever they were expecting, it wasn't this. "Anyone feel like showing off, and telling us how a storage seal works?"

A young girl at the front of the class quickly raised her hand, and Naruto nodded toward her. "Ahem... a storage seal is one of the most basic fuinjutsu, and we usually use it on scrolls. A well-written one will create a sizable pocket dimension aligned with the scroll. Simply by pulsing chakra into the seal, a ninja can store or withdraw more gear than he or she could carry out in the open. The scroll can then be rolled up and stuffed into a pouch for easy storage. It's an invaluable ninja tool."

"That was perfect," Naruto laughed cheerfully. "Great job." the girl blushed faintly at his praise. "It's also a very versatile tool. When I was younger, I used to carry my sword around like this..." he unsealed a black cutlass from within the ring, catching its hilt deftly, "...so I could always have it ready. Nowadays I've been carrying my sword around normally, but I still have this old thing. That's not even mentioning the Black Death and the Fractured Flame," he added. "Both of them use storage seals as a huge part of their fighting styles."

A few students quietly murmured to their friends, who didn't recognize one or both of the nicknames, "Gaara and Tenten."

"So this brings me to lesson two!" he held up his armed hand, in the same way he had when it was empty. "Bukijutsu. I'm gonna keep this short and simple, everyone. Learn to use a weapon." as he sealed away the black sword, the crowd nodded enthusiastically, absorbing the information.

"In my graduating class, there was only one student who used melee weapons as well as shurikenjutsu. That was Tenten. But now, there's her, me, Hinata, Gaara, Shikamaru... Sasuke started using a sword just before he began his one-on-one training with Jiraiya... what I'm getting at is, it's better to have a familiar weapon on hand rather than using taijutsu all the time in close range. Now, you have to be careful, and really learn to use the weapon you pick, but once you do it'll really help you out in a tough situation. Got it?"

The class nodded. "Okay, that's all the time I have. Iruka-sensei, could you...?" He shrugged, lifting the stack of paperwork under his left arm.

"Take it to Shizuku in room 307. She'll know where each document is going," Iruka spoke with authority.

"Great!" Naruto addressed the class hastily on his way out. "Told ya, Iruka-sensei knows everything! So pay attention when he's teaching; it'll be worth it. Believe it!"

With that, he shut the door and left. From that day on, no student ever ignored Iruka's lectures again.

X

Hinata rounded the corner of a hallway in the Hyuuga compound, clad in the typical white robe worn by most of her clan during meetings. Her eyes went wide when she spotted Naruto grinning back at her, just before he swept her into a kiss. "Sorry I'm early," he murmured softly.

Hinata giggled briefly. "How... why aren't you still at the Academy?"

"I used the Empty Wind to get all that paperwork done in about ten minutes. I even pranked Shizune while I was at it."

"That... that's genius," she breathed. "Maybe I could have a water clone spend the day running the Hyuuga Clan's affairs. Then you and I could just do missions like we always have."

"I like the sound of that," he kissed her again. "By the way... I finished writing up the paperwork for our honeymoon. You and I are both free of any and all missions for the next month, and baachan is gonna be in charge of the village while we're gone."

"Oh, Kami I'm looking forward to that," she sighed. "For so many reasons..." after a moment, she took a step back and raised her hands in the Snake seal. "Water Clone Jutsu." A puddle of water that hadn't been on the floor a moment earlier rose up, shaping itself into a copy of Hinata who winked at the original before continuing along the same path that Naruto had interrupted.

"And now we both have the day off," Hinata grinned.

X

"Kabuto."

A black silhouette with a single purple Rinnegan eye greeted the Otokage as he strode into the dim, isolated cave with a grin.

Pain noted the presence of a young Hyuuga woman trailing behind Kabuto alongside Orochimaru, with her doujutsu activated. "I see you didn't come back from Konoha empty-handed. Did you find what you were looking for?"

Kabuto's pale eyes gleamed in the darkness. "Oh, yes."

He glanced around at the gathered Akatsuki, and noted that among them, only Sasori and Deidara were actually present. "Well then," the puppeteer spoke gruffly. "Are you going to give us a demonstration, or just keep us waiting another year?"

"Yeah, let's see it," Deidara agreed. "And who's the Hyuuga chick, hm?"

"I'm Mariko Hyuuga," she introduced herself. "An expert in assassination and stealth, and the Akatsuki's newest asset."

Kabuto grinned. "You wanted to see what I've brought back from Konoha, and I've been quite excited to show you..." his open right palm shot forward toward Pain's silhouette, and he shouted, "Eight Trigrams Air Palm!"

Pain made no effort to dodge, since he wasn't truly there in the first place. The blast of wind shot through him, temporarily disrupting his form into a cloud of black smoke before he materialized again. His single Rinnegan eye blinked once, unimpressed.

Kabuto pushed up his glasses, still grinning. "I suppose you're wondering why I aimed it at you... to be honest, I was curious what would happen if someone was struck while using this jutsu. Now I have my answer."

"Hn."

Madara's voice immediately drew the attention of the rest of Akatsuki. "That's not what you went to Konoha for," he declared firmly.

"No," Kabuto agreed, unconcerned. "I went there for this... Wood Release: Wood Clone Jutsu."

Kakuzu leaned forward, interested, while Madara's Sharingan eyes flashed crimson. "That's better," he declared. "Much better. You actually have a decent level of control over it."

"Yes, well..." as he dispelled the clone, Kabuto turned to address the ancient Uchiha. "I didn't get this power from the First Hokage's cells, as you did. I harvested it from his grandson, Nawaki Senju. It's proven far easier to control than I'd expected, and I've integrated it seamlessly into my body."

"Hn."

"Oh, but that's not all," he went on. "I also brought this." He pulled a small glass vial out of his Akatsuki robe's right pocket, shaking it slightly to rattle around the fragments of bone within. "This is the real prize."

"And?" Pain replied expectantly. "Whose bone is it? It can't be from one of the Hokages... all four of them are sealed away with the Reaper Death Seal."

"Exactly," Kabuto declared meaningfully. "The Reaper Death Seal. Do we have any Zetsu clones on hand?"

"A few from the first generation," Madara answered, then slapped his right palm on the floor. "Summoning Jutsu." In a cloud of smoke, a Zetsu clone was summoned from nearby. "You're going to be sacrificed via Edo Tensei," he told the clone bluntly.

Despite the clone's feeble protests, he was quickly dragged before Kabuto who then drew a fuinjutsu on the ground around the clone and laid the fragments of bone at Zetsu's feet. "I've made some modifications to the ceremony that will simplify things. Summoning: Impure World Reincarnation," he declared. It took several seconds, but the clone's screaming was silenced.

In his place there was a young woman before Kabuto, garbed only in waist-length scarlet hair that was draped around her limply kneeling form.

After a moment, Tobi recognized her. "Kushina Uzumaki..."

Kushina's eyes opened at the sound of her name, brilliant blue in a field of black. "What... where am I?" she peered up at Kabuto. "You summoned me, didn't you? With Edo Tensei."

"Correct."

"Why?" she glanced down, and her expression grew furious. "And why the hell am I naked!?" she lashed out, aiming a volley of six chakra chains toward Kabuto, who dodged them and paralyzed her with the jutsu.

"You're naked because I never took, or even had, the time to prepare clothing for you," he answered simply, "and you're here because Minato Namikaze has been sealed away by the Shinigami."

Her eyes went wide with shock, then hate. "You bastards. You think I'm just going to-"

"Yes," Kabuto cut her off. "When the time is right, you'll lead us into Konoha to retrieve the Shinigami Mask."

"Like hell." Kushina spat in his face, but he dodged that too. "It's not like you can torture me, ya know! I can barely feel anything in this body!"

"Torture won't be necessary," Kabuto replied. "With this jutsu, I can completely suppress your will and force you to tell us."

The light left Kushina's eyes suddenly, and she began to talk. "There's... a shrine at the southern edge of the village... that's where it was when I died. Inside there are a collection of masks on the back wall. The... the Shinigami Mask is the seventh one from the left, in the top row."

"Excellent." Kabuto turned to Deidara. "Give her your Akatsuki robe. The two of you will watch over her for now. I'm going back to Oto."

Deidara nodded, and slid off his black and crimson robe before stepping forward with it in hand. Kabuto lifted the paralysis and returned control of her body, but implanted a directive in her thoughts that kept her from attacking Deidara. Instead, she snatched the robe with an indignant glare, flipping it inside-out to display the blood-red lining instead of the red clouds themselves. She slipped it on and buttoned it up, scowling.

"When I find a way to break this jutsu, that son of a bitch is the first one I'm gonna destroy. Believe it." Kushina looked around, finding herself face-to-face with Tobi's masked silhouette. Her eyes began to glow scarlet, and her pupils thinned into slits. "...Madara. I stand corrected! You'll be the first, and then I'll take out the snake kid. Which reminds me..." she turned on Orochimaru. "What the fuck are you doing here?"

"Oh, I can't believe I've forgotten," he purred back, "I went missing-nin a year or so after you died. I was caught experimenting with kekkei genkai and a kinjutsu to achieve immortality, and I fled the village."

"Huh." Kushina bared her elongated canines in a wicked smirk. "You were always a little off, but frankly I thought you were a nice guy."

"Is... is anyone gonna tell her?" Hidan spoke up. "Come on, you dumbasses! She thinks this moron is Madara!" here he pointed to Tobi.

"Hn. It can't hurt to sort that out, I suppose," the real Madara spoke up, drawing Kushina's attention. She froze at the sight of him and his Rinnegan. "I'm Madara Uchiha."

If she had been alive, Kushina might've felt fear when he demonstrated his killing intent impressively, but instead she simply wiped away her smirk. "Oh, this just gets better and better," she deadpanned. "Is anyone gonna tell me something good?"

"Well, uh," Tobi spoke up hesitantly, drawing Kushina's suspicion since he was still using his childish persona, "Naruto is the Hokage!"

X

Next time on Sasuke Gaiden...

"You're telling me I get to kick Kabuto in the sack on my way out? Sounds great!"

Attack on Oto - May 15, 2014

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