I do not own Naruto. I do, however, own Chiyuki, any original characters, and this story's plot.
(for some reason I completely forgot to post this, even though it's been uploaded to my doc manager the same time I posted this chapter on ao3. i'm so sorry about the blunder.)
siren
.
She is a force to be reckoned with, not only because she wanted to, but also because she needed to.
Senju Tsunade is barely in her early twenties when they tell her to fight in a war that makes no sense. The war takes, the village takes, people take take take take-
The war takes her family members, their sister village Uzushio, and her heart breaks in two.
The war takes Dan, the love of her life, and her heart crumbles.
The war takes Nawaki, her sunshine of a little brother, and she buries the remains of her heart deep within herself, so that she'll never open it to anyone, ever again.
The renowned medic-nin Senju Tsunade, the last of a prestigious lineage, granddaughter of the Shodaime Hokage, leaves Konoha after the Second Shinobi War ends. She runs away from a village that only ever took from her, and never gave anything good in return. The memories she has are bittersweet, painful, and she's tired.
Tsunade's heart, buried deep within herself, aches and aches - so she runs.
Her jounin sensei and her teammates do try to get her to come back, of course. They're precious in a different way than her family had been, in the way Dan and Nawaki had been, but ultimately, they're not enough to make her come back to Konoha.
She tries not to think of the hurt in Jiraya's face, or the exhausted resignation in Hiruzen-sensei's eyes.
(Orochimaru is… complicated.)
Gambling and drinking ease the ache in her heart, and that's how she spends the next few years, happily pretending the village means nothing to her. The blonde woman runs and runs, spending her family's hard earned money and dragging Shizune along as she goes. Sometimes she comes back to Fire country, sometimes she visits neighboring villages, but she never steps foot into Konoha ever again.
The memories hurt too much, and she's tired of hurting.
One day -
-because all things must come to an end, eventually-
- Jiraya finally finds her, but his request is definitely not what she'd been expecting. Her ex-teammate has his arms full of three dying children, their teacher's youngest kid amongst them, and something in her snaps.
She's moving towards them with glowing green hands, quickly analyzing the situation and deciding who's in worse shape - Hiruzen-sensei's daughter, of course - and her blood phobia is unable to rear its ugly head in the face of children dying right in front of her.
In the pale moonlight, Sarutobi Chiyuki's ash blonde hair almost looks white-blue, like Dan's had been, and Tsunade's heart aches and aches.
One of the girl's teammates looks to be around the age Nawaki was when he died, and the blonde grits her teeth, willing her hands to stop their trembling.
She barks out orders for both Shizune and Jiraya, and the three of them spend the rest of the night elbows deep in blood and guts, refusing to let even one of these kids die.
The war has taken enough children as it is.
The three of them miraculously survive to tell the tale of their encounter with Orochimaru, but Chiyuki's prognosis is guarded. There's something extremely complicated and delicate going on between her and Jiraya, though, and Tsunade wants nothing to do with the beef a grown man has with a brat who barely reaches his hips.
(If she tells Jiraya in no uncertain terms to get his shit together, well. It's no one's business but theirs.)
Hiruzen-sensei's daughter is all of ten years old and has already been through a near-death experience.
By the hands of her ex-teammate.
Is the Hokage's seat all that, Tsunade wonders. She decides she doesn't want to know.
She's a kid that should still be in the Academy, running around and playing with her friends, not being the team leader of a group of child soldiers, fighting in a war they have no place in. And yet, she's clearly a child of war, with a lithe body made for quick and efficient kills and the mental fortitude to put grown adults to shame.
The brat is a menace.
Chiyuki looks at Tsunade like the medic-nin didn't run away from Konoha, like the Slug Sage has done nothing wrong, with a twinkle in her chocolate brown eyes that makes her heart ache and ache-
Chiyuki tells her about a boy with the Wood Release. Admits it was one of the arguments they were supposed to use to bring her back, and looks appropriately ashamed when she does. The girl looks at Tsunade like the woman has all the answers in the world, as if her presence alone will make things instantly better.
The Sarutobi Princess tells her she's going to be Hokage, and for a split second, Tsunade sees Dan and Nawaki in that determined expression - in the quietly burning flame behind her gaze, in the iron-clad truth in the words she speaks - and Tsunade's heart aches and aches, but for a different reason now.
The Senju woman gives her grandfather's keepsake to Chiyuki. The child sputters, clearly thrown off by the entire situation, and at the same time Tsunade sees both Dan and Nawaki in her, she knows they're not the same.
A menace, all on her own.
Chiyuki holds entire galaxies in her eyes, and Tsunade's loved ones' legacy lives on. Her heart aches and aches, bittersweet in its healing as she goes back to the place where it all started.
.
.
Senju Tsunade meets Tenzou - who now goes by Yamato - the boy with the Wood Release, and curses Orochimaru in her head for the nth time that week.
Although the boy has straight, thick brown hair and dark eyes typical of a Senju, he looks nothing like her grandfather. His pale skin tells much about the time he spent underground, with the poor social skills to seal the deal. He's hesitant, skittish, clearly scared of her, and the medic-nin really wishes she'd had a drink before this meeting.
Still, with all the gentleness she possesses, the Slug Sage kneels in front of the small boy, and looks at him with kindness.
(He does not need pity. Her anger is not directed at him. She breathes, and he breathes with her.)
Yamato needs support and a healthy environment to heal and grow in. He needs a responsible adult, a guardian, a family-
-her heart aches and aches-
-and she offers him a home.
"Hi. My name is Tsunade. Though the circumstances are… less than ideal, you now possess the Wood Release, something only my grandfather had been able to wield."
The boy flinches back, as if the woman has slapped him, and Tsunade exhales lightly.
"I believe that makes us family, wouldn't you think so?"
She gets lost at the depth of dark eyes staring at her, hesitant but oh so hopeful, a hidden abyss of hurt and pain and loneliness, so similar to her own and yet so different.
"Family?" Yamato carefully asks, daring to hope, daring to think that he could have what he'd never been allowed to have.
"Yeah. Family." The medic-nin murmurs, offering her manicured hand to the lost child. "How does gaining an aunt sound?"
Neither a mom nor a sister. Tsunade cannot be anyone's mom or sister.
Not anymore.
The boy's lips tremble, and he exhales shakily, but resolutely does not cry. Danzo's conditioning, she reckons.
(She wants to punch something. The old man's face, preferably. Multiple times.)
"That- yes." Yamato says, in a tiny little voice, and stands very still as Tsunade - his aunt - ruffles his hair.
"Alright, then. Welcome home, Senju Yamato."
His tears come abruptly, unbidden, and his sobs are loud. Snot runs down his nose as he furiously tries to wipe it with the sleeve of his shirt, but he's relieved, so relieved, he has a family-
Tsunade slowly hugs him, and her heart aches.
.
.
She's sent to face a man she thought she'd never see again, but life has a funny way of throwing things at you when you least expect it.
Tsunade helps the leaders of the Akatsuki take Hanzo down, along with Jiraya and Uchiha Mamoru, who she's never personally met before, but works well enough with.
The man, however, seems to have a personal vendetta against the Ame trio, never trying particularly hard to make their life easier, and the medic-nin marvels - not for the first time - at how loyal the Uchiha are to Chiyuki.
She remembers the look on Mikoto's face as she tore Jiraya down with words alone, and decides she does not want to get involved in it.
'A menace, indeed.'
The redhead - Nagato - approaches her on the night before they're supposed to leave, a blank look on his face. The man asks that she give a scroll to the Sarutobi Princess, and Tsunade wastes absolutely no second opening it, in case it's a trap.
The doujutsu user has the balls to actually look a bit disgruntled, as if to say he'd never do something as stupid as that. She raises a blonde eyebrow, wondering just what happened in the two weeks Chiyuki was kept captive.
"A show of good faith." Nagato murmurs, voice low and smooth like the deep waters of a river.
Tsunade blatantly looks him up and down, about to refuse, until he opens his mouth again.
"I think she'd like it." The words die on her tongue because the woman can't argue with that. Insect summons are great for gathering information and other tasks that require finesse, making it the perfect summons for someone who needs all the info she can get.
And who knows? Maybe her little menace will finally learn to plan ahead and make people play according to her rules.
(Her heart aches with careful excitement, itching to break free.)
"Fine." The medic-nin scoffs, pocketing the scroll.
"Thank you." The redhead nods, and that's the end of their conversation.
She ignores Jiraya, who had been watching the exchange with careful eyes, and throws the scroll to Mamoru, whose impassive face had been stuck on the object for the entire time.
"You're free to check it out yourself." The man nods in appreciation and double-checks the scroll, putting the little note back in it after they both have decided it's a normal summoning scroll. Tsunade shoves the object in the depths of her clothes, glancing one last time at Nagato, who surprisingly meets her eyes head-on.
For a brief moment, it seems as if they're both measuring each other up, deciding on whether they're friends or foes. Mindful, watchful, careful.
If, for some reason, he's genuinely showing good faith towards Chiyuki and their village, whether on a calculated move or not, there's nothing wrong with that. Hell, Tsunade will even encourage it; the more allies her little menace has, the better.
Honey eyes narrow down on pools of swirling purple, a promise of pain deep and raw like he's never experienced before. If, however, they set their sights on her little menace again-
She'll tear them down - every single one of them. Show them pain in its most intimate form, drown them in their misery and weakness, make them hurt and ache until they're gasping and begging for the sweet reprieve of death. Tsunade knows how to make people slowly lose their sanity, knows how to kill someone so slowly that it takes days for them to finally feel the cold embrace of death, knows how to make people scream in agony without dropping any blood. Then, she'll heal them and start over, hurting them over and over, over and over, until they are capable of nothing but ache.
No one will take her future Hokage away from her - not again.
Not ever.
(Her heart still aches sometimes. It leaves a distinctly hollow feeling in her chest, bittersweet in its melancholy, because healing is not linear.)
Still, Tsunade heals. And for now, that's enough.
.