Author's notes: This story is very much like life, if you live a life full of danger and trauma. It has lighthearted moments that make you laugh, and there are brutal moments that rip out your guts - literally, in some cases. There is a redshirt Kumo nin who winds up disemboweled by the Future Fourth Hokage. There will be graphic violence, sex - willing and unwilling - and child abuse, among other problems. In other words - it's my usual style of story telling! Although I'm pretty sure there won't be any cannibalism, this time...

I posted this originally in 2013, and then took it down to do some massive editing, and am now reposting. A few years back, on an anonymous internet forum, I actually found a rec for Litter of Misfits, under"Fic you love that's nigh impossible to rec". The poster had written thus: It's 250,000 words of disability AU fic for an incredibly minor character. There's multiple graphic scenes where a twelve-year-old girl is raped by an adult man. The love interest of the thing is probably the most-hated character in the entire canon. The main character's family is written as misandrists who kill their male children, despite there being literally no canon evidence pointing towards that interpretation of them[...] But I swear to god it is the single most heartwarming fic I've ever read in my entire life, with nuanced and three-dimensional characterization of pretty much every character, and its portrayal of both disability and generational trauma is fucking amazing. The plot is this beautifully-interwoven mix of action and drama and found family stuff (and the found family elements actually feel like the characters are family, not a one-note fluffily perfect combination of people!), and it's genuinely one of my favorite fics ever. I'm going to be heartbroken forever about not getting to read the third arc.

This is not only the most flattering and damning description of Litter of Misfits ever, but dear reccer, if you ever find this again, know that the third arc will make its appearance. (And, at this point and time, it's actually 340k words and counting.)

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The child's bloody footprints in the disturbed snow looked silver and haunting beneath the moonlight, side by side with the large paw prints. Her eyes traced them, her nose tracked the scents beyond what her eyes saw. The child had followed the old bitch, squeezed through the broken slats in her fence, trekked through the snow, and ducked into her kennels.

It was cold – the kind of cold that Konoha only saw every hundred years or so – and frost was so thick on the trees that they looked like they had been dipped in silver. It was a rare sight, breathtaking in its stark beauty, usually only seen in the northern countries, like Frost and Lightening, and Inuzuka Tsume stood in the midst of the cold, dressed only in a man's long-sleeved nightshirt that fell to her knees and a pair of open-toed sandals. Her toes were numb, and her breath formed a freezing mist. Snow had fallen earlier that day, but its surface had been completely scuffed up by a laughing Kiba long before the sun set.

Konoha had lost power with the clearing dusk and the bitter dropping temperatures. She was sure it had something to do with the cold and some malfunctioning power lines somewhere, but hadn't really noticed it until her nine year old daughter and three year old son had dragged her from her cozy nest of blankets. So she had made a fire in the relatively unused fireplace, heated up some hot cocoa with a water-kettle hanging over the fireplace, and settled her two pups down with various pillows and blankets to keep warm for the rest of the night. ("Yay! Hot cocoa and camp night!")

Hana and Kiba weren't her only puppies. After careful crossbreeding of the ninken who managed to survive the Kyuubi attack and wild wolves that Tsume had more-or-less kidnapped from several different countries and half-tamed, she had finally managed to birth a successful litter of eleven strong nin-puppies five weeks previous, although she hadn't been able to save their mother. She was finally able to assign actual nin puppies to her clan's children, who had been without any partners for over three years, finally be able to help some of her kinswomen replace their dead partners.

After ensuring her children were snuggled down, Tsume left the nice, warm house for the kennels, intent on bringing the puppies inside for further protection, so poor Hana didn't have to brave the cold for their early morning feeding.

Two in the morning was so not the best time to find her kennels reeking of the Kyuubi - the same stench that had clung to the different body parts of over fifty Inuzuka women and a few hundred ninken that she had had to identify three years ago. ("This was all we could find. There were many who were too… disintegrated to identify. But, uh, you can sniff out the scraps, right? If you need any help, Douga could fetch a bucket and shovel. And some sponges.")

The only thing that kept her from charging into the kennels with her claws and fangs bared was the lack of alarm coming from her kennels. That, and those tiny, bloody, footprints.

They were the same size as Kiba's.

Grateful that she had left Kuromaru babysitting her children, Tsume pushed away the last of the killing intent and increased the chakra in her nose. She took in the scents surroundings her, cataloguing and dismissing familiar odors. From a great distance away, five Uchihas were congregating. That wouldn't normally bother her, except the distinct odor of Uchiha – this one a recently-appointed ANBU who antagonized her frequently enough – was fresh outside her gate. She had a feeling that the congregating five would soon be at her doorstep. And they would not be alone.

ROOT was also on the move, according to her nose.

She hurried the rest of the way into her kennels, deliberately kicking snow to obliterate the bloody footsteps, and heard the sounds of eating upon her entry. She paused to secure the barn door shut prevent the cold from following after. The kennels was actually a barn that had been partitioned off generations ago, split into multiple little stalls and a few special rooms to accommodate a vast number of dogs.

She walked past the stalls – all but six were empty – and the different storage and holdings rooms – also all empty, before turning left at the very back of the barn, into the large end room where a single lantern cast long shadows. Nagumi, who was half-blind and half-deaf and completely toothless, was nestled in a pile of hay and curled up in a ball. Eleven puppies in various states of sleepy movements cuddled against her.

In the squirming mass of puppies, half buried beneath the hay himself, was a naked, and rather ravenous, blond three year old. His face was smeared with the mush she had prepared for Nagumi. Two mouthfuls of mush later, he realized he had been spotted. He froze in mid-swallow when he saw Tsume, one bony fist filled with mush and raised halfway to his face.

The soles of his feet were raw and open like sliced meat. There were dark hollows under his eyes, and three stripes on either cheek, almost like whiskers, almost invisible beneath the mush.

Killing intent unexpectedly flared out of her control as she looked at the toddler's gaunt face. He was eating dog food!

He quickly sprang from the mass of puppies as the dish of dog food tilted out of his clumsy grasp and landed upside down with a goopy squish. He crouched down and feral blue eyes flashed around. After a quick second of hesitation, he attempted to dart past her. Used to the escaping antics of three year olds, Tsume easily nabbed him by clamping a firm hand around his arm.

She was not used to three year olds snarling as they sank surprisingly sharp milk-teeth into her arm. Instead of cuffing him like her first instincts screamed at her to do (kill kill KILL KILL THE KYUUBI) she simply pried him loose and shoved him away from the exit with a sandaled foot. Crying now instead of snarling, sickly and lost and frightened, the child scrambled back to Nagumi and the puppies. The puppies were too sleepy to give much notice. Nagumi raised her head and turned milky-white eyes to Tsume. Nagumi growled in warning. My puppy. I found him. Mine.

Tsume pulled the killing intent back, and felt the cold seeped through her nightshirt. She watched as the child cried silently and rubbed at his teary eyes. "He's awfully scrawny," she told Nagumi as his gaze drifted hungrily to the upside-down bowl of dog food. Children shouldn't have every rib so clearly outlined. She approached the child – he retreated further back, his feet leaving new bloody trails on the cold ground. He hid behind Nagumi, snot dribbling from his nose into her fur.

Tsume tugged her nightshirt off as Nagumi licked the boy's face clean and whined again. He was cold and hungry. He followed me home.

"And I suppose you think that means you can keep him, huh? Here, kid," she said, holding the nightshirt out. "You need it more than me." Even without the nightshirt, she wasn't as naked as the boy. She still wore sandals, after all. He flinched at her voice though, his tiny hands fisting in Nagumi's thick fur. One of the puppies whined as it climbed over Nagumi's back and tumbled into the boy.

Tsume gently tossed the nightshirt so it landed in front of Nagumi. "It's okay, baby, it's okay." Tsume lilted her voice into a croon, just like how she spoke to one of the Nara deer last year when she had found it caught in a hunter's snare outside of the Nara Forest. And the wolves she kept trapping and keeping. And the Suna genin team three months ago who had wondered why the hell Tsume was apologizing for accidentally ensnaring their sensei in her wolf trap. ("Ah, quit your bitching, Sasori-kuni. You're coming out of this trap in a much better condition than the last sensei I accidentally snared. I'm still banned for life from any craft stores in Fire, and it's not like the sand wolves appreciate glitter.")

Eh, cornered prey was cornered prey. "I'm here for you. I won't hurt you." Nagumi pawed at the nightshirt before catching it in her maw and flipping it with a toss of her head to cover the kid.

The cold made the hair on Tsume's skin stand on end and her nipples pebble. But the anger – he was naked, and eating dog food – warmed her against shivering. She straightened as the Uchiha scents invaded her compound. The child pulled the nightshirt over his head as he sank lower out of sight. ("If I can't see you Mommy, then you can't see me!") She bit back a snarl as she remembered Kiba giggling from beneath the blankets in front of the fire a few minutes earlier.

Tsume exited the large room, unmuted her siren seal just enough to distract, and was half-way down the hall when the door crashed open. Five Uchiha, including Pencil-Dick himself, filled the breadth of the entrance. Their Sharingan eyes were red and spinning but their movement forward halted at the sight of her. And then Sharingan eyes began looking everywhere else. Tsume was under no illusion whatsoever that she was a beautiful woman – she was built more like a pear-shaped brick and less like an hourglass, and her face was more scary than it was handsome – but she was female and naked and artificially alluring.

She smiled, just a hint of fang showing, as she spread her arms above her head to either side of the hall. It blocked the Uchiha from being able to walk past her – and brought attention to her breasts. They weren't the most impressive, especially after two rounds of breastfeeding, but hey, in her wide and varied experience, most men weren't all that picky about bare breasts. "My," she said, her voice smoky with the promise of pleasure, "and here I was just thinking of how cold my bed is."

Uchiha Fugaku pinched the bridge of his nose, and made sure that he kept his gaze resolutely trained on a spot above her left ear. They had sex once, years ago. It had ended in disaster, and was the perfect example of how historical attempts by the Uchiha and Inuzuka trying to get along generally resulted in unmitigated disaster, and with both parties refusing to own up to any role they may have played in the creation of such. The clans just had that special touch with each other. "Really?" he muttered in a low voice. "It's too damn cold and too damn early to do this, Tsume."

Uchiha Ringo hid a yawn. "Any time is too damn early to deal with Tsume. If we're going to wish for the impossible when it comes to the Inuzuka, I'd like to request that Aunt Natsumi grow up. It's going to eventually happen any day now, right?"

"After ninety-plus years, that old dog isn't going to be learning any new tricks." Squaring his shoulders and clearing his throat, Fugaku managed to look very stern and unaffected by lust, especially since he had been dragged out of a warm bed and the warmer, much more welcoming embrace of his wife less than thirty minutes ago. "Inuzuka Tsume, it has come to our attention that you are harboring the jinchuuriki. The law prohibits ninja clans from interacting with the jinchuuriki until such a time as he enters the Academy."

Tsume sniffed and tossed her hair. There was another person approaching – his scent was dark and made her insides curl with anticipation. "There's nothing here but puppies and old bitches. In fact, I was thinking that one of those old bitches – with the use of honey in all the right places – could warm my bed tonight. I was hoping for a good fucking – not to be fucked over. Although it is colder than balls outside. So you all probably have blue balls." She grinned. "I can take care of that!" The Uchiha scents had shifted; attraction was giving way to desire under the influence of her seal. Ringo always did admire the way of Tsume's hips.

Fugaku twitched, and pinched the bridge of his nose again. "It was reported to us that the jinchuuriki entered this building. We will have to search."

She slowly slid one foot up the wall, and then rested it knee-high on a kennel slate. Anger made her mouth taste of blood. They knew a naked three year old boy wandered through the snow. Did they follow the bloody footsteps, too? And the fuckers couldn't be bothered to do anything about it until an old, toothless dog herded the boy into some empty kennels, to eat mush and sleep in a pile of hay.

In Tsume's world, problems were solved with a) sex, b) violence, and/or c) judicious application of cute puppies and great food. And it was definitely a problem to allow the police into her kennels. So Plan A it was. All she had to do was stall. She dropped her right hand between her legs and languidly stroked as a sweet smile crossed her face. "Excellent idea. You should start with me – a full body cavity search. I might have, um, weapons hiding somewhere." She palmed her breasts. "Kunoichi always have something hiding in our cleavage!" That made all eyes but Fugaku's focus exclusively on her. He just looked annoyed and suspicious. She tried to make her voice sound sexy, instead of creepy. "I do so love a man in uniform."

"You don't even have any decent cleavage to hide anything!" Then Fugaku cleared his throat, annoyed and determined to stay on the subject and not allow himself to be distracted by her antics. "If you do not cooperate-"

"Will you spank me?" Tsume cut in eagerly. Her toes curled as a shiver – not of cold, nor of pleasure – raced up and down her spine as the dark scent invaded the kennels, as soft and as quiet as shadows. Eagerness. "Ooooh, do you promise the cuffs?"

"Enough, gentleman." The police stiffened at the new voice, and then parted, turning to face the latest arrival. As their attention shifted from her onto a much more immanent threat, she instantly muted her seal. Excitement joined anger and anticipation, and she felt her heart skip a beat. Shimura Danzo's face was cloaked in the darkness, but she didn't have to see his expression to know that it was cold and deadly. He never liked it when she used the siren seal around Konoha. He liked the Uchiha clan even less. "I shall handle it from here."

"Sir-" Uchiha Yahiko's voice halted when Danzo raised his left hand dismissively. He stepped forward.

"The Inuzuka compound and kennels cannot be entered without the Clan Head's expressed permission or a warrant. It appears that you have neither."

Uchiha Fugaku didn't smell intimidated by Danzo – not like the other four Uchiha, whose pores were drenched with fear. "We know that the jinchuuriki entered Inuzuka-kun's kennels. We're here as officers ensuring that the law is upheld."

Anger boiled again as she imagined the Uchiha heartlessly following the trail of a small child, not bothering to hurry because the cold needed time to work. Clearly, she was going to have to have Aunt Natsumi "get lost" in the Uchiha District again. Tsume raised her right hand back over her head and smiled at them, hiding her true feelings behind a smug lust. She was Clan Head. In this capacity, Uchiha Fugaku was acting as police, not Clan Head. Her authority trumped his when it came to her territory. "Just puppies and old bitches," she said again. "And a couple of asses, but you know who you are."

Danzo stepped past the Uchiha, his movements slow. His eye didn't leave Tsume's face. "I'm well aware of the law's details, Uchiha-san. I wrote the damn thing myself. Tell me – do you hear any barking ninken?" He paused a moment for them to pay attention to something other than the bold, naked woman who had spread her knees to them. "Growling? Snarling? Anything that may indicate an intruder as unwelcome as the jinchuuriki has invaded the premises?" The wolves might've snarled and growled, but they were too busy trying not to garner attention in the presence of the Kyuubi's odor. They knew where they ranked on the food chain, and it wasn't very high in comparison. "I thought not. Do not waste your time and effort in making enemies where you least need them. I shall stay… and discuss with Inuzuka-san the parameters of the law." His voice took on a hard edge – the sort of edge that meant that the discussion would be as severe as the elder. Tsume allowed the smile to drop from her face and her shoulders to tense.

She remained like that, even when the Uchiha – smelling rather smug, the bastards – departed from her compound. Danzo stepped into her personal space.

"Really?" Danzo asked her in exasperation as he traced the long, severe, crooked scar that marred her abdomen, just below the umbilicus. It stood thick and red against her skin, still looking recent though it was three and a half years old, because she had torn it open twice in two months before the Fourth Hokage barred her from field missions until it healed completely, and then threatened to slap multiple seals on her if she didn't obey or if she attempted to emotionally blackmail him via Kushina-chan. "Sex is not the solution for this problem."

She barred her teeth at him. "I was outnumbered, and they didn't look like they'd go away if I gave them some hot chocolate and a puppy to romp with. Besides, I only needed to stall them." Her skin tickled as he continued to trace the scar, applying pressure steadily to push her aside without resorting to the brutal strength she knew he had no problem using – even against fellow Konoha nin, and especially against her.

"Your overemotional irrationality never ceases to amaze me with all its boldness." Danzo's hand stilled as his voice dropped into a dangerous whisper. His unique dark scent coiled, like a viper preparing a strike. "Move by your choice or my will – it makes no difference to me."

Tsume dropped an arm and sullenly shifted her weight. Danzo's left eye narrowed before he planted his hand against her hip and shoved her further out of his way. His bandaged right arm brushed against her nipple as he continued forward. She trailed behind, hackles rising as he entered the last room.

The jinchuuriki had bundled himself tightly in her nightshirt and was curled up fast asleep against Nagumi's flank. He was covered in snoring puppies. His face was still smeared with the mush and now plastered with straw, and his breath rattled and wheezed. His feet poked out from beneath the puppies – they still looked like two raw slabs of meat, but at least they didn't bleed anymore.

"What have we here?" Danzo asked with a blank voice.

Tsume stepped beside him. "Puppies!" she declared with a brittle smile, draping her arm over his shoulders.

Danzo raised an incredulous eyebrow at her. "There's a fox in the midst of your dogs."

She walked two fingers up his bandaged right arm. "I only see puppies," she whispered. She tried to match his dangerous whisper from earlier. "The jinchuuriki's tears smelled just like my son's." She slid her fingers across his chest and then pulled him around to face her. "Why is a child wandering this cold night without clothes, so hungry and desperate that he's reduced to scarfing down dog food?"

His expression was closed but amusement lit his eye. "Reduced? Your ninken eat better than most of ROOT."

ROOT was also a problem. A big stick-in-the-ass heartless problem that she was trying to fix with judicious application of puppies and good food, since violence wasn't going to solve it and sex so far has been an unsuccessful, albeit pleasurable, distraction. Still, she refused to let Danzo digress. "You know the ANBU still watch outside my house. The fucker was in my compound. He's stinking up the place."

He resumed tracing the scar on her abdomen – softly now, little flicks of his fingertips that made her skin tingle. "Yes. And he will remain there, because the Uchiha don't suspect." He brushed his mouth against the shell of her ear and his breath tickled as he whispered. "They know where the demon is to be found."

Which meant that more asses would be going to be knocking on her door in the morning. Oh joy.

"Then we'll just move the puppies." She turned away from Danzo and stepped out of his reach as a thought visibly crossed his face for the first time – we? "Anyway, can't have them out in the cold. I'm not losing any of my litter."

The child woke up at her approach, and began kicking and screaming when she scooped him and five puppies into her arms. Nagumi growled again. "Keep it to yourself," Tsume told the old bitch. Then her fingers twisted into several seals before casting the calming genjutsu, specifically designed by her clan for unruly puppies. The child went still, his face looking blank and tired.

"Really?" Danzo's voice was dry again.

"At least I'm not solving this problem with sex," she said, juggling everyone to fit comfortably in her arms. "Can you grab the rest?" She was surprised when he draped his winter cloak around her shoulders. His expression was amused as he tucked the folds around her. "What's with the sudden interest in protecting my nonexistent modesty?"

He leaned back. "ANBU will not be distracted by your breasts if you're holding the jinchuuriki in front of them." He shifted the folds so two puppy heads poked out; the remaining bulk would be completely mistaken as other canine lumps. Then he stooped and carefully gathered up another five. Tail tick-tocking slowly, Nagumi grabbed the eleventh by its scruff and followed after Tsume, who blew out the lantern without slowing.

The wind had picked up as Tsume skipped across the yard from kennels to house, trying to keep her feet above the snow. Danzo didn't seem bothered in the least. She shouldered through the door directly into the kitchen – another lit lantern was there, but Tsume didn't pause. "In the living room," she told Danzo over her shoulder.

Hana and Kiba were curled up and asleep in their piles of cushions and blankets on the floor in front of the fire. Kuromaru was silent as he raised his head from where he had commandeered the couch. Kiba had kicked his blankets off and was sleeping belly-down on top of her favorite fluffy cushion. Nagumi circled in front of the fire a few times and settled down on the old rug. She released the puppy, which whined a few times before flopping over one of Nagumi's gigantic paw and falling asleep.

Hana woke up momentarily. "Mom?" she asked, bleary eyes shifting from Danzo to Tsume. Hana wasn't the least bit bothered by Tsume's apparent nudity. Or by Danzo.

"I'm only bringing in the pups from the cold. Back to sleep – you still have the Academy in the morning."

Hana snuggled deeper in her nest. Danzo was silent as Tsume arranged first her armful of puppies and then his, around Nagumi. The jinchuuriki, still under the influence of the genjutsu, was also fast asleep, and hung from her arm like a broken doll. She paused a moment to rearrange him against her shoulder, like Kiba sometimes slept when she carried him to bed. The rotten little demon had the nerve to drool on her.

Tsume's voice was a whisper as she removed the kettle from the fire. "The puppies will need feeding in just a few hours." Danzo followed her back to the kitchen. With the bare light from the lantern, boiling water from the kettle, and some snow outside, she filled a basin to clean the jinchuuriki's face and hands. The child stirred a few times as Tsume fussed over his feet, and then she shot Danzo a withering glare when he told her dismissively not to bother, that the feet would heal in no time thanks to the demon. Out of defiance, she cleaned and bandaged them anyway.

"You're a demon," she muttered as she carried the child back to the living room. She hesitated as she hovered beside Hana. "What's his name?" she asked, feeling as bewildered as she probably looked.

Danzo's lengthy silence was even more telling than his scent, before he finally whispered, "Uzumaki Naruto."

Tsume winced, but managed to keep the volume of her voice down. "Uzumaki, huh? Wait – I think I slept with his mother at one time."

He sighed in exasperation. "Who haven't you slept with, Tsume?"

She ignored that jibe. "Red hair? Loud mouth and explosive temper? You know: the Red Hot Habanero?" A growl entered her voice. "My genin teammate that I shared my blankets with during the Second War and our circus days?" The person she did her best not to remember since that date of fire and death, because it hurt hurt hurt to think of everyone she loved and lost.

She really ought to know that deliberately forgetting things generally came back around to bite her in the butt.

"An uncanny coincidence, I'm afraid. Uzumaki is a common name from Whirlpool."

Tsume didn't know why he bothered being deceitful with her. He knew she could smell it. She focused on waking up Hana again as Danzo stoked the fire with a few extra logs. "Here. This is Naruto – a stray orphan who was sleeping with the pups for warmth. Make sure he knows where to go to the bathroom when he wakes up. I've got the milk all ready for the pups when they're hungry, but you can feed this one cup ramen. The kettle on the fire will do fine for the ramen. Kuromaru will stay with you in case you need anything." Kuromaru gave Tsume a dirty look, which she ignored. "Good night, sweetie."

Hana, used to Kiba crawling in with her when he had nightmares and even more used to the random orphans that Tsume brought home, barely blinked before tucking Naruto's head under her chin and folding the blanket tightly around them. Her nose wrinkled. "He stinks."

"He was rolling around in the kennels."

"No'm. Like fire and fox and fish cakes."

Tsume ignored how the pit of her stomach dropped. She hoped she wasn't making the wrong decision. "He needs a bath, but nothing we can do anything about right now. I'm sleeping in my bed tonight. Drop all the pups with me before you leave for the Academy."

"Mmmm'kay."

Danzo followed Tsume through the living room and up the stairs. No lantern burned in her room – the window curtains were pulled back though, letting the moonlight stream through the large picture windows. Her bedroom wasn't as warm as the living room, but still not freezing – the chimney ran up through the room, warmth radiating from the stones. Outside her windows was a large oak tree, and Tsume knew that Uchiha Daimaru watched from its barren branches. She grinned and turned her back to the windows as she drew Danzo forward with his hand in her own. Only the Byakugen could read her lips through the back of her head. "I need to talk to you, but I also need to distract that ANBU from our discussion and from any presence of my puppies in the living room. Can't have him knowing about Naruto." The name played off her tongue – it sounded kinder than jinchuuriki. "So, on to Plan A.

"An old favorite of yours."

"Yes." She slid his robe off his shoulders and let it drop to the floor, then stroked her hands across his exposed chest. She rolled his nipples gently as she nibbled at his collar bones. His breathing and expression didn't change, but his scent shifted. "I'd go down on you, but you always bitch about me talking with my mouth full." Her hands skimmed lower and dipped into his trousers. At his age – and how the moonlight highlighted all sixty years he had survived in the harsh shinobi world – his arousal didn't immediately burn as hotly as hers, nor did his erection harden quickly, but his arousal had an early start – stirring the moment touched her in the kennels. It only took ten years of effort to condition a positive sexual response from him.

Danzo drew her hands out of his waist band and swiftly turned her away from the window, pushing her against her dresser.

"Lift me up. I'll be just outside of that guy's view."

Danzo wordlessly hoisted her up and deposited her on the small chest of drawers. Her hand knocked the hairbrush clattering onto the floor. Their profiles would still be seen through the window, but she was right – as she parted her knees before Danzo and arched backwards, head touching the wall, her face out of view. Her voice was bitter. "And when Daimaru checks with his brother before his captain in the morning, he can honestly report that not a word was spoken of the jinchuuriki – and that animal Inuzuka woman ruts off-missions like the whore she is on missions. Bah. Pencil-Dick already knows that, though."

Danzo silently dropped to his knees and pressed his mouth against her scar. He tongued it as his good hand slid up her torso and cupped her left breast. Tsume threaded a hand in his graying hair. She sighed. "I know you think people are irrational, overemotional creatures." Danzo's teeth nipped at her scar – a reminder of how irrational and emotional he knew her to be. Then he moved down and turned his head away from the windows to kiss the inside of her thigh.

"Does this have a point?" he whispered against her skin, before he nipped her.

"Do you think my ninken are weapons?"

His eye flickered up towards her. His voice was a murmur. "The point?" He nipped her thigh again as he tweaked her nipple. Tsume rolled her hips as anticipation shivered up and down her spine. She was beginning to feel her arousal burn with the same intensity as the anger that still boiled beneath her skin.

"Of course you do. And, like all decent shinobi, my ninken are domesticated."

"If by domesticated, you mean that shinobi are housebroken and don't pee on the rug – then, yes, your ninken are that. I don't know why you bother with being subtle." As if to prove that everything about this situation was blunt, he tongued her clitoris. She squeaked at the sudden suction, knees momentarily clamping tight around his head before he dropped his hand from her breast and pushed one knee away. Then he slid a finger inside and stroked. She gasped and arched forward, before dropping her head out of sight again. Her fingers tightened in his hair.

"My ninken, wild wolves – they're both predators. Both deadly." She undulated her hips against his mouth and hand; he allowed her. "The difference between my ninken and wolves in the wild is simple – my ninken are loyal to clan and Konoha because they're domesticated. Konoha has fed them, loved them, played with them, proven her own loyalty to them, and they see that Konoha is a friend, someone worth fighting for. They can be aimed. Wild wolves only lunge and snarl at the hand attempting to free and feed them." And she should know – and so did he. One of her Inuzuka clanswomen accidentally released two wild wolves from the kennels last year, and it had taken her two eldest sons and one very sad-about-being-bait Pakkun to recapture them. Danzo had looked onward and yelled out tips to her two sons.

Pleasure warmed Tsume's body better than the anger did earlier, her fingertips tingling and her toes curling. Her body knew the difference between fight and flight (insofar as she understood flight) – but fight and fuck felt one and the same to her, especially when Danzo knelt between her knees and was skillfully stroking her pleasure. She would never hold a candle to the level of sheer power that lay beneath his skin, but no one else alive could say that Konoha's War Hawk had knelt before them and his face buried between their thighs.

His fingers squelched as he withdrew them. He stood after she gently tugged on his hair, and she undid and dropped his trousers to his ankles; he let them pool on the floor. She almost wished she could see the face of the ANBU. Danzo's erection didn't jut upward as it did the first time fifteen years ago when he viciously fucked her in a brothel, but it was no less impressive. She grinned as Danzo pulled her one-armed off the dresser to stand in front of him - age hadn't lessened his strength, nor the size of his cock. He turned his face away from the window again as she lifted a single leg high and wrapped it around his waist. "I've known this about the Inuzuka ninken before you were even born. What does it have to do with the jinchuuriki?"

Then he slid into her. Tsume sucked in a deep breath, but he didn't give her time to adjust to his size before setting a rigorous pace that slammed her against the edge of the dresser so hard she knew there were going to be vertical bruises come morning. His hand went back to her breast. The tingling moved from her fingertips up her limbs and made her insides quiver. She was now in line with the picture windows – she turned her face towards his throat and spoke again. "Your jinchuuriki – that weapon you want to reinforce Konoha's forces – is going feral." She hissed as he twisted her nipple in warning as his thrusting became more brutal. Anger rippled in his scent. Her pleasure only burned and tightened like a coil within. "I saw his eyes tonight. You cannot aim a wild wolf, you fool." She mouthed his neck and chose her next words in challenge. "Are you trying to finish what the Kyuubi started three years ago?"

(She wondered what it must it look like from the remote viewpoint of her tree – an old, crippled man and a young, lithe woman coupling in the moonlight?)

"Don't you fucking dare…!" His hand slid from her breast to her throat – the uncomfortable press of palm against trachea and fingers curling against carotid arteries reminded her that he had no problems and plenty of experience crushing windpipes amidst coitus. "What do you want?" She heard the undercurrent of impatient anger (smelled it much more though, felt it as he hammered her body into jelly), but he was still otherwise stoic.

She dropped her hands from his hair and lightly dragged her nails over his buttocks. She traced her fingers in the sweat that was beginning to dampen his spine. "Your weapon is a mere puppy – I can domesticate him before it's too late – before you lose him utterly." Before he ever has to wander naked and barefoot and alone through the snow again. She gasped against his skin now, little pitching cries ripping from her throat with each brutal thrust. Danzo was hitting that spot deep inside that was absolutely delicious. ("I can take every one of your weapons and use them against you. Even your own body." "You can take my body, but you'll never have my dogs. Their loyalty is to me. I am queen alpha bitch. Konoha is my territory.") She clawed at his broad shoulders as the pleasure coiled tighter. A sheen of sweat made his body glisten. She felt the vibrations of his heart pounding in his chest.

Danzo's laugh was low and mocking. "Why?"

My puppy. I found him. Mine. Tsume was the clan's alpha bitch – all puppies, no matter the mother or species, were hers. "He followed me home, and I'm going to keep him. Haven't you heard? Whore-bitch Tsume likes to gather strays."

"I know. I started that damn rumor myself." He kissed her harshly, and since he didn't have any poison in his mouth, she sank her teeth into his bottom lip. He fisted her hair and yanked her head back. His hips stilled but he remained sheathed deep inside. She whined and tried to move her pelvis against his. The coil was tight and she was right on the edge – just a little more would shatter her.

He trailed her throat with his bleeding lip, smearing her with his blood and marking her with his own scent. Fifteen years of fucking with (and over, the butthead) the Inuzuka alpha bitch taught him how the clan kunoichi marked their territory without pissing everywhere like their dogs. His face buried against her throat and his hand dropped from her hair. Lips unseen from the window, he whispered harshly, "Your puppy, my weapon." For all that Danzo looked down his nose at emotions, he wasn't free of them. He stank of desire, anger, frustration, resentment, and impatience. He thrust twice more at the delicious place – rolled the hood of her clitoris between his fingers – and sent her slamming into her orgasm.

Pleasure ripped through her, muscles quivering and limbs twitching. She gasped, more quiet in orgasm than in intercourse. He prolonged the sweet high notes of her pleasure with the roll of his pelvis against her own – her hands tingled and her head buzzed. He held back his own climax as her pleasure ebbed. "Oh." She cupped his face with her hands, and slowly lapped the blood off his lip.

He responded with a gentle kiss, and she felt her breath hitch in surprise. It was rare that he allowed kissing, and almost unheard of that the kiss should be so soft and sweet – she wondered if he was as angry as she at the boy's condition. Eh, he was probably just mad at Tsume doing what Inuzuka Tsume did best – mess up so badly that she inexplicably wound up all the better for it. "You're a gentleman tonight." She blinked back tears. "What's the occasion?"

He sighed against her lips. "It's two-thirty in the morning. I'm too fucking tired for my usual level of sadism." Danzo bucked against her – a sharp thrust that smashed her painfully against the dresser – and exhaled sharply as warmth flooded her insides and endorphins flooded her nostrils, temporarily blocking out the Kyuubi's odor. His body relaxed against hers, heart slowing as his breathing calmed. The tension was out of his shoulders, but the anger lingered. She sniffed and settled both feet firmly on the ground as his limp cock slipped out of her. She much preferred the pungent musk of sex over the acrid of anger.

"Gosh. You are tired."

He mumbled against her skin. "And that was before the orgasm." His hand tightened protectively at her hip – and then slid around to trace the scar. Perhaps that was why he instigated the kiss.

"You haven't been sleeping well."

"I anticipate that won't be a problem as soon as I get back to my bed."

She waved her hand at the window, careful not to focus her eyes on the ANBU, but didn't bother to hide her lips. Daimaru could kiss her ass. He'd been lusting after it as long as Ringo had. "You can't go out in that cold. Your cock will shrivel up and fall off. I'd be forced to seek mediocre pleasure from Pencil-Dick Uchiha himself."

For all that his body was as fit and trim at sixty years as it had been at forty-five (minus a few slightly cumbersome limbs), Danzo was not light. He sagged more heavily into her arms. "And what a deplorable tragedy that would be, especially for his wife, and for what little decency remains of your reputation. Hmm, especially considering what happened with your last attempt to bed Fugaku… how many years ago? Ten?"

Tsume grimaced. She had been successful in bedding Fugaku, in that they were both naked in bed together. She had asked Fugaku when he was going to start, he had said his cock was already in her, and she had declared him too small to notice the difference. And then Pencil-Dick did something with his Sharingan, so it was harder than usual to remember the exact details. She was almost positive that actual sex never happened, the bastard. "Twelve years."

Danzo's face relaxed from its stern lines into something softer, more natural. She tried to pretend that her heart wasn't fluttering with fondness. "But if I stay here, I may be subjected to your evil bitch-whore wiles in the morning."

"A terrible risk – I personally feel that morning wood shouldn't be wasted – but one that I'm afraid you're going to have to deal with." She smiled and turned her face away from the window and pressed her lips against his throat. She licked the sweat beading on his skin. "Besides, who wants their tired ass hauled home by emotionally-constipated ROOT asking embarrassing questions about your love bites? Over to my bed, now. You can sleep here safe."

"Indeed." Tsume would smell any intruders long before he would sense them. In that, he was safer with her than in his own home. Tsume helped Danzo pull up his trousers and gently tucked his wilted cock inside. He was painfully sensitive after sex, so she kept her touching to a minimum. As he stumbled towards the bed, she stretched in front of the picture windows. "Such a cocktease," Danzo muttered as he casually tossed her multiple pillows to the floor – he preferred resting on a completely flat surface. Tsume focused on her reflection in the window and trailed a hand through her trimmed pubic curls. They glistened from her lubrication and his semen. She made a show of licking her fingers clean, tongue suggestively swirling around each digit. Take that, she thought viciously at the ANBU and the Uchiha clan in general when she yanked the curtains shut.

As the warm glow of her orgasm lessened, the winter chill settled in her bones. Her right arm and fingers ached and burned. It was an old, familiar pain of an old and familiar injury. She picked Danzo's robe off the floor and wrapped herself in it – she liked surrounding herself with his scent – before joining him under the covers. She turned her back to him and nestled her head on the one pillow he allowed to remain, and of course it would be the flattest pillow. He scooted close and spooned her. "Your feet are cold," he whispered into her hair. "They're always cold."

Tsume slid her hand over to meet his. He wasn't an affectionate man – he certainly didn't believe in that any more than emotions – but he was usually too sleepy after sex in his older years to put up much of a fight. She twined her fingers with his, and rested their joined hands against her scar.