DISCLAIMER: I don't own anything from the Naruto universe.

A/N at end of the chapter.

Thinking (+ flashbacks, "Mito speaking to the Kyuubi in her mindscape," etc.)

Emphasis

Bijuu, etc. speaking

Bijuu, etc. thinking

"Boys, I want you to listen to me carefully," Minato said, trying to keep his emotions under control. He trusted the four men in front of him implicitly. The only ones he trusted as much as his Guard Platoon and remaining student were his sensei and Mito. And Tsunade - perhaps.

His sensei, who was with Rasa, and Mito, who had also been taken. Kakashi had sworn he saw the fuuinjutsu markers for the summoning jutsu when his precious Mito disappeared and wasn't that terrifying? There had been so much of Mito's blood - and teeth and... flesh - present in and around her former cell, and most summons had a test even with a contract. He'd already checked Shikkotsu Forest, but his daughter hadn't been with Katsuya-sama.

At least Tsunade was now out looking for her, too.

"Sensei?" Kakashi asked, regaining his attention. They were in the forest outside of what was apparently a ROOT base. He was surprised that Danzo hadn't taken the Hiraishin marker off Naruto's clothes. Actually, Kakashi had never been sure exactly how that worked…

"Hai," Minato said, striving to be all business again. "I'm going in with Kakashi," he explained to his guard. "I want you three to stay together in case things get dicey. If you see any members of his little army, I want you to take them out. Leave at least one for interrogation."

"Kakashi, as soon as you see Naruto, I want you to grab him: do you understand?" When Kakashi accepted the mission as it was, he continued. "My sentence for Danzo is death. Make sure Naruto doesn't see it." He hoped to draw the traitor's death out as long as possible as long as his son wasn't present.

"Hai!"

"Mama!"

Mito closed her eyes, trying to steady her racing heart and somehow look poised while bleeding from that damn chunk that had been taken out of her back. –And from everything that she'd just escaped. Of all of the summoning realms out there, how in the world did she end up here?!

Nearly naked and extremely afraid: that's exactly what she was. She refused to cry out as she attempted to pull her legs up and crossed her arms over her chest. Or at least she tried to keep quiet.

The cheetah baby soon returned with her mother. Mito could only lay on the ground and try not to flinch. "Cheetah-sama," she said, unable to even offer a polite nod, considering the pain she was in and the way she was shivering.

"I smell blood," the cheetah said creepily.

I'm going to die. Mito swallowed hard despite trying not to. "Yes, Cheetah-sama. I… found myself in an un- in a bad situation. Thing."

"I don't recognize you as a summoner," she said while stretching. "We don't currently have a summoner, to my knowledge."

To Mito, it looked as if the cheetah was about to pounce. She closed her eyes for a few seconds and refused to pass out, even though either her vision or the environment was getting darker as a whole. "I am not. I used the summoning jutsu…"

"And wound up here? Well, isn't that interesting?" the mother asked, licking her chops.

"I was… partnered with th-slugs," she slurred. When Mito used the jutsu, she had hoped that she'd go back to Katsuya-sama.

"The slugs are formidable," the cheetah admitted before growling. "Did you abandon them?"

"No," Mito exclaimed - probably too hotly, she realized - as she struggled to both hide her very bloody wound and to stay off of it at the same time. It was impossible. "My chakra changed and…"

"If that's true, it too is interesting," the cheetah mother interrupted, bending down low, sniffing, and glaring as she inspected the area they were in for threats to her meal, Mito assumed. The cat let out an incredibly loud series of yelps that made Mito cover her ears. It still made her ears ring.

"We have a potential summoner," the cheetah purred at the…

Lion. A fucking lion, followed by two lionesses. Mito unintentionally let out a whimper. "Lion-sama, Lioness-sama," she said weakly and got sniffed with large wet noses. She quickly accepted death or tried to. She had many regrets but wanted to leave this world strong, at least in spirit.

At least I'll soon be with Kaa-chan. – After I'm eaten. Oh, God…

"She's not urinating on herself, so that's a plus," the lion said before flopping down on a patch of grass. "As you are, human, you are no challenge whatsoever."

Mito grimaced even more than she might have been before. "My name is Mito. Namikaze Mito. Maybe I can come back when I'm well?"

"Agreed," he said. The other cats repeated what he'd said. They all sounded bored.

"So… What happens now?" Mito deeply regretted that her voice was quivering. And that she sounded like a toddler because of her missing teeth.

"What village are you associated with, human?"

"Konoha."

"Take her back there," the lion directed one of his partners.

"No! Please," Mito corrected herself, speaking more gently and politely (she hoped.) "I can't return."

"Are you a traitor?" the lion asked, suddenly looking more awake.

To Mito, his expression resembled a certain fox's: one that she had been trying to get to know for years. "I am not, but I am in exile." A nagging intuition reminded her that she'd be accepted back, but she didn't want to see… Anyone.

"Should we leave you to die then?"

"I don't like eating humans," the chibi cheetah said.

"Cub, you don't know what a human tastes like. And although it has been many years since I've had their meat, I remember not particularly liking it." The lion then started licking himself, totally ignoring the wounded human beside him.

One of the lionesses rolled her eyes - if Mito really saw that. Maybe she was hallucinating.

"Where to, then?" that lioness asked.

Mito was so out of it and in so much pain, that she wasn't sure she cared where she'd be taken. But she was half-Uzumaki, and many countries wanted her bloodline. "Grass? Rice Paddies: southernmost side? There's a small settlement that's supposed to look like a cave…"

"Very well," the lioness said. "You found her: you're the one responsible for her."

Mito could tell that the cheetah was annoyed and as they argued, she began to lose consciousness. She felt a huge paw turn her over as the cats hissed, complaining about her wound. One of them started licking it with a very rough tongue and she cried out. Another cat latched onto the back of what was left of her top and some of her hair.

Minato flashed to the second Hiraishin marker: the one he'd put on Naruto. Not the one on his clothes.

He found his son brandishing a tanto! "Daddy! Kashi-baka! Look…"

"Danzo," Minato hissed, disgusted at what he'd just found. Kakashi already had Naruto in his arms and was ready to sunshin out, but the entire area was filled with children. Children playing - no, training with blades - some even younger than his son!

Danzo lifted his hand, surprised that the Yondaime had found him so quickly (and here, unfortunately,) but was prepared nonetheless. "Yondaime-sama, a moment of your time, please."

"Get him out of here, Kakashi." Naruto was whining about his order but, thankfully, appeared to be fine. Minato kept his eyes on his enemy but had seen that Danzo had changed Naruto's clothes.

A Hiraishin marker on a body is permanent, Traitor. That was a little family secret that Minato would take to the grave.

Naruto's was under his hair. He now wished that he had applied Mito's later in the same place... When he'd put it on her back, she'd been just a baby.

My baby girl...

Danzo smiled, and it was interesting to Minato that he was using the arm that was usually in a sling. He wondered if any of The Warhawk's other supposed old wounds and injuries were real.

"There's been a change of plans," Danzo smirked. "The Daimyo has seen reason. Konoha requires a stronger leader..."

"That's what I asked him to tell you, Danzo." Minato couldn't stop the grin that crawled up his face at seeing the slow realization cross Danzo's face that he'd been had.

Although Minato had asked the Daimyo to send Danzo faulty information, he probably had to credit someone else for quickly sending a message that Danzo's ROOT forces had overrun the Capital so quickly, before any of Danzo's allies informed him of the truth.

Danzo's disbelief and shock were written all over him before he decided to get serious. His chakra erupted as he prepared a wind jutsu Minato easily avoided. Danzo pulled down the bandages that covered his first implanted Sharingan. He was again too slow. Minato was suddenly beside him and plunged his kunai into his temple, gouging out his eye. "GAH!"

"I want you children to hide," Minato yelled at the kids but continued attacking. Why was Danzo fine now?

There was an explosion of Mokuton.

Something similar happened three more times before he was able to cut the man's head off. Bending down to see if he really had seen eyes on the man's arms, Minato bit back bile. Danzo had four additional Sharingan in his false arm. One of them was still open. He pulled out a scroll to seal his body - and that's when the torso began to sizzle.

There were children here! Danzo had put a fail-safe on his body: the Reverse Four Symbols Sealing!

Creating a transportation seal with his chakra - just like I had to use with that bijuu bomb on that horrible day - Minato was able to send Danzo's body to the Naka River.

Where it exploded near the Uchiha District.

He took a deep breath and saw some children cowering in fear, while others looked as if they were in shock. He sent a signal to his Guard Platoon which nearly exhausted his chakra. They appeared and he tried to smile at the cowering little ones. "I am Yondaime Hokage Namikaze Minato. You are all now under my protection..."

Mito woke up gradually and tried to smile, her formerly stitched(?) lips cracking when she saw Anko hovering over her. "Hey. Dey - th- they did it!" The big cats had saved her!

Anko started to cry.

"Wha' happen you?"

"There was a fight," Anko sniffed. "A bunch of fights you dumbass! What - why are you asking me what's wrong with me when you look like fucking death?!"

"Sorry." It's just that Anko looked beat up. "Wha..?" She reached for a cup and was surprised that she could feel a little of her chakra, although… What was the deal? She could raise her arm, although she was really sore and stiff. "Whas?" Oh: I'm drugged. Mito had never been drugged before. She felt stupid and dazed. Anko brought the cup closer to her lips and Mito winced. "Ow."

"Yeah, 'ow!' What the fuck are you doing messing around with jungle cats?"

"Ah. Know why…call that." Normal lions and cheetahs lived in a Savannah or so it was said, but the cats she'd seen were definitely in some kind of jungly forest. She'd read that the big cat summons were called the "jungle cats" so now it made more sense to her.

Pretty kitties. She snickered before shuddering with grief and getting her wits about her.

Where was she again?

"I gotta get Jiraiya-sama," Anko said, trying to pass her. Mito grabbed her.

"No," she barked in a low voice, hurting and remembering things she didn't really want to. "An' why?" Anko didn't immediately answer and looked very anxious.

"There's been a lot of trouble in the last hours -or maybe days," the purple-haired teen admitted quietly. She'd been awake (and had fought a giant fucking panther) for a long time. "Everything's fine now."

Mito scoffed. "Tell that to shinob' I kill." Anko put her hand on her arm in concern and Mito flinched, then tried to laugh at herself, grinning enough to make her lips open back up.

Anko put something new that tasted kinda like weird toothpaste on her mouth, then scolded Mito for trying to lick it off. "I heard about the attack at the capital," she said quietly while using the chopsticks in her hair to scratch at her ponytail. "I'm sorry you had to go through that. What happened… after?"

Mito closed her eyes, shaking her head slightly as she remembered. Her gut churned and she tried to simply be grateful that her lips were moister now. "I was… tire'. Dis traitor," she began but didn't know how much she could say, considering what had happened. "I use' da last… strength for 'Ruto-chan, den got surprised. I nee' da sheck on him," she mumbled to herself. "Why Jiraiya here?"

Anko looked outraged for just a second, but she contained her wrath and disbelief. "He's gotta reseal the… I know about IT okay?" she cried in despair, wanting to ensure her best friend knew that the fox didn't bother her. "The fox. He's gotta reseal the fox."

Mito stared at her, hard, for a minute, thinking about it more. "No."

"Whaddya mean, no?!" Anko yelled, wondering where the fuck her sensei and Jiraiya were - or any of the rest of their little "Sound" band of misfits - damn Orochimaru-shishou's obsession with opera: it's so embarrassing - although she'd recently run them off as they'd all been too damn loud around her formerly unconscious friend. "Mito, I heard them arguing about it: they were just waiting for you to wake up! You probably know what this means more than I do, but Jiraiya-sama said that he had to take one of your seals off, then he had to do something with the other so that you could heal? But that it's still not safe? …What's wrong?"

Mito went into her mindscape but found the Kyuubi just sitting there behind his crappy cage and looking at her with one eyebrow raised. He wasn't in her basement… Actually, where did her carefully arranged Mind Palace go? Fuck: everything was everywhere. Her mindscape looked like a messy, whack laundry room. Even her scrolls had been scattered everywhere. What a mess.

"Anyway, that old perv said that…"

"Don' call 'im a pervert," Mito requested in a quiet voice.

"Right: Super Pervert," Anko clarified, rolling her eyes.

"No. He'sa decen' man: a good man," Mito said angrily. "And no' a bad-kinda pervert," she whispered although she almost phrased it as a question. The two girls were silent for more than a minute before Mito shook her head slightly and grimaced. Everything hurt. "It's no' righ' da call him some'ing dat o'er people are." Anko nodded and sat down, careful to keep her hands to herself. "He NEVE' pervs on doze who are unshush-pectin' or who're naked. I dink. He- he might use 'is pervy imashina-tion, but… Doze are romansh sh-storiesh, an' - an'… Um…"

"What happened to you, Mito?" When her friend didn't say anything, Anko offered her more water and then couldn't help herself. "You arrived here with your clothes ripped off!"

"Shhhh," Mito quickly hissed before smiling in a way that made Anko want to squirm - and not because of the missing teeth. She wondered what was wrong with her friend, mentally, and she still couldn't believe that she would ever see her best friend in such a beat-up state. Mito was obviously not "right" and it wasn't just because of the drugs Orochimaru-sensei had given her.

"It happens, doesn't it?" Mito mumbled, trying to be reasonable. It's not like the guy had done much more than touch her indecently… Not too much. It could have been worse! Far worse. If he'd had even just a little longer with her, that Eren fucker would've been able to…

The fox had saved her from being outright raped.

She felt sick but eventually told Anko more than she should have, making her best friend promise not to tell anyone else, ever, as long as she kept Orochimaru and Jiraiya away from her for a little while longer.

Mito had been cleaned up, but she really wanted to go take a long, very hot shower.

Anko was so mad and crying - and Mito just wanted to run away instead of telling her that it was okay; that she was fine. Mito told her that anyway, though. "I ough' da go."

"What?! What do you mean you've 'gotta go?'" Anko asked in outrage, wiping at her face.

Mito smiled up at her friend as much as she could although even she knew that it didn't reach her eyes. "Gotta sheck on 'Ruto-chan."

"Idiot! I'll give you a minute to get your shit together, Mi-chan. Don't move." Anko left to tell Jiraiya and her sensei that Mito was awake and determined to go see her baby brother, not even thinking about her bird.

Mito had given her a nod but made sure that Anko was down the hallway before she focused what little chakra she had running through her coils on the special kunai that was hanging in her room, as well as on clearing her head. Flashing off, she crashed into her futon.

Having no idea that Konoha was in a state of emergency as its Hokage and trackers were desperately seeking her out, it wasn't until the next morning that she appeared in front of the Daimyo along with the remaining members of his guard. Asuma tried to grab her and she punched him into a nearby wall.

"Gomen?" Mito asked more than said, not sure of what to do or why she reacted like that. She did finally painfully kneel, though, as much as she could.

"Mito-hime! We did not expect you," the Daimyo said in alarm. Mito looked horrible. None of his guards were in great shape even now, but Mito was barely recognizable. In fact, if it wasn't for the hair…

"I see," Mito said. She knew she sounded ridiculous because of the missing teeth, but pressed on, concentrating on what she wanted to say rather than how it might sound. "If my services are no longer wanted, I will remand myself to Konohagakure. I understand if you'd either prefer to have me escorted to Hozuki Prison, or wish to jail me in the dungeons."

It took the Daimyo a few minutes - and to hear what the remainder of his Guardians were whispering about - to understand what the Leaf Princess might be on about. "The shinobis that attacked were not under the Hokage's orders." Seeing what he thought was a confused look on her swollen, bruised face, the Daimyo nodded, working his fan in a tizzy. "It would seem that Shimura Danzo had his own army: one that had been disbanded by your father, but that operated underground. It doesn't any longer! And I'm happy to say that the traitor is dead. You did not attack or kill loyal Konoha soldiers."

"Danzo," Asuma mouthed to Mito as he popped his neck and shoulder (the latter back into place,) even as he tried not to give her a hurt look. His little sister was hurt enough as it was.

"As I told you earlier, Guardian Mito-hime," the Daimyo continued, "you and your faithful comrades defended Hi no Kuni and my family well."

"Very good, sir. Thank you, sir," Mito replied dutifully, suddenly feeling even more exhausted.

"Would you like to stay on at the Capital?"

"Yes sir: please. Thank you for having faith in me. And in Hokage-sama," she added.

"Lord Hokage," Homura pleaded, "you simply cannot order a village-wide lockdown and the return of shinobi because your daughter is missing! And shouldn't your guards be posted with the jinchuuriki?"

"I will slit your throat where you stand," Minato said curtly. He was holding his son who was thankfully fast asleep. Wasn't that enough for them? "You are dismissed."

Homura bowed out, hoping that Danzo had covered his tracks along with his own. And Utatane's. They were now all that was left of Tobirama-sensei's legacy.

"Hokage-sama?"

"Track her, Kakashi. Find her. Are you listening?" the Hokage asked in a louder voice to his other tracking teams as well. "You have her blood. You have her scent. Mission Priority One-Alpha, Code Nine." Gasps were heard all around him while most were staring at his son in shock.

Genma stepped up, not really understanding. "Sir?"

"Mito-hime, my daughter, is the Kyuubi jinchuuriki. She is missing and grievously wounded."

Everyone left had darted away in shock. They had all thought that it was Naruto…

Asuma knew something more was going on when Mito tried to sloppily attack him with one of her chains before she locked herself in her room. He hadn't seen Yondaime-sama again and wondered if the man knew that she had returned. The last thing he had been told was that Jiraiya-sama would immediately be taking Mito back to Konoha.

He knocked on Mito's door again, feeling her erratic and seemingly magnified but wonky chakra from the courtyard.

"Yes?" Mito asked, her door still closed enough that Asuma could only see one of her swollen black eyes. "Where's 'Ruto-chan, Asuma?"

"'Ruto-chan?'" Asuma asked in disbelief. When he saw Mito stagger, he had finally had enough. "He's with Chiriku, you baka! He's just a damn bird… Let me in right now!" Mito stared at him blankly.

Then she fell over.

"Fucking hell!" Asuma burst into her room, quickly ensuring there were no threats, then summoned the monkey king. Mito was bleeding from her back. He normally avoided Enma, but he needed the best today.

"Is - Is that Mito?" Enma asked, horrified.

"Who else?! I'd say get me Hokage-sama, but I think we need Tsunade," Asuma said in exasperation. Enma dispelled while he made a compress and applied it to the wound, wondering how the hell Mito had made it back from wherever she'd been taken, where the Hokage was - or anyone else for that matter. After her kidnapping, the Capital was overrun with Konoha shinobi, the Hokage, and his clones, then everyone just up and disappeared.

And yet here was his kidnapped little sister, all by herself, showing up in front of the Daimyo. "Seriously?! What is your deal, Mito?!" He anxiously picked up a bloody kunai that was laying beside her and hid it away.

He didn't realize he was crying until Tsunade showed up.

And that was when the alert went up again. The bodies of two of the remaining elders had been found. "Someone" had slit their throats.

Oh, Mito: what did you do?!

/

A/N: Sue me, but I think that Minato's Hiraishin would overpower the heck out of Danzo! -Especially as the Yondaime had several more years to enhance the technique.