13

Chapter 12: Shoulder to the Plow

Naruto and Tsunade walked through the prisoner corridors of Anbu Headquarters. Naruto had been summoned by Tsunade during his leave from active duty and was asked to accompany Tsunade and Shizune to Anbu HQ to check out a prisoner. All Naruto was going to do was train in the Forest of Death that day anyway, so he didn't really have any problems with being called out by Tsunade, but he was somewhat confused on what he was doing there.

Picking out his ear as he followed Tsunade and Shizune, Naruto finally questioned his purpose in their presence, "Uh not that it really matters to me or anything, but what am I doing here? Why do you need me to see a prisoner?"

Shizune turned back with a smile and gave him his answer, "A captured enemy ninja is for some reason far too weak for us to interrogate by normal means and they happen to be too high profile to just go ahead with anyway, the info they might have could be vital to us, too vital for us to lose due to negligence Naruto-kun."

That answered part of his question but opened up a few more, "So why the hell am I here again? If their body is weak, get a Yamanaka to go into their mind or something. What do you expect me to do that no one else can? I don't interrogate people, I kill people."

Tsunade, Shizune, and even Tonton sweat-dropped at Naruto's cavalier description of his own on-the-job-skills. Tsunade got over it first, "Because brat, you seem to have a knack for pulling things off when it's really necessary. We can't go into her head for some reason, attempting it injured Inoichi when he attempted to do so. Also, you do need to get some kind of paycheck don't you? Or are the Suna genin reimbursing you for all of the things they're using in your house?"

Naruto face-fell but swiftly pulled himself back in line with the others, "Okay. So who is this prisoner? Are they dangerous?"

Tsunade shook her head, "Not really, since as I've already said, she's very weak right now. Besides, she's totally disarmed and you've already defeated her once already."

Naruto narrowed his eyes, "I've only fought one person that could still be alive and possibly be imprisoned right now. What, pray tell, is the real reason you're sending me in to do this for, just so I know?"

Shizune smiled back at him, "Tsunade-sama thinks you have quite a convincing air about you Naruto-kun. If anyone could get this girl to talk without resorting to force, we think it could be you."

Naruto sighed, "Fine… But if she spits at me or does something stupid I'm leaving right after she catches a backhand from yours truly, I swear to Kami. I should have proved my point by how I kicked her ass the last time though so I could just be paranoid."

Tsunade gave him a dry look as they made their way to the holding cells, "Violent much brat?"

Naruto pointed to the hitae-ate on his belt, "My entire job revolves around varying degrees of violence baa-chan. If I wasn't violent, I wouldn't be so damn good at what I do." The group came across the cell that housed Naruto's mark for the day, "All right. Will a guard let me out when I'm done?" The two women and pig nodded, "All right, I'll see you guys when I'm done then."

Tsunade nodded as Tonton oinked and Shizune waved goodbye after opening the door for him. Naruto sighed before slapping himself and putting on his game face before slinking into the cell and shutting the door behind him. He looked across the cell and ended up locking eyes with the red-haired girl sitting on a bed in the corner. Her brown eyes looked at him in curiosity, then changed to anger, and then to fear. Naruto held up his hands in a placating manner as he walked in to let her know he wasn't there to hurt her.

As he looked at her appearance she looked pale, paler than should have been healthy. Her eyes had bags underneath them, probably stemming from some kind of exhaustion, and she did look very weak, spot on with Tsunade's explanation of her condition.

Naruto pulled a chair from a corner and propped it in the middle of the room, taking a seat. He looked over at her, curled up on her bed as she warily looked him over. Seeing that she wasn't going to say a word to him whatsoever, Naruto decided to get the ball rolling, "Hello there Tayuya. I haven't seen you since I knocked you out. I assume Konoha's prison system is treating you well enough."

Tayuya simply kept on looking at him somewhat blankly. Naruto sighed, this was going to be a long day, he could see it already. Naruto cleared his throat, unintentionally getting her attention, "So I guess you know by now that all of your team is dead. Unfortunately, Sasuke still got away, but everyone that went after him from my village is still alive." Naruto saw that that little bit of news brought a smirk to her face, "Ah, so that got a little something out of you didn't it?"

Tayuya finally spoke, "I should have known you were just for show. Kimimaro must have torn your ass a new one when you chased after him huh?"

Naruto chuckled, drawing a confused look from her, "Actually I ended up fighting him until he just flat out died. I was kicking his ass if I do say so myself, I just couldn't finish him." Her eyes widened at the knowledge that Kimimaro was dead, "None of your little squad made it back, and you're the only one that survived. You can thank me whenever you'd like."

Tayuya glared at him, "You think I should thank you shithead? I'm as good as dead you fucking moron! You should have just killed me on the battlefield, that would have been better than rotting away in a fucking detention cell waiting to be interrogated!" She stood up from her bed suddenly, "Orochimaru, the fucking snake, he pulled the plug on the cursed seal, I just know it. That's why I'm so weak for no reason right now. I'm dead to him now, worthless..."

Naruto noticed a dark bruise on her neck where the cursed seal used to be, "You're going through some kind of withdrawal from the seal's power aren't you? That must be painful…"

Tayuya laughed bitterly, "It fucking sucks shithead… I feel like death right now. I guess I knew it would end like this somehow anyway… All that snake had on your village was an element of secrecy and a shitload of pawns like me to move around. I don't see how he got everyone else in that fucking place to believe they can actually take out the strongest hidden village, I knew we were fucked back during the invasion."

Naruto quirked his eyebrow, "You're being awfully forthcoming with the information here. What changed from before to now? You weren't talking to anyone before this."

Tayuya chuckled, "Sure, if you call those misanthropic motherfuckers coming in here asking me questions that I didn't know or that I thought were too stupid to answer, 'talking', then no I wasn't talking." She shook her head pitifully, "After all of the probing shit they asked me stuff like what Orochimaru wanted with the Uchiha kid."

Naruto cut in, "They should know what. Hell, I know what he wants, that is a stupid question."

She started listing things, "They asked me where the main base in Ta no Kuni was…"

Naruto cut in again, "They should know that too, I told baa-chan that after I brought her back. What the fuck?"

Tayuya continued, "They asked me about how to get the cursed seal off… That bitch in the trench coat and mesh bodysuit was really uppity about that one."

Naruto sighed, "Why the fuck would you know that? Like Orochimaru would tell you how to get his glorified slave collar off of you." He rubbed his temple, "Carry on, I might have to bitch to baa-chan about this shit later."

Naruto noticed Tayuya getting livelier as they continued speaking. It was like she had loosened up or something. Naruto just kept talking to her. He didn't really have anything to do today, and he knew it had to suck being kept isolated by one's self so why not? Naruto listened to her bitch about the cell, and the shitty food, and how she wished they would just do whatever it was they would do with her and be done with it.

Naruto eventually decided to voice something that had been nagging at him for a while, "So why are you talking to me? I mean, I know I came to you and everything, but I really didn't expect to get a word out of you at all."

Tayuya looked at him as if she was pondering the answer herself before she shrugged, "I'm caught, the snake-pedophile has all but verbally declared that I'm being left for dead after he cancelled the seal, you're strong enough to beat Kimimaro by yourself so I know you could do whatever you want with me whenever you want, and fuck Otogakure… I hate that place."

Naruto pulled his chair closer to her bed, "So what? Were you forced into becoming a ninja for Orochimaru and Oto? You didn't want to be a ninja?"

Tayuya shook her head, "Not really shithead. When I was five my home village in Ta no Kuni was attacked, my family and everyone else there were killed or taken prisoner. I ended up stumbling upon a group of the bastards and they caught me and made me start. As far as it went it was either learn or die, so I went along with it. And hell, if you have to do something, why not do it all the way? I was one of Orochimaru's rising elites by the time I was nine years old, he had already put his fucking seal on me by then."

Naruto chuckled, bringing her from her story, "What's so funny shithead?"

Naruto looked up at her apologetically, "None of it, sorry. It's just, you were one of his elites for only maybe a few months probably by time I was caught inside of Otogakure when I was eight. That had to suck going back and telling him that you couldn't catch me."

Tayuya shivered involuntarily, "You don't even know shithead. That bastard even 'disciplined' Kimimaro, who was his favorite little ass-toy after we got back. None of us ever fucked up again after that. We were thrown together in an elite team and here I am today, the last one alive." Tayuya chuckled a little at the memory, "You were kicking our asses though for the longest time, I remember."

Naruto scratched his head sheepishly, "I wouldn't necessarily call it fucking up, I guess you could say I was inspired to get away after Kimimaro almost took my eye. You guys chased me for two days. I still can't believe I got away. Ahh, good times…"

Tayuya nodded, "Anyway, yeah, like I said, fuck Orochimaru, I never wanted to work for him and he and the Uchiha can go fuck each other for all I care… Everything that I can tell you, you already know, that teme played his hand close to the vest. We may have been his 'elite bodyguards', but Kimimaro was the only one out of all of us that really ever accompanied him anywhere outside of the base in Ta no Kuni. No doubt he has more, and that one cleared out the second the Uchiha kid arrived, so it would be useless to check it out now anyway."

He looked up at Tayuya seriously, "So what do you think of me? We have been talking for the longest time and you don't seem to be too pissed at all about me being here. I did capture you after all."

Tayuya sighed and laid down on her bed, "Well, I haven't been tortured yet, unless you can call the crap they feed me as torture, so I don't have a reason to be, not at you. This is your job shithead, actually no, your job is to kill. So as far as I'm concerned you could have just slit my throat, left me lying in a ditch and kept moving after you beat me. You may be the reason that I'm locked up, but I wouldn't have hesitated to do the same to you if the circumstances were flipped."

Naruto nodded, "Well talking to you wasn't bad at all. Your language is a little vulgar, but somehow I kind of like that. I'll see if I can come back later this week or something, I'm on medical leave after your bony buddy and me made a mess out of the landscape."

Tayuya grunted in acknowledgment, "Sure shithead. You do whatever you want. It's not like they can torture me until I get over this seal crap so I'm not going to be executed anytime soon."

Naruto chuckled as he made his way to the door and gave it a knock, "So I'm shithead now huh?"

As an outside guard opened the door for the blonde killer's exit, Tayuya gave him a toothy grin from her bed, "Yep. Later shithead."

Shaking his head with a smirk on his face, Naruto shut the cell door behind him and nodded to the guard before leaving to report to Tsunade about what he had heard and done that day.

XxX

After grabbing a short lunch at Ichiraku's, Naruto returned to the Hokage Tower to find Tsunade asleep on her desk. As he entered through the window he saw her face down on her desk, paperwork stacked neatly to the side. Naruto took a second to pick up a sheet from the top and give it a once over. It was an order form from the Anbu trying to get restocked. Naruto's eyes widened once he got to the part that listed the material their kunai were made from, "Man Anbu get all of the good stuff…"

He placed the sheet back down and took a seat a distance away from the desk before making a Kage Bunshin and sending it over to her desk. The replication looked back at Naruto with a pitiful look, "Do I have to? Why can't you do it?"

Naruto shrugged, "Okay… I'll do it." The Kage Bunshin smiled until the original Naruto pulled an elastic from his pocket and shot it at Tsunade from across the room, hitting her right on the ear. Before he could even yell in fear at his creator the Bunshin was dispelled by a nasty right hand from the still sluggish Tsunade who slowly focused her eyes on Naruto who was waving from across the room.

She blinked and allowed her eyes to focus, "Brat? How long have you been here? *yawn* What woke me up?"

Naruto grinned as he moved closer and sat in front of her desk, "A mosquito baa-chan. You scared the hell out of me just snapping up like that and throwing that punch."

She rubbed her eyes, "It felt like I hit something solid… Anyway, I assume that you're coming back from speaking with Tayuya? How did it go?"

He looked down at the ground, "Well, she doesn't know anything that I didn't already tell you right after we got back from Tanzaku Gai. For being an elite, Orochimaru doesn't tell many of his own very much. She is going through symptoms from the sudden loss of the cursed seal, I guess either you or Shizune-chan are responsible for her not being dead from it flat out?"

Tsunade nodded, "It basically poisoned her system and put her into cardiac arrest a few hours after her arrival here. It was touch and go for a while, but she's still too weak to interrogate regularly, or else we risk killing her."

Naruto scratched his head sheepishly, "About the whole, 'killing her' thing, you think we can keep her alive? I know that she's an Oto ninja and everything, but after all of the stuff she told me I'm sure that given the option to live somewhere like this as opposed to there she'd take it in a heartbeat, especially now."

Tsunade gave Naruto a chiding look, "How do you know she wasn't lying to you brat? She is an enemy ninja."

In return, Naruto gave Tsunade a dry look, "Who do you think I am? I can tell when lies are being told to me. Not only did she not lie to me, she told me everything that I asked for, even the things that I didn't ask about." A grin then appeared on his face, "Besides, I like that attitude of hers. There's nothing wrong with a rose having a few thorns every now and then."

Tsunade snorted with an amused look on her face, "So you think the girl is good looking? Are you sure you're not any closer to Jiraiya, because you're thinking kind of like him right now."

Naruto laughed and propped his feet up on her desk, "Well she'll be much better when she gets over the cursed seal backlash. And don't ever say that again. I'm no massive pervert, I'm just a boy beginning to enter adulthood and I have no problems admiring the female form from time to time."

"What's the difference brat?" Tsunade asked him with a raised eyebrow, "It all sounds the same to me."

Naruto tapped his head with his finger, "Oh, but it isn't. A pervert will go out of his way to do things like that. Like peek on hot springs or write their own pervert books to get off. I, on the other hand, do none of those things. However, if a blatant opportunity to admire the opposite sex arises I have absolutely no qualms about taking full advantage. Isn't that what ninja are trained to do anyway?"

Tsunade sweat-dropped, "Did you just admit to me that you were a pervert?"

Naruto stiffened up and slammed his hands on her desk, "Hell no! The entire point of that tirade was to defend why I wasn't a pervert. Are you sure you're not closer to ero-sennin, because your mind shot to the pervert possibility pretty quickly."

The two glared at one another until they both broke out in laughter. Tsunade and Naruto calmed down as she fished an envelope from her desk and passed it to Naruto, "Here you go brat, your pay for a B-ranked mission. Use it wisely."

Naruto took the envelop with a wary look on his face, "B-rank? All I did was talk to Tayuya. It wasn't even hard or anything, it wasn't unpleasant at all. Hell, I think I brightened the girl's day up just by talking to her, I'm going back later this week."

Tsunade quirked an eyebrow as Naruto placed the envelop in his pocket, "You're going back? Why would you do that for?"

Naruto shrugged as he stood and made his way to the window, "I don't know. Being all alone like that really sucks. She's not really a bad person, she was just a ninja for the wrong nation, it's no real reason to want to hate her." As Naruto went to jump out of the window Tsunade clearing her throat got him to pause and turn.

An evil smirk was on her face that sent a chill down his spine, "Brat, I hope you don't think you really got away with that elastic crap." She held up the offending band and placed it around her wrist, "You're lucky that you're supposed to be on medical leave right now. Just remember that."

Naruto nodded slowly and jumped from the ledge, shivering slightly when he heard her chuckling evilly behind his back.

XxX

After cashing his check and buying groceries for his depleted supplies, which was not too hard when compared to previous times he did so when on this occasion he said that for every dollar over the average that he was charged he was going to break his foot off in the grocer's ass. The house guests that would not seem to leave apparently seemed stoked to be receiving the abundance of food. Anyway, he decided to try and get his body back into a steady condition, seeing as how he had all but fully healed from his previous injuries. And he knew no better way to get his body used to hostile environments than to head into Training Ground 44, because the Forest of Death was as close to a near death situation as he was going to get until he got an active combat mission.

Upon entering, Naruto took it upon himself to fuck with every species of wild animal he could find, from packs of wolves, to birds of prey, hell he even tried provoking a bear; although he did keep from going too far, like into the restricted northeast corner where all of the truly horrible things were, mostly because fighting a slew of big-ass man-eating spiders and tigers twice his size was something he felt like holding back on at the moment. He had just gotten out of the hospital thank you, let alone the morgue.

So he had been jumping through the woods, getting some exercise and generally running amok amongst the wildlife to satiate his innate desire to generally cause havoc in an unrestricted environment to get his legs back under him.

Landing on the forest floor to take a short breather a small burst of killing intent was his only warning before a kunai passed by his face, cutting his cheek to bring about a strange feeling of déjà vu. He dabbed his cheek and sighed, "Anko-chan. Come on out."

Anko stepped out with a kunai in her grasp and a look of anger on her face, "Don't Anko-chan me gaki. I know you interrogated that Oto kunoichi today, I also know that you didn't even bother asking anything about the cursed seal. Or more specifically, how to get it off of me like it was for her!"

Naruto was immediately put on the defensive as Anko came in attacking. He was forced to dodge the striking attempts from her kunai while trying to calm her down, "Anko calm down! You're being stupid!"

Anko caught him in the body with a hard kick that sent him flying backwards into the trunk of a tree, "Why did you just let that question slide? That damned snake still has his seal on me, he left her for dead and took hers off!"

Naruto growled as he stood back up, "If you would calm the fuck down I could explain everything to you now. Unless you still want to vent your useless anger on me, in which case I will be hitting you back."

Anko chuckled, "I know I saw you run through those genin back during test of yours, but I'm still quite a bit out of your reach my dear gaki."

Naruto shook his head, "I know you know about the retrieval mission, so I have to ask you… What the hell makes you think I can't beat the shit out of you Anko. Why would you try this on me? You can't scare me, I did nothing to you, and any threat that you even try following through on, I'll make you pay for it myself, fuck disciplinary measures."

Anko narrowed her eyes at him, "All right then gaki, I was about to sit and listen to what you had to say, but now I think I'll rough you up a bit just out of principle."

Naruto slid into a stance, "Don't think it will be that easy. Of course I should thank you though, the wolves and the bears were getting kind of easy to take down. You should be able to get the old blood pumping."

Anko licked her kunai, "I'll get your blood flowing gaki." She then threw the kunai at Naruto and headed in to engage him up close her taijutsu. Anko took quick, precise jabbing thrusts at Naruto that he was forced to parry or suffer due to the nature of her attacks. Anko went for the least guarded areas on his body, aiming at his neck, his eyes, even his groin, he really didn't like that last one, as evidenced by the return kick he gave her right back in the same area after one of Anko's attacks landed low.

Both broke off holding themselves below the belt, doubled over in pain, "What the hell gaki, you don't hit a lady there! *cough* What's wrong with you?"

Naruto backed away inhaling sharply, "You punched me in my junk! It was a reflex, and besides, just because you're a girl I'm supposed to hold back? It's not like you women ever guard that spot in a fight anyway so why the hell not? It's open."

Anko growled at him and thrusted her arm out, "Sen'eijashu (Hidden Shadow Snake Hands)" As a mass of snakes flew from Anko's sleeve at Naruto he reached for the sword on his back only to pull out his broken ninjato.

Naruto sweat-dropped just as the snakes hit him dead on and constricted around him. Anko's face took on a victorious look as she loomed over him, "Alright gaki, playtime is over. If you try to move these snakes will bite you, and they are poisonous." She then pulled out another kunai, "Now that you're all tied up, we're going to have our little discussion about what exactly you need to ask about next time you see that Oto girl."

Naruto looked at his scaly bindings and chuckled, "This is all you've got? I'm immune to all of the stuff that your snakes could have." Naruto had already built up an immunity to certain poisons as a precautionary measure before his mission to Otogakure years ago. All of the snakes from the jutsu Anko just used were among the first poisons that he ended up getting over. He began shifting around and, true to her threat, Anko's snakes bit into him. She gasped, she didn't mean to kill the brat, just rough him up a bit. That gasp soon turned to another as he broke the snakes' hold on him.

Upon standing he looked at Anko's slack-jawed face, "What? It's not like they were constrictors or anything. It wasn't too hard." He then decided to engage Anko instead of waiting this time. As he ran in Anko smirked confidently, the kid wasn't even trying to work angles. The sound of something coming into their plane of existence signified that he had made Kage Bunshin during his push forward. As the Naruto in front of her tried to keep the bulk of her attention occupied, the Kage Bunshin he had created were flying around her trying to pick their shots.

Anko did her best to trade strikes with the real Naruto and avoid attacks from the clones, but like she already knew, he was ridiculously fast for someone his age, and when he made contact, like the real one did right in her body with his fist, when the kid hit, it hurt, 'No thirteen year-old kid should hit that hard!'

The one punch from Naruto would have sent Anko flying, had he not grabbed a hold of her arm and pulled her back roughly. She almost wished that he had let her fly backwards as when he pulled her forward he smashed her in the ribs with a knee before stepping out of the way for one of his clones to drop a flying kick from behind on the back of her head.

Anko was sent sprawling forward onto the ground and quickly made her way back to her feet to see all of Naruto's clones crouched in front of the real one, ready to react. Naruto crossed his arms and stared out at the purple-haired snake summoner, "Are we done Anko? Or do we keep going? Because unlike you I have absolutely nowhere to be for the rest of the day."

Anko gritted her teeth and tossed a kunai right through the bunshin wall to hit the Naruto within, only to watch it go up in smoke. As all of the bunshin dispersed Naruto's disembodied voice rang out from the trees, "Now that wasn't nice Anko, I just wanted to talk. You want to know why I didn't ask about your cursed seal right?"

She looked around rapidly for any sign of the scarred blonde, "Yes! Why didn't you? If she could get hers off, even unwillingly then I-."

Naruto cut her off, "Because she doesn't know anything about it except how to use it. And Orochimaru may be a genius with ninjutsu, but he's not as good with fuuinjutsu as you think he is. Why do you think he tested his seal on you and didn't just put it on himself? The detriments were too great. He didn't even research a way to take it off of a recipient until he came up with the seals for the Sound Four, Kimimaro, and Sasuke. He can't remotely deactivate yours like he can for the others because yours was made before he was any damn good at making them, there's a reason yours is the first."

Anko shut her eyes tightly, "So there's really no way to get it off of me…"

"I didn't say that…"

Anko's head snapped up with that nugget of news, "You know how to do it? How?"

A sigh came from her surroundings, "I don't know yet. I'm starting to get into fuuinjutsu and every seal can be broken from what I've read, there's just a trick to them all. Orochimaru has something that I need in order to get a good read on what to do with your seal. I have a question though, has anyone ever put Fuuja Houin (Evil Sealing Method) on you?"

Anko blinked, forcing another sigh out of Naruto, "Goddamn it, what is wrong with this village? All right, find Kakashi or something and ask him to place it on you. It should help at the very least until I can think of what to do with it, it could take me years to find out how to break your seal."

Anko turned around as Naruto came striding out of the brush, "Wait, that didn't work. The Uchiha brat had that on him and it broke."

Naruto snorted, "That's because his dumb ass was the one who broke it. The seal is dependent on the will of the recipient, he wanted to use the seal, you don't. It's that simple. He got drunk off of the power boost and called upon it, you just want the damn thing off. The fact that your model is shoddy when compared to the others means that he can't slip subliminal messages through to you to influence you either."

Naruto turned to leave when Anko called out to him, "Wait gaki! How do you know so much about these seals? The Uchiha is the only person you knew that had one and he didn't know a thing about it."

Naruto turned back with a smile, "That is a secret. Some things should just stay buried in some instances Anko. You'll never find out why because only four people alive in this village know, and they aren't very talkative on the matter. One might be, but you have to narrow down who it is first. Later." Naruto then proceeded to shunshin out of the area, leaving Anko alone.

XxX

Naruto slinked back into his apartment later that afternoon before flopping face first on his couch, much to the amusement of the Suna kids… who were still there. Kankuro snorted in laughter as he saw Naruto's disheveled form collapse on his couch, "Long day kid?"

Naruto rolled over and gave him a dry stare, "Why are you still here? It's been a week…" He picked himself up into a sitting position on the couch, "And where the hell are Gaara and Temari?"

Kankuro opened a bag of chips from Naruto's freshly purchased groceries and sat on another couch, "I don't know. Temari said she was going shopping and Gaara… left to go do Gaara stuff."

Naruto nodded as he was facing the TV before something clicked, "Wait, shopping? How can you shop without enough money to even get a place to stay?"

Kankuro was sweating bullets after Naruto noticed his mistake, "Uh, we finally got paid by your village for helping out with the retrieval mission?" 'Please buy it. Please buy it. Please buy it!'

A hard stare was kept on Kankuro for a moment before Naruto relented, "Fine, whatever. But if you bastards are going to keep staying here you're going to start paying for your own stuff. Why are you still here, answer me."

Kankuro crunched on a few chips and passed the bag to Naruto who readily took a few for himself, "It's one of the conditions of our treaty with your village. We must lend out a genin team to help with manpower issues, and we ended up being the selected team since we're already here anyway."

Naruto rolled the bag up and stood to head back towards the cabinet he remembered placing them in at first, "All right, you guys can stay here for as long as you like, the company isn't that bad and my roommate is cute, things could have been worse, all things considered."

Kankuro shook his head amusedly, "You starting to dig my sister Uzumaki? You'd better watch yourself kid, don't overstep yourself on this one."

A chuckle came from Naruto as he sat back down, "I hope you're not threatening me like Gaara did in Suna. I'm just saying, she's hot, and she's sleeping with me in my bed. To just straight jump from having no visitors in your house for years to having Sabaku no Temari sleeping in your bed, it's definitely a noteworthy step up for some random orphan kid."

Kankuro nodded, "I wasn't really threatening you kid, I'm sure Gaara handled that already, he's been getting protective over her lately. It's kind of funny to see."

Before they could continue a knock came at Naruto's door. Naruto rose to greet whoever it was before narrowing his eyes upon discovering the identity of the person filling his door frame, "Ero-sennin."

Jiraiya gave Naruto a serious look, "Naruto, I need to speak with you. Can we go somewhere?"

Naruto turned to head back inside and return to his seat on the couch, "I just got home after a few hours in the Forest of Death, I just got groceries, I'm hungry and tired… I'm not going anywhere, you can tell me here."

Jiraiya sighed and walked inside, "You mind if I had a seat myself?" Naruto simply pointed to an open chair and sat down, Kankuro and Naruto looking at him.

Kankuro thumped Naruto on his shoulder and whispered to him, "You know Jiraiya of the sannin? Kid who the hell are you?"

Naruto brushed the older puppeteer off of his shoulder and let Jiraiya get settled before he spoke, "All right ero-sennin, what do you want with me? I thought I told you that the only thing keeping me from actively pursuing your head was that you're too elite for me to try to kill and that you're too useful to Konoha."

Jiraiya frowned, "I know that gaki, but there are some things that you need to know. Orochimaru didn't take Sasuke's body, he had to take a different one before he could arrive and now has to wait three years before he can try again."

Naruto nodded. At least something decent came out of that mission, "So three years to find the snake and kill him and his vessel before things go to shit. It's almost easy…"

Jiraiya had to chuckle at how Naruto narrowed down the situation, "Well not only that, but do you remember Itachi and his blue buddy from a while back?" Naruto nodded, it's kind of hard to forget meeting and fighting Itachi Uchiha, "The group that they happen to be a part of, Akatsuki, they have also ceased operations for the time being, just about the same time frame as Orochimaru."

Naruto let out a short laugh, "Well I don't really give a damn about the Orochimaru thing, I just care for the sake of the fact that I'm going to be involved somehow, but the Akatsuki thing… Hey, if they want me I should tell Gaara too, they'll probably try something on him as well right?"

Jiraiya nodded, "About you though. I want to take you on a training trip to get you ready for what is to come. You need to be ready to take down S-rank level ninja within three years time."

Kankuro's eyes widened as he again turned to Naruto, "Kid who the hell are you! Who deals with this kind of crap and doesn't even flinch?" He points out at Jiraiya, "He's sitting here telling you a group of S-rank criminals are after your head and you just shrug like it happens every day."

Naruto looked at Kankuro and shrugged, "Meh, if you start every single day expecting the worst you can only be pleasantly surprised."

Jiraiya and Kankuro sweat-dropped as the older man spoke up, "That's pretty morbid gaki."

Naruto snapped icy blue eyes back onto Jiraiya, "I'm sorry, I guess the day before you found me I should have been thinking that someone like you would just let me be or at least let me wake up before you took drastic measures."

Jiraiya looked at the ground, "Damn it kid, how long are you going to hold that over my head? I know it was a mistake, I knew it the entire time it was happening, but it was an order, if nothing else you can at least understand that right?"

Naruto sucked on his teeth, "Yeah, if it was something that ended up being for the greater good I probably would understand and accept it, even though you never tried to get my side of the story before you made me into a retarded four year-old version of my eight year-old body, locking all of my hard-earned skills, strength, and speed away into the depths of my mind. But nothing good came from what you guys did to me."

Jiraiya stood to leave when Naruto stopped him one more time at the door, "Wait." Jiraiya turned to face him only to see the same stone gaze on his face, "During the chunin exams… When I found you, did you agree to train me because of the reason you said, or was it because you remembered what you did and wanted to remedy it if only a little?"

Naruto didn't let him answer, "I'm going out Kankuro, I'll be back later tonight, tell the others." Naruto then utilized shunshin to exit the premises. Jiraiya sighed deeply and followed suit, leaving Kankuro alone in Naruto's apartment, "Wait! What the hell just happened?"

XxX

(Two Days Later)

"So what's eating you shithead?" Tayuya shuffled the deck of cards that Naruto had brought to pass the time. She looked way better now than she did two days ago, her skin had gotten its color back and she looked like she had finally gotten some good sleep for once.

Naruto sighed. He had come to talk to her because he actually enjoyed her company and she could give him an unbiased opinion on things being that she didn't know anyone in the village other than him, and that was only a little bit. They were seated on the floor due to a lack of table in her cell. Due to the fact that she regularly talked freely to Naruto she had not been tortured, nor was it seemingly on the horizon as long as Naruto reported to Tsunade what they talked about afterwards.

"What if the guy that had a hand in screwing your life up was trying to make amends to you, but the wounds were still fresh." Naruto took the seven cards that Tayuya dealt him, "Take them back and re-shuffle, I saw that. Get the cards out of your sleeve."

Tayuya cursed and brought some chuckles out from Naruto, "Well shithead, I would just say either kill him and be done with it, or suck it up and get over it. You can't bitch about it forever, that isn't healthy."

Naruto looked at her as he took the cards that she re-dealt, "Why am I shithead again?"

Tayuya smirked as she drew a card from the top of the pile, "Because you act like a shithead, therefore you are shithead. There's no way I'm calling you your real name 'fishcake'."

Naruto watched her place a card down in the pile and took to drawing his own card, "Sure, sure Tayuya. I guess I'm shithead then. So you think I should just get over it, just like that."

Tayuya nodded as she looked over her cards, "Yeah, I mean is being angry at whoever it is you're talking about actually doing anything for you?"

Naruto grinned as he finally threw down a card, "Yeah, it makes me feel a hell of a lot better about being me, that's for sure."

Tayuya flicked a discarded card at Naruto's head, catching him flush in the face, "I mean is it doing anything practical for you? Obviously not if that was the first thing that you told me. You told me it was an order from the last Hokage, no one is stupid enough to go against their superior's word especially someone that high up in the food chain. You got sealed, I understand. If it was me, I would have killed him, but you're apparently nicer than that, and holding grudges really doesn't seem like your kind of thing."

Naruto grunted as he picked up a card from the discard pile and switched it with his own before laying down a spread of three of his own cards, "Fine… I'll try. I guess he isn't going to leave me alone now after what he just told me the other day so at least tolerating him would be in my best interest. Especially since I can't just beat his ass to make myself feel better, he's still out of my league."

As Tayuya dropped another card Naruto smiled while picking it up and laid the rest of his cards down, "I win Tayuya-chan."

The aforementioned girl raised an eyebrow at him curiously, "Tayuya-chan? Since when am I a fucking –chan?"

Naruto gathered up the cards and remade the deck before standing to exit, "Since I became shithead. Take care Tayuya-chan, I'll see you soon. Stay cooperative and I'll see what I can do for you."

Tayuya flipped him off, "Fuck that Tayuya-chan shit. And fuck cooperating too."

Naruto shook his finger at her at the door, "So you say, and yet you're as docile as a lamb from what I've heard and seen."

Naruto quickly left the scene just as Tayuya started shouting at him, "Get me out of here and I'll show you how fucking docile I am shithead!"

Naruto shut the door behind him, chuckling the entire time and faced the ninja guarding the door, "She's a little playful today. Take care when it's time to give her dinner."

The man snorted and chuckled along with Naruto as the blonde in question made his way out of the building, "You are one ballsy kid, kid."

XxX

As he made his way to Tsunade's office he entered to find Shikamaru inside as well, "What's up Shikamaru, how have you been."

Shikamaru gave Naruto a small smile, "I've been good Naruto, things are about to get troublesome again soon. I've got a mission to go get ready for. I'll see you around."

Naruto gave him a short wave as the lazy chunin walked out, "Don't work too hard Shikamaru." As he left he went to sit down by Tsunade, "How have you been baa-chan?"

After the obligatory inanimate object was winged at Naruto's head and the two settled back down Tsunade smiled at him, "I'm fine brat. Now Jiraiya came to me about something because he never found you to get your answer last night. He wants to know whether or not he can get you to go on a training trip with him."

Naruto sat still, pondering for a moment, "No, I won't just cut and run now. I agree that I need to train myself to get ready for Akatsuki, but I don't have to go anywhere to do it. I don't get what his reasoning for leaving would be for me. He said it himself that Akatsuki aren't coming for me for a few years, so it's not a matter of village security. If he thinks it's because I need to work on using the Kyuubi's chakra, I can do that here, I've been doing it well enough so far and it hasn't affected anyone around here yet, hell I go to the Forest of Death to train for that so there's no issues there."

"Brat, Jiraiya can't stick around to train you himself for all of the three years. He has his own responsibilities to keep to elsewhere. You know about his spy network. Taking you with him would kill two birds with one stone." Tsunade tried to reason.

Naruto shook his head, "No, he either wouldn't focus on one or the other. If I stay here he can give me stuff to work on and let me train, then drop in when he's in Konoha to see how I'm doing. That might make for a more productive schedule for me than simply being on the road. It's kind of hard to train when you never stay in one place for too long. Besides, you still need someone like me to help out with your mission load, and I still want my promotion too, I'm not putting my career on hold for three years."

Tsunade looked at him, thinking about what he was saying, "Are you sure you're not just still upset with Jiraiya? Naruto the man is sorry for what he did. I know that he messed you up badly, but carrying a grudge like that cannot be good for your state of mind."

Naruto waved her off, "I'm still pretty pissed off, but I'm not going to go Uchiha-teme on him over the whole thing. It'll take a while, but at the very least I can try and let him back in. He seemed to genuinely want to train me when we were looking for you, he's trying to make up for it at least. Tell him everything that I just told you, I'll see you later baa-chan."

Much to Tsunade's chagrin, before she could stop him Naruto shunshined out of the room, making a mess out of the papers on her desk, "Damn you brat…" She turned her attention to one of the corners, "Did you get all of that you pervert?"

Jiraiya dropped his transparency jutsu and walked over, "At least he's out of the outright animosity phase. I'm kind of upset that he doesn't want to travel with me, but after how he just broke it down I have to say he has a point. He was so convincing I think he may be mature enough to know about his family, he's a chunin now anyway, isn't that the level Minato wanted him to be before he was told?"

Tsunade nodded, "Are you sure? Telling him might just piss him off even more at you."

Jiraiya sighed and looked out the window, "I hope he sees it as something that was necessary to hide. If he's still upset then I'll deal with it, but the kid still deserves to know at this point. I'll tell him when I get a chance, maybe before I leave."

As Jiraiya walked away he never noticed the figure sitting on a ledge under the window. Naruto scratched his familiar blonde hair as he heard Jiraiya and Tsunade leave the room after shutting the window, "So my old man's name is Minato… I wonder how many Minato's lived in Konoha before the Kyuubi attack?"