Chapter 56
Tsunade stared out the window of her office. For the precious few minutes before her next meeting, she enjoyed the view. All over the village, a riot of pink flowers sprang into bloom, shedding their petals over everything and scenting the air. She thought longingly of flower viewing parties, sake, and dumplings. When her door opened, however, she turned around.
“Sai,” she said, nodding to the young man as he stopped in front of her desk.
“Hokage-sama.”
“I've come to a decision about Root,” she said, watching as his face remained neutral. “Officially, it will continue not to exist. In reality, it will answer directly to me, and you will be its leader. No one may know of its existence, and if any of its members are caught, I will have to disavow them and their actions.”
Sai nodded. The concept was one he had been operating under for years.
“As the leader, your first job is to speak with your new subordinates and make sure they understand the situation,” she said, giving him a sharp look. “Danzou is gone, as are his policies, and it is in everyone's best interest that they know this.”
He nodded again, and she seemed satisfied, at least for the moment. The Hokage dismissed him, and he slipped out without alerting Shizune. He assumed she knew of the arrangement, as she seemed to know everything Tsunade did, but giving her plausible deniability seemed like basic professional courtesy in this case.
Over the past several months, he had managed to track down what he thought amounted to all of Root. It was possible that he had missed some, and he resolved to keep his eyes open for any such stragglers, but no one had named them and he had seen no sign of their existence.
Sai allowed himself a moment to watch the cherry blossoms, memorizing them for a later work, and then set off to begin his task.
---
The figure appeared on a sunny day, its raincoat marking it as unusual even before the first shinobi noticed the Amegakure headband. By the time a couple of jounin strolled up, looking a little too casual to be believed, several civilians had stopped to stare.
“Excuse me,” the figure said. Its voice was hollow and tinny behind the rebreather it wore, but sounded feminine. The rest of its features were obscured by a pair of goggles and the headband. “Could you please take me to Naruto Uzumaki?”
Word of the Ame kunoichi reached Tsunade before the visitor herself did. By the time the foreigner had arrived at Hokage Tower, Sai had already been summoned to her office.
“...and go check out her story. Take a couple of subordinates,” Tsunade said, dismissing Sai as the knock on her office door sounded.
Sai left through the window, lingering just outside a moment as he thought on who would be best to take with him to Amegakure, and how to hide themselves. Before the door opened, however, he was gone.
The two jounin who had found the woman led her in between them, not touching her. She had come willingly, and settled in the chair across the desk without being asked. Tsunade frowned at the familiarity and steepled her fingers.
“Who are you?” she asked without preamble.
“My name is Hibiki, Tsunade-sama,” she said. “As I said to your underlings, I would like to speak with Naruto Uzumaki.”
“You may discuss any matters you have with him with me as well.”
Hibiki shook her head slowly. “I'm sorry, ma'am, but this concerns him directly.”
“What, exactly, do you have to do with a member of my village?”
“Ma'am,” Hibiki said, carefully neutral.
Tsunade fought the urge to roll her eyes. She caught the eye of one of the jounin who had escorted Hibiki and nodded. Hibiki did not look back over her shoulder.
“So, Hibiki-san, how was your journey to Konoha?” Tsunade asked, smiling sweetly.
All of the gear obscuring the Ame ninja's face kept Tsunade from reading her expression, though she thought she caught a tiny flicker of movement behind the goggles. She wondered if reliance on her face being hidden had kept Hibiki from developing a proper poker face.
“It was uneventful, ma'am.”
“The best kind, then.”
They lapsed into silence, Tsunade narrowing her eyes to stare into the goggles. Hibiki shifted in her seat, and the overhead light caught her at an angle, casting a glare across the glass. Behind her, after several long minutes, the door opened and Naruto stepped inside.
“Yo, Gran-” he stopped, spotting Hibiki.
“Ah, Naruto,” Tsunade said, forcing a smile. “You have a visitor. Pull up a chair, and we can all talk.”
Naruto did as she said, though with an odd mixture of reluctance and curiosity on his face. Even as he dragged the extra chair from a corner of the room, his eyes never left Hibiki.
“Naruto, this is Hibiki from Amegakure. Hibiki-san, Naruto Uzumaki.”
“Ossu,” Naruto said, staring openly.
“Hibiki-san, what is it you wished to say to Naruto?”
To both their surprise, Hibiki slipped out of her chain and knelt, facing Naruto.
“Naruto-sama,” she said, and he actually edged away from her several inches, though she didn't appear to see. “Amegakure has sent me to assure you that we follow the angel Konan-sama's pledge to support you.”
“Okay,” Naruto said, glancing at Tsunade for guidance. She shrugged. “That's nice of you. Um, you can go back to your chair, if you want.”
“Thank you, Naruto-sama,” Hibiki said, taking her seat. “It is not only to renew our promise that I came to see you, actually. Even in Amegakure, we heard about Kabuto's recent, ah, visit. Concerned for your well-being, we began to follow him, albeit at a safe distance. Although we were not able to discover any detailed information on him, we noticed that he appears to be searching for someone.”
Naruto nodded. “Makes sense. He's probably still looking for Sasuke, too.”
Tsunade glared at Naruto, hoping Hibiki would not see. She gave no sign she noticed, though neither did Naruto.
“That would be Sasuke Uchiha?” Hibiki asked, and Naruto nodded. “We shall keep our eyes open. If we find him, or any reliable news of him, we will send word.”
“Thanks,” said Naruto.
She nodded. “As I have said, we will do all in our power to support you.”
“If there is nothing else, Hibiki-san, you must be tired from your travels. Speak to Shizune, and she will find you some accommodations. Please feel free to rest in Konoha for several days.”
Hibiki stood and bowed, though not as low as she had for Naruto. “Thank you, ma'am,” she said, and left.
Naruto looked to Tsunade. She waited several seconds after the door had closed before reacting.
“Well, this going to be interesting,” she said. “Could you try not to reveal so much next time you're speaking to the emissary of a foreign power?”
“Sorry,” Naruto said, scratching at his chin.
Tsunade sighed. “I'm going to have to meet with the council now. You should go. Just... try to stay out of trouble.”
Naruto nodded and fled the room.
---
“You have to admit, Amegakure's loyalty being to him, personally, rather than to the village as a whole, is... concerning,” Homura said.
Tsunade made a noncommittal noise, eying the council. “Naruto is loyal to the village. Remarkably so, given how he was treated for much of his life.”
At her added comment, she noted, at least a few faces had the decency to look ashamed.
“An entire village, though, loyal to one citizen?” Gorou Katai, a newer council member, asked. “That is a lot of power for a single genin. A lot of temptation.”
Tsunade suppressed a sigh. After Danzou's death, she had expanded the council, thinking a wider variety of voices would be beneficial. She still felt her idea was sound, but doubted some of the newer members had ideas that were more than retreads of Danzou's xenophobia and hawkishness.
“He's saved the entire village on multiple occasions. I don't know what more you want,” she said aloud.
“As I recall, Orochimaru protected the village well before his betrayal,” said Gorou.
Tsunade sucked in a breath. His comment, however right it was, stung.
“Time will tell,” Koharu said, holding up a hand. “This council has borrowed trouble for itself enough times. I think, by now, we should have learned better.”
The Hokage raised her eyebrows, glancing at the older woman. She had been on the council since the Third Hokage's time, and when Tsunade had taken over Root, she had learned at least a few of Danzou's dirty secrets, if not the most interesting. Everything she had heard had suggested that Koharu and Homura had leaned towards his views more than a little. Indeed, Homura looked at his old teammate in surprise, but said nothing to gainsay her.
“Yes, well, at the very least, we can agree that the Amegakure woman must be watched,” he said, recovering. “Set an Anbu guard to tail her.
“Oh, I have,” Tsunade said. Root, too, she thought to herself.
“Do we know the situation in Ame?” Gorou asked. “They've been so insular and secretive for years, and then they lost two leaders in a short time.”
“I have operatives checking it out now. Though rumor is, they've started letting in civilian merchants,” Tsunade said, smiling. “Perhaps the rumors will reach us before the official report.”
This got a chuckle out of Aita Shounin, another new member, though she disguised it as a cough. She was a retired kunoichi in her sixties, the first in her merchant family to become a shinobi.
“They're in chaos, most like,” said Gorou. “A great deal of resources, if we could find some way to ensure their loyalty...”
“Are you suggesting absorbing them?” Homura asked sharply.
“Merely a thought,” said Gorou, spreading his hands. “It is, after all, quite a prize to leave lying on the ground.”
“What was that you said earlier about power and temptation?” asked Aita, earning her a venomous look.
Homura sighed. “Even if we could take it, how would we organize that? Either we have a satellite village, which the other major powers would not countenance, or we try to absorb an entire village's worth of new shinobi. It would overwhelm us.”
“There wouldn't be enough jobs to go around,” Aita added. “Unemployment is bad enough among civilians, no need to have your malcontents armed and trained.”
Gorou crossed his arms. “Perhaps, but let's not discard the idea permanently. Who knows what the report on Amegakure will say?”
Tsunade rubbed her temple where a headache was forming. “Gorou is right about one thing. There's no point continuing until we have some idea of what we're dealing with. Let's end for the night, and meet back up again when we know more.”