Chapter 6: John Didn't Title This Either

Kakashi hummed to himself as he strolled into Gato's compound. Thanks to Naruto's clones, the remaining mercenaries who had been venting their displeasure at the loss of a paycheck were rounded up in short order and had been turned over to what currently passed for justice in Wave. At the moment, that was a tribunal of Tsunami and two other survivors whose attitude towards capital punishment could be broadly called "enthusiastic". While the "trials" were still going on, Naruto had been also helping the suddenly staffed crew of bridge builders. Kakashi wasn't sure what a bridge would do for a trading port that acted as a hub, rather than producing much trade goods, but that wasn't his problem.

He calmly formed a trio of shadow clones and began to search the area for money. If he were a kinder man, the money would be left with Wave to help them rebuild, but Konoha had put in far more than a C-rank mission's worth of service on this job and that required repaying with a hefty supplement to remind others that the mission-rankings were not just suggestions. On the other hand, Wave was ripe for the plucking . . . it would be a waste to not make use of it. He nodded to himself and resolved to turn this whole mess over to the Hyūga when they returned to the village. Let the ones with the twisty-thinking and the forked tongues figure out how to milk Wave properly.

FMB

He came upon his students training, that was normal. What was unusual—rather, what was the new normal—was Sasuke hovering next to Hinata as they broke for lunch. From what Kakashi had observed, the only time Sasuke wasn't within a foot of Hinata was when she was in the bathroom. And that only because Naruto was physically restraining him and seeding the area with clones. Kakashi had already resolved to get the lad an appointment with Inoichi the moment they got back to the village. As one of the few people privy to the real events of the Uchiha Massacre, he was aware of several things and was planning to sort them out while the lad was getting a talking to. Come to think of it, they should chat about killing fifty or so men and not reacting.

Sasuke and Hinata had repaired their clothes to the best of their abilities, with varying degrees of success and remedying varying damages. Hinata had needed to patch several places that had been flashing her breast-band through her top. Sasuke had plenty of tears and rips to repair, which he had coupled with a layer of chains under the poncho which Kakashi was going to have to remind him to baffle. Naruto hadn't even needed to wash his clothes, all the blood and even his own sweat had been evaporated by the cloak he'd manifested.

Speaking of which, Sasuke and Naruto were both experimenting with their newly unlocked and/or discovered abilities. The swathe of burned trees and slashed stumps bore witness to Sasuke's efforts. It was hard to identify Naruto's achievements, mostly because his ninjutsu was so destructive that spotting any change in the level of damage caused was academic at best. Naruto reported that he had trouble bringing up the cloak unless he focused on anger and fear, but that he was doing okay at what the team had taken to calling pre-cloak and maintaining it.

For Kakashi, who'd been on the front lines against the beast, it was something horrible to see the malevolent eyes of the Kyūbi staring out a face that was a mix of his sensei and his sensei's wife. But the moment he actually looked, the difference was plain: there was a softness that had been lacking in the raging creature that had devastated Konoha. There was a hard edge, but none of the undirected hatred of all living creatures. Understanding his most energetic student had been something of an exercise at first, as he was relearning to speak with canines that were too large to be human and a voice that had not merely dropped as most boys' did, but had picked up an extra timbre as though there were a second mouth speaking which had a vocabulary of noises rather than speech.

And there had been learning to not scratch things. Naruto was learning how to not wreck his bedding, his friends, and even his own face with fingernails that had become claws. So had his toenails, but that took less relearning and his teammates would just have to get used to being sliced by kicks.

Kakashi had to admit to a perverse interest in finding out what Konoha would do with a jinchuriki who sported red eyes.

FMB

All told, the journey home had been rather dull. Without the added interest of over-mission ninja attacking and not having to slow down for an old man, they moved rather quicker. What had been a journey taking nearly a fortnight was done just shy of a week. If it hadn't been for Sasuke's unwillingness to allow Hinata out of his sight, it would have been a calm journey. For Kakashi, it was, but Naruto was working to ensure that Sasuke at least physically gave Hinata some space, even if he was hovering.

FMB

"Hi guys!" Naruto bounded up to the gate guards, his exuberant joy at being home evident in his burst of extra pep as he grinned at them, showing those giant canines and beaming with his slitted pupils.

"Demon!" The chūnin on guard rapidly decided between them that retreat was the better part of valor and fled to hi—seek reinforcements.

Kakashi shrugged. "I'm going to go report to the Hokage. I feel that this is a report best given promptly. Do head home."

FMB

Hinata cocked her head as she walked down the main street of Konoha. Naruto had split off a while ago. "Why are you following me, Sasuke? Your home is the other direction."

"I'm making sure you're safe."

"Ah."

"Besides, this isn't the way to your home. This looks rather more like Tee and . . ." he trailed off as a firm hand clasped his shoulder. He glanced up and saw Morino Ibiki frowning at him. "Morino-san?"

"You have an appointment," Hinata said, her smile not unkind.

"But how will I keep her safe?" Sasuke demanded as Ibiki calmly dragged him into the building. On his way through the door, Ibiki grabbed Naruto, who'd just been leaving.

"Come on, kid, you have an appointment as well."

FMB

"Sasuke, care to explain why I was informed I needed to have a prompt meeting with you?" Inoichi leaned forwards, elbows resting on his desk, hands clasped in front of his face, eyes calm, but his expression was probing.

"Hinata's in danger!"

"I've been monitoring Hiashi . . ."

"Not from him!"

"Oh? Who from, then?"

"Everything!"

"Ah."

FMB

Naruto sat on the chair they'd dumped him on. The room was utterly devoid of anything but the metal seat, which was not only bolted to the floor, but the bolts had been welded and rivets had been used to secure it as well. Naruto considered this overkill in spite of the fact that it was only that combination which had prevented him from taking it apart so he could make something.

They'd done a thorough search, way better than the chūnin who usually did it, and had even found his hidden hidden pockets. Most of it he was informed he would get back when he left the building, but several of his specialist supplies had been confiscated outright. He was still deciding how to get them back. He was rather upset that they had taken even his string. He'd told them (honestly, as it happened) that he wanted to be able to at least pay cat's cradle with himself to keep from boredom, but they had (reasonably) declared that T&I policy was that anyone named Uzumaki Naruto was not allowed to have anything but a T&I-issued jumpsuit while in the building.—T&I existed to ensure the secure holding of dangerous ninja who often were rather good at either escaping (killing several people on their way out) or killing themselves (taking their information to the grave); either way, they specialized in preventing this outcome.—The end result was that Naruto was truly bored for the first time in several years. At least in school he had some stuff on hand and could tinker with mechanisms to make traps. Or try and trap the room while instruction was going on. Or just cut. Something.

The door banged open and a woman stepped into the room. Stepped was not, in fact, the right word. The less . . . cultured . . . would have called it "undulation"—Naruto was educated in these matters after living four years in the seedier parts of Konoha. It was, in fact, a very particular type of walk that combined the confidence of a strut with the attention-grabbing effect of a sashay to declare to the viewer that this was someone who was more than happy to cut the viewer's throat, but that the walker also knew the viewer was too busy enjoying being the viewer to notice until the knife was actually wet with blood.

She was dressed for the effect as well. For no apparent reason, her hair was pulled into almost a topknot, the short ends spiked out in their explosive attempt to return to their natural state of slightly-tousled. Her face had no makeup, but there were a few tiny dots along the tops of her cheekbones, just under her eyes, that resembled animal markings. A tan coat covered her shoulders and arms, the bottom flaring at the middle of her calves, weighted to catch the unaware a stinging blow or be flicked into a sight-line to keep someone blind for a crucial moment. Her chest was one of the best Naruto had seen, his somewhat practiced eye telling him that they were natural and well-formed, rounded instead of elongated. All she was covering them with was a thin shirt which was as low-cut as it could be without allowing bouncing. Other than that, a pair of sandals, and a pouch strapped to her right thigh, all she wore was a skirt what was barely high enough on her hips to prevent viewing of her more intimately, and which was cut so high on her thigh that she probably had to buy from a lingerie shop for her bottoms.

"I'm too young," Naruto declared.

Anko came to a dead stop. "What?"

"Hinata and Sasuke told me I should wait until I'm fifteen before I 'indulge in my baser instincts'."

Anko blinked. "Run that by me again?"

"Besides," Naruto went on. "Sasuke wouldn't be happy if I spent what it'd cost for an hour with you."

"Wow. It's been a while since I met someone so young with a death wish." Anko drew a kunai from the pouch at her hip and twirled it around her fingers. "Either you're stupid, suicidal, or you have the biggest sac . . ."

"Too young!"

"I'm going to take my time killing you."

"I'm not agreeing to pay!" Naruto insisted. "Snuff probably costs extra."

Anko's face twisted from bloodthirsty to confused. "I'm not a whore, kid."

"Ah, of course. Some prefer 'Lady of the night'," Naruto nodded sagely. "Or 'woman of easy virtue'? 'Soiled dove'? how about 'person of negotiable affection'?"

Anko was across the room in a blink, her left hand lifting Naruto by the throat and slamming him into the wall, snakes slithering from under her sleeve to coil around his limbs as she pointed the kunai at his left eye. "Any . . . last . . . wor . . ." she trailed off as she registered the eyes. She was back on the other side of the room. "HolyshitKyūbi!"

Naruto stomped and crossed his arms. "Great. Another person who judges me for being the jailer."

Anko coughed. "Kid. Are you Uzumaki Naruto?"

"Yeah." Naruto's expression was sullen.

"Are you currently possessed by a demon?"

"No. I'm possessing a demon." His face moved into outright scowling.

Anko decided that T&I personnel were smart enough not to stick the Kyūbi in a low-security room without supervision, so he was probably not the demon. "Why do you think I'm a whore?"

He looked at her, getting to use an expression that he normally saw directed at him: it was the look of someone who cannot quite believe someone is asking such a stupid question. He gestured at her.

Anko looked down at herself, then glowered. "Great," she said, her tone imitating his. "Another person who judges based on my clothes."

Naruto cocked his head. "But you're dressed like a whore . . ." when her scowl turned murderous, he went on, "I mean, Arisa-chan used to wear that exact outfit. Mostly for her genin clients." He paused. "Well, not quite that exact outfit." Naruto gestured to his chest. "She had a better top, but she was a little better endowed. And she's got a little more flesh on her than you do, you've got a flat belly. Less, hip too."

Anko was now looking decidedly confused. "What?"

"You're a little less padded, but you've got more attitude than she does, so that probably makes up for it."

Anko wasn't sure if she was being insulted, so she decided to ignore that. "Who the fuck is 'Arisa-chan'?"

"The whore who taught me how to apply foundation properly."

Anko was more confused than ever. Despite there being better things to do with her time, she couldn't help but probe deeper. "Why was a whore teaching you to apply makeup?"

"Arisa-chan didn't teach me to apply makeup. That was Misumi-chan! Especially lipstick and how to do eyeliner better. I got pretty good at most of the stuff, but I've always been pants at hair-coloring. I keep trying to improve things, but no one is happy with orange."

"Why were you learning from whores?"

"Because I was bored and they decided that instead of being alone in my apartment, I should be with human beings, learning skills. That's what Tenuō-Obaasama always said."

Deciding that her meetings could wait, Anko settled herself on the floor, revealing to Naruto's practiced eye, that she had flexibility several orders of magnitude greater than any of the whores he knew, because she managed the feat without flashing anything and ended up still not flashing anything while sitting with crossed legs. "Why are you in T&I, kid?"

"I don't know."

Anko barked a laugh. "That's what they all say. D'you know that sooner or later, I always find out differently?" She smirked. "Let's try going through the steps. How come you're in the building?"

"I really don't know, not-a-whore-chan!" Naruto insisted. "I was here to let them know that Sasuke was coming in for an unscheduled, emergency appointment with Inoichi-sama."

"Alright . . . " Anko motioned for him to go on.

"Well, I was just leaving and I saw scar-man grab Sasuke and drag him into the building. On his way, he grabbed my arm and said 'you're next, brat'. Then he had them search me and put on this jumpsuit and stuck me in here. That was a long time ago!"

"So you're meeting with Yamanaka-sama?"

"I guess?"

"Why are you meeting with him?"

"I don't know! Sasuke's meeting with him because he's been freaking out since Hinata almost died on the mission."

"I think we're coming to the crux of the matter. You were freaking out, too, then."

"No way! Me and Sasuke killed the ones who hurt her and all the ones who threatened to sell her. If anyone ever threatens Hinata, I'll just KILL THEM." For a moment, wisps of red chakra boiled into the air around Naruto and his eyes had a glint of the all-consuming fury of the beast within. Then it vanished and he was beaming again. "So why worry? Better to just get stronger so she's never hurt again."

"When you say 'all the ones who threatened to sell her'?" Anko studiously decided not to address the fact that for a moment, she had felt claws of icy fear grasp her heart in a way that her old Master had never managed.

"The bad man, Gato, had hired a bunch of thugs and they were going to sell Hinata. So we killed them all. Except Gato. Hinata killed him while we were discussing how to torture him."

Anko's eyebrows rose. "How many are we talking about?"

"I couldn't count, 'cause all the ones I got mostly burnt up, but Sasuke and Kakashi-sensei used their Sharingan and said there were about a hundred."

"And so you're here to work through the guilt?"

"What guilt?" Naruto looked genuinely puzzled. "They were threatening Hinata so I killed them all. Well, except the ones Sasuke got."

Anko looked him over. While she was not psychologist like her superior's superior, she had about a decade of working in interrogation and the kid in front of her had none of the usual marks of the shinobi who just killed because they liked it, but he didn't seem to be harboring any repressed feelings. He seemed to have found the groove that took most ninja years to reach: where killing certain people was just the right thing to do and they didn't let it bother them.

"You're alright, kid." And the smile he gave her was so radiantly happy that for a few moments, the curse mark on her shoulder didn't even twinge.

FMB

The Hokage rubbed his eyes tiredly and repacked his pipe. This was his third in a row, but the tobacco was the only thing keeping his mood even a little stable. "Let me see if I'm understanding your mission report properly, Hatake-jōnin. You decided to proceed with a trio of genin on a mission where the enemy was Momochi Zabuza. Hyūga Hinata was nearly killed, Uchiha Sasuke unlocked some special form of the Sharingan and has had a partial regression in his psychological progress, and Uzumaki Naruto is now intentionally keeping himself partially possessed by the Kyūbi no Yoko? Oh, and both Naruto and Sasuke have between them over a hundred kills to their names and even Hinata has three. Oh and there was the part where Naruto slaughtered dozens of men while embracing the rage of the Kyūbi and from what you've told me, at the least remembers it as if he were in complete control at the time. Did I get all of it?"

"When you put it that way, it sounds pretty bad," Kakashi admitted. "I'd prefer to think of it as my genin gaining valuable field experience, having the opportunity to make their first kills with people they have no reason to feel guilty over, and two of them accessing new fonts of power that they can put to use for the village." Kakashi was rather proud of that summation. He'd been planning it since he'd seen the aftermath of his genin's rage-fueled butchery and was pretty sure he'd done the best he could at sanitizing it. "Oh, and got to deal with the fear of losing a teammate without the actual death part."

"And yet, I have Uchiha Sasuke in an emergency meeting with Inoichi and you've scheduled Naruto for the slot right afterwards."

"Just because I don't think they're having any problems with killing doesn't mean I'm right. I want to make sure that a professional helps with anything I missed. And Sasuke really needs to find a better solution than hovering to protect his teammates." Kakashi paused and then corrected himself, "teammate."

"I have reports from the gate guards that the Kyūbi has taken over its container and is rushing through Konoha destroying entire buildings in a single swipe of its hand."

Kakashi looked pointedly out the window at the village which was impressively free of overt destruction.

"Some dozen or so heart attacks attributable to Naruto." Kakashi didn't reply to that one, not sure what he could add. "And as soon as he sees the mission report, Hyūga Hiashi is going to try to kill me, then you, and then possibly the last Uchiha and our Jinchuriki."

"Given the Kyūbi, you could always classify the mission report, Hokage-sama." Kakashi held out a form. Kakashi held out the mission reports to be signed by the Hokage, who scribbled a signature on the official copy for the records, the copy for his personal records, and the mission copy. If he hadn't been so frustrated, he might have noticed a slight problem with that last bit of paperwork.

(A/N Spoon)

Sooo sorry, everyone. We've just been swamped with real life things, between me getting sick and John doing way more adult things than I do, as well as just general schedule conflicts. Updated next will be Itachi, so anyone who reads that too should be happy.