Naruto Fan Fiction ❯ Fuinjutsu ❯ Bloodlimits ( Chapter 5 )

[ Y - Young Adult: Not suitable for readers under 16 ]

Chapter 5.

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Konoha Sector A; Military Hospital; Room 201; 12:00 GMT.

Tsunade regarded the unconscious, blonde chuunin laying out cold in one of the hospital's crisp, white-sheeted beds.

The Hokage stood next to her, and behind her, leaning casually against the wall, was the much lauded genius jounin of Konoha; Namikaze Minato. Kushina and the members of Minato's team were all waiting in the hall.

“So,” she started, “will any of you deign to tell me why you saw the need to summon me, and why you believe this Rei person to be worthy of my attention?” She was busy enough at the hospital without having to bother with every person sporting a scrape or complaining about a headache that walked through the door. A chuunin suffering chakra exhaustion and needing bed-rest was hardly enough to demand her interest and talent.

The Sandaime's hand twitched towards his pocket in search for his faithful pipe before he remembered that he was in a hospital with a strict no-smoking policy.

“Originally we called you because Mumei-san sported a severe injury as the result of a spar with Minato,” the Hokage admitted with a sigh, mournfully thinking about his untouched pipe.

Tsunade frowned, expertly running her eyes over her blonde patient. She noticed the blood staining the blonde's front and the hole in his shirt, but she saw no present wound on the chuunin.

“What injury, and what caused it?” she asked when she finally came up blank. It would be best to start at the beginning. Obviously something was going on that the Hokage deemed worthy of her attention.

Her old sensei coughed uncomfortably as he spared a nervous glance on his volatile, female student. “A three-pronged kunai piercing his left lung,” he said in answer to both her questions.

Tsunade's eyes widened and she turned fully to meet her sensei's eyes.

“Truly?” she asked.

When he nodded seriously, she turned to regard the blonde jounin behind her. “He's not jerking my chain?” she asked him, desperately searching for an explanation to what she was seeing.

Minato shook his head. “He's telling the truth. Rei-san took a direct hit to one of his lungs just to prove a point.”

Tsunade shook her head in disbelief as she turned to examine her patient again.

“But that's impossible,” she said as she opened Naruto's shirt to examine his chest. “There's no mark to be found on him.”

“That's because Rei's got the coolest healing ability I've ever seen.” Kushina's voice butted into the conversation. She'd been waiting patiently outside… okay then, in the slightly opened door-way, but she finally couldn't stand how the Hokage was avoiding the true issue at hand.

Tsunade's eyes widened. “That's still hardly possible to believe. The pressure such a fast healing ability would put on his body would be enormous. He'd be aging at such an accelerated rate that we'd literally be able to track it by monthly observations.

“And you cannot sense any accelerated healing when you examine him?” The Sandaime was frowning.

“No,” Tsunade answered, keeping her eyes trained on her mysterious patient.

“Test his blood then,” the Hokage finally decided. “Inform me of what you find, but do not reveal the information to anyone else. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to get back to work.”

The Sandaime took his leave, nodding to Tsunade, Minato and Kushina as he left.

Tsunade regarded the door as it closed behind her sensei. After a second she finally snapped herself out of any thoughts she was trapped in to focus her attention on her patient.

“Do any of you know anything else about this supposed healing ability?” Tsunade asked of the two people left in the room.

Minato shifted his position slightly as he frowned in though. “You know, now that you mention it, I do remember Rei saying something about it being an ability he'd had since he was a baby.”

Tsunade nodded doubtfully. “Maybe a Blood-limit then…” she murmured to herself.

Kushina and Minato exchanged glances.

“Look, do you need us to be here? Only, I've got this date coming up and I-“

Kushina was cut off by the indignant sound of her fiancÃ©. “What do you mean you've got a date? I don't know anything about a date. Are you cheating on me? I swear I'll kick-“

“Take you're lover's quarrel somewhere else,” Tsunade commanded tersely as she prepped a needle, “At the moment you'll only be in the way and Mumei-san is not in any danger. He's just sleeping.”

The two lovers' broke their fight off as suddenly as they'd started as they both turned to regard the sleeping chuunin.

“You'll let us know when he wakes up?” Kushina asked anxiously.

Tsunade scoffed, “What am I, a mail service?” Turning to catch a glimpse of the two's worried expressions; she softened her own before she turned back to her patient again. “Yeah, sure, whatever. Just get out of here,” she commanded.

“As you say, Hime.” Kushina saluted Tsunade's back joyously as she grabbed a hold of Minato's arm before dragging him out the door.

“Now, about that date…” could be heard from the fiery redhead before the door closed behind them.

Tsunade snorted in exasperation.

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Konoha Sector A; Military hospital; Hallway; 15:00 GMT.

Tsunade hurried through the hospital corridor towards her patient's room, the results of a blood test clutched in her right hand.

The test had taken longer than she'd thought. Some buffoon had pressed his team too hard on a training trip in the Forest of Death, resulting in all of them falling unconscious and needing immediate blood tests to check for possible toxins in their bloodstream. The Forest of Death was as much of a death trap as the name suggested and the most regular cause of injury or death in the forest was various toxins secreted or injected by the numerous bugs thriving in the damp foliage.

Tsunade would've liked to have words with the idiot leader of the afflicted team, but he was currently unconscious too, so she'd better wait `till he could properly enjoy her righteous anger. Not only that, but Tsunade currently had her own patient to worry about and while the blonde chuunin wasn't in any danger, he was far more interesting and intriguing than some idiots sporting signs of being poisoned.

Impossibly fast ability to heal though, now that was interesting, and far more deserving of Tsunade's considerable talent. She was practically itching to figure out what made her patient tick.

The blood test she was carrying had only given her half of the answers.

As she neared room 201, Tsunade was forced to reduce her speed or risk passing the intended door. When she opened the door and entered her patient's room she was more than surprised to see that her patient had woken up. It didn't deter her from her mission though. Oh, no. It actually worked better for her. Now she could actually attempt to get some useful answers from the source of her curiosity instead of her having to rely on guesswork and conjecture.

“Good. You're awake,” she greeted the patient.

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Naruto blinked at the abrupt manner of Tsunade's greeting. He'd known the famous medic for several years now and thus wasn't too surprised at her method of introduction. He'd always known the slug summoner to be direct. She also had no tolerance for nonsense.

It made him inexplicably happy to see her again even if she'd never technically met him before. She had been a loyal and trustworthy Hokage when Naruto finally managed to convince her into accepting the position after the death of the Sandaime. In a way, she'd become something of a surrogate mother or big-sister for him over the years. He'd always trusted her to have his best interest at heart and he could count the people he afforded that amount of trust to on one hand. He realised then that he was saddened too by this meeting, since it symbolized the end of their old relationship and the beginning of a completely new one where they might as well have been strangers to each other. Then he steeled his resolve and he promised to himself and the memory of the future Godaime that he would do his best to achieve a new friendship with the headstrong medic.

“Uh… Okay,” he answered, bewildered as he did his best to mask his inner turmoil. Then it struck him that he had no idea what was going on. As far as he knew, he'd been resting to regain energy from healing himself. He hadn't needed to go to the hospital and he certainly didn't need a certified medic.

Tsunade completely ignored Naruto's softly spoken words.

“My name is Tsunade. You are my patient, Mumei Rei, just in case you're suffering from memory loss. It's not too uncommon for people suffering chakra depletion. Don't worry, if you've forgotten something it'll come back to you as your chakra stores are filled up again. I'm your assigned medic for the duration of your stay. If you have any questions you can ask me now or call one of the assistants or one of the interns later on. Any relevant medical history is to be given directly to me. Now, we've taken a blood test and-”

“What do you mean you've taken a blood test?” Naruto asked in surprise, interrupting the future Godaime before she could finish speaking.

Tsunade huffed as she glared balefully at the blonde, practically daring him to interrupt her again. Seeing the cowed expression he suddenly sported, Tsunade nodded once and then continued her explanation.

“As I was saying; we've taken a blood test to determine the origin of your ability to heal. You were brought to the hospital because the Hokage first summoned us claiming a chuunin to be seriously injured. When we arrived at the scene of the spar you were knocked out cold because of chakra depletion and exhaustion. We could not however, see any signs of and external or internal wounds on your body.” Tsunade stopped here to throw Naruto an inspecting overlook. “Now that...” she finally declared, “caught my interest.”

Naruto groaned internally. Knowing how obsessed Tsunade got when it concerned medical knowledge, he'd never get out of the hospital.

Expertly ignoring Naruto's badly hidden expression of distaste, Tsunade forged on.

“The blood test was to determine if you have a previously unknown blood-limit. You tested positive and now I'm here to figure out exactly how your blood-limit functions and how it was obtained.”

Naruto blinked in surprise. “I have a blood-limit?”

Tsunade nodded as she wrote something down on the form she held in her hands.

“Yes. I'll assume by your reaction that you didn't know?”

Naruto shook his head.

Tsunade nodded as she'd expected the answer. “Very well, did anyone else in your family have a blood-limit, or exhibit an abnormally fast healing-rate?” She asked in her usual straight forwards manner.

Naruto frowned. “I wouldn't know. I'm an orphan from a hostile attack. I've never even known my parents' names, let alone if they were ninja at all.”

Tsunade glanced up briefly from her form to meet his eyes. “I'm sorry to hear that.”

Naruto shook his head as he grinned brightly. “Don't be, I can't miss what I've never known, right? And anyway, I'd like to think I've done my parents proud. That's why I've always aspired to be the best that I can be and do my best all the time. I promised both myself and them that I'd do my best, and I don't break my promises.”

Tsunade smiled briefly in the face of such a bright spirit as she wrote something else on her form. “Good for you then.” She finally said. “But that doesn't help at all in figuring out how you've obtained a blood-limit.”

Naruto scratched his head in confusion. “I thought you were born with a blood-limit, not that it was obtained. How does that work?” He asked.

Tsunade frowned. “You don't know how the blood-limits originally came to be? They didn't exactly pop out of thin air you know.”

Naruto smiled sheepishly. “I guess I never thought about it. It's not like I ever expected to have one myself.”

Tsunade's eyebrow rose in an incredulous expression. “And the increased healing ability you sport didn't tip you off at all?” She asked completely unimpressed.

Naruto ducked his head in embarrassment. He was treading dangerous grounds here. He'd always attributed the healing ability to the Kyubi and it wouldn't do to bring the fox into the conversation. And how would he go about doing that anyway? There was no chance in hell that he tried to explain that he came from a future where he'd been the vessel of the Kyubi.

“It wasn't as pronounced in the beginning I guess,” he settled for saying as Tsunade's suspicious stare became more and more piercing, “As a child I didn't really notice at all until I started training under a jounin from Konoha. I managed to cut myself with a poisoned weapon by accident once and my sensei thought I'd die from the poison on the blade, but I cut myself deeper with another blade to bleed the poison out and he noticed that the wound was closing faster than what he considered normal.

“I guess I didn't notice in the beginning because I only ever got scrapes or bruises. It was never anything big so I never thought my healing rate to be anything out of the ordinary. The first time I ever really noticed how extraordinarily fast it was, was when I was… thirteen I think and…”

Naruto trailed off. He didn't really want to talk about that incident and he cursed himself for bringing it up at all. Tsunade wasn't deterred though. To her, the story had just become interesting and she intended to hear the end of it. “And?” She prompted.

Naruto glanced uncertainly at her. “Does it really matter?” He asked. He'd never told anyone the whole story before. Sasuke's desertion had become taboo for both him and their other team-mate Sakura.

Tsunade nodded seriously. “It may be vital to determine how your ability works. We have to figure out how you've attained the ability and how exactly it works because it could potentially have serious consequences for you later on.”

Naruto frowned; Tsunade had mentioned something to that effect to him when he was younger too. She'd seemed to think that his accelerated healing would take years off his life, but he hadn't cared too much at the time. The threat of either the Kyubi or the Akatsuki finally getting one over him had been a lot more pressing at the time.

“When I was thirteen I got into a fight," he finally started, “The one I fought was prone to using electrical based techniques and he punched me through the right lung with a fist enveloped in lightning.” At the admission, Naruto started to pluck lightly on the bed-linen.

Tsunade sucked in a startled breath at what she'd heard. Naruto didn't notice though, he was too caught up in the painful memories of Sasuke's actions and words that day. “I healed in seconds as soon as he pulled his arm out of my chest,” he continued.

When he didn't say anything else Tsunade finally got her wits back as she regarded her patient with a gentle expression. She might've been a tough no-nonsense person, but she was also able to have compassion for her patients. In fact, she was often too compassionate towards them. It was one of the reasons for why she became so incensed when she believed one of them to have acted foolhardy. She was strict with her patients because she wanted them to be more careful.

“And this was the first time you really noticed how fast you healed?” she asked to make sure he remembered correctly.

Naruto tilted his head up as he smiled wryly at her. “It was kind of hard to ignore and forget,” he said.

Tsunade nodded as she decided to let the matter rest for the moment.

“Okay then. I guess I'll have to tell you how blood-limits are obtained then, maybe you'll think of an explanation for your ability if you know. After that, we'll do some tests to try to figure out the limits and possible consequences of your ability, if indeed there are any.”

Naruto nodded, suddenly inexplicably wary of what the `tests' she would be doing would involve.

“Right then,” Tsunade abruptly started as she pulled a chair over for her to sit in, “What you first need to understand is that all blood-limits are results of tampering with the supernatural. Blood-limits did not just suddenly appear in humans one day out of thin air. They were gifted to humans by supernatural beings or means. In this context though, it's not really a gift since there's always a price to be paid for the different abilities.

“As a shinobi versed in the art of sealing, you should be more than able to follow this explanation since all of the sealing art has a basis in the supernatural.”

Naruto nodded to show his agreement. Even the most basic of seals dealt in the realms of the supernatural. The supernatural was considered that which cannot be seen or sensed humans in the mortal realm. Chakra for example was not considered supernatural since all living beings had it even in a minuscule quantity. Spirits though, or demons like the different tailed creatures, were considered supernatural. It was the same with summoned creatures. They did not naturally exist in the mortal realm but had either lost their way, been summoned or been cursed to the mortal realm. They did not really belong and if they spent too much time in the mortal realm without a source to draw power from, they'd cease to exist. Seals were used as a bridge between the supernatural - like different realms or dimensions - and were even rumoured to have been gifted to the race of humans by the great Kami.

Ignorant of Naruto's thoughts on the subject, Tsunade continued her explanation. “Let's take some of the blood-limits in Konoha as examples. The Inuzuka clan is a relatively new clan. They're only a couple of generations old. The founder of the clan loved dogs. One day when he was travelling through a forest, he came across a wounded dog. Naturally, being the dog-lover that he was, he takes care of the dog and nurses it back to health. It was first after the dog was healthy that he learned that the dog was a messenger of a great dog-spirit tied to the forest. The messenger talked to the man and said that his Lord would grant him a gift of companionship and eternal loyalty if only the man would continue to help any dogs he came across for the rest of his life.

“The Inuzuka complied and the contract with the spirit was drawn - not with blood - as is done with summoned creatures, but with the spirit of the human-man and the dog-Lord. As a result the clan has dogs as familiars and they can communicate with dogs as if they were human. In addition they have some physical characteristics granted to them by the great dog-spirit. This is all a result of the bond between the great dog-spirit and the Inuzuka. Everyone in the Inuzuka clan now has a bond with the Great Spirit. They share in his power and he shares in theirs, making it possible for the spirit to sustain itself in the mortal realm.”

Naruto's eyes widened as a terrible suspicion began to crawl up his spine, but he didn't interrupt Tsunade yet. He decided to hear her explanation out before he began making assumptions. Maybe he was worrying himself over nothing.

“The bond or the contract between humans and spirits manifests itself as a genetic mutation in the human DNA. As such it is hereditary, but sometimes people in a blood-line clan are born with recessive genes resulting with them never manifesting any of the abilities that are derived from the contract. If one of the clan members breaks the contract by refusing to pay the agreed-upon price it would mean instant death for the guilty person, or alternatively, if the spirit is the perpetrator, it would cease to exist.

“The Inuzuka clan didn't exactly decide to get a blood-limit. For them it just sort of happened and they were really lucky with the price they paid for it. For others, the price has been much more severe. I've heard of a clan that existed in the village of stone before. They had to pay for their limit with the life of their second-born children. In the end, the clan leader couldn't do it and the entire clan died within a week from unknown causes, though all know that whatever deity they were tied to had collected its pay.

“Those who seek out deities to get a contract on a blood-limit often spend years doing research. Most want to have a great ability at the same time as they pay a relatively small price. They try to learn about as many deities as possible… what their tempers are like… which powers they have… what they hold dear and so on. For most the risk is simply not worth the gains; which is why there are so few clans with blood-limits. Konoha actually has an abnormally large percentage of clans sporting blood-limits.

“A clan that actively sought out a supernatural being to summon and bind their spirits to was the Hyuga clan. The founder of the clan wished for the power to see beyond that of what the mortal eye could perceive, and so he summoned a spirit with eyes rumoured to see what is going on in all of the existing dimensions and realms and he asked to be bound with the spirit, thus enabling it to sustain itself in the mortal realm whenever or wherever it so whished. The spirit granted the request and it stated its price. To this day, no-one outside the clan knows what the price entails, but we all suspect it to be of the pricy variation.”

Tsunade stopped briefly in her explanation as she gave Naruto a lingering look.

“What you have to understand Mumei-san, is that most people - both civilians and shinobi - fear people with blood-limits. You won't notice any fear in Konoha because the village is so used to clans with blood-limits, but outside the village you may well be hunted down if the secret of your ability gets out. Some of the fear is rightly warranted. You have to remember that people with blood-limits enable supernatural being to exist and sustain themselves in the mortal realm. Some of these beings are not always benign. There have been reports of demons being summoned and bound with a blood-limit-contract in the past. Hundreds of people were killed by the demons before people managed to kill the humans tied to the demons' existence.”

Naruto's eyes widened even more at hearing that and he struggled to conceal his expression as Tsunade turned her gaze on him.

He swallowed to moisten his throat before speaking.

“Is it possible to tie yourself to a deity or a spirit without even knowing it yourself?” He finally asked.

Tsunade frowned as she thought about it. “I've never hear of it happening before. I'm pretty sure that all the people who started a blood-limit-contract actually remembered their meeting with a supernatural being.” She turned suspicious eyes on Naruto as wheels in her head began to turn. “Why? Have you ever met a supernatural being?”

“Uh…” Naruto scrabbled frantically for something to say and by the time he remembered that he could've blamed it all on the parents he never knew, he realized that his hesitation had already given his guilty answer away. “Well…” He hesitated. “Do summoned creatures count?” He finally asked.

Tsunade pursed her lips. “Well, yes. I guess so, but I've never heard of summoned creatures with amazing healing abilities before. Have you dabbled in summoning? What kind of creature can you summon?”

Naruto groaned mentally. He couldn't tell her about the toad-summoning-contract because Jiraiya guarded that contract as if it was his only child - if you disregarded his note-books on Come Come Paradise.

“Well… two of the shinobi that taught me were summoners and I used to talk to their summons all the time.” Which wasn't exactly true, but wasn't all a lie either.

“Did you ever mention anything about contracts to the summons?” Tsunade asked as she wrote some more on her chart.

Naruto frowned in though, remembering a conversation he had with the Kyubi years ago on the subject of paying rent. “Maybe,” he finally answered. “I don't remember all the conversations that well,” he reluctantly admitted.

Tsunade `hmm-ed' as she jotted another note down on paper, finally she looked up to meet Naruto's somewhat worried eyes. “I don't think you should worry too much,” she placated him, “Summons' are generally genial and laid-back creatures and I don't suppose you could have a casual conversation with the more angry and unpredictable summons'. Most likely, you've probably unwittingly agreed to a contract with one of your sensei's summons. You'll know the price when the summons comes to collect, but you shouldn't worry too much about it. I don't believe a summons would be too greedy. Summons' get to travel to the mortal real often enough and then they normally only get paid in chakra. I don't think the price of the blood-limit can be too costly for you seeing as you can't even remember agreeing to it.”

Naruto nodded as he attempted a smile for her efforts in calming him. There was no way he'd be calm though. What if he'd unwittingly made a contract to Kyubi, making it possible for the demon to sustain itself in the mortal realm as long as Naruto was alive? There was no way he could live with himself if that was true. Now he really needed access to the more restricted parts of the library.

As she finished the last notes to her form, Tsunade set the paperwork away as she gave Naruto a once over.

“Now, let's get started at figuring out how your blood-limit works.” She said decisively.

Naruto grimaced as he fidgeted in an attempt to stall. “Ah, what exactly will you be doing?” He asked as he gave her a wary look.

Tsunade brooked no nonsense as she pulled the covers off him. He figured he was lucky to still be dressed in his own blood-stained clothes.

“We are going to test your regeneration ability, your ability to recover from strenuous activities and your ability to recover chakra. After that, I'll start to look for any bad reactions or consequences that may result from your blood-limit.”

Naruto eyed the flimsy hospital gown with horror as he scrambled out of bed. “I'm not wearing that,” he protested loudly as he pointed at the paper-thin garment.

Tsunade's expression got scary.

“Yes. Yes you are.”

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Konoha Sector A; Outside the Military hospital; 09:00 GMT.

Naruto sighed heartily in relief. He was finally out of the hospital and to be honest he'd never thought the day would come. Tsunade had kept him for three days as she did tests and devised experiments for Naruto to suffer through. True, nothing was actually painful for Naruto - if you disregarded the pain of being put through days of boring tests. Officially, Naruto had been admitted to the hospital for the healing of his wound, observation and then rest. The Hokage had even visited to tell Naruto that he should take some breaks from his research once in a while. Apparently someone had noted how little Naruto had been sleeping and eating.

Naruto suspected that he was under close surveillance from someone the Hokage trusted and he couldn't begrudge the old leader that. He'd probably have done the same thing if he'd been the Hokage.

On the bright side Naruto had gotten along with Tsunade splendidly. Apparently, he reminded her somewhat of her younger brother Nawaki.

After all the time spent in the hospital, Naruto was actually looking forwards to getting back to his research in the library. He'd learned a lot about blood-lines from Tsunade and he was hoping to expound on that knowledge. First though, he was going home to change his clothes and get something to eat.

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Konoha Sector A; Military hospital; Tsunade's Office; 12:00 GMT.

Tsunade frowned as she sank down into her chair behind her desk at the hospital. She'd just returned from delivering her report about her newest patient to the Hokage.

He was an enigma, an opinion that was apparently shared by her old sensei too.

She strongly suspected that Naruto had been with-holding facts when they'd talked together during his stay, but she never caught him in an outright lie. Still, his explanations didn't really fit together.

If Rei had come by his blood-line by unwittingly making a contract with a summons, he wouldn't have had his ability from infancy. On the other hand, it could be possible that the young chuunin had inherited the blood-line from the parents he'd never known.

Whatever the reason behind Rei's mysterious ability, Tsunade couldn't help but worry just a bit.

As far as her tests had shown, the chuunin's blood-line seemed too good to be true. He could heal serious and life-threatening wounds within seconds. In addition the young man had an incredible ability to restore both his chakra reserve and his stamina if he only had some food or rest. Naturally the healing ability seemed to slow down if Rei hadn't had enough food or rest prior to an injury, but even if the chuunin appeared to be completely out of chakra, his ability managed to dreg up some stored chakra anyway to get the job done.

On that note, Tsunade had been fascinated beyond belief when she'd examined the enormous amount of chakra locked into the chuunin's body. She shuddered to think about Rei's potential if he ever managed to get full access to his chakra and even pondered on the idea that the huge chakra reserve was linked to his blood-limit.

What she'd found to be most surprising about the blood-line's abilities though was that it didn't seem to be putting any untoward stress on Rei's body. From her experience with healing and cells splitting to make new tissue, Rei should be aging at a rate where he'd most likely be dead within the decade. Contrary to all medical facts though, Rei's ability seemed to draw nearly exclusively from his chakra stores, thus managing to keep the stress on the body to a minimum.

Tsunade wouldn't be surprised at all if Rei was actually aging at a slower rate than what was normal for humans. She smiled in humour at that idea. If it was true, she figured that the chuunin had to have been really short for his age before he reached puberty.

Still, all the gain he got from his blood-limit worried Tsunade immensely. For there to be so much gain and no drawbacks to the ability the price expected by the being he'd tied himself to had to be something of high value indeed.

Tsunade was so caught up in her own thoughts that she nearly missed the arrival of one of her team-mates.

Stacking some papers together and placing them at the right end of her desk, she raised her head to meet piercing eyes. She'd never really liked those eyes…

“Orochimaru,” she greeted with a polite nod.

Tsunade and her team-mates had never really gotten along at all in the beginning of their genin days. Tsunade couldn't stand Jiraiya or his lecherous ways. Jiraiya couldn't stand Orochimaru's arrogance or brilliance in training and Orochimaru didn't care at all about anything but his own progress. It had taken quite some time for the dynamics of the team-work to be worked out.

Now, they were all adults and had been team-mates for over a decade. They were rumoured to be the best three-man team ever created. Tsunade acted as the team's medic and its close-combat specialist. Jiraiya was the distant-combat specialist and the one who worked to keep the team's spirit up while Orochimaru was the tactician as well as the guy with a lot of mixed knowledge of different methods of combat (meaning he was the backup when everything else went down the drain).

After many years of working together, Tsunade still couldn't stand Jiraiya's perverted ways, Jiraiya still didn't care much for Orochimaru's aloofness and Orochimaru still focused most of his energies on furthering his own ambitions (whatever they were). What had changed was that they could tolerate or ignore each other to the point that they worked flawlessly together and when they weren't on missions together (which didn't happen often anymore) they managed to be civil to each other.

Her old team-mate nodded politely at her. “Tsunade-hime.”

Tsunade smiled briefly back at him before she opened her desk-drawer to search for some blank medical forms. Nothing was ever boring for long at the hospital and pretty soon she'd be called to help out with some patient.

“Long time no see,” she said, “What brings you here?”

Orochimaru shrugged lightly as he sat himself gracefully in the chair positioned in front of Tsunade's desk.

“Nothing much, sensei has me running all over the country for him, but as you know most of what I do is restricted so…” he raised his hands in a helpless gesture as he smiled kindly, but still somehow distantly and blandly to her.

Tsunade snorted, “Yes, I know. I wasn't asking you to tell me anything secret, I was only wondering what you're doing here.”

Her black-headed team-mate attempted to look hurt, “What? It's illegal for me to visit my team-mate now too?”

Now that was something she'd never expected to hear coming out of his mouth and Tsunade frowned as her expression hardened slightly. Something was up. “You know that's not what I meant. If you're here for medical reasons, you would've said so already. As it is, all this stalling you're doing is really making me curious.”

“Now that you mention curiosity,” Orochimaru started, finally deciding to get to the case. “I heard a rumour about a chuunin sparring with Namikaze-san…” he trailed off, leaving it to Tsunade to work out what exactly he was after.

She didn't bite.

“What about it?” She asked tersely, not at all interested in his guessing games.

Fighting frustration, Orochimaru managed a careless smile, “I heard that the chuunin managed to recover on his own after being on the receiving end of Namikaze's kunai.”

Blowing out an exasperated breath, Tsunade fixed hard eyes on her team-mate, “If you're asking me what I think you are, then you know perfectly well that I won't answer.”

Orochimaru didn't quite manage to hide his frustration this time, “Oh, come on Tsunade! I just want to know if it's true, and if it is; how did he do it?”

Tsunade shook her head firmly as she picked up her blank forms and started to rise. She was due to check up on the apprentices running around the hospital right about now.

Orochimaru halted her with a hand to her left shoulder. Tsunade let her eyes trail from his grip on her shoulder and up to his eyes. She grimaced as she met his gaze. “If you really want to know anything, you should ask the Hokage or the chuunin himself. I'm under oaths to keep my mouth shut. Now let me go!” With that, she shrugged him off and brushed passed him out of the room.

Orochimaru watched her leave with a pensive expression on his face. Tsunade's reluctance to talk about the rumoured spar proved one thing at least and it implied another. For one, the rumoured spar wasn't just a rumour and two, the chuunin had been hurt.

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Konoha Proper; Near Ichiraku's; 18:00 GMT.

Orochimaru was frustrated.

It hadn't been difficult to find out who the chuunin that had sparred against Namikaze earlier that week was. Apparently, a large number of Konoha shinobi had witnessed the fight and they were all eager to talk about the spar. Nearly all of them agreed that the chuunin in the rumour was the Hokage's new researcher. A few argued that it hadn't been a chuunin, but another jounin and one had even managed to convince himself that Namikaze had sparred with the Hokage. Orochimaru decided to go for what most of them agreed on and now he was looking for the Sandaime's new researcher. He vaguely recalled passing the chuunin when he was on his way to the Tower for a mission one late evening some weeks…months? ago.

He just arrived back from the mission this morning and when he'd arrived, he'd heard the most interesting rumour. Orochimaru didn't normally put much stock in rumours, but for this particular rumour, he was willing to take a leap of faith.

From what he could piece together, some anonymous chuunin had challenged the renowned genius (Orochimaru snorted spitefully) Namikaze to a spar. Naturally, the chuunin had lost spectacularly, but not only that, he'd managed to get mortally wounded in the fight. What was remarkable - according to the rumours flying about - was that the chuunin had somehow managed to heal himself in a matter of seconds.

Now that particular detail caught Orochimaru's interest.

An advanced ability to heal; now who wouldn't want that? …Particularly if you wanted immortality…

He'd visited Tsunade as soon as he'd delivered his report. Surely the Hime would know if the village suddenly sported a shinobi with advanced healing abilities. The woman was obsessed with medical knowledge after all. Unfortunately she was also cursed with moral and having sworn oaths of confidentiality.

Orochimaru snorted again in annoyance. She just couldn't make it simple for him and now he was scouring the village after a chuunin he'd barely glimpsed one time earlier in bad illumination. It was like looking for a needle in a haystack.

…Which was why he was so damned frustrated.

He'd practically looked everywhere for the illusive chuunin. He'd searched the libraries, he'd scoped out the Tower, and he'd visited the Hokage Monument and the Heroes' Stone. He was running out of training areas to check and he still couldn't find the person he was looking for.

He'd finally given up for the day and he was headed to one of the bars he frequented when a flash of yellow hair caught his eyes.

He blinked.

Apparently his sensei's new researcher really liked ramen.

Shaking his head, Orochimaru changed his course as he headed from the ramen stand where the blonde chuunin was seated with a mountain of empty bowls next to him.

“One miso ramen,” Orochimaru ordered as he sat himself down in the seat next to his target.

If he hadn't been observing the blonde chuunin as much as he was, he would've missed the minute tensing of the blonde's shoulder. As it was, he was studying the chuunin intensely and the small movement he noticed sparked his interest.

When it seemed that the man next to him didn't seem too inclined to speak - in fact, was the chuunin eating faster than he'd done before? - Orochimaru decided to make the first move.

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Damnit!

Naruto couldn't believe his luck. Of all the people and all the places to eat, it was Orochimaru who decided that he wanted Ichiraku's ramen this evening.

Naruto had sensed his presence as soon as the man had entered the small establishment and he couldn't quite suppress the nervous twitch that ran through his body when the damnable man sat down next to him.

Mentally, Naruto frowned, at the moment he and the newly arrived jounin were the only customers at the ramen stand so there were plenty of places to sit. Why had Orochimaru decided to sit next to him?

It didn't take much for Naruto to suspect that something was going on and it put his nerves on edge.

In hopes of getting out of the establishment quickly, Naruto increased his pace in cleaning out his last ramen bowl out. Maybe he could escape before Orochimaru had time to reveal why he was there.

It seemed that he had no such luck, but then Naruto suspected strongly that it had nothing to do with his luck anymore and everything to do with the will of the black-haired jounin.

“It's a nice evening…” Orochimaru started as he accepted the ramen-bowl handed to him over the counter.

Naruto swallowed what he had in his mouth as he regarded the older man suspiciously from the corner of his eyes. “Mmm…” he answered non-committingly after a few seconds.

Orochimaru seemed to take it as encouragement to continue talking.

“I've just come back to the village from a mission and it seems that there has been some ruckus created while I was gone…”

Naruto turned beck to concentrate on his food, he was not at all sure that he liked where the conversation was going. “Is that so?”

Orochimaru nodded once as he broke apart his chopsticks. “I'm sorry,” he then said, “It seems that I've forgotten to introduce myself. I'm Orochimaru, jounin.”

Naruto fought hard to keep from rolling his eyes. It was obvious now that Orochimaru was fishing for some information, and from the way the conversation was going Naruto would bet his chakra reserve that he wanted to know something that pertained to the spar he'd had with Minato.

Still, it was freaky beyond words to calmly sit next to a future traitor and a sociopath while said person was trying to act polite and maybe even nice.

Naruto fought a shudder at the thought even as he fought the urge to attack the personified monster next to him.

“Mumei Rei, chuunin," he introduced himself, keeping himself short and consistent to signal that he really wasn't interested in a conversation.

Orochimaru acted surprised as he turned to give Naruto a searching look. “Really? You're Mumei Rei? I've heard a lot about you. Aren't you Hokage-sama's new researcher?”

Naruto nodded curtly as he fiddled with his chopsticks. As if he didn't already know…

“What a coincidence,” Orochimaru continued, apparently not noticing Naruto's dismissive behaviour, “If what the rumours say is true, then you played a central part in the ruckus I mentioned earlier.”

Coincidence my ass. Naruto thought to himself. And now he was nearly sure of where this conversation was headed. It didn't really surprise him at all that he'd managed to attract Orochimaru's attention, though he'd hoped beyond hope that it wouldn't happen. Of all the people that Naruto wanted to remain invisible to, Orochimaru was at the top of the list. He inwardly cursed himself at having ever agreed to the spar with Minato. He should've known better. He did know better, but it seemed that his impulsiveness was harder to overcome than he'd previously thought.

“You shouldn't put to much stock in rumours.” Naruto finally said as an answer to Orochimaru's rather obvious meddling.

“And normally I wouldn't, but I have to admit that my curiosity was piqued at what I heard. I hoped you don't mind obliging a jounin in his curiosity.”

Naruto was really tempted to say that curiosity killed the cat, but he knew he was way out of his league when it came to Orochimaru so he kept his peace. Maybe he could humour the jounin and get him to leave him alone. If he was really clever he could perhaps even manage to dissuade Orochimaru from whatever goal he'd set himself this time.

Sighing in barely concealed consternation, Naruto turned to face his worst enemy. “Fine, what do you want to know?”

Orochimaru smirked, or maybe he sneered. Naruto wasn't sure and frankly he didn't really want to know. His only desire at the moment was to get the snake summoner out of his hair.

“I heard you had an extraordinaire ability to heal and I wished to confirm this rumour. I have a vested interest in medical knowledge, in that I'm much like one of my team-mates. I believe you've met her. Her name is Tsunade.”

Naruto mentally raised an eyebrow, not at all impressed by the obvious lies and the obvious attempt to manipulate him into trusting the man. He knew Orochimaru's ways far too well to fall for any of his more obvious tricks. Still, he'd resigned himself to tell the man something in order form him to leave him alone.

Naruto shrugged non-concerned as he met Orochimaru's piercing eyes with an effort.

“Apparently I have a blood-limit which gives me abnormally fast healing,” he finally revealed.

Orochimaru's gaze hardened and focused on him as if he was a hawk after its prey.

“How fascinating. How did you acquire such an ability I wonder? It would be most beneficial for Konoha's shinobi if they all could share in your fortune.”

Now that was too bold, even for Orochimaru. He should know very well that information pertaining to blood-limits - especially rare and valuable blood-limits - was guarded to the death.

Naruto raised an eyebrow as he regarded the snake in front of him coolly.

“As much as that may be true, I don't think the shinobi of the village would be willing to pay the price for an ability such as mine,” he said calmly, coolly.

Orochimaru either didn't see, or he disregarded the warning Naruto was subtly giving him to back off. He probably wasn't concerned at all with angering a chuunin. Compared to him, chuunin were lowly insects with barely any talent at all. Normally they weren't worthy of his attention and the only reason he'd gone to search for Naruto was because he wanted Naruto knowledge and ability.

“And why might that be?” Orochimaru asked as a response to Naruto's statement.

Naruto mentally shrugged.When the truth doesn't cut it; lie.

“I had to give up my ability to channel chakra in return for the ability to heal at an accelerated pace. I doubt other shinobi would be willing to pay that price. I only did it because I never had much ability with jutsu anyway. To me, it was a win-win situation.”

Orochimaru looked most displeased by this information, and Naruto mentally cheered. Hopefully he'd gotten Orochimaru to loose interest. He knew enough about the man to know that he treasured nothing above the ability to perform jutsu.

“Hmm… you may be right in your assessment,” Orochimaru grudgingly agreed as he stood up to leave. “'Till we meet again then, Mumei-kun,” he dismissed himself as he briskly walked out of the ramen stand.

Naruto watched him leave with a relieved air. He'd thought he'd never get rid of him. After another second, he sighed. Now he was far too wound up to sit in the library for hours. He needed to burn some of the nervous energy that had been building up during the awful and unwanted conversation.

Paying for his meal, Naruto left for the nearest training ground.

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