Author Jiraiya – The Legendary Sucker
Orochimaru was many things. Patient, poise, calm, calculating, creative, ingenious... however, whenever he was around Tsunade, the bitch seemed to bring out the WORST in him! Back when they were teammates, the Senju heiress could always make Orochimaru break his stride. She was tough and demanding, taking no shit from her teammates and not afraid to smack them upside the head if necessary, putting all of her considerable strength into her blows whenever she got angry... which was quite often.
So yes, as much as he understood that it was a very bad thing for him to upset the Slug Sannin, he couldn’t help but lose it... this accusation WOULD NOT go unchallenged! “What do you mean I'm Gruff McSnarl? I’m Otenmaru, damn it!”
Fortunately for the Nuke-Nin, his old teammate didn’t punch him out for raising her voice to him. Instead, the blonde beauty raised a hand, waving him off while teleasing an imperious snort of indifference. “Nah, impossible...” she argued. “You HATE music... and everyone with half a brain knows that’s Otenmaru’s other passion!”
Hey, she may have been annoyed when she thought that Tomoe Tiger had been ripping her off, but the Senju woman had to admit: it was good literature. Jiraiya may have been a petulant pervert when they were younger but Abukunai was entertaining... okay, granted, she didn’t really read any of it, but it was easy enough to enjoy the pretty pictures when you were sloshed so that counted for something!
Before he could open his mouth and tell Tsunade how kettles shouldn’t call pots black—after all, the woman had thought of herself as Tomoe and SHE certainly wasn't a samurai—it was then his long-standing pain-in-the neck assistant chirruped, “But Orochimaru-sama really IS into music! Why, he’s the Bard of Flower Country who gives charity concerts for the blind children!”
When the blonde fell out of her seat in complete hysterics, the woman’s young apprentice was immediately by her side. “My Lady, if you laugh that hard you could injure yourself!” she warned fearfully. After all, the blonde wasn’t getting any younger... or soberer... or less stressed... or less guilt-ridden... or nicer...
Fighting off a nervous twitch—after all, he wouldn’t want to have to abandon his body for his untested possession technique due to an embolism, and certainly not with the currently available choices—he turned towards the ninja whom he hoped to one day sell off to someone. Hmm, maybe Tsunade... she might want her just to investigate that immortality... he thought before turning his attention back to the woman who was sure to cause him to stroke out any day now. “Do you not understand the meaning of the word, ‘sarcasm’?” he asked with a strained tone of voice.
The tanned blonde formerly known as Wade Winston Wilson a competent ninja, tapped her chin. “I do not recall it, Orochimaru-sama. “ Perking up, she then questioned her master, “Shall I look for a dictionary, or could you explain it to me—preferably in the form of a song to prove your skills as a bard?”
His face hitting the table with a loud thud upon impact, Tsunade rolled about with rip-roaring laughter, finding the old fart’s suffering hilarious. “Oh... oh Kami-sama... oh Ninja-God... needed... that... so much!” she managed to get out before holding her sides and laughing that much harder.
Shizune fretted a bit, nervously looking up at the Nuke-Nin who had once been considered her teacher’s equal if not better. She didn’t need to see his sourful expression buried in the desktop to see how pissed he was; she could feel the Killing Intent starting to leech off of him and into the surrounding environment...
...Oddly enough, the dark-skinned kunoichi seemed unaffected by it. Instead, her attention was drawn to the bobbing bird decoration at the corner of said desk, the pink bird tilting up and down as it ‘drank’ from a glass of water that was right next to it.
“Tsunade-sama...” Shizune tried, ever the voice of reason for her perpetually sloshed sensei. “Perhaps you should try and calm down now...”
“I... I can’t!” Tsunade cried out. Oh, she hadn’t laughed this hard since she had ‘accidentally’ exposed her Sensei and Jiraiya to those hot spring bathers, at a kunoichi empowerment conference.
Actually, they had initially gone because they were all certain it was a trap of some kind.
It wasn’t.
But watching the ladies take turns bashing the two males in the privates had left her with happiness for decades to come. She still thought about it whenever the ache she felt from missing her brother and her fiancé started to become unbearable and there was no drinking alcohol within reaching distance.
Taking several calming breathes, Orochimaru slowly pulled his face from the indentation he put in the desk and stood up, making a mental note to get some local spices, and maybe try to feed the annoyance of his life to Manda. Worst case scenario, she’d be lost in the land of the Snake Summons. “Shikoro, the former,” he replied to the bane of his existence. “In fact, why don’t you go look for one right now?”
“AH! Okie-dokies, Master Orochies!” the young kunoichi chimed as she saluted her lord and master. She then made her way to a small alcove in the wall that served as a book shelf. “Abukunai... Abukunai... Abukunai... Gutsy Ninja... Abukunai...” she mumbled as she looked at the spines of the books.
With the girl temporarily distracted, the Snake Sannin immediately turned his attention towards his former teammate; the woman still chuckling but now under far more control than she had been when she was laughing like a damned Iwagakure Hyena. “So, tell me, Tsunade... you’re good with kids... want to take this one off of my hands?”
And just like that, the laughter immediately stopped. While she was glaring angrily at him, Orochimaru couldn’t help but smile at the sweet relief his ears and ego were feeling as her mocking giggles were finally silenced. “I'm serious. Range-Free Lackey, Only Slightly Used, Just as Good as New!” In his mind, he couldn’t help but think, Warning: no substitutions, exchanges, or refunds.
Tsunade just stared at the black-tressed Sannin who’s garments were a patched-up menagerie of red clouds, blue crescent moons, pink hearts, a couple of green shamrocks ,and one purple horseshoe that she could make out. “You’re kidding...” she grumbled in disbelief of the snake bastard. To try and pawn off a child on her!
“If it helps, she can't die: ever. Believe me, I’ve tried...” oh how he had tried. “So you need not worry about losing someone precious ever again...” the Konoha Exile cooed to the blonde.
“...She’s not precious to me...” the Senju heiress blurted out tactlessly.
Smiling like a proverbial used car salesman—what, Snakes were nowhere near as sleazy!—Orochimaru told her, “She could be!”
Yelping as her teacher fell down once more, the young brunette dropped to her knees at the older woman’s side. “My Lady, seriously! If you keep laughing this hard, you WILL injure yourself!” she warned most fretfully.
And with teammates like this, is it any wonder when I got screwed over for the Hokage job, I left? Orochimaru thought to himself. He knew the statistics. After all, aside from perhaps the Ino-Shika-Cho team, how many teams not only survived to past their twenties, but were still on speaking terms?
And no, his former Sensei and his teammates didn’t count. He had heard the drunken ramblings of Sarutobi-sensei... and to be honest, Orochimaru had planned to give the man their severed heads as a thank you gift for being made the Fourth. Well, now he can suffer longer with them still alive, he thought wistfully.
“You do know I am being serious,” Orochimaru stated, as Tsunade tried to regain control, her laughter slowly dialing back. “After all, unlike me, you DO have a heart... I’m sure the little Kumo-Nin could work her way into it... worm her way like a cancer, twisting it like a vice and making you wish you nev... er... let me try that again...” he muttered, genuinely relieved that she hadn’t heard him over her own continuous laughter. Seriously, just WHAT did it take to get some respect around here!?
Oh yes, when he finally had enough money to get Otogakure past the planning stages so it was up and running, his first order of business was going to be to pay to put Tsunade into the Bingo Book as a Missing Nin rather than one on a sabbatical... or at least make it a common D-Rank for Oto Genin to spray graffiti all over the walls of the Senju Estate.
Finally, after numerous minutes of gut-busting laughter, the busty blonde gambling addict was able to pull herself to her feet, a wide smile looking quite out of place on her if he was honest with himself. “Seriously, ‘Chi-chan—”
“OROCHIMARU!” the Snake Sannin snapped irritably at the woman who had been his Number One Fangirl during their youth called him by that damned nickname of hers for him.
Raising her hand and waving it off like it was nothing, the Medic-Nin grumbled. “Whatever. Point is, I don’t care. I really don’t care anymore. Only way I could care less would be if I put Shizune up for collateral in a card... game...” she trailed off, blinking her eyes as she saw her fellow Sannin pull a deck from out of his sleeve.
Opening the pack and removing the playing cards from their plastic wrap, Orochimaru began to shuffle them with a surprising amount of skill. “So, Hime...” he said, using her nickname from their youth. “Care to wager that?”
“TSUNADE-SAMA!” Shizune called out fearfully, seeing her master stare at the shuffling cards, like she sometimes stared at unopened bottles of liquor.
Shaking her head out of the trance, Tsunade’s eyes narrowed. Glaring at the pasty-faced snake fetishist, the blonde growled out, “No deal.”
“I have cash, lots of it,” Orochimaru stated again, pulling out a thick wad of notes.
“...How much cash?”
“TSUNADE-SAMA!?!?”
“Fine, fine,” the busty Sannin waved off. “No betting apprentices.”
“...She is not my apprentice,” Orochimaru growled out pointedly.
That made the woman raise one of her blond eyebrows. “Then why is she with you?” Tsunade asked.
Orochimaru suddenly stopped shuffling the deck. “...Honestly, I ask myself that very question every day,” the Snake Sannin responded. “I dumped her in deep holes, left her in a shack filled with explosive notes, threw her through a closed fifth-story window, left her out in the Forest of Death at night covered in honey, set her on fire with numerous katon jutsu, tied her to a post at the side of the road and ran off like a chicken with its head cut off, and yet somehow... SHE KEEPS COMING BACK TO ME LIKE A DAMNED LOST PUPPY!” he yelled, the stress he suppressed finally finding a way out.
“PUPPY!” the Kunoichi chirruped, having found the dictionary finally. She then began to read off, “A Noun. Plural: puppies. Can mean, A: a young dog, B: a young rat, and C: a young seal. Slang, (usually in the plural) a woman’s breast.”
Tsunade stared at the young Kunoichi sitting on the desk with the large book, before turning her head towards the pale ninja who was dressed in colorfully decorated black garments.
“...Remember, this is Jiraiya’s dictionary; Shikoro found it on his book-shelf...” Orochimaru said. Although he was pretty sure the old wart-nosed fart hadn’t been the one to print it, it was just nice to turn the woman’s ire back on their mutually hated teammate. If rumor was correct, she’d managed to bust the Toad Sage’s left testicle... maybe she could get him to explode the right one this time like one of Iwagakure’s Explosion Corps.
“...Just cut the cards...” Tsunade grumbled. “We need to pass the time while we await our soon-to-be-dearly departed Jiraiya...”
Anko blinked her eyes as the Jounin she’d been walking with and would be working for during the next month or so paused in his tracks. “Hey, Toad-Face!” she shouted irritably. “What’s wrong? Why’d you stop all’a sudden?”
“...I would’ve sworn it felt like someone just stepped on my grave...” he finally told the ten-year-old before shaking his head. He usually would only get that sort of shiver up his spine whenever he would peep on the women’s Onsen during his teenage years. But he hadn’t done that in the longest time... what the hell could have made him nearly piss himself for no reason?
Snorting, the young Snake Contractor grumbled, “Well, no surprise. I don’t know what you did but the Hokage’s pretty mad at you...” she grinned wide, showing off her pearly whites. “Tell you what! We can do the “Catch Tora” D-Rank Assignment TOGETHER! I always wanted to take revenge on that cat...”
“...The Yondaime did not assign the Great Jiraiya of the Sannin a D-Rank,” he blurted out emotionlessly. Although he had to admit, the kid did have a point... although not for the reasons she thought. It took some effort, pleading, cajoling, and use of the ninja’s greatest enemy, “common sense” but he had finally gotten the two love-birds to agree on a compromise: “Naruto Tomoe Namikaze”. Perfectly nice first, middle, and clan name. Still, for the life of him, he couldn’t figure out why the hell were they so pissed about the child using both names rather than one or the other!?
Hmm... maybe that WAS why he had gotten thay shiver.
“And why are we heading in this direction anyway?” the young Tokubetsu Jounin grumbled. “The gates aren’t this way!”
“That, young Anko, is because we’re picking up a possible extension to our group...” he hoped Tsume accepted. She would be perfect for Shiroyuki! He just needed to get her down and the movie project finished before she got too far along in her pregnancy for travel.
Not that such travel would be more difficult for the pregnant Inuzuka. Oh hell no!
No, it was that as the pregnancy preceded further, so too did the danger. Rumors had it that an entire legion of invading nin were taken out by one Inuzuka who was seven months along.
She was eight months before anyone from Konoha had dared to inform her that the war was over, and she might want to go home.
That brave ninja was remembered for his sacrifice... although Jiraiya had no idea what that ninja’s name was... still, the legend endured so that counted for something!
Anyway, the sooner he got her there, the sooner the project could be done, and the less likely the entire production staff would be found slaughtered for questioning her way of saying her lines or even—he suppressed a shudder—adlibbing.
“So, who are we getting?” Anko queried as she kept in step with the Toad Sannin once he started walking once more. “Is it someone I have to work with?” She pouted cutely. “You know it’s supposed to be my mission and I work alone!"
Shaking his head, the man replied, “No, Anko... she’s not going to be working alongside you with your mission. She’s going to be doing something else for me... hopefully... maybe...” man, if the Inuzuka Clan voted against this, he was going to have to look at the local pool of talent again... and once in that shark pit had been enough!
“Who?” the violet-tressed girl queried. “And why wouldn’t she go with us? Is T&I not allowing her to finger-paint either?”
“She’s a Clan Head for one thing,” Jiraiya replied seriously as he started to take twists and turn through Konoha’s streets, headings towards the direction he knew would answer her question.
Eyes widening as they started to come to a more opened area on the western side of the city, the young Tokubetsu Jounin looked up at the older man. “...We’re going to the butt-sniffers?”
Sighing, the white-tressed ninja lowered his head. “...How my teammate didn’t succeed in killing you, I’ll never know. He’s never put up with such disrespect from anyone... EVER...”
Smirking, the girl replied, “Well... I’m just too cute and innocent!” she said, practically beaming with a child-like innocence that the Toad Sage knew was completely faked.
Jiraiya just glared at her. “You had blackmail, didn’t you?”
Anko opened her mouth—either to deny like a ninja or admit it like a bluff... also like a ninja—when she paused, scratching her head. “Not sure; everything is a bit fuzzy. Hell, I’m not even sure what happened to my teammate. I asked, but it’s like when I start finger-painting... everyone just clams up.”
Huffing—mainly to hide the fact that he now had to consider how if they ever ran into Tsunade, she would react to her brother’s former teammate not remembering him—he turned to resume their pace. “She’s part of the mission. If that’s an issue, I’m sure we can find other activities for you to do in the village. Why, I heard they have new secret punishments for the failures of the ‘Capture Tora’ mission, worse if the cat suffers an ‘accident’.”
He tried not to enjoy the fact she winced, looked around, and shivered worse than she reportedly had when rescued from Orochimaru’s base.
Tried was the key word there, as no one ever accused Jiraiya of resisting temptation.
Realizing he was enjoying how uncomfortable she was, the young child was pouting at the older man. “...At least I didn’t come up with something as stupid as Abukunai...” she said with a little huff. “Honestly! A mouse!? Why would anyone be interested in a mouse!?”
Now the older man looked confused. “Wait a minute! I thought you liked my works!? I remember you jumping for joy and going on about how you were going to tell all your friends!”
“I don’t,” the purple-tressed child admitted. She then honestly explained. “I merely enjoy making my peers jealous and causing them suffer!” she then reared her head back and cackled in a way reminiscent to Orochimaru. “The fools! I get to spend time around their precious Abukunai and they DON’T! FUFUFUFUFUFUFUUUU!”
A drop of sweat began to trickle down the side of the Toad Sage’s head. “...Well, looks like you learned SOMETHING from my old teammate...”
As they drew to the main gates of the Inuzuka compound, Jiraiya had to wonder... would she say something wrong that would set off Tsume? After all, no one had seen the Clan Head’s husband/mate/whatever he was being called... in a few months...
Was he dead?
Did he try to run?
Was he hiding somewhere, afraid—and rightfully so—that Tsume had put a bounty on his head?
Now normally, Jiraiya would warn his cute little students about any obvious dangers they might come across—even if they would totally ignore him, get into even worse trouble with the thing he had warned them of, and have to be rescued...
But she hated his work.
She was on her fucking own. Sarutobi always said it was a mission leader’s job to lead, not ensure everyone made it home despite their stupidity.
That’s why no one ever remembered the Village Hidden in the Boonies.
As they came upon the clan compound, the two were surprised to see the woman standing there and awaiting them; decked in her full Jounin attire. Beside her, her black-furred, eyepatch-bearing wolf was settled by her side... and at either side of the Inuzuka duo were three more large Nin-Ken: seven in total. All of them sitting on their haunches but their attention firmly on the Toad Sage.
Looking over everything before him, Jiraiya could only quip, “Did we come at a bad time?”
Shaking her head, the Inuzuka Clan Head replied, “Nope, not at all...” she managed to smile as she met the male ninja’s eyes with her own predatory gaze. “Meet your new voice-actors.”
“......Zuh?” the children’s author finally managed to query in a tone that didn’t even try to hide the confusion he was going through.
Crossing her arms over her chest, the woman explained, “I talked it over with my fellow Clansmen. They were actually very pleased to hear that you wished to do an animated musical on the Inuzuka version of the tale of Shiroyuki... hell, my own little girl was excited to hear you were going to, ‘make mommy into a princess’...” she managed to smile that was more genuine and thus, not as terror-inducing.
She then frowned, destroying any relief the Toad Sage might have been feeling. “However, they want to make sure it’s an authentic production atop of wanting to make sure I am secure. So a number of my Clansmen decided to kill two birds with one kunai and lent me their nin-ken, both to lend voices and to guard me and my unborn pup...”
Jiraiya took a moment to register this before replying. “...You know, it’s usually people that voice the animals in these things, not the other way around...”
“Yep, life’s full of surprises, even in the Ninja World,” she smirked, before her face went hard. “Now let’s get going before I gotta piss again—damn brat is sittin’ on my bladder!”
“Well, that’s nice,” Anko waved off. “So your big ass won’t be slowing us down because of being fat, but because you got knocked up. Even better!”
Jiraiya sighed heavily, rubbed his forehead. “Should we go after she wakes up?”
“Nah, just carry her,” Tsume responded. “I wasn’t kidding about the bladder thing.”
Anko raised an eyebrow. “What do you mean you’ll carry—”
*WHAM!*
“Thanks for not killing her,” the Toad Sage said in gratitude, as he created a Kage Bunshin to go into the broken trees and recover the child. “Really didn’t want to explain that to Sensei... or my student.”
“What can I say? It’s the mother in me,” Tsume replied with an eerily creepy smile. “Shall we get going?”
Shivering, the male ninja slowly nodded his head. “Uh... yeah...”
“And while we’re on the way, we can discuss our paychecks!” Kuromaru piped up as he started to lead a concession of Inuzuka Nin-Ken. “After all, we’ll be working, we gotta get paid...”
Both Jiraiya and his Kage Bushin stared at the black-furred lupine as if he’d grown two heads. “...Do you even have bank accounts?”
“I don’t know,” replied one of the other Nin-Ken. “Maybe we should ask the Clan Head...”
“...We’ll see when we get there,” was Jiraiya’s noncommittal reply, following quickly behind as his clone went to retrieve Anko. Damn dogs were already threatening him for a paycheck...
Yep. They’d fit in well with show business.
“Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear...” the Snake Sannin cooed theatrically as he sat across from the buxom blonde while clad in only his boxers—black with red clouds. “You truly are a wonderfully skillful card-player Tsunade-hime, the best I’ve ever seen...” he practically brown-nosed the Senju heiress.
She didn’t hear any of it, so pleased was the woman with this turn of events. Cackling maniacally, the Slug Sannin could hardly believe her luck. “I know! I knew all those years of bad luck and poor gambling skills would finally turn around on the pendulum swing! I’m the Legendary Sucker NO MORE!!!” She slammed her cards on the table. “A royal straight flush beats a full set of two’s!”
Nodding his head, the pale-faced Konoha exile calmly replied, “I know, I know... you win my wads of cash, my wallet, my watch, my Akatsuki robes and ring, my hia-te...” he grinned more deviously as the woman was going through the contents of his wallet. “And my Assistant.”
“Yay! I’m a collateral!” Shikoro cheered jubilantly.
Counting the ryo notes, the buxom blonde nodded her head with only the slightest bit of attentiveness. “Yes, yes, I know... I beat you and I won your cash, valuables, red dawn crap, and your—WHAAAAT!?” she screamed as she looked up...
...Only to find that the Snake Sannin was no longer sitting there.
“...Orochimaru?” Tsuande nervously called out, looking around the room before turning to her assistant.
“I...” the brunette kunoichi gulped. “I didn’t even see him move, Tsunade-sama,” Shizune offered with awe.
Tugging on the sleeve of the Senju’s gambler’s jacket, the former Kumo kunoichi looked up at her with wide, doe-like eyes. “Are you my new Mommy?” Shikoro asked with innocence.
“...OROCHIMARU!?!?” Tsunade yelled in hysterics.
Shizune merely shook her head. Her Lady should have realized something was wrong when she had a winning streak. The last time that had happened... well, her Lady had leveled several villages to deal with the nude sculptures that had resulted.
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(Posted Tue, 20 Aug 2013 19:22)
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