The Zero Tails Jinchuriki #6

Disclaimer - I don’t own anything. As the corporations say these days, you will own nothing & be happy. I don't, and have never claimed to, own Naruto or any of its characters. With that out of the way, let’s goooo!

Konoha, Land of Fire

–Kenta Akimichi–

His eyes snapped open as awareness returned to him, it still being dark outside. Once again, out of reflex, he stilled for a second as Nature Energy flooded his body, boosting his sensory abilities manifold as he performed a sweep of his surroundings.

He smiled upon sensing Tsunade in the general direction of the General Hospital, probably healing people throughout the night, as he woke up from the ground, stretched, and moved to the gates, nibbling on a tree branch from one of the Hashirama trees, to clean his teeth.

Over the years of living alone, with only a malevolent mass of negative energy as company, he had picked up some quirks or habits. For one, he needed very little sleep compared to even the average shinobi, let alone a civilian, allowing him to get a full night’s rest in at most 3 hours and giving him the ability to go without sleep for a week, at most, without experiencing any serious side effects.

He abruptly stopped and resisted the urge to facepalm as he realised what it would look like, with a strange thin man showing up at the gates with just a headband in hand. He didn't even know if his shinobi Identification number was even active because, last he heard, they had gone to great lengths to declare him dead in the official records.

Changing gears, he leapt off the ground and crossed the walls and the patrolling shinobi, landing lightly on a light pole, before leaping off in the direction of the hospital. Sarutobi was in his office, even now. He wondered if the man even slept or even if he did, did he go to his house or just passed out on his table?

It was a sorry state of affairs for all the higher ups of Konoha, to bear the stress of being caught with their pants down if any enemy ambushed Konoha, because that is what Konoha was at the moment, a mighty looking tree with most of its roots sheared off in a single go.

Spotting an open window, he jumped through, with his headband on, obviously. It wouldn’t do to be attacked on sight because someone thought that the Konoha General Hospital was under attack.

Sarutobi most definitely did not need another heart attack.

Roaming through the hospital floors, with an air of confidence did wonders as he went through two floors before finally reaching the emergency wards, the place with all the chaos, and through that chaos, he heard Tsunade’s voice. 

He waited a bit, right outside the emergency care unit doors, and only after a couple of minutes, a patient, a shinobi with burn marks all over his face and his left leg and hand missing, was wheeled out of the room, with the familiar Chunin signature still working her jutsu on the man and…

His brows furrowed as Tsunade did not come out of the chambers immediately. Only after the patient was wheeled off, did Tsunade come out of a door on the other side of the emergency room, looking very pale before she stormed off.

That was odd. Very odd. Usually, as far as he knew, Tsunade was a medic and the best the world had to offer; she would not be standing back while someone else, most probably her student, healed someone and not completely at that.

He might have accepted it had the patient not been in obvious pain and in a condition that the Tsunade of the past could have easily healed. He was not that familiar with her to just march up to her and tell her about his disagreement with her current arrangement.

Of course, he could not go any further or talk to her student to see if she was amenable to revealing some information because an ANBU appeared beside him.

“Hokage-sama has called for you,” The orders were whispered in a deathly quiet tone before the ANBU disappeared, and he with him. 

___xx___

He pushed the doors open and finally came face to face with Jiraiya of the Sanin. That made two of the three Sannin inside the village, a rare occurrence and something that should it be made public, would give even the strongest of the Great Villages a pause as no one and he meant it, no Kage would ever want to fight the Professor and the Two Sannin, not without outnumbering them.

He nodded at the massive white haired man, and sat down beside him, “Jiraiya.”

“Kenta-san.” Well, the formality was expected because they did not know each other all that much, despite being roughly the same age. Jiraiya was older than him by about 5 years, which was not all that much when compared in the advanced ages.

In the younger ages, 5 years was the difference between puberty and kids, making a huge difference.

“So, I suppose you saw Tsunade,” Sarutobi commented and he nodded, “Yes, but I noticed some odd behavior from her. Why is she not operating directly on the patients? Why is the girl who I assume is her student, doing the healing?”

Jiraiya’s grimace clued him in that they knew what was wrong. Sarutobi sighed, “Though it is not my secret to tell, but with our plan to have you revealed as a Senju, you are both going to meet sooner or later so might as well reveal it. Tsunade has hemophobia.”

He froze at that, the absurdity of the greatest medic of the Elemental Nations having a crippling fear of blood hit him like a sack of bricks, “What?”

It was Jiraiya that spoke, “It is almost crippling as well. She freezes at the sight of blood, unable to think of anything or mold chakra. If not for Shizune, her disciple, she would have long since been dead  because she can’t even defend herself if she is exposed to blood.”

What?

“How? Why?” he pressed, unable to find his words because the thought of losing the most talented medic of Konoha, because Konoha did not have a next generation of medics, to fear of blood was almost as insulting as it was morbidly ironic.

Sarutobi sighed, the very action making him seem older than dirt, “It is a number of factors but after the death of her then lover, Tsunade has increasingly withdrawn into herself. There is not much we can do here unless she seeks help herself.”

“And the Yamanake? What do they say?” He pressed, because it would be the height of foolishness to just wait for Tsunade to come and seek help instead of forcing her to it, because she was not just a Shinobi, she was a bloody strategic asset of the village.

“...Tsunade has refused to go to them.” 

He sagged in his seat, having so much stuff to tell them but not willing to invest so much of his time into this, for something that he could press on Tsunade later on now that she was back in the village.

Sarutobi, getting his intent, moved on, “We have the Jounin meeting later on in the day. As we discussed before, we plan on introducing you as Kenta Senju instead of Akimichii. I have already spoken with Choza and he has agreed. So we can–”

“Wait. Why are we still doing that if Tsunade is back in the village? Surely her presence itself should be enough to boost morale. It would be much more prudent to keep me hidden for something later on, if we have the  Hokage and a Senju back in the village.”

The difficult looks on their faces clued him in on something, “She is not staying, is she?”

Sarutobi slightly shook his head and he had to stop himself from reacting because what stupidity was this?

Why even come back if she was not going to offer her world class healing abilities and then not even help the village with the enhanced security her mere presence would provide?

“Why don’t I like this version of Tsunade?” He said out loud as he agreed to the proposal of being introduced as a Senju. It was not wrong either. Aside from Tsunade herself, he was the most complete Senju alive, with his mother being a Direct Senju and his father being half Senju, from his father’s side.

As he left the Hokage Tower, he was taken to a saloon of all places, to get cleaned up, in the words of  Sarutobi, to be introduced to the jounins at the meeting.

This was going to be his biggest human interaction in the past two decades, which actually made him nervous a bit before it was swept away by the calming presence of Nature Chakkra, his body having stilled and drawn on Sage Mode on instinct, probably in response to his stress because this was the most he had been angry in the past couple of years.

The world’s greatest medic with a fear of blood? Pathetic. 

He might just have to force an appointment with the Yamanake because the village could not lose an asset like Tsunade and if Sarutobi was too involved to be hard on her, he would gladly knock some sense into her.

She was Hashirama-sama’s granddaughter for Kami’s sake!