Naruto walked the spiral path to Lady Tsunade's office with his hands behind his head. His loud steps echoed through the quiet halls. He figured he wasn't close because he couldn't hear yelling. Lady Tsunade—Granny might just not be home.
"Maybe I'm just growing up..." he mumbled under his breath.
As he walked by a window he saw the Hokage's staring down, passing by in step with him. A landmark that had been there his entire life. Naruto smiled. He was so glad the statues had survived the destruction. The fact that they still stood being there made him all the more determined to reach it. From here he could see Tsunade's visage in the stone. The morning sun had just started cresting over the mountain.
Naruto hurried the rest of the way and pushed open the door to the Hokage's chambers.
He still didn't hear her. Instead, he saw Tsunade with her head down on her desk. Her blond twintails frazzled and loose in their hairties. Surrounding her were high stacks of paper, half-empty bottles of ink, and books he figured were about treatises, agreements and other boring stuff. On the far side of the room was half a bottle of sake that had probably been moved by Shizune.
"Are you sleeping on the job, Fifth?" he asked out into the room.
Tsunade shuffled around. "Closer to dead than asleep," she mumbled into her desk.
"The Hokage should rest at her own place instead of on the job, right?" he thought, rubbing the back of his head.
Tsunade looked up and trained her brown eyes right on him like he was a target. "You don't know anything about it."
"Heh," he laughed nervously, "I guess not."
She looked at him. "You're still a welcome sight."
"I mean getting yelled at when I come here is normal, so no worries."
"Why are you here, then?" she had to ask.
"Oh. I just wanted to tell you that my mission went off without a hitch!" He smiled wide and gave her a thumbs up.
"It was a C-Rank mission," she looked seriously at him. "I know you're still a Genin, but after everything that's happened lately, don't worry about reporting back. I'll handle the paperwork. It's all the same to me," she sighed, leaning back in her chair. She'd been sweating a bit, sat by the windows all day hard at work. Her low-cut blouse made it easy to tell.
"I get it... but I also know that what you need is to get out of this cramped room!" He went over to one of the windows and pushed it up. "See? It's a nice day!" He turned to her. "It's like how if I train too much in one place I go crazy."
She laughed at him. "And what do you suggest the Hokage do with her time?"
"Well I was gonna go do some training today, actually!" he sort of asked, sort of said.
"Maybe it's just the Shinobi way to overwork, eh? I do wonder how you handle yourself out there. I've only seen you in one fight lately, and those weren't the best circumstances."
He suddenly got a little nervous.
She continued, "Just don't expect my help. I've already got a student."
She stood up from her desk and her chest shook.
Naruto looked out the window again, "I've never thought of you like a teacher anyway."
Tsunade came up beside him and had to look up a few inches. "Well, don't you forget I'm still one of the legendary Sannin! So let's see if you can impress me," Tsunade put a hand high on his shoulder and led him out of her chamber.
Naruto and Tsunade walked together through the village, in what was certainly a unique sight to it's denizens. He was wearing his wide smile, while hers was more reserved, for once. Naruto lead Tsunade to the waterfall near the edge of the village, the one that Yamato had built for him. He hadn't been back here in a while, but he thought it might be a good place to train. It sounded easier before he had company.
Just as she had put it on, Tsunade pulled off her green haori and sat it on the grass like a blanket. She pulled off a black heeled shoe, and then the other like a natural. Standing there in her basic gray clothes, without even her kage's hat, she looked like the embodiment of a woman.
"So, Hokage-To-Be, let's see it," she said plainly.
"Well, I was just gonna do some basic training… it's kinda boring, even for me. But Kakashi says it's important."
"I'm here, aren't I? So let's see those basics. And I'll see if you need to be whipped into shape," Tsunade made a smirk look scary. She sat down, cross-legged, a few feet from the waterfall, and watched.
Naruto tried his best to brush it off. Lady Tsunade or not, he had a lot of work to do. But after his Sage Mode training, it was no work at all for him to clear his mind. He just hoped she could help teach him a few things.
He unzipped his jacket and pulled it off, tossing it aside. Leaving his fishnet undershirt on, Tsunade could see the Third's necklace still hanging from his neck. She faintly smiled. She could also see just how much older he looked compared to the first time she'd seen him, when they fought Orochimaru. He was so much taller, his muscles were more defined, and he'd gained scars in all the time that had passed. She blinked a few times, but never turned her eyes away.
"You look like Pervy Sage! Are you okay, Granny?" Naruto said, oblivious.
She ignored that. Tsunade found herself wanting. Wanting him to call her a Lady… wanting… anything except for that miserable nickname! Tsunade slammed her fist into the ground beside her and, once the dust cloud scattered, saw a large dent in the dirt.
She didn't see that Naruto's lips pursed up like a frogs. He quickly went back to his training so that he wouldn't wind up with a dent from Lady Tsunade. He made two clones and in a similar puff of smoke they sat beside him in front of the water.
Three of him for training… he's improving. She thought slowly and carefully, her head in a bit of a tizzy.
The original Naruto held out his hand with his other holding the wrist. Blue chakra began swirling into a small sphere of energy. It started to swell. The others put their hands up and began the rotations and adding of nature.
Naruto closed his eyes. This will show her how much I've grown!
The spiral itself started to grow, and grow, and it began taking on the shape of the Rasen-Shuriken, but not quite as it had before. It was loose, eclectic, a unique kind of swirl that was irregular in it's pattern.
Tsunade came over so carefully that he didn't notice and put a hand on his shoulder.
"Easy. It's just training," she assured him, noticing the instability in his jutsu.
He didn't say anything, which was rare enough on it's own. His chakra slowly eased back down. Yet kept it's strange pattern. It wasn't special chakra necessarily, but even Tsunade herself had never seen anything quite like it.
She noticed that a cut on Naruto's waist had started to bleed from the exertion. She put her fingertips gently against his side, and her healing energy began to course from her and into him. The bleeding immediately subsided. Tsunade didn't think, she just sat herself behind Naruto, her legs on either side of him with her chest against his back.
