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It’s the middle of the night, and Naruto is curled into a tiny ball, his legs pressed up to his chest and he scribbles seals onto the scroll spread out in front of him. Modified, to incorporate his silk into them.
Sakura’s back is pressed against his with tiny bottles of poisons surrounding her in a manner of organised chaos.
Shisui is asleep on the futon he’s spread out, wanting to be in their presence rather than his and Aoba’s room. Aoba’s arms are wrapped around Shisui’s waist, with his face half obscured in Shisui’s t-shirt.
They both look incredibly at peace, wrapped around each other, Both with full faces on display, no Hitai-ate covering Shisui’s empty eye socket and a chunk of his face and no sunglasses covering Aoba’s eyes, and his own Hitai-ate abandoned.
It’s a strange sight that Naruto thinks he can absolutely get used to. It’s a strange thing, to see two very strong people look so vulnerable out of uniform, but regardless of their strength, they’re still human.
And they both trust them enough to sleep in their presence.
Naruto can see Shisui’s eye bags more than ever in the dim light of the apartment. They’re never as bad as Tenzou’s permanent look of bone-deep exhaustion, but it’s enough to leave a hollow feeling in Naruto’s chest. His complexion looks almost sickly almost reflective of how much Shisui has struggled to get his body, health and mind back to where it was before Danzou had hurt him so.
Aoba looks tired. Worn in a way that makes Naruto realise that it’s not something sleep can cure. Naruto knows a whole lot of nothing about Aoba, but Kurama has noticed the worried glances Shisui gives him too often for it to be nothing.
Aoba and Shisui will be fine, but that’s hardly the point.
Sai is sleeping on another futon near Naruto and Sakura’s heads. Covered in bandages and bruises, his pale skin taking on a grey complexion.
It’s okay Sai had told Aoba, doubled over in his arms, bleeding from so many places Naruto hadn’t know what to do.
The mission was a success, Sai tells them, even with his body a mess and there was no way Sai isn’t hurting, his voice is as level as always. His face didn’t let through, even though he must be in agony he never flinched when Sakura had helped stitch together the worst of the wounds with Shisui and Aoba.
Which lands them here now.
Sai is bound to Danzou for now, and it’s risky enough as it is for him to even be associating with them. One day, Naruto and Kurama will get him out. One day, they’ll free all of the Root agents trapped in Danzou’s program.
But for now, they plan.
Sakura leans over to him, her head tilted at a painful angle. One of Naruto’s spiders crawls up her arm and Sakura spares it a gentle pat.
“Once we get into the barracks can we use your spiders to get the poisons and the seals in their places?” she asks.
That’s the problem, getting their traps where Danzou will accidentally set them off. But Naruto has been practising making the silk blankets lately and he’s given them to Root operatives. He even managed to convince one of the older Root veterans that he should take it, and one of his largest, beautiful spiders.
He’s established rapport and the closest thing to trust with people who are almost just puppets.
Naruto thinks he and Kurama can convince them to get the traps set up. He’ll use the spiders just in case that plan falls apart to be safe.
“I think I might be able to convince some of the Root shinobi to help us, but we can use the spiders too,” he says. Kurama rumbles deep inside of him, Naruto can visualise him stretching out his legs and his big eyes blinking away the sleep without even seeing him.
“How’s the kid?” Kurama asks, his voice rumbling through Naruto.
“Kurama wants to know how Sai is,” Naruto tells Sakura and she nods, carefully pulling herself to her feet, careful not to dislodge any precious bottles and closes the small distance between them and Sai’s sleeping, unmoving body.
He nudges Kurama with his mind in acknowledgement.
Sakura turns back to him after a moment. Her face is dark, and Naruto knows what’s she’s feeling without her saying a thing.
Danzou hurt Shisui. Nearly killed him in both the physical and mental sense. Danzou hurt Tenzou, let Orochimaru experiment on his as a baby and then dragged him through Root. The only reason Tenzou isn’t still a part of it was a fluke meeting with Kakashi.
(Naruto can’t say how happy he is that Tenzou and Kakashi have one another. If not, Naruto thinks they wouldn’t be anything close to the happiness they’ve achieved.)
And here is Danzou, burning Sai’s soul from the inside out along with every Root shinobi under his orders.
But that’s why they’re doing this. They can’t kill Danzou, but they can make him a paranoid mess.
“He’s okay. He just needs to rest,” she says, slipping back against Naruto’s side.
He nods and lets himself drift into his and Kurama’s shared mindscape. The spider folds himself down to be closer to him, waiting.
“Sakura says he should be alright, he just needs to sleep,” Naruto says and Kurama grumbles out something Naruto doesn’t make out.
“Maybe you should just kill the bastard,” he growls, leaning closer to Naruto until he’s laying right at his feet.
“We can’t. If we could, Shisui and Aoba would have figured it out a way,” he sits down, pressed against Kurama’s head.
“Still,” Kurama says. “He deserves it.”
Naruto nods and knows it’s true. He’s hurt so many people, so many of Naruto’s precious ones as well. Danzou deserves a thousand deaths and one more.
“We’re going to make him suffer all the same,” Naruto whispers. He pats Kurama’s head and lets the mindscape fade back to the living room.
Sakura has organised the bottles in some sort of order, used to Naruto’s conversations with Kurama.
She rolls over to face him and her eyes linger in Shisui, Aoba and Sai for a little too long.
“Are we really doing it?” she asks, although there isn’t a thread of unwillingness in her voice.
“Of course,” Naruto says.
They can’t kill Danzou. They’re not strong enough and Like Aoba said, the political implications of that wouldn’t be worth it.
They can’t kill him, but they can make him suffer all the same.