Naruto: Mind over matter

Riku makes a bad team leader



Pov: Rocks

Too slow... but ill get to him eventually

...

---

-1 day later-

Pov: Riku

I just got out of the hospital fully and Emrys reattached, so I'm walking back to Ladies office to get back on some missions, as I was walking however I ran into Hinata and Shikamaru.

"Yo! What's up with you guys? Where are you headed?"

Hinata speaks up.

"Riku! Good to see you out and about, we are heading for our next mission, probably our last before the exams in Water"

"Cool, cool, cool, you guys seen Sasuke or is he busy too?"

Shikamaru thinks before answering.

"Pretty sure he was training at training ground 3 last I checked, been there since this morning... what's up?"

"Nothing much, just wanted to see how he was doing after the... revelations"

"Ah.. right, troublesome...."

That's right, we found many documents about Danzo's involvement with the massacre, it was disturbing and horrifying for Sasuke who is now very confused as to the real reason his brother murdered the Uchiha... no definite proof but with all the documentation on the coup and the reports from root agents monitoring his old clan... yeah, a tough pill to swallow.

Hinata pipes up.

"Uhmm... I'm pretty sure Sakura said he wanted to be alone for a-a while... should we not bother him until he bothers us?"

I nod my head.

"Might as well I suppose... or until I enter that office up there and both comically and conveniently am put on a mission with him"

Shikamaru raises his eyebrow but the rest of his face is looking right through me.

"You sent Ace to her office and got into a mission with him while we were talking didn't you? What a drag... enjoy"

"I will see ya! Hinata! Shikamaru!"

I give them a wave and head up into the Hokage's office where I de-summon Ace and stand where he was. Ladies eye twitches.

"Stop doing that"

"Sorry got held up... also no"

She almost crushes the paper in her hands but takes a breath and continues reading our mission.

"To summarize: infiltrate the rising merchant business built by Soma and eliminate him if he is conducting deals with criminals of the land of fire. This team will be lead by Riku and both Sasuke Uchiha and Sakura Haruno will be your subordinates. This is a pseudo test for your team leading capabilities Riku, ensure the mission goes well"

I nod my head and look to both my team members nod there heads at Lady.

"Alright team lets head out in ten if we are all good"

"I am fine"

"Just need to get my pack from the hospital and meet you guys at the gates"

"Thanks lady! Have a wonderful day!"

I wave and she scowls at me before I throw her a bottle of sake.

"And thanks for the expedited healing!"

She immediately hides the bottle in her desk before coughing and smiling at us leaving.

"Of course brat, don't make me heal you again"

Ten minutes later and we head off towards the big town that holds an up and coming merchants house, based on trading 'paper' supposedly, they are getting way too much money for that stuff so most likely some behind the scenes dealings.

This is barely a B-rank mission perhaps a C-rank and it is just for testing my capabilities at handling others, also Sakura needed a break from the hospital and Sasuke needs a low priority mission to wind down.

...

Pov: Tsunade Senju

I have a few more weeks of investment into Riku's renown and that should naturally spread on its own... Yamato just got back from his mission and should be available... ill pair him and Riku with Anko again for a few months as he does high-level missions and after that ill figure out what will be best for him.

This whole Danzo and Root thing will be labelled as his first completed S-rank and I need to fill our Anbu with competent Jonin again... Root had been in too many places and now we have to fill them all.

Riku has shown great promise, we should continue making him out to be Konoha's latest monster and with it hopefully Kumo and Iwa will be less of an annoyance on our borders, both villages had a taste of our last monster after all.

Though what should we carve Riku into? A hero is definitely not the way his reputation makes him out to be... but we cant have the terror just do no name missions or join Anbu where your identity is secret... Akatsuki seems to be the latest threat, I will have him Co-lead a team of our most powerful rising chunin that will be dedicated to hunting them, Kakashi will lead as well... if Naruto is on the team we should place Yamato as well, this team will have a leader then two captains who will be the second in command.

Kakashi will be the leader while Yamato and Riku take up the captains... now the question is... who of the other 12 prospective chunin should I place in the team?

Sasuke is a must, due to his brothers situation.

Naruto will need to make a name for himself too.

Sakura is a wonderous medic who will be needed for a team like this.

So team 7 plus anyone else who would be free for Akatsuki hunting... what about the former Root members? We need to place them somewhere and Yamato should be confident to watch over them.

Ill have to check all my documents but this should be a good proposal to the council as to solve our Riku and Akatsuki problem, they will start up there hunting activities in a year or two according to Jiraiya.

---

Pov: Riku

"Seems easy enough, no?"

Sasuke nods his head and Sakura sighs.

"I mean... why are we doing this?"

"Hn"

"Obviously we cannot just barge into Soma's office and demand answers, we also cannot wait for months until he contacts his 'underground friends', so naturally we have to pose as new 'friends' interested in his 'products'..."

"But why am I playing the part of the rough and tough criminal and Sasuke is my daughter??? What does that have to do with anything?"

"The least expected is never prepared for, you would question the convenient bad guy who shows up for product, but not the Mother criminal who wants to spoil his daughter!"

"Hn, then why are you a pirate?"

"Ran out of ideas- lets go!"

I enter into the merchants lobby and start screaming for Soma and his product.

"Soma! I want your Illegal goods! Me hungry for your product!"

Two men barge out of the main office upstairs and look down at me, Soma looks to his bodyguard and tells him to kick me out.

As I'm being dragged away I poof into smoke and henge into a random Konoha ninja.

"Bah! Just you wait Soma! Ill complete this mission if its the last thing I do! My teamates have already infiltrated your compound!"

I point to Ace and Anchor who henge from random people into random ninja, they slap there fore heads and walk out carrying me and slapping me once or twice, making sure to utter 'now we have to go back and report mission failure dumbass!'

...

Sakura and Sasuke look at me in disbelief before carrying out the mission, an hour later they meet me at the tea shop on the other side of town.

"Did you get the information?"

They sit and order some food.

"Hn, what was that idea of yours? I have no clue why you would do that"

I shrug.

"C-ranks are boring, I made it harder for you to get the info, wanted to see how well you would do"

Sakura slurps her tea aggressively while staring me down.

"What..?"

"Why!?"

"Why not..?"

"This is a test! For you! You made the mission harder for no reason!"

I take a long sip of my tea.

"And?"

"And!? And!? Please don't tell me we have to do more missions with you"

I snicker and Sasuke shakes his head smirking.

"Worse than Naruto?"

"He does things on accident! You on the other hand-"

She does a strangling motion.

"You had fun cuddling Sasuke as his mother right?"

Sakura's eye twitches and she looks into the distance while sipping her tea, Sasuke's smirk falls.

"Can we get back soon? I don't like staying in one place for too long"

"All right, we will leave after you finish your dessert"

---

Pov: Naruto

Bah! Failed again, dumb fox not helping at all! Dattebayo!

I sit across from pervy sage who is eating his barbeque gleefully, more gleeful from staring at that waitress however.

I pick up my chopsticks and start eating some more food.

"(Whisper) did you hear? About The inhuman terror of Konoha?"

"(Whisper) who?"

"(Whisper) a new monster from Konoha, apparently the next genius and Jonin at 13!"

I stop eating and speak.

"Hey! That's my age? Who became Jonin...?"

Pervy sage looks at me and with a deadpan face asks.

"Who do you think?"

"Hmmm... Neji?"

"Its Riku"

I drop my chopsticks.

"What!? But Riku isn't inhuman! Or a terrible person at all!"

Pervy sage laughs loudly.

"Its a name Naruto, it fits when he goes all manual doesn't it? And terror as in he gives people nightmares or whatever"

"But he doesn't give people nightmares! He believed in me, my dreams and ambitions! Inhuman-"

*wack*

I get karate chopped by pervy sage and he looks at me curiously.

"Why so shouty all of a sudden? I haven't met the kid but I'm sure he would think nothing of it"

"But- but! Haaa-"

I deflate... I just feel like Riku got his Inhuman freak name because of me, he doesn't deserve to be called freak!

"Alright kid cheer up, lets get out of here and start teaching you those wind jutsu, or did you want dessert?"

"Popsicle please..."

"Hahaha~ alright lets get going, waitress!"

Pervy sage calls the waitress over and we leave paying for our meal.

---

Pov: Rocks

...

---

Pov: Yamato/Tenzou

Haaa- back home after that long mission, well technically I was coming back and forth all the time but still... when you are working on information gathering in another country you can rarely get some time to sot at home.

"Anko? You in here?"

I open the apartment that we are sharing and suddenly hush as I see Anko fallen asleep on the couch with a bottle hugging to her chest.

I go grab a blanket and place it over her.

Lets just have a shower and get to bed.

---

-tomorrow-

"You awake Anko...?"

I say to the purple haired lady who is currently sleeping on top of me.

"How did you even manage to get here...? You were on the couch?"

"I'm awake dumbass, glad you are back.. Riku did Riku things again..."

"He jumped into another Tailed Beasts belly!?"

"What? No... he just, there was a minor revelation that me, Hatake and the Hokage had about him... something important"

I sit up on the bed and she sits next to me.

"We think that Riku has seen the afterlife... and that he was denied entry"

"Sorry..?"

"I have multiple reports and some statements here that might prove that statement in some way... and if not give clarity into Riku's situation, even if its not true he does believe it to be"

She pulls out a phew scrolls and hands them to me, reading over them I am mostly shocked and curious... what happened Riku?

"Have you said anything to Riku?"

"..no"

"What do you say about this?"

"I have no clue... that's why I waited for you, was hoping you would be able to help- somehow at least"

Hmmm... Riku wants to rest but cannot...

"Well we cant do anything by waiting and sitting still, we should get Lady Tsunade to summon him and get him to tell us about this... if we can help, it will be done only when he wants it, if he doesn't want to speak we can only trust he has himself covered"

She sighs and stands up, I follow her out of our apartment and into the streets of Konoha.

"Oh yeah! The brat got a new nickname as well, The inhuman terror of Konoha, Hah! Suits him"

I chuckle.

"Certainly tells the people how annoying it is to be his sensei... I feel bad for any kids he has to teach in the future.."

She barks out a laugh as we head off towards the Hokage.

Hopefully this thing is just an exaggeration from Riku.. lets hope a Yamanaka can solve this 'afterlife' he saw.
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