Karin followed after her 'handler', she had gotten a choice of 1 year of community service or imprisonment, obviously, she took the first option.
After hearing that Otagakure and Orochimaru were now gone, it's not like she had much else to go back to.
The only thing she wanted to do was find Sasuke, she was quite happy that the boy who saved her in the Chunin Exams was also part of Otogakure.
She barely met him there, he was almost always training, but what few times they did meet, she found his Chakra to be so alluring.
Even if it was growing darker and angrier as time went on.
But she shook her head, focusing on the now.
The Order was her best chance at finding him anyway, now that Otogakure was gone, if she could garner enough goodwill with them then maybe she could convince them to look for him.
But until then, she would work, making sure she didn't waste this opportunity.
Her 'handler' reached their destination, a room labeled 'Emergency Surgery 3'.
He pushed open the door without hesitation, Karin following behind him, inside was a man laying down on an operation table, next to him stood a few nurses.
"Report!"
One of the nurses turned to him and gave a short bow.
"He's still unconscious, we've performed what immediate measures we can, but he will require surgery soon." She informed him. "It seems that he has bone fragments in his lungs and stomach."
"Alright, Karin, give me my scalpels." He ordered, holding out his hand.
Karin dutifully reached into the pack she was carrying, pulling out two sealed packs of medical equipment, she handed them both to him.
He opened both of them and began setting up, Karin stood a bit further away, watching closely as he took his scalpel and cut into the man's skin.
This was her job for the foreseeable future, when they had said she was going to be working at the hospitals, she had thought it would be just like Kusagakure, being forced to heal people over and over again.
But instead, she was now working as an assistant to one of the better doctors, instead of healing herself, she carried packs full of tools and followed him around all day.
She even got some lessons sometimes, filling up the holes in her knowledge that Orochimaru never bothered to teach her.
"Karin, stem the bleeding in 10, 9, 8-"
He continued counting down, Karin quickly stepped forward and placed her hands on the open wound, using the Mystical Palm Technique.
This really wasn't so bad.
***
"And now take a deep breath... feel the Nature Chakra, but don't absorb it, keep it at a distance..."
Jūgo did as he was instructed, his teacher stood behind him, observing him as he meditated.
He was a big bird.
A very big bird.
This place had a lot of big birds, his new teacher was the biggest, Shun was the second biggest.
There were others, some smaller, some bigger, one as big as Shun, but none were bigger than his teacher.
Jūgo opened his eyes and glanced back at him, this bird's name was Mukuro, or Sage Mukuro.
He was trying to teach Jūgo how to stop transforming when angry, and how to start transforming when he wanted to.
A wing lightly tapped him on the head.
"Focus, Jūgo." Mukuro scolded, his tone one of slight amusement. "This will take time, you need to be patient."
"Sorry..." Jūgo muttered.
"Don't apologize, just focus."
Jūgo closed his eyes again, breathing deeply as he focused on the feeling of Nature Chakra around them.
It was quite hard, but he didn't mind, he had nothing better to do anyway.
***
A FEW HOURS LATER
Tsunade leaned back in her chair, a bottle of sake in front of her.
Haruka had recommended this restaurant to her, saying, 'The food is to die for, but the environment is not for the faint of heart.'
Which didn't really tell Tsunade much, but she decided to come here anyway, dragging Jiraya along with her.
As the second person was sent flying through a window, she got a pretty good idea of why Haruka warned her.
She and Jiraya had spent hours negotiating with Haruka, Tsunade finally had found out what the Order's goal was.
Friendship.
It was such an unexpected ploy that Konoha had fallen straight for it.
The incredibly generous deals, the mild requests, they were all to tie Konoha and the Order together, she had been looking for underhanded tactics, signs that the Order was a puppet state for any of the other Great Villages.
Instead, they were trying to create a web of mutual benefits, it had been heavily lopsided in Konoha's favor, but after the meeting they just had, it was slightly more balanced.
And it's not like Tsunade could reject it, if their current deals were broken then Konoha would suffer a small recession.
So she had to accept, the still beneficial, deals that were put in front of her because if she didn't then Konoha would lose out on millions upon millions of ryō in revenue.
And the detailed information the Order had recovered from Otogakure, turns out the first folder just included a part of what they had.
In Haruka's words, 'We can't just share sensitive intel with people who are not our allies.'
Fucking bitch.
Most back in Konoha would praise her for signing such beneficial agreements, most also supporting the alliance, since it wasn't often that a new power rose in the Elemental Nations.
But since she had been basically forced into it, it left her feeling a bit bitter, which was a very weird feeling.
"Here you go, one plate of grilled steak and a bowl of tomato soup." Their waiter...
...
Tsunade exchanged glances with Jiraya, they both looked back at their waiter, who placed their dishes down in front of them.
Why was Sasuke Uchiha their waiter?
"Anything else I can help you with?" He asked politely. Did he not recognize them? Or did he simply not care?
Both of them were staring a bit too long, and Sasuke raised an eyebrow.
"N-no," Tsunade replied upon noticing the awkward silence. "That will be all."
Sasuke nodded, bowed slightly, and walked away.
Tsunade looked back at her drink, and decided that drinking it right now was a very good idea.
Jiraya snatched it from her hands before she could.
"We can't drink all of our problems away, Tsunade." Jiraya said firmly, picking up his chopsticks and digging into his food, wilfully ignoring the mess that was about to happen. "Besides, this looks great!"
"Easy for you to say!" Tsunade snapped. "You're just going to go gallivanting around again after we finish here."
Jiraya laughed a bit awkwardly, guess he couldn't just ignore this.
"Look, I'll handle this, you can just focus on the stuff in Konoha, alright?" He offered placatingly. "Besides, Naruto would kill me if I didn't try to bring his best friend back."
Tsunade sighed but relented.
Once she got back to Konoha, she was totally taking a break, fuck Hokage duties for a day or two, she had more than earned it.