Blonding

Chapter 5 : Seventh Hokage

The Honorable Seventh Hokage yawned, stretching his fingers behind his neck as he leaned back in his desk chair, checking the clock as he did so. With a few tired smacks of his lips, he leaned back up again and over his desk, the bags under his eyes seeming to grow with each passing moment.

All this paperwork. All the time.

It had only gotten worse after the economic and technological boom that happened shortly following the Fourth Shinobi War. He had - for a brief period of time, at least - thought that the advent of the computer would alleviate most, if not all of his papery woes.

Nope.

Naruto Uzumaki ran a tired, bandaged hand through his short, yet spiky blond hair. He still missed his forehead protector, even though he now wore something much more precious and symbolic. He shot a tired, yet admiring, glance at the white cloak that flowed from his shoulders, bunching up down his back as it was pinned to the chair by his exhausted frame.

It was important to note, however, that Naruto Uzumaki never got tired - well, not physically, at least. It seemed that whatever unseen deity that had granted him with the strength to fight for days... literally days... took his mental stamina as payment.

Naruto rolled his eyes as he felt the strange, disconnected feeling of someone smirking from within his stomach.

"Yeah, yeah, I know what I said," he grumbled to his empty office, sliding open a drawer and pulling out a pen and a stamp. "Don't be a smartass."

With a very unmajestic yawn, he began to scribble away at a budget analysis that had wormed its way onto his desk. He drew swirls and doodles along the margins as he read, slowly drawing his quickly dwindling attention. Finally, after less than thirty seconds, he just muttered something incoherent - but most likely very explicit - flipped the page to the back, and slammed his signature onto the blank at the back. Whatever. He'd just read it more closely later... right?

His eyes shot open, as they darted to the watch on his hand.

"Shit!" he said with a grimace, slapping himself in the face. His hand lingered for a moment, before it slowly slid down his nose and mouth, dragging skin along as it went.

With a groan, he began to forage around in one of the mountains of paper that covered his desk, the chairs in front of it, the surrounding floor - hell, one even went all the way to the ceiling. Or so he thought, at least. It certainly felt like it did.

Finally, he found what he was looking for - his laptop. It wasn't anything special - just enough for him to compile important notes and documents for the daily announcements memo he sent out at precisely six in the morning, every morning.

It was currently 6:18.

He looked through the short list of things he had noted the night before - or, rather, earlier this morning. He really didn't sleep much anymore. Naruto just shrugged his shoulders, and reached around another pile of paperwork to the phone that was planted firmly in the far right corner of his desk. With the click of a button, the hollow sound of a woman screeched out of the speaker.

"Good Morning, Lord Seventh. What do you need?"

"Hello, Tasukete. Umm..." he grinned embarrassingly, rubbing the back of his neck, even though no one was there to see it. "Hehe, yeah... I may have forgotten to send the daily email out earlier today - can you please put one together for me and get it out by seven? Today is a really important day, so I don't have much time to do it myself, unfortunately."