Author's Note: There was no chapter numbered 27. I've skipped the numbering from chapter 26 to 28 in order to bring it back in alignment with what FFN thinks it should be.

"Now, why don't the four of you set your weapons on the ground?" Orochimaru said. "You are outnumbered by superior opponents and surrounded. This is serious ground, but not yet death ground. Set your weapons down and let's talk. I promise you will not be harmed."

"Sadly, I cannot promise the same to you," said the Nine-Tailed Fox, making Naruto's body step casually away from Hinata and walk forward to stand between the team and their enemies. "Kage Bunshin no Jutsu."

A thousand Fox-Narutos appeared across the battlefield, three around each person, two dozen in an inner perimeter around Team Anko, and hundreds more in an outer perimeter around the entire field.

Team Anko found themselves each grabbed by a trio of Foxen, hurled to the ground, and buried under a pile of furry bodies. Anko and Shino struggled to no effect; Hinata lay still and watched through her Byakugan as events unfolded. The mass of Naruto pressing down on her blocked all sound, but lipreading was easy enough.

At the same instant that Team Anko was being tackled, monomolecular claws were tearing the heads off the Sound ANBU...which just activated their contingent kawarimis and switched them with many of the training logs around the field. At which point the Foxen who had been waiting next to those logs tore the heads off the ANBU for real.

"Your freedom," Orochimaru said, in the split second before the bijuu-clones reached him and bore him to the ground.

"...I'm listening," said the original Fox, standing over the Sannin with arms folded.

"You should recall my former teammate, Jiraiya," Orochimaru said, calm and unruffled despite being held down by a combined half a ton of inhuman monsters. "He is, without a doubt, the best seal smith in the world, and probably the only person who could cleanly undo your seal. I've arranged for him to be here in two days."

"Interesting," the Fox said. "And why would you do this?"

"My reasons shall remain my own, I think," Orochimaru said. "However, if you would like to be free of the blond, you'll need to bargain with me."

The Fox raised Naruto's eyebrow. "Will I, now? And what exactly is to keep me from ripping you in half and 'negotiating' with Jiraiya when he arrives? I've found that most monkeys will do whatever you ask after you peel off enough of their skin."

Orochimaru snorted. "Please," he said. "Don't act the fool. You can't compel a sealmaster; all he needs to do is make the tiniest 'mistake' and you'll be in agonizing pain, or locked away again, or banished to Hell."

"A valid point," the Fox admitted, diamond-hard teeth grinding together. "However, I'm sure that Jiraiya will be happy to set me free in order to save his godson."

"I doubt that very much," Orochimaru said. "Yes, he'll want to save Naruto, but he will believe that the first thing you would do upon being released was to kill the vessel of your former imprisonment. Even if you can convince him that you wouldn't, he'll still recognize that both Naruto and Konoha are better off with your power available to them. He may promise to set you free, but actually he'll just imprison you again."

The tooth-grinding got louder. "Very well," the Fox said. "I note, however, that you have not answered my first question. Explain to me why I shouldn't tear your head off right now?"

"Because I can convince Jiraiya to actually set you free," Orochimaru said.

"...Go on," the Fox said.

"No," Orochimaru said. "Get off of me."

Hinata watched, eyes wide, as the Fox stared down at Orochimaru for long seconds. She could feel the killing intent boiling off the monster, but Orochimaru remained completely unmoved.

Slowly the Fox clones stood clear. Orochimaru waited until he was completely free, then stretched languorously and rolled to his feet, dusting off his clothes.

"If you do not give me useful information in the next three seconds, I will kill you," the Fox said calmly.

"No you won't," Orochimaru said, straightening his tunic without bothering to look at the bijuu. "If you do, you'll never get your freedom and you'll be sent to Hell when that body dies."

"I can make this body live a long time," the Fox snarled.

Satisfied with his appearance, Orochimaru finally looked up. "Yes, I'm sure you can. How long, though? A hundred years? Two hundred? That's a long time for me, but hardly an eyeblink for you. Stop insulting my intelligence."

The Fox's eyes were glowing red. "You would do very well to show a little more respect," he said quietly.

"And you would do very well to show a little more intelligence," Orochimaru said. "Now, are you going to continue acting offended and attempting to cow me, or can we actually negotiate like rational people?"

The Fox's lava-red eyes blinked back to Naruto's sky blue ones; the killing intent and angry body language vanished.

"How did you know?" he asked. "That works very well on most humans."

"Yes, well, most humans are too stupid to realize that being a ninja is the only career worth pursuing, regardless of how much effort it costs," Orochimaru said scathingly. "And most ninja are too stupid to realize that handseals and calling your attacks is idiotic."

The Fox snorted. "True. Although, to be fair, most civilians lack the chakra reserves to be ninja, no matter how much they want it."

Orochimaru looked at him in disgust. "You should know who Rock Lee is; Naruto trained alongside him for three years. Lee has zero ability to use chakra, yet he graduated from the most prestigious ninja academy in the world, merely by working hard. Don't tell me that a civilian couldn't become a ninja. Plus, constantly working chakra reserves to exhaustion will allow even a civilian to reach minimal ninja levels after a couple of decades."

The Fox nodded, granting the point. "Fair," he said. "Now, what's this about Jiraiya and my seal?"

"Don't you think you should let the others up?" Orochimaru asked, gesturing to where the non-Naruto members of Team Anko lay buried under Fox clones.

"Hm," the Fox said, looking from the piles back to Orochimaru. "I told Naruto I would keep the team safe. Right now my bodies are protecting them. Were I to let them up, you could harm them."

Orochimaru sighed in disgust. "Stop," he said. "I despise word games. If you're going to keep them prisoner, fine; it's little bother to me, although I would be mildly interested in negotiating for their freedom. If you actually want to protect them and maintain good relations with me, let them up. I have every motive to keep them safe—I want them to join me, and killing them would carry a reputational cost with you while not providing commensurate progress towards my other goals."

"Loyalty through enlightened self-interest, hm?" the Fox said. "How bijuu of you. Also, congratulations—you slid that into the conversation very smoothly. It would have been so much more clumsy had you explicitly threatened me with betrayal the moment I was no longer useful to you."

"I had rather assumed that was understood," Orochimaru said. "It is what I expect from you in turn, after all. For example, I note that you're not in a hurry to give Naruto his body back."

"I need to ensure that the team is safe," the Fox said. "I'll give the body back as soon as I'm sure that's the case."

"Oh?" Orochimaru said. "And what exactly is required for you to feel that the team is safe? You just killed ten percent of the Sound ANBU force. The remainder will be displeased, although they're unlikely to challenge you against my orders. Do they constitute a threat? Or perhaps you'll leave and take the team back to Konoha—at which point Hinata's father will go back to having her beaten."

"Not after I tear his arms off and hang his body up by the intestines," the Fox said. "And then work my way down through the family until the survivors get the message."

"Yes, and I'm sure that will make Hinata so very happy," Orochimaru said. "I see that your definition of 'safe' covers only physical safety. Now, are you going to let them up or not?"

"Fine," the Fox said, waving his clones off the team.

The genin and their sensei straightened up, brushing themselves off and—at least on Anko's part—glaring daggers at the Fox.

"Fox-sama, with the greatest respect, I would humbly ask that you please not harm my family," Hinata said, bowing deeply. "As Orochimaru-sama said, I would be very upset by that."

The Fox looked disgusted. "They. Are. Beating. You," he said slowly. He shook his head. "A thousand years and I am often still baffled at how you humans react to things."

"Part of it is that she grew up in the environment and therefore regards it as normal," Orochimaru said. "Embarrassment might also be a factor—it would cost face to admit that one's family was abberant. Then there's low self-esteem, which she clearly has; she has probably justified it to herself by thinking that she deserves it. As I recall, Hiashi was a stone-cold bastard, but he was very smart, and very good at manipulation; he's undoubtedly told her that he loves her and the beatings are to help her improve. And of course, there's peer pressure—she may feel that no one would believe her and—"

"Stop it!" Anko yelled. "Stop talking about her like she's not here!" She pulled a shuddering, tearful Hinata into a hug and glared at her former sensei.

Orochimaru turned to Hinata and bowed respectfully. "Of course. My apologies, young lady."

"If I may ask, Fox-sama, do you intend to return Naruto-kun to us?" Shino asked carefully.

"Of course," the Fox said. "Just as soon as I'm confident that you three are safe, I'll switch places with him again."

"And when might that be?" Anko asked acerbically. "When Hell freezes over?"

"Not that long," the Fox said. "Just as soon as I'm sure that no one is planning to kill, maim, or kidnap you. Oh, and we have a solution to Hinata's problem, of course." He turned back to her. "Are you sure you won't just let me exterminate your clan?" he asked hopefully. "It would be no trouble, really."

"I would be very grateful if you would please not harm them, Fox-sama," Hinata said, bowing deeply.

The Fox sighed. "Maybe just your father?" he wheedled. "Just a little harm. Wouldn't need to kill him, just a bit of maiming? Or maybe not even maiming, just permanent crippling? I mean, he doesn't really need the use of his legs, right?"

Hinata's voice had lost its Hyuuga calm and bobbled back and forth between hysterical laughter and horror as she said, "No, Fox-sama. Although I thank you for your concern."

The Fox gave a put-upon sigh. "Very well," he said in disgust. "Can I at least scare him, or is even that too much?"

"I'm sorry, Fox-sama, but that would be—" Hinata paused, thinking. "Maybe just a little?"

The Fox's newly-inhuman mouth broke into a wide, needle-fanged grin. "Excellent! Excellent, yes, that should solve everything. All right, I think we can scratch that one off the list. Now, we just need to make sure none of you three are in imminent danger of death and then we're fine and I can give Naruto his body back."

Orochimaru cleared his throat. "I doubt they are in imminent danger at this moment," he said acerbically. "However, I would prefer you not hand the body back just yet, as I have a proposal that I think would benefit all of us, including Naruto."

The Fox turned to him. "Oh?" he asked, one blond eyebrow raised. "Do tell."

"Not here," Orochimaru said. "I want some dinner and some tea first. And I'll need to have the bodies of my people buried."

"Doton: Swamp of the Underworld," the Fox said, casually slapping a hand to the ground. Patches of earth throughout the field turned to swamp, sucking down the bodies—and decapitated heads—of the former ANBU. When the Fox lifted his hand the ground immediately reverted to its former state, leaving the field completely undisturbed.

"Shall we get that tea?" the Fox asked.