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Orochimaru looked into the mirror and felt his face wrench itself into something somehow approximating both a smirk and a scowl. He was still covered in all sorts of bandages, and it hurt to walk, talk, move in any way, or breathe. The Kyuubi brat had done this to him, injured more than anyone else had in decades.

He wanted him so badly. Sasuke? Who was Sasuke?

He grunted in soft pain as he fell back onto the cot and began thinking. After a long consideration, he had finally admitted to himself that he probably couldn't take over Naruto's body, even with the Kyuubi gone. He was simply too powerful... the jutsu wasn't cabable of letting him take over the bodies of those more powerful than himself. If so, he would have simply kept attempting to get Itachi's body, with his more advanced Sharingan.

As such, it would be wiser to simply add him to his elite. Kimimaro was going to die soon... he had to be replaced. He'd been planning on using Sasuke to fill that role... he couldn't quite remember why. Oh, right... the Sharingan. Although the Sharingan was why he wanted Sasuke's body, and so he would only be leader of the Sound five for a week or so... or a short three years if he missed the switch date. No reason to let them get accustomed to following the commands of someone who wouldn't be around for long, when he could have them under someone more capable, who he wouldn't be using as a shell.

Now that he had the whats and whys down, he needed to start working on the hows. How would he convince Naruto to join him? The curse mark was a viable option, with the slight brainwashing element involved in its early stages... Then he recalled that he wasn't quite sure what the effects of the curse mark would be on him now that he wasn't quite human anymore. He never considered that he was still completely human... the power he'd been using was decidedly demonic in nature, and with his claims of the Kyuubi being gone that left only one viable option.

So, no curse mark. Unfortunately, Orochimaru's wellspring of ideas ran dry right there. None of his typical modus operandi would work. Not if he wanted him to be loyal anyway. They only way it would possibly work was if he managed to save the boy's life or something and played the debt card... fat chance. Maybe if he'd been smart enough to take a look at the boy ten years or so ago, when he was still an impressionable kid... OROCHIMARU NO BAKA! He felt like slamming his head into the wall. The kid had been chosen as the Kyuubi Jinchuuriki... with training, how could he have proven to be anything but insanely powerful? And he'd probably missed dozens of potential chances to aquire that power! Stupid, stupid, STUPID!

Overlord, Chapter 8