Root Base.
His body shrouded in shadow, Danzo sat with his lone eye half-closed, the index and middle fingers of his left hand tapping lightly against the desk, as though waiting for something.
Suddenly, with a faint sound, Danzo snapped his left eye open. In the previously empty hall before him, the air had begun to warp violently, and a masked man draped in a black robe abruptly appeared.
"You came."
Danzo stared straight at the lone eye behind the Masked Man's Spiral Mask. Only after a long moment did he speak hoarsely.
"I came." The Masked Man likewise sounded as though he had terminal throat cancer.
"You shouldn't have come." His eyelid drooped as Danzo snorted coldly, his two fingers still tapping the desk.
"Hmph, brat, weren't you the one who called me back?" The Masked Man had no intention of trading cryptic lines with Danzo any longer and shot back mockingly.
"Didn't you say last time that this was your Konoha? How come, after all these years, the Hokage's surname is still Sarutobi? Or have you changed your name to Danzo Sarutobi?"
A flash of anger crossed Danzo's eye, but his expression remained impassive.
Damned Uchiha. Does he really think he's Madara Uchiha? How dare he order me, the Darkness of the Shinobi, around!
If I didn't have a use for you, I'd make you pay!
"Enough lip. Only by working with me can you obtain what you want."
After that reply, Danzo said nothing more. Instead, he picked up a stack of files and spread them across the desk before him.
"Oh? The Uchiha Clan will hold a clan meeting in three days? What are you planning?"
The Masked Man glanced over the files, his tone amused.
"The Uchiha Clan harbors treasonous ambitions. They intend to launch a coup, overthrow the Hokage, and plunge Konoha into eternal ruin. As acting Hokage, I must naturally uphold Konoha and save it from fire and flood.
"For the greater cause, we can only strike first and eliminate these treacherous usurpers."
Danzo spoke loudly and with utter conviction, his words brimming with righteousness. Had the Masked Man not known what sort of man Danzo was, he might almost have mistaken him for a truly loyal servant of Konoha.
Only someone like Danzo, who had lied for so long that he had even fooled himself, would believe those words.
Perhaps it was his imagination, but Danzo thought he heard an exceedingly faint snicker in the empty hall. He paid it no mind, merely fixing his gaze on the Sharingan behind the Masked Man's mask.
"Madara Uchiha, let us assume for now that you are who you claim to be. Surely you hold no lingering attachment to your own clansmen?"
Faint snickering continued to echo through the hall, seemingly mocking Danzo, yet also seemingly mocking the Uchiha.
"Heh. When I left the village back then, there was no one behind me. Not a single person followed me. Those Uchiha had forgotten their roots. No, they don't deserve the name Uchiha at all."
The Masked Man's tone was icy, while a hint of reminiscence entered his gaze, as though he had returned to those days decades ago when he had left Konoha alone.
This bastard's putting on a pretty convincing act. ×2
The corner of Danzo's mouth twitched as he silently sneered. Even through the mask, an air of utter idiocy hit him square in the face. While this could not possibly be Madara Uchiha, he was unquestionably an Uchiha, not someone with a transplanted Sharingan.
A transplanted Sharingan could never be this pure. With this degree of idiocy, what else could he be but an Uchiha?
Shaking his head, Danzo opened another file, revealing a photograph. He stared hard into the Masked Man's lone eye and spoke one word at a time.
"On the day of the clan meeting, I will dispatch Root to assist you, and I will personally come to support you. We will launch a surprise attack that night and wipe out the Uchiha Clan.
"You want Three-Tomoe Sharingan, don't you? Take as many as you can."
"Not enough. Forty percent for you, sixty for me." The Masked Man glanced at the photograph, his tone still flat.
"Impossible! I do all the running around, only to sew a wedding dress for a whelp like you to wear!"
His lone eye widened, and Danzo's left hand stopped abruptly. He was about to slam the desk, but something seemed to occur to him. Suppressing his anger, he tapped it lightly instead.
"Fifty-fifty. Not a bit more."
"Heh heh. So this is what you call doing it for Konoha?"
"Konoha's development naturally requires these rebels to contribute. Though they have betrayed Konoha, their corpses and wealth can still add bricks and mortar to its growth. That, too, is an honor for them."
As though he had not heard the mockery in the Masked Man's words at all, Danzo remained the very picture of righteousness.
"Heh, whatever you say. We'll drown the Uchiha Clan in blood in three days. What does this photograph mean? You want to spare this boy called Sasuke Uchiha?"
"No!" Danzo blurted out with absolute finality. He slowly shook his head, then continued in a chilling voice.
"Kill this brat first. He is the primary target."
"Heh. What a magnanimous heart our esteemed Hokage's aide has. You truly wring out your heart and drain your blood for Konoha." The Masked Man paused at those words, then seemed amused by the contrast between Danzo's reactions and spoke with dripping sarcasm.
"Such a glib tongue."
Danzo tapped the desk again to express his displeasure.
"Once the job is done, I will provide the forbidden techniques I promised you. Go make your preparations."
"Does this operation have a code name?"
"A code name? Night of the Uchiha Massacre!"
"Not a single survivor?"
"Not a single survivor!"
Having received his answer, the Masked Man said nothing more. He merely nodded, then vanished into a swirling distortion.
Danzo let out a long breath and leaned back slightly, a few barely noticeable beads of sweat appearing on his forehead.
With one worry laid to rest, he felt far less weighed down than before.
Picking up another scroll and looking it over, Danzo curled his lip, stood, and headed outside.
Time to go stir things up with that fellow Hiruzen.
Over the past two years, Hiruzen had stopped calling him to meetings as often as before, and the same was true of the other two advisers. He seemed intent on holding all power in his own hands. Overriding every objection, he had repealed many of the policies previously directed against the Uchiha and was instead vigorously promoting reconciliation between the Uchiha and the village.
But... hmph.
Recalling how Hiruzen Sarutobi had begun wavering again under the repeated pressure he and his two old associates had applied recently, Danzo could not help sneering.
Indecisive, too sentimental. Hiruzen Sarutobi doesn't deserve to be Hokage at all. A position like that should belong to me, Shimura Danzō!
As Shimura Danzō continued to grumble inwardly about Hiruzen Sarutobi, even his steps grew lighter. He left Root's underground base and headed toward the Hokage Building.
After he left, the air in a shadowed corner of Root's hall abruptly warped in exactly the same way as before.
A tall figure draped in a black robe and wearing a Spiral Mask appeared before the desk. He looked in the direction Danzo had gone, gave a soft snort, then withdrew his gaze and stared blankly at Sasuke's photograph on the desk. The Mangekyo in his eye, seemingly formed from three boomerangs arranged counterclockwise, rotated slowly.
His gaze fell on the files on the desk, nearly all of which concerned Hiruzen Sarutobi. The masked figure could not help looking up and sighing.
"It really is just as he said. This Danzo and the Third Hokage truly are a pair of ill-fated mandarin ducks-"
Before you continue