After Lee finished his fight off with Nanami they went out the entrance that he came from to go and meet up with Shikamaru and the rest of team two. At the same time Sasuke was arriving at the staging point of team two and Sasuke said "right Shikamaru, what is the current situation?"

"Team 3 has left to take out the remaining members of 'root.'" Shikamaru replied. He then, seeing who was with him, asked "what is my father doing here?"

"He was at the council meeting that Danzou was trying to take power from Tsunade, so I brought him here to assist you."

"Assist, what do you mean? Do you doubt my ability?"

"No. You're currently responsible for the lives you have under your command Shikamaru, any mistake you make reflects badly, on both you and me."

"I see, so what are you doing here, shouldn't you be with Lee, Sakura and Tenten right now?"

"Lee and I got separated as we took on separate opponents, so I figured that I'd be better off if I found out the current situation."

"Well, as I said before, team 3 is taking care of the root members in this base; according to the latest reports, team 3 hasn't encountered any opponents of a level higher than low–to–mid level chuunin."

"Really, for an organization like root I find it hard to believe that they don't have any jounin class ninja with them."

"You're right, it's inconceivable for such a thing. That's why it's likely that team 3 merely hasn't encountered any jounin rank ninja or the upper echelons of their command" Shikaku said.

"I was just getting to that dad."

"It doesn't matter who got to it first, just that you both did, now Shikamaru, you and team 2 will be coming with us as we head deeper into the base."

"What... uh, I think that that's a bad idea."

"No. I agree with Sasuke. No offence to Neji's skills as a Hyuuga, but at this point it's more beneficial to have access to first hand information" said Shikaku

Shikamaru sighed and said "fine, fine, whatever you say dad."

"This is no time to be having a father and son fallout, focus on the mission, for all our sakes."

"Okay, okay. Jeez, he's getting as troublesome as Naruto."

"I'm not sure that I like being compared to him in such a way thank you very much."

"Well, never mind then."

"Okay, let's move out. First of all Neji, where are Sakura and Tenten?"

"Sakura and Tenten are... oh no!"

"What is it?" Sasuke asked urgently.

"They seem to have stumbled upon those upper echelons that we were talking about."

"Well, I'm sure that Sakura will be fine, Neji, you were on Tenten's team, how do you think she'll fare?"

"Unless she comes up against a ninjutsu type she'll be fine."

"Hmm, fine then, I'll go to her position, where is she now?"

"She's down the second corridor on the left from here, then you'll need to take the first right, then the second left and you'll be in a large cavern."

"Alright, team 2, you meet up with Lee, he'll be fine by himself, but you guys probably need him more than I will right now."

"Alright, then what?" Neji asked.

"That's up to Shikamaru." Sasuke then took off, following the directions that Neji gave him.

"Alright, pack up and move out."

"Uh, I think that that statement is unnecessary in this situation Shikamaru" Neji said.

"I'm aware, it's just that I've always wanted to say that." Team 2 then left to meet up with Lee.

Tenten's opponent, just as in her first chuunin exam, used wind natured chakra. The ninja she was fighting had his sword drawn and was holding it with both hands in front of him in a defensive position. Tenten said "it's been a while since I fought someone with wind natured chakra, of course, the last time was in my first chuunin exam. You look to be about my age, were you enrolled in the exam as well?"

"We of root are above such petty exams" her opponent said in a rough voice.

"Ah, so that's why the members that I've faced so far were all so weak that it was almost funny."

"What? Weak, I'll show you who's weak."

"Oh, I'm scared" Tenten said dismissively.

"You should be, I use the wind element and that is best for cutting things."

"Yeah, about that..." Tenten trailed off biting her thumb and smearing blood on her palm, after which she slapped her right thigh with her blood coated hand and a cloud of smoke appeared out of a seal that she had had embedded in her pants when they were being made. When the smoke cleared, the root member could see a scroll in her hand. Now Danzou, being the thorough person that he was, made available all of the records of Tsunade's ninja to the members of root. The information included data about Tentens raising twin dragons jutsu and as such he assumed that that was what the scroll she had was for and jumped away from her creating enough distance, in his mind, to dodge anything that she could throw at him. The scroll that Tenten withdrew however was not one of the scrolls that she uses for the raising twin dragons, it was in fact, merely, a storage scroll, albeit one that only her family knew how to make. When she placed some chakra into it she was no longer holding the scroll as when summoning the weapon that she did the scroll got incinerated. When the smoke surrounding the weapon in Tentens hand dispersed the root member was surprised to see, not more scrolls, but a sword. The sword that she was holding looked like a normal katana, but it had a royal blue guard and hilt and the blade was blood red. Tenten said to the opponent "meet Kurimuzon Shouten(1)."

"What is that, our records don't have anything about you using a katana."

"I'm a weapons mistress; of course I know how to use a sword."

Tentens opponent thought to himself *Well, I still have my wind element running through mine.'* He then said aloud "your sword can't cut me, or have you forgotten about my wind element?"

"Hmm, I wonder about that."

"Why youuu" her opponent said and then charged at her, full of rage; When he got near Tenten she saw that was no berserker and that his rage could only hurt him. She then let him get closer to her and he swung flat at her, trying to cleave her in two at her neck. Tenten ducked and swung her katana at his stomach. It cut through it like a hot knife through butter. Which wasn't actually a bad analogy as, as soon as Tenten had separated his torso from his chest, the root members clothes caught on fire. The root member started screaming "put it out, put it out."

As the root member was screaming, Sasuke arrived at the scene, seeing the two halves of a person burning he asked "what did you do to him, I thought that you were a weapons specialist?"

"It's simple really, my clan is one that has specialised in weapons for centuries. Prior to the one village per nation system came into place each clan had to acquire weapons and ways of defending oneself. Some clans, like yours and to a greater or lesser extent the Hyuuga, stole techniques and weapons from other clans and enemies that they had defeated..." seeing that Sasuke was about to say something Tenten said, trying to appease Sasuke, "don't get me wrong, I'm not insulting either clan, merely using them as examples." Seeing Sasuke had calmed down she continued "well, my clan were not only weapon specialists, everyone in my clan needs to, at some point, make a weapon of their own and place their chakra in it whilst still in the forging stage. This..." Tenten held her sword up "...is my Kurimuzon Shouten, a katana that only I can use and the only one that will be able to use it, other than me, is a direct descendant of mine. Even if I had a twin brother, he could not use it."

"So how'd this guy..." pointing at the burned root member "...get burned?" Sasuke asked.

"Simple, when we infuse our chakra into the weapon it gains the primary elemental chakra type of the user; even if they aren't a ninjutsu type."

"Looks like he was worried about nothing then."

"Worried... who?"

"Uh, I probably shouldn't have said that."

"Said what Sasuke-san?" Lee asked walking into view of Tenten and Sasuke.

"Nothing at all Lee. Now we better meet up with Sakura." Lee, Tenten and Sasuke then left the area to search for Sakura.

When they got to Sakura's location they saw that Sakura had finished her fight with the root member and was in the process of healing a deep cut in her forearm. Sasuke asked her "are you okay?"

"What do you think!" Sakura retorted angrily.

"Uh, sorry..." Sasuke trailed off, not having much experience apologizing.

"No matter, I'm done."

"Was he difficult?" Sasuke asked, referring to the ninja that Sakura was using as a seat.

"Not really, he was a taijutsu specialist, like Lee."

"Hmn, alright, let's go help the cleanup."

"We probably don't need to" Tenten said.

"I agree with Tenten" Lee said enthusiastically.

"While I want to have blind faith in their abilities too, I just can't help but think that they'll need help."

"Shikamaru and Neji are taking care of the remnants and assisting team three, they'll be fine."

"You say so, let's see if we can find the library in the meantime" Sasuke said.

Sakura said "I'm going to need some time to finish healing, you go ahead."

Sasuke looked at Lee and said "you stay here while she's injured then both of you come after us." Sasuke and Tenten then left Lee and Sakura to look for the records room.

Author's Notes

Crimson Death