Disclaimer: I do NOT own any of the characters written here. They are own by their respective owners. Nuff' said.

Warning: This is rated M for a reason (blood, gore, extreme violence, language, and possible adult themes/lemons, etc.) Some of the characters will be a little OC.

Now on with the chapter.

The Black Leaves

Chapter 33

"Shit!"

Venom shouted as a large horn was shoved through his shoulder alone with a massive gray mass. The Rhino smashed into Venom and continued to carry the symbiote through several buildings. Crashing through each wall with a surprising amount of ease. Each slam into a wall jolted Venom and caused him to shout out loudly in pain.

The massive man violently grabbed the black symbiote and ripped him off of the massive horn atop the man's head. Caused the already large hole in Venom's shoulder to become that much bigger. Rhino held Venom's primary arms tightly against his side and started to squeeze.

"You crush Bird-man. Rhino crush Spider!" He shouted as his muscles flexed and the pressure on Venom increased. "Rhino hates Spiders!"

Venom let out a roar of pain before bringing his secondary arms up and stabbed at the Rhino's arms. And nothing happened. Venom's massive claws failed to pierce the thick material that the horned idiot's suit was made of.

Venom tried again with more force and only succeeded in bouncing his claws off the tough hide. Rhino laughed stupidly as he continued to crush Venom's smaller body. The black symbiote produced several tentacles that wrapped around Rhino's arms and tried to pry the massive man off with little success.

Seeing as how nothing appeared to work, Venom tried one more tactic. He opened his mouth wide and let loud a loud, long, and wretched roar. Strings of saliva splattered on Rhino's face as the around their heads rippled with a combination of the ferocity of the roar and the wretched smell of Venom's breath.

Rhino's eyes widened as they began to tear up, the stench becoming too much for even his dim brain to handle. Rhino let go of Venom before rearing back and quickly bringing his hands up to his nose and groaning loudly at the awful smell that had invaded his senses.

The symbiotic lord landed on his feet before balling his hand into a fist and clocking Rhino hard against the side of his dull head. The punch did not even faze the massive man, but it did distract him from the awful stench.

Rhino gave an angry roar before attempting to flatten Venom under his massive fist. Luckily, Venom's new body was well suited for dodging the obvious attack and allowed him to land onto the wall of a building before using his momentum to launch a flying kick right for Rhino's face. The kick landed and caused the behemoth to stumble back a few steps.

Venom quickly followed the attack with a barrage of tentacles that slammed into the wall of flesh and forced Rhino to stumble back again. But this time into the wall of a close by building and falling over along with a large portion of the structure. Venom dived in and made an attempt to attack the downed man, only to have a giant gray fist collide with his side. Sending him careening through another of the building's wall and the wall of the building right next to it before crashing through a table and skidding to the wall across from the new hole his body made.

Venom took note of the family huddled in the corner of the room. The loud groaning of Rhino brought Venom's attention back to the beastly human as he crawled out of the rubble. Venom quickly got to his feet and produced several tentacles out of his back and stomach. Said tentacles stabbed into the floor of the cowering family's home and quickly hooked themselves deep into the Earth, anchoring Venom solidly to the spot.

Rhino got to his feet and say the black spider guy standing in a 'come-bring-it' posture. This man Rhino give a loud animal-like snort before lowering his head and preparing to charge.

Rhino let loose and charged straight for Venom with his head down. Venom's entire body tensed up as he saw the charging mass and prepared for the impact.

Rhino slammed into Venom full force and ripped the symbiote clean out of the floor and through several more buildings as he tried to impale the black creature on his horn. Venom had grabbed onto Rhino's shoulders and was able to keep himself away from the horn but was finding it difficult to get off of the raging beast-man while being constantly bashed through walls.

The man in gray came to a sudden stop that flung Venom off of him and onto the ground. Before he could even roll across the unforgiving Earth, Rhino slammed his fists down onto Venom's smaller body. Venom tried to grab onto Rhino's arms to stop him but failed as the man's massive fists smashed into his body, shattering bone and forcing his body to start to liquefy. Rhino's fists continued to beat down until the near liquid body of Venom was buried within a small crater.

Venom was about nothing but a black puddle when a loud whistle brought Rhino's short-span attention to the squatting form of Ambush on the roof of the building he had just ran through.

Ambush gave the giant a wink before turning around and shaking her shapely symbiotic rear at him while sticking her tongue out in an insulting manner. "Come and get us Horn-boy." She slapped her butt a few times.

It took Rhino a few seconds to understand he was just insulted. So, he growled before approaching the building Ambush was standing on and attempting to grab the female symbiote. Ambush simply leapt straight up into the air every time the idiot tried to grab her.

As she continued to jump up and down, away from Rhino's grasp, Ambush looked behind the bulky man with her scary smile plastered on her symbiotic face. Behind the impressive sized, Ambush could see the semi-liquid mass of her dear Lord Venom slowly slurp its way out of the small crater towards the growling and increasingly furious Rhino.

Ambush groaned in annoyance. This was not something she enjoyed doing, but after finding a heavily injured Payback hiding away in the rubble of a smashed structure, the two worried for Naruto's life and decided that the least injured of the two would go assist their Lord and Master.

The female symbiote continued to distract and dodge Rhino as she watched Venom's amorphous body produce several small tendrils and increase its crawling speed. It came to a stop just a few feet away from the enraged Rhino.

Seeing this, Ambush suddenly came to a stop and held her hand out in the international sign for "halt". "Wooooh there Horn-boy!" The idiotic Rhino stopped and stared at Ambush with a dull, confused expression. She then pointed a long talon at the black, rippling. "Looky looky!"

Rhino slowly turned around and looked at the mass that Ambush was pointing at and gave the most confused and mentally dull expression humanly possible before taking a step over to it.

"We wonder what it is! It looks soooo cool!"

Ambush was not even bothering to try and sound at all interested in Venom's liquid body. Rhino looked down at it for a minute before reaching down and attempting to pick it up.

"Don't to that!"

Ambush suddenly shouted just as Rhino's hand was about to touch Venom.

"Why not?!" Rhino bellowed as he turned his head to glare at the female symbiote.

"It might be bad to touch. It would be better if you got a real close look at it, just to be safe."

The dusty, rusty and broken gears inside Rhino's head clanked and grinded as his small brain found the little logic there was in Ambush's dumbed-down explanation. So, the Rhino did the only thing he could think to do. He got down n his hands and knees and got his face as close as possible to Venom's liquid form without touching it.

He stared at it for a few seconds before Venom's face suddenly popped out of the puddle and bit down in Rhino's exposed face. Rhino reared back and yelled out in a combination of pain and surprise, bringing the whole of Venom's mass with him.

The very instant he mad contact, Venom started to absorb Rhino's energy, both in an effort to kill the massive man as well as to speed up the regeneration of hi splattered body. His prey grabbed a handful of him and attempted to pull off the symbiote lord.

Rhino quickly began to swing around his other arm wildly while stumbling about and struggling to remove the external parasite. He smashed into every standing structure that was around him in his panic and only succeeded in tiring himself out that much faster.

He finally pulled the black mass off of him and tossed it aside only to receive four large cuts across his hard face, courtesy of Ambush. Rhino stood there for a moment before the pain registered and he threw his hands up to his hard face and bellowed loudly in pain.

This gave Venom enough time to quickly use up the energy he had absorbed from Rhino to quickly reform his body and then slam full force into the still bellowing monster-man. The force was enough to make Rhino fall down onto his back and open himself to a vicious beating from Venom attacking his face.

Rhino tried to grab Venom and throw him off, only to realize he could not move his arms and that both of his arms felt really, really cold. Just a few feet away stood a heavily injured Payback her arm cannon pointed right at Rhino's arms. The top of the cannon was open and extended, showing a white glowing light and cold fog leaking out.

"Now stay! You fucking piece of maggot infested shit!"

Payback screamed as she held a massive hole in her side.

The more Venom beat on Rhino, the more enraged the idiot got and everyone knows how dangerous a mad moron can be. With a mighty roar, Rhino ripped his massive arms out of the ice and smashed a fist hard enough against Venom to send the symbiote lord flying through the air.

"Rhino tired of games!" Rhino bellowed before turning his attention to the two women. "Rhino done with creepy ladies!" He lowered his head and charged at them, only for the two women to dodge the attack and for Rhino to just keep running. They prepared for another attack, only to watch Rhino continue running until he was out of the village and out of sight.

The two women looked through the line of holes the beast made, then at each other before looking over to their limping lord. When he reached the two, all three looked at each other before wordlessly walking to where the sounds of combat still echoed through the village. They slowly made their way to the three non-host humans they were involved with.

Jiraiya, Shizune and Tsunade were a little battered and bruised but being legendary ninja, a massive mob of thousands of untrained fighters was not too difficult. The three symbiotes approached the trio before they all heard a happy chirp and Baby came calmly floating down, caring the corpse of a drained Order member.

Baby hovered down to where all three had gathered and hovered there for a few moments before dropping the corpse and floating over to her papa. Everyone gave each other a short glance before they all turned towards the direction of the Hidden Leaf Village and slowly began to walk home. Not a word was spoken or a grunt was heard as they all quietly walked home.

The group had just finally made it to the woods when Baby made a soft chirp. Right after, everyone else let out a massive sigh as their collective bodies loosened and their posture slacked.

"Our body hurts all over."

Venom complained as he rubbed one of his aching shoulders. Baby cooed softly before giving her father a 'hug'. Venom rubbed her affectionately in return.

"Tell us about it."

Payback groaned as she continued to hold the now much smaller hole in her side. Her other arm was still a cannon and was currently being used to create a small ball of ice to apply to a large discolored portion of Shizune's back and shoulder. The young apprentice was reluctant to lower down a bit of her outfit, but her wrappings were enough to cover her good-sized assets.

A tired Jiraiya was leaning up against a just as worn out Tsunade. The breasty old lady was too tired to push away the old pervert and just used him for just as much support. Ambush was gently massaging her sore legs while trying to walk off the pain.

"I'm all for a break." Jiraiya spoke out. Everyone else made grunts and groans of agreement. The group walked a ways off the road and came to a very small clearing, where everyone simply slumped down to the ground.

"This was supposed to be easy!"

Payback whined loudly.

"Please don't be so loud Payback darling."

Ambush moaned as she rubbed her head.

"We've taken a few too many pipes to the head."

"How were we supposed to know that they would have some guy in a bird suit and a rhino monster?!" Jiraiya tried to shout, but hurt too much to produce anything more than a slightly excited voice.

"Did anyone check to see if that Vulture guy was dead?"

Venom asked while laying spread eagle on the ground. Hearing only grunts and groans of negative confirmation; Venom gave a loud angry groan and just went limp. He saw Baby slowly float over to her mother and cuddle up against her.

The group decided to just stay in the small clearing for the rest of the day and that night, none moving or even thinking about getting food. The next morning the group begrudgingly continued on their way back to Konohagakure.

"Looks like you coming with us without much of a fight." Samus said with a wicked smirk plastered on her face.

Tsunade shot her fellow blond an icy glare. "It's not like I have much of a choice."

"Being on the wanted list of the Order and Konoha. It isn't hard to figure out which of the two is the lesser evil."

"If you only knew." Naruto mumbled quietly.

The trip back to Konoha was as uneventful as possible, with only Samus' flirting and Ambush's attempts to pry off the blond host the only constant remainder beside the near silence of everything else. They reached the village with no problem and made their way to the Hokage's tower.

On their way, Naruto, who was lagging behind a bit, heard some strange noises coming from a nearby alley. His curiosity getting the better of him, Naruto decided to take a peek into said alley way and the result of witnessing what was inside had the young boy's jaw hanging wide open and both of is tongues hanging limply in the air.

In front of him was his old sensei and father figure, Umino Iruka, pressing the body of a tall woman with long pink hair against one of the alley's walls. The woman's arms were tightly wrapped around Iruka's neck while her legs were just as tightly wrapped around the academy instructor's waist. Her mouth was wide open in an audible moan while her eyes were clenched shut in pleasure while Iruka's mouth firmly attached itself to the woman's neck. His hands were firmly gripping onto the pink-haired lady's butt.

Naruto slowly raised his thumb up to his one large fang and firmly pressed it up against his fang hard enough to snap both him and Venom out of the shock induced daze they shared. The pain snapping the two out of their collective daze, Naruto quickly looked around to make sure nobody noticed him or the adult couple, of whom were suddenly missing an article of clothing or two, before silently slinking away.

The young blond quickly caught up with the group, minus Ambush and Payback who both had suddenly remembered they needed to be somewhere else. Shizune looked at our young hero and noticed his pale face and slightly disgusted face.

"Is something the matter Naruto-kun? You look like you have just witnessed a passing spirit." She chuckled slightly at the end. Naruto did not respond.

After they remaining individuals of the group reached the Hokage's office and both Naruto and Jiraiya gave their own respective reports; the two males left their female companions with the Hokage to discuss matters that Naruto did not really care about.

A tired Jiraiya decided to head to wherever the Hell he currently lived to catch some much needed r and r. Naruto waved him off before quickly grabbing his gut in pain as the feeling of incredible heat spiked in his gut for a split second. Just as quick as the pain had appeared, it had vanished. Naruto decided to ignore the strange pain for the moment and decided to get some much-needed rest.

Meanwhile, Venom was far from as calm as his host. Deep inside of his host's mind, Venom slowly dragged his massive form through the very tight corridors that made up Naruto's sub-consciousness. Ever so slowly, Venom dragged his bulk further and further down the respectively small corridor. The light grew dimmer and dimmer as the symbiote approached a room that he had long sense nearly forgotten.

The old massive room that had once contained the dreaded nine-tailed demon fox. The room was covered in Venom's symbiotic tentacles and, just like the rest of Naruto's mind, the water had been drained and the room looked to belong inside a European style castle's dungeon. The bars that had once held the formidable beast were now gone and only strands of symbiotic tendrils covered where the bars once stood.

The tendrils slowly parted as their master dragged his bulk through the once massive cage. Near the back of the nearly endless darkness that was the cage, stood a tiny flickering light. As Venom got closer to the light, the symbiote started to see it take the form of a small ball of fire. The symbiote stopped close to the burning orb and noticed that the small area around it was void of any symbiotic growth.

He gave a loud grunt of annoyance before commanding his tendrils to cover and consume the orb. As soon as his tendrils got close to the small flame, they were quickly burned to ash. This caused a curious look to appear on Venom's face as he slowly lowered one of his massive heads down closer to the flame for a better look.

Deep inside the little frame was the white kanji character for fox. A hair-thin length of chakra was visible coming out from his tendrils and into the flaming character. Venom gave another huff before raising himself back up. "We thought you long since dead. It matters not. You will never regain your full power."

The small flame gave a small angry burst at the comment. "You are and will never be a threat to us or anybody else, fox. Even if you do burn yourself out of here, you will be nothing more than a snack for the symbiote hive."

The small fireball let out a tiny ember of anger at the symbiote's words. "We wonder, how does it feel to be a once mighty and feared being then to suddenly become nothing more than mere morsel for a parasite?!" Venom's booming laughter echoed through out Naruto's sub-conscious landscape. You and your kind will be consumed by the Symbiote Horde!"

The resulting week was rather calm with the only real excitement being Tsunade being declared the next Hokage once the old man steps down. She was currently stationed as the hospital's top medical officer in the meantime. Not many people were against it and nobody really cared about those that complained. Shizune had been left as Tsunade's personal assistant with the Hokage telling her she will "need the help" when the time comes for her to wear the hat.

There had also been some hoopla over at the Hyuuga estate with the sudden return of Neji out of the blue! The once thought dead Hyuuga was quick to explain that Naruto had cast some sort of genjutsu over the crowd and hit Neji hard enough to put the white-eyed youth into a short coma. The hospital had been commanded to not say anything due to the potential of adding fuel to the violent debating that had been going on over the potential execution of the Uzumaki kid.

Considering how farfetched Neji's explanation was he quickly summed it up as "It was the Hokage's orders."

The other cause for the collimate over at the Hyuuga main household was the way Hinata was acting. For a while now, the girl had slowly stopped eating her meal, and whenever she would, all she would eat would be whatever meat was provided. The young Hyuuga girl had also stopped participating in the mandatory practice sessions as well as not using any Hyuuga techniques or her Byakugan during the few training sessions she did participate in.

Hinata would also tend to get rather rude whenever her bossy and admittedly asshole-ish father would command something out if his eldest daughter. She would act haughtily and more refined than a ninja of her caliber should ever allow. But her father could not be completely outraged at his daughter since he had snuck a few peeks are her training on her own, and he had to admit that while she trained in a manner he would most definitely NOT approve of, the dedication, time and energy Hinata put into is was astounding.

But the final straw was when one of the maids was cleaning Hinata's room and tripped over a loose bit of flooring right near the young girl's bed. The maid quickly reported to Hiashi what she discovered underneath the loose flooring and an instant family meeting had been called for all direct members of the Hyuuga's main family branch.

Hinata sat silently on one side of the large meeting room while her father and younger sister sat on the opposite side of the room. The heated glare, grinding jaw, and massive tick mark on Hiashi's head were the only signs of the extreme rage churning around inside him. Hinabi just sat there silently; unaware of what her older sister could have possibly done to tick off their father so badly.

They sat silently for a full five minutes before Hiashi cleared his throat loudly. "Would you like to explain yourself?!" He nearly shouted at his eldest child. Hinata looked up to her father with a genuinely confused expression.

"Explain what, father?" She said in the most polite tone humanly possible. This seemed to have been the last the head of the Hyuuga clan could take since he suddenly leapt up to his feet and threw open the door behind him.

"Explain this!" This time he did shout as a mountain of chocolate cascaded down around him. He stood there motionless as the mountain fell; Hinabi quickly covered her head with her hands to prevent any stray chocolate bars from hitting her cute lolicon head.

Hinata stared as the chocolate fell around her father and his face started turning a slight red. "Well?!"

Hinata looked at the chocolate mass before looking up at Hiashi before speaking. "We were hungry." Her response was as cool and calculated, as Hiashi's would have been. And if the Hyuuga leader was not so pissed off, he would have been a little proud at his daughter's emotional control.

"What is this 'we'?! Are you keeping a pet in your room?!" Hiashi shouted loudly in rage. Everyone in the clan knew that pets were not allowed on the clan grounds. They distracted too much from training and daily duties.

"No sir." Hinata responded calmly, though her eyes had shifted from her father's to the massive pile of chocolate behind and around the man's feet. 'Control darling.'Ambush warned Hinata in her usual tone of voice that made the young Hyuuga think that the symbiote would belong perfectly in a large butique in the middle of some small village.

"It's that Uzumaki brat isn't it?! You've been allowing him into the compound and into your room!?" Right as the words left his lips, Hiashi paused in his shouting and slowly, his face grew very, very pale. The mental image of Hinata, Naruto and a small child ran through his mind.

"Hyuuga Hinata!?" He growled through clenched teeth. He was about to explode in rage when a sudden worse feeling of dread washed over the Hyuuga leader. He could feel the whole compound tremble as the shadow of a demonic figure appeared behind the paper door directly behind his still sitting and calm oldest daughter.

The shadow grew in size as a massive wave of incredible rage washed over Hiashi and froze him on the very spot. The demonic shadow grew in size until it took up almost the entirety of the wall behind Hinata. Now Hiashi was visibly sweating.

The door behind Hinata slowly cracked open just an inch before stopping, along with Hiashi's breath. Time seemed to stand still as the door slowly opened. An eternity passed before the horrific monstrosity appeared standing behind Hyuuga Hinata in all of it's pristine beauty.

"Oh my! What could possibly be the problem, Hiashi-kun?" The matriarch and stepmother to both Hinata and Hinabi said in the most kind and sweet voice humanly imaginable.

Hiashi tried to school his facial features but failed as the visible signs of fear were still etched clearly on his well trained face. "N-nothing! I was just scolding Hinata here for keeping so many sweets in her room." His stutter was almost non-existent but was just barely heard.

The Hyuuga woman looked down at her stepdaughter, then to her husband, then to the mountain of chocolate surrounding him. A small motherly smile appeared on her soft face as she looked down at Hinata.

"Hinata-chan, why don't you and Hinabi-chan go while I have a word with Hiashi-kun?" She said sweetly.

The two girls looked at their mother for a moment before nodding their heads and quickly and quietly leaving the room. The door mysteriously slammed shut behind them right as they left with the only sound being a near silent whimper coming from Hiashi.

After that, Hinata's stepmother had come to her room that night and explained that what was going on was completely normal and that her parents would lover her no matter what. This caused Ambush to laugh inside the confused Hyuuga's head. Also, all of the chocolate that Hiashi had taken was kindly returned to Hinata and was even put back underneath her floor.

The whole endeavor was confusing for everyone but Ambush, who simply laughed at the entire situation. After the event had passed, Hiashi seemed to appear much paler than usual for the next few weeks.

Besides all that, the next week or so was rather calm and uneventful. And Naruto was about to loose his mind to the amount of boredom he was experiencing. All that he had done was go train with his team or do some simple chore-like missions.

Naruto took notice of Sasuke and how he seemed suddenly a little different then how he acted before the blond returned from the Tsunade Retrieval mission. He had become nearly silent and somber. His normally, average normal attitude was gone and an almost scowl was always seen on his face.

When asked about his sudden mood change, Sasuke would suddenly revert to normal and would admit that nothing was wrong and that he hasn't changed. And he would act like his normal self for a few hours before slowly turning back into his somber self. He would refuse to eat with the rest of the team and would almost completely ignore any form of teamwork when training or on chore-missions.

Ever since Tsunade had been announced as the successor to the current Hokage, the Uchiha populated portion of the village was in an uproar. Feeling that the Uchiha might have finally been able to get their rightful place as leaders of the hidden village, Uchiha Fugaku was at the head of the outrage and anger that the whole of the Uchiha clan felt towards the Hokage and the council. Even though, half of the council did want the Hokage's successor to be a member of the Uchiha clan.

While his youngest son was out training with that 'demon' Fugaku had called a clan meeting and was currently sitting sternly while the silent room was filled with the clan council members and tension.

"This is unbelievable." An aged council member mumbled as he held his head in his hands.

"Agreed." Another spoke up. "To think that the position of Hokage would be given to that old bag of a woman and not Lord Fugaku." She brown-nosed.

"Not only that, but that woman and old man both do not seem to have any concern about that beast that roams our village!"

"Unacceptable." Fugaku muttered under his breath, but was loud enough for all to hear. He had not planned for himself to succeed the Hokage, but for his eldest child Itachi to take the metaphorical throne. "That old fool has gone too far this time. Allowing that demon brat to run free as well as place MY son on his team! Then allowing for that man-eating demon to roam free!"

The council started to converse in agreement to their clan leader's sudden violent outburst. "I feel that it is finally time for the Uchiha to take their rightful place as the true leader of Konohagakure." Fugaku stated calmly. A cheer erupted among the council members at the announcement, but were quickly quieted down by Fugaku's hand.

"Unfortunately." He said softly. "We will first have to talk to our...benefactors, before we can proceed with any form of taking what is rightfully ours. As we are now, we would never succeed in our mission and the Uchiha clan might be completely eliminated."

Again, the overzealous clan members agreed with their leader. These cheers only helped swell up Fugaku's already massive ego and would unfortunately lead to him making several mistakes in the future that will not be stated here and now since that would spoil this entire story and nobody would even bother to read it anymore.

Fugaku's announcement was quickly spread through out the clan grounds and a great wave of eagerness and pride reiterated over said clan residential area. The very few Uchiha clan members that were opposed to the idea of a hostile take-over of their home village wisely did not voice their opinions or else risk the wrath of the Uchiha leader and being executed.

Unfortunately for Fugaku, his immediate family were on the later side of the situation. The only person brave enough to mention to the Uchiha leader that his plan might not be the best idea, was his wife. Ever since his announcement, Uchiha Mikoto had tried a combination of hidding hinting at his plan being a bad idea to almost screaming at him to cool his head and poke a hole into his inflated head. None of her attempts were successful and were only met with being ignored or yelled at.

This near constant fighting was tearing poor Sasuke apart. On one side, he wanted to agree with his father and make the clan leader proud; but on the other hand, he knew that what was planned was very wrong and wanted to side with his morally correct mother. So, the reason for his currently somber mood was the conflicted emotions tumbling about inside his mind and heart.

If only Sasuke knew the horror he would experience within the next few days as he heard his parents arguing again. He looked at his father with a combination of fear and adoration, completely unaware that said man would breath his last relatively soon. Since even the Uchiha leader failed to notice the set of ears that had over-heard the betrayal that was planned.

The individual that had listened in on the many conversations was quick in heading over to his leader, the powerful leader of the Symbiote Horde, Lady Empress. Finding this little bit of information interesting, Empress decided to address the situation to her colleague, Hiruzen Sarutobi.

"This, is very unfortunate news." The Hokage lamented. "The people and a large portion of the council will be upset and will want the extermination of the Uchiha." He muttered to Empress before sighing heavily. "I can guarantee that just as many members are for this whole mess?"

Empress sat across from the old man and decided to remain quiet while the Hokage mulled about what he was going to do. The symbiote leader had already thought up a plan, but chose to wait for either Sarutobi to make one up himself or ask for her help.

After a full hour of thinking, Sarutobi finally came up with a plan of his own. Unfortunately, it would result in all but one of the Uchiha being terminated which would end up causing said last Uchiha to be exiled and thus end up being a danger to the village if he/she were to be accepted by an enemy faction.

Sarutobi explained his plan to Empress and was given a dejected look from the female leader. "Come now Hokage-sama. Surely you can come up with a much better plan?"

Hiruzen leaned back in his large chair and crossed his arms as he sent a half-hearted glare at the symbiote. "And what do you propose I do?"

Empress' already impressive mouth grew into an even larger, toothy smile. "Use Venom." She stated as if it was the most obvious idea ever.

"Explain." The Hokage said kindly.

Empress' smile grew even larger. "As far as your village knows, Lord Venom is nothing more than some random monster that had happened across the village and decided to make Konoha his feeding grounds. The last thing your villagers would expect would be a planned and calculated murder spree of an entire clan of very powerful ninja. Any ninja would be both confused at the sudden change of intelligence as well as be too terrified when the see all of the strong Uchiha slaughtered so easily."

Sarutobi gave Empress a skeptical look. "Sounds like you've had this planned out for quiet a while." He accused.

Empress only continued to smile. "One must always have a plan within a plan within a plan, Hiruzen-kun. To be truthful, this plan was created just in case your village decided to try and attack our own, knowing that the Uchiha are perfect users of any and every fire technique. This way, you can get rid of a usurper and we can get rid of an annoyingly deadly pest."

The Hokage continued to sit quietly in his chair, deep in thought. He silently weighted his options on what currently was and what might eventually be the biggest threat to the safety of Konohagakure. His eyes slowly moved over to the still smiling Empress and slowly hardened into a glare.

"Fine. Do what you must to protect the village." He said. "BUT! You will only have those in direct responsibility removed. Understood?!" He announced harshly with a deadly glare.

Empress simply continued to smile before standing up and walking to the door. "Have no worries Hokage-kun. Lord Venom may be a brutish beast, but he knows when to follow orders. Most of the time." She laughed loudly before leaving.

Hiruzen suddenly had a very terrible sinking feeling fill up inside his chest.