Chapter 8: Plan to Kill?

In the Hokage's Office

James POV

"You're early, James." I hear the Hokage say this as I walk into his office.

The meeting was supposed to start in half an hour, but I needed to talk to the Hokage before the meeting started.

"I know Lord Hokage, but I need to talk to you about something important," I say as I place my bookbag down.

The older gentleman looked at me as he grabbed his pipe and stuffed it with tobacco.

"James, what's on your mind?" The Third Hokage said while lighting his pipe with a fire jutsu.

"One, has Jiraiya arrived? I have a folder of information at home waiting for him." I say as I sit in the chair in front of the Hokage.

It's a typical office chair to the right of the desk. One would be able to see the village and the Hokage at the same time, an excellent spot for painting. I need to paint here at some point.

"No, he has received the summons to return, but he was in tea country then, so it'll be a little over a week before he makes it to the village," Hiruzen responds after taking another puff of his pipe.

He blows out the smoke towards me, but the smoke never reaches me. I assume that the smoke is pulled away by a wind jutsu. Does this man use jutsu for everything?

"Welp, I'll wait a little longer. My second question was about Danzo. What do you plan on doing?"

Hiruzen's face tightens as he takes a tired breath.

I continue my train of thought.

"Because if Danzo learns of my knowledge, then every plan I have will fall. I know Danzo is your friend, but you might need to-"

"I need to what?" Hiruzen glares at me with a tired and frustrated look as he cuts me off.

Sometimes, I forget that I'm not talking to a regular person. I might be able to use chakra, but I'm not even close to Naruto. I'm not strong compared to anyone to be talking about killing anyone.

"Please, James, don't take my anger or tone as being directed towards you, but you aren't a ninja. You haven't taken a life. You aren't me. I am not you. You understand that, so please understand that I know what must be done to ensure Danzo is handled. This information must never get leaked, and I've personally seen to make sure no Root shinobi follows you."

The aged Hokage takes a deep inhale of his pipe. I can see his shoulders release tension.

"Danzo knows of you, but your hobbies have no importance. That's why you lived so long. No doubt that Danzo had people look into you during the first four years of your being here. You were not interesting enough. Engineers aren't rare. They are just dead."

"Wait, what?" I say it without trying to say it, but Hiruzen heard me anyway.

All these failed technologies and incomplete devices were made by murdered inventors. I haven't created anything too crazy or tried selling anything yet. If I sold anything, I might have been placed on a watch list and been taken out. Shit.

"Your mind is great, but your chaotic nature in creative avenues makes you seem unorganized. That saved you. That and Yugao living there. You were seen as no more than a carpenter with no chakra." The Third Hokage finishes as he takes another hit from his pipe.

"You know, I learned a lot more than I think I wanted to, but regardless, I think I got the answers I wanted." I say, ending the entire conversation.

I hadn't realized that my heart had been racing since I learned about Danzo. I was fortunate that I had not been deemed interesting enough to be captured or killed. I began reviewing my papers and information for the meeting but I was merely wasting time. The fear in my soul was strong, but my determination to fight for Konoha remained. I knew that I had to be strong.

I would fight to the death, if necessary, to protect what was important to me. However, I had no real choice in the matter. My mere existence is screwing with fate, which could change everything.

I took a deep breath as I sat down near a desk where my papers were ready to be handed out. I took a nap.

I felt myself wake up from the softest of pushes. I opened my eyes to see Yugao staring at me.

"People will be here in about two minutes. Wake up." She said.

"Ok, mom." I say as she hits me on the head.

"What the hell?" I say, rubbing my head.

"You wasn't up." Yugao said while walking to a chair in front of James.

I stand up and get myself ready for this meeting.

"This will be another long meeting, won't it?" I realize as I sigh, but it's too late to complain.

The clan heads open the door and take their seats as all the Jonin Sensei stand in the back of the room.

"I don't wanna." I hear someone say before the door opens with Anko and Kakashi pushed in by Gai and Kurenai.

"Mah, I wasn't planning on being that late honest." Kakashi said as he took refuge in the back corner of the room. The best spot to see everything in the room.

Anko sat on the chair closest to me and started slumping into the chair.

"Let's start. Might as well talk about the most important items first. Two days ago, I showed my plan for Konoha. I open the floor to discuss each item I listed on the document." I finished as I pulled out a notepad and a pen. I continue to talk.

"My first point was Konoha's genin teams. The main issue that I noticed with the future is that many of the people fighting the battles are the same people. The Konoha 12 basically became Konoha's main fighting force. This would be great if they were all high-level Jonin, but at most, three become high-level Jonin, and one dies. Increasing the number of teams that become stronger and the strength of many of the Konoha 12 is the best way to solve this issue. Thoughts?"

I see Shikaku glare at me as he starts to speak.

"For the upcoming 3-year quiet period, yeah, that would be best. However, we are going against time. Most of the shinobi would not be able to grow much within 3 to 6 months. Only this 'Miracle Generation' could hope to grow fast enough, but that's hoping something forces them to want to change."

"This is true. Right now, my team and Kakashi's would even be able to grow that fast just out the gate." Gai said, backing up Shikaku.

I look around the room, and I can see most people agreeing with Shikaku. I smirk.

"However, you knew that it was a long shot. You just wanted me to get frustrated by your basic and lackluster solutions." Shikaku glares at me while I see Anko and Yugao laugh softly. Asuma smirks as he just thought of a way to piss off his Nara, I assume.

"So we will focus on restructuring the 12 Konoha shinobi, while I and others will create a streamlined version to apply to the other shinobi teams and Genin teams. This effort will be a 3 part plan. One, focus on the training of the 12. Two, create a 'boot camp regiment' to improve teams. Three, update the academy with a 5-year structure to better prepare future ninjas."

I clap my hands together.

"Don't piss me off." Shikaku mutters.

"That should work, but I offer that the Jonin Sensei spearhead this movement since these are your students." Hiruzen says, taking another puff of his pipe.

I write down the new plan for the first item and move to the second item.

"Ok, next on the list is the Chunin Exams. We have three parties to worry about. Orochimaru, the Sand village, and Danzo. Danzo allowed Orochimaru and the Sand village the ability and opportunity to attack Konoha. We are months away from the attack, and we are on the clock. So I proposed a solution. Allow the attack, but kill Danzo and Orochimaru. In order to make sure no variables change, we need to allow certain events to happen to make sure we can take out the variables that cause many other events to transpire."

I could feel Hiruzen's stare directed toward my head. I knew he wouldn't like my solution based on the "talk" we had before the meeting.

"James, I think you are right to be worried about Danzo and Orochimaru. However, these are extremely dangerous grounds we are stepping onto." Kakashi said, with Guy nodding his head in agreement.

"Kakashi. What would you suggest?" I say as I prepare to start writing.

"I'm not suggesting anything. You ask for us to kill two shinobi that we know should be kage-level. However, I will state something I'm not sure you noticed. We won't be fighting Sand and Sound. We will be fighting Root as well."

"I know." I replied, prepared to explain before Kakashi started again.

"No, you don't. Root is merged with all shinobi ranks. Anbu too. If we fight Sand and Sound, we will take losses. If we fight Root too, we are planning to fight a battle with all sides closed in. A fight we won't win unless a miracle happens.."

"As much as it pains me, Kakashi is right." Tsume Inuzuka said.

"We will be up against the wall and the wall might be an enemy. Danzo has placed himself in a great position. It's better to fight just Sound and Sand and kill Orochimaru since we don't really have to round up any hounds for either scrap." The head of the Inuzuka finished.

All eyes turned to me, waiting to hear my rebuttal. However, I had none. Kakashi was a bit crass about it, but he was right. I didn't think about root killing Konoha shinobi while we fought on three fronts. However, that's the reason for this meeting, I would have failed if I didn't ask for help.

If I was reborn into the world of Naruto, I could create a better plan with me being much stronger to play a better role. However, I waited for four years to bring this to Hokage. I wanted to be as prepared as possible and make everything I needed in order to live here, but I wasted time. I should have devised this plan 4 years ago, but why didn't I.

Something's wrong. All these plans were good enough a year ago, but what happened?

"We are walking into a trap regardless. We have the knowledge of the trap and the pieces that will be used. Orochimaru would be easy to put down, but Danzo won't be. I don't know what we can do, but I think Guy and Kakashi with Kurenai would be a great combination. With the Inuzuka and Hyugu heads as they fall back."

"I think so too, James. But, my youthful students and the other Konoha 12 need to be led. The amount of enemy shinobi that I took out, according to the "anime," easily numbered near 400, if not 600. That would leave at least 400 shinobi alive, with Root killing shinobi killing Konoha shinobi without us knowing who they are." Guy said.

"That's why we are here. To find a solution. So we will be here for a while."

I hear Shikaku sigh. I guess he figured out something, but it'll probably be a lot.

"We are looking at this wrong. We don't need to kill Danzo and Orochimaru at the same time. We just need to kill them. We can easily ensure Danzo dies. He must become Hokage."

And there is the Nara's suggestion.

"A time crunch." I said, noticing Hiruzen coming to the same conclusion.

"You want to kill him while he gives his speech. This is super risky." Inoichi noticed.

"Yeah, but a certain missing-nin arrives in Konoha to report to Danzo to warn him. A genjutsu with his eyes will get a message across. Danzo betrayed Konoha." Shikaku says.

"Use Itachi to bring down Danzo." I whisper softly to myself while in thought.

This could work, but the issue is who is Itachi in this universe. Itachi could easily be his canon self, which means the plan would work as intended for a bit. I don't know what bothers me more; knowing that Itachi might be just like canon or that he might not be like canon. I don't know.

"We are going to be here all day, aren't we?" Kakashi says as he looks towards the window.

"I'm going to regret this tomorrow." I hear the masked shinobi mutter as we bounce ideas back and forth.

A/N:

Three things.

One, sorry for the long wait. My job randomly got hectic and I got hella busy and I became very tired every day. But by the end of this month, I'll be done and back in the groove.

Two, this chapter is my least favorite and has the most plot in it so far. I am finding it difficult to write some scenes with James and its always the meeting scenes. They are very difficult for me to write, but I have to make sure each character has their own voice. I probably will cut back on the amount of planning that happens on the page. I don't know yet.

Three, this chapter brings us to the end of the first arc of the story. This arc is just called the Introduction Arc. The next arc will start with the next chapter.

I hope everyone is enjoying my story, and please don't hesitate to give me any feedback or any pointers.

Please leave a review of what yall think.

Peace, Love, and Hairgrease.