Interlude 1: Hiruzen Sarutobi

Danzo, he decided, had had his finger in far too many pies.

The records that had been kept in Danzo's little hideout was damning.

Assassination, antagonizing of foreign elements, kidnapping, experimentation.

The list went on and on.

Worse still was the fact that he knew it wasn't everything, only the things that Danzo had decided weren't too sensitive to destroy.

He'd always had an idea of what Danzo was doing, but never had he expected this.

How many lives have been ruined because of my inaction?

It was a question he had asked himself far too often. And not just for Danzo.

Orochimaru.

He should have killed them, all those years ago. Danzo when Kakashi had informed him of the attempt on his life, Orochimaru when he'd abandoned the village. So much suffering could have been prevented.

The only silver lining for this was the Uchiha clan.

Despite Danzo's best efforts to get Itachi to kill them, 21 Uchiha remained.

21 Uchiha, all that remained of the entire Clan.

If Danzo hadn't convinced Itachi to kill them, how many more would still be alive?

That's enough. There's no use dwelling on 'what if's'.

All 21, in hospital under ANBU guard. 16 were recovering from whatever sedative Danzo had used on them, 4 were recovering from the trauma of the massacre, and Sasuke...

Well, the Medic-nins thought it was a mere genjutsu.

Hiruzen knew better. He was quite aware of Mangekyo Sharingan, and the Tsukuyomi it granted.

An incredibly powerful and dangerous Genjutsu. That Itachi had been willing to use it on his brother showed just how far he was prepared to go to ensure Sasuke's safety.

He'd recover, eventually. Itachi wouldn't use it to its full effect on his brother.

For Itachi's sacrifice, he'd do his best to keep the child safe. For as long as was possible in a world like this.

The survival of the Uchiha clan also had problems of its own, however. The planned coup, though utterly destroyed thanks to Itachi, meant that he'd have to discretely screen the survivors for supporters of the coup. He could pass that off as counselling for most of the younger Uchiha, but he'd have to be a bit more discrete for the elder.

There was also matters such as leadership, ownership, living arrangements and organisation. Young Sasuke was now the clan heir, but he was both too young and had not been trained for the part.

It had been expected that Itachi would inherit the title, after all.

In the meantime, some of the older village laws would temporarily place the oldest member of the clan as the head- 37 year old Kuruko Uchiha, mother of two young sisters.

Sasuke, at least, would have a family to help him.

And, to think it was all because of the little black creature that had popped up in the village a few years ago. It was almost funny, how things turned out.

Even a few minutes later, and the ANBU Shikaku had summoned wouldn't have managed to pick up the trail that Danzo's ROOT had left on the night.

"What a mess." Shikaku sighed, dumping another stack of paperwork on his desk. "Thankfully, this is the last of the written records from down there."

Hiruzen picked several sheets off of the top of the pile.

Plans, records, detailed maps, reports and codes.

Years upon years of information already sat at this desk, being relegated to the ANBU to sort through, but it would take several weeks to sort everything out.

"And what of everything else?" He asked.

"Well, the ANBU are still removing the equipment Danzo was keeping down there. They tell me they should be finished in about 36 hours. There's a hell of a lot of it down there." Shikaku sighed. "And, as you requested, they're guarding the room where Danzo died. I got word a while ago that Jiraiya-sama is on his way here with all haste."

"Good. And the result of Danzo's sealing technique?"

"Frankly, we have no idea what it is. Jiraiya-sama's message stated that he thought it was a breach in Time-Space, but beyond that, we don't know anything." Shikaku stated, pulling a letter out of his flak jacket and handing it to the Hokage. "Jiraiya-sama speculated, but Space-Time was Minato-sama's specialty, not his. In the meantime, he advised us to not touch it. For now, everything that got caught in its radius is missing. Including the little one."

Hiruzen nodded, accepting the letter.

"That'll be all, Shikaku."

Shikaku snapped off a salute. "Hokage-sama."