Building the Yellow Brick Road by LittleOne94

Chapter 17 : ROOT

"How did it go?" inquired Tsunade, doing her best to temporarily forget the man before her was likely a traitor. Until she had more evidence then speculation she wouldn't move.

"That brat Ryuu went toe-to-toe with me to the point I was kicked off the mountain!" Grumbled Jiraiya, still annoyed at the fact the toads had chosen the brat over him. That boy had a silver tongue that was razer sharp; Not at all like the happy idiot he'd met four years ago.

"What did he tell you? Anything about ROOT?"

Jiraiya adopted a sheepish expression, he'd been so preoccupied trying to get to the Uchiha he'd forgotten why Tsunade had sent him.

"My bad~"

Tsunade took a calming breath, trying to keep her disappointment at bay; this was just one more tally to add against Jiraiya's innocence. She needed to get him out of the village before he realized they were cleaning the lower ranks and shinobi related establishments without him.

"I need you to go out and gather what you can about what the other hidden villages think and are planning regarding Konoha since this ROOT business started." Demanded Tsunade pompously, trying to ack the way she normally would when dealing with Jiraiya.

"Do you know where the brat sent the letters?"

"No." it was a lie; he'd sent her a list with her letter with who he'd sent them too. "Even if we did the news could have spread to Konoha's enemies by now." It was true, and if they had any oddly credulous dealings with Konoha it could turn Konoha's allies into enemies without her knowing.

"Sigh~ I'm off then, got a lot of ground to cover." complained Jiraiya, while he was already thinking on who he should contact. He knew Iwa and Kiri would be the ones giving him the most trouble, not to mention Orochimaru's lot!

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It was time, Harry decided. He could tell Itachi was getting antsy after all these months, and Sasuke would go mad if he was kept under watch for much longer. He was surprised Itachi didn't give himself whiplash with the way he went from drill Sargent to mother hen on them all the time. Leaving Sasuke and Itachi a note for them to find in the morning, Harry told Ma and Pa he was going on a mission to Konoha and to make sure neither of the Uchiha boys tried to follow him, before he was off. Crossing the sea to the mainland.

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"You know where ROOT's base is located!" screamed Tsunade, Inoichi and Shikaku were never gladder for the silencing seals plastered all over the office; otherwise all of Fire Country would have heard their Hokage's scream. As it were, they were wondering if they were now deaf themselves and made note to check in with the healers sometime soon.

"Yea. It's pretty dam hard to miss actually. Under the emergency tunnels and the sewer system ROOTs got a pretty big compound hidden. It has tunnels that run all the way to the other side of the mountains and into a number of Konoha's forests and training grounds too." Commented Harry offhandedly. Keeping an eye on the old women before him, Harry was prepared to move if she made any threatening moves towards him.

His paranoia would prove to be for naught, as the three Konoha shinobi simply went from shock straight to planning their attack.

The loyal ANBU raided ROOT that night, using the information Ryuu had given them and thanks to what they'd learned from those ROOT members who had already had their seals removed; they were well prepared for who –if not what- they were going to face.

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"Orochimaru's experiments he was chased from the village for were ordered by the Hokage and Danzo. When Minato was closing in on ROOT they leaked information about Orochimaru's experiments in order to lead him down the wrong road and steer him clear of them and their more important goals. Bitter over the betrayal, Orochimaru most likely swore revenge. He probably knew he wasn't meant to have survived his escape as he knew the pair thought him too dangerous to be allowed to live." Intoned Inoichi, they had just spent the last week going through ROOT documents after having removed the seals. What they'd found had disgusted them, but knew what they were encountering was a product of previous generations.