Shisui was not the only one to have opinions about their impending defection.

The mysterious jerk who kept setting off the village’s barrier system and casting doubt upon the Uchiha appeared once again within the clan’s compound. Only this time, Zuko was the one closest to intercept the man rather than any others who had reportedly run into him before.

When he first set eyes upon him, his blood chilled.

Because this was the same man who had appeared on his first C-rank mission, the one who had killed Tenma. Why had he interfered that day? How long had he had his eye on the Uchiha heir, and for what purpose?

Zuko had seen his sharingan change shape as he phased out of existence. Whatever technique he'd used to allow Zuko’s fire to pass through him relied on the higher form of the sharingan; its shape was one of the first things his own eyes had etched into his mind.

There was only one person who had ever defected Konoha with the mangekyo sharingan.

“Uchiha Madara,” Zuko named him, fury beginning to simmer in his veins. “You think I don’t know what you’ve done? Unleashing the demon upon Konoha?”

This was the man responsible for the suffering of generations of shinobi, for the grief and misery the youths of Konoha had to endure, the horrors the demon had inflicted upon them.

“So you know,” Madara said, sounding pleased. “Yes, I was the one who released the kyuubi eight years ago.”

That’s right, he –

Wait, what?

The kyuubi? Zuko had been talking about Tora!

Agni’s guiding light, Konoha’s higher-ups had been right all along; the Uchiha really had summoned the ninetails into the village!

The younger ninja's face remained stony even as he began panicking internally.

“Why do you keep returning here?” he asked tonelessly, voice revealing none of his inner turmoil.

“Why not?” Madara replied ambiguously. “Is this not my clan?”

Zuko refrained from frowning. “You keep slipping through the barrier to the compound on purpose.” He must know that appearing within their self-governed grounds – where the higher-ups cannot enter – only inflamed their suspicions.

Did Madara desire conflict between the clan and the village? How long had he been planning this, or was he simply taking advantage of the turn of events?

Zuko didn’t know. He didn’t know what this man wanted or what he stood for, and his ignorance gnawed away at him.

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Madara was not the only old man keeping a close watch. Like an experienced sailor before a storm, those in the know could sense something was brewing.

The Hokage and his councillors hadn’t missed the clan’s movements; stockpiling weapons, rations, resources… their preparations and dissatisfaction hadn’t gone unnoticed.

As the only Uchiha within ANBU – Shisui had turned down councilman Danzo’s offer last week, seeing no point in joining when they were planning to leave – Zuko was their only eyes within the clan and was expected to be loyal to the Hokage above all else.

So when suddenly confronted about their suspicious behaviour, Zuko had panicked:

“The Uchiha Clan intends to revolt against the Hidden Leaf.”

“What!?”

Admittedly, not Zuko’s brightest moment, confessing to planning treason before his military leader. But what else could he say!?

Oh, we’re just planning a mass-defection that will embarrass Konoha on an international level and reveal that the village is weaker and more divided than people think. But there’s no need to worry, honest!

He couldn’t tell them the truth, but the Uchiha were also clearly Plotting, so he had to give them something. Plus, the clan had been considering it beforehand, so the idea was already floating around in his mind.

But it was actually a very good lie to tell.

It was believable, and the Hokage would now be expecting them to be infiltrating the village and planning for a takeover, when in fact they were doing the exact opposite. Eyes would be watching inner village moves closely, while the clan’s out-of-village operations would face far less scrutiny.

However, this meant that Zuko had to keep reporting the ‘progress’ the clan was making towards a coup d’état, and each week he made up new lies about the arguments amongst the Uchiha, hoping that a supposed division within them would prevent the Hokage from taking any hasty action.

While the elders wanted to know everything, Zuko just wanted to know why on earth they all automatically assumed he would side with Konoha against his own clan.

Did he possess this inherent traitorous characteristic that somehow shone through? Perhaps going against his relatives in his past life to save the Fire Nation from his father and sister had carried over, and Zuko now automatically came across as this hardcore, family-betraying patriot?

Surely he hadn't been that bad.

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Yes, there had been the time in an abandoned town in the Earth Kingdom where Zuko ganged up with the Avatar, (Undesirable Number One), and his friends, (Undesirable Numbers Two through Five), to fight Azula. Then when he betrayed his uncle in the catacombs below Ba Sing Se. And the time he dumped his girlfriend via letter, shot lightning at his father, and joined his family’s greatest enemy; all to dethrone them and save the Fire Nation.

Oh my god, he really was a hardcore, family-betraying patriot!

Zuko despaired internally and feared he must have come across as rather emotionless as he monotonously reported to the Hokage.

Whatever it was, the Uchiha heir had notably never been asked for his opinion to spy on the other party – by either his father or the Hokage – and felt very much like he was caught in the middle of a game of Chinese Whispers, where the stakes were unimaginably high.

If Zuko hid something the Hokage already knew about, they would doubt his loyalty and his insight into their thoughts and actions would vanish.

But if he revealed too much, he’d give the game away entirely, and that would be disastrous.

“Itachi.”

The Sandaime’s voice broke through his spiralling thoughts.

“Buy me some time, however little it may be.”

Zuko, kneeling before the Hokage and his advisors in the standard ANBU salute, could only agree.

“Hai, Hokage-sama.”

For someone who was a terrible liar, Zuko found himself lying all the time. He lied to the Hokage, lied to his colleagues, to Sasuke who was too young to be trusted, and to his new team.

Somehow, as if the Hokage didn’t realise spying and treachery was a full-time occupation, Zuko had also been promoted to ANBU captain and placed in charge of a team full of shinobi who were clearly under orders to monitor him. Not only was it more stress he didn’t need, but it was also insulting that they thought it would work.

Zuko was balancing at the edge of an abyss, and one day he was going to slip and fall if things continued as they were.

Thankfully for his sanity – already imperilled before all this nonsense – Zuko knew there was light at the end of the tunnel, and the clan’s preparations were proceeding well. Already, Uchiha Kana had faked her death on a mission and had sent word back through the Cats that she’d reached Uzushio.

So went his days: Zuko reported to his parents, schemed with the Committee, plotted with Shisui, concocted lies for the Hokage, and dodged the ever-ambiguous Madara.

And yet, as if the universe had judged this ridiculous series of events insufficient, there was one more person who wished to add to the on-going disaster that was Zuko’s life.

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Councilman Shimura Danzo had yet another unwanted, unsolicited opinion that he deigned to share with the hapless Uchiha heir.

Zuko was seriously getting tired of hearing the opinions of old people who all thought they knew better than him. It’s true, Uncle did know better, but comparing these new elders to Uncle was an insult to his memory.

Even at Iroh’s worst - changing their course for a pai sho tile he’d had in his sleeve the whole time; firebending his tea in the middle of the Earth Nation’s capital; getting caught with his pants down (literally!) by earthbenders - he had never been this tedious.

Hisana nagged his ear off about needing contingency plans, Sarutobi went on and on about stalling and diplomacy – though he never offered anything substantial, which made Zuko question if he was truly trying to deescalate the situation - and the oldest and most suspicious of them all, Madara the Masked, had started popping in with more frequency.

But somehow, Shimura Danzo managed to outdo them all – a real accomplishment given everything he’s had to listen to these past months.

“I want you to make a choice: either align with the Uchiha, launch the coup d’état and die along with your clan…” Danzo turned to him, one dark eye glinting.

“Or side with the Leaf and save your little brother, and help us eliminate all other Uchiha.”

It took a long moment for him to simply process the councilman’s ridiculous words, so unbelievable they were.

“You want me,” Zuko repeated slowly, “to kill my entire clan.”

Seriously – what, exactly, did these people think of him? And why did Danzo keep bringing up Sasuke?

It was such barefaced, shameless manipulation: save your innocent little brother, your little brother will be spared, blah blah blah.

Zuko was incensed; who did Danzo think he was, presuming he would fall for something so obvious?

The name Uchiha Itachi was synonymous with peerless genius.

Silent as a shadow, a master of illusions, and the greatest wielder of fire in the entire history of the Elemental Nations.

If they thought he would stand for this, they all had another thing coming.

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Zuko brought up Danzo’s orders for the clan at their next meeting, causing everyone to dissolve into a predictable frenzy.

“When did this happen?” Fugaku’s grim words cut through the uproar.

“Danzo confronted me three days ago, directly after my latest meeting with the Hokage.”

“Why did you wait so long to report this?” Inabi - a perpetually angry officer - demanded.

Zuko shot him a derisive look. “What do you think Danzo would have done if I had immediately convened a meeting the day he passed on those orders?” he snapped, you moron going unsaid but clearly heard. “We all know the compound is being watched.”

“You’ve done well, Itachi,” Tetsuya’s placating voice sounded. “It was the right decision.”

“We must set our plans in motion then,” Mikoto spoke decisively, moving them along. “Although we could benefit from more time to prepare, we must make do with what we have already completed.”

The meeting was filled with raucous debate, going over resource reports, and discussing contingency upon contingency until even Hisana was satisfied.

After all the final details had been decided and people assigned their roles, Zuko voiced the thought that had been weighing on his mind this entire time, even beyond the spectre of potential genocide.

“Speaking of final preparations,” he paused then continued with all the sensitivity and tact he possessed: “What’re we going to do about that asshole calling himself Madara?”

His mother raised a dainty hand to cover her smile, while Shisui snorted and Fugaku regarded him in defeat. His father had finally resigned himself to the fact his son possessed no social grace whatsoever, and would likely never gain any. (Zuko was, technically, over a hundred years old. If he hasn't learned tact after an entire century, he's pretty sure it's never going to happen). But it was a necessary topic to discuss, and one with no obvious solution.

If he really was Madara, then everyone in the clan was screwed if it came to a fight. If he wasn’t but still had the power to summon the kyuubi, then they were probably still screwed because the man clearly had ties to the old Uchiha founder.

Madara was the only person able to summon the demon, and he had never shared that secret with the rest of the clan. Obviously Konoha thought otherwise, and that’s what got them into this whole mess in the first place.

It was truly ironic; they were the greatest technique thieves in the world - you’d think it would be a stolen jutsu that would cause the most controversy. Yet the one technique that got them into so much trouble had been created by one of their own. It was made even worse by the fact the Uchiha didn’t even know the technique they were accused of preforming!

The clan had stewed over this indignation for years, and the fact that it actually was an Uchiha – though a rouge one – who was the cause of all of their misfortune had not made anything better.

Zuko’s terrible karma had clearly rubbed off on the rest of his family.

With fighting out, negotiation off the table, and assassination a truly risky possibility, what was left?

“Isn’t it obvious?”

Everyone turned to look at Shisui, who was baring his teeth viciously; he hated the masked man with the same intensity Zuko did after hearing he’d been responsible for releasing the kyuubi.

“We should do to him what we do to all traitors.”

Shisui grin was downright wicked.