AN: So. Um. I really should be working on Rising Sun, but here have this in the meantime I guess? *laughs sheepishly* Also, there is a tiny little crossover here, but it's minor and the character is dead, so.
Kushina is eleven when Uzushio falls, crumbling under the might of its enemies and sinking back into the waves.
She is told before the rest, the Hokage quietly taking the jinchuuriki aside and breaking the news to her. Then the word spread throughout the village - Uzushio was an ally, after all, their fall was big news - and soon she is given pitying glances, quiet apologies.
For what, she thinks, are you apologising? The words are meaningless condolences from people who can't even fully grasp the enormity of this catastrophe, who can't comprehend that her clan, a thousand-men strong, proud and strong and mighty, has been destroyed. The sealmasters, with their blackened fingers and smiles crinkled like paper; the shinobi, cold and warm and burning with the wisdom and power of maturity; the children, too young, too bright, snuffed out, laughs echoing in her ears. Her entire family, crushed underheel, their remnants called to rest by the pull of the crashing waves. She is the last of her clan in Konoha, the last one who remembers their names, the only one left who bears their work on the skin of her stomach.
The Uzumaki know how to grieve, and Kushina does just that - she calls in bereavement leave, cleans up her messy apartment, makes a little red shrine on her coffee table. The joss sticks burn in their holder, smoky incense lingering in the air as she throws herself into rituals, old routines taught years ago by old masters coming back to her as she paints and paints and paints. Intricate seals line the walls, painted onto wood and paper, in ink-black and blood-red and the blue of the ocean. Kushina buys bottled seawater from a caravan of Kiri traders and sprinkles the scent around her home, until the salty ocean smell of her childhood fills her house. She writes the names of the dead with steady hands onto scroll paper; family trees, bloodlines, grandparents and uncles and aunts and cousins and parents and siblings until her trembling fingers are stained with black and her tears are making the ink run.
Kyuubi laughs, mockingly; she ignores its chuckling. She has learned to live with the demon sealed in her belly, but that doesn't mean it'll ever stop being a jackass.
She cries for a while, then wipes her tears, unrolls a new scroll, and starts anew.
Rememberance, Grandmother told her at mother's funeral, is important. Recall the dead. Mourn their deaths, celebrate their lives. Preserve your memories of them; keep them close to your heart, write them into ink. And then, the old woman said with a wrinkled, weary smile, a comforting hand on the little girl's shoulder. Let them go.
(She would have turned a hundred and five this year, she recalls, and writes that down next to her name.)
So she secludes herself in her home, cuts off her friends and teammates and teachers, with only the voice of the nine-tailed fox for company. And mourns.
Minato finds her in there, a full week later, freshly back from a B-Rank outside of the village. It's been seven days and her teammates are all worried about her, but she's not taking visitors right now for some reason. So he takes the time-tested shinobi way. (He briefly considers that maybe she had a really good reason to isolate herself from everyone. Then he remembers that he hasn't seen his best friend in a full month and also this is Uzumaki Kushina they're talking about - being cut off from her friends is most decidedly not a good thing for her.)
As his lockpicking skills earn him an open window, the scent of incense and sea salt assault his senses. The breeze quickly blows it away, gusting into the smoky home and rustling papers and long, red hair.
Kushina glares at him blearily, green eyes taking in Namikaze Minato's stupid bright blonde hair and stupid pretty boy face. Minato, bag of food in hand, senses her disgruntlement and quickly raises his hands up in a peace motion. "I come bearing gifts of instant ramen."
A little of the anger goes out from her at that, and she relaxes. "Shut the window," she snaps, voice hoarse, not even bothering to pause in her writing. A well-worn fine-tipped brush is clutched in her hand, a half-empty inkstone beside her and a pile of rolled up scrolls tied with red ribbons lies behind her. Another name goes down on the list as Minato carefully hops onto the floor. The apartment is cleaner than he has ever seen it before, and being able to see Kushina's carpet is like being abruptly thrust into an alternate universe where the Uzumaki actually bothers to keep her place tidy. It's unsettling.
"Kushina, it's apparently been a full week since any of your teammates last saw you." Minato says quietly. "What's going on?"
The jinchuuriki blows a stray strand of red out of her face. "Haven't you heard?" she says roughly. "Uzushiogakure's fallen."
Minato exhales slowly. "Oh."
"Yeah. Oh." She snorts and dips the brush in the black ink. "So if you'd kindly show yourself out the window, I've got family to mourn."
The blond raises the bag up. "Ramen?"
"Put it on the counter, I'm not hungry." she says idly, already moving on from Uncle Iemitsu to Cousin Tsunayoshi, brush moving in slow, steady strokes. Ink lines curve together to form the characters of her favorite cousin's name - Tsu-na-yo-shi - and in her mind she can see his awkward smile, his scrawny teenage frame, the bright fire in his eyes when he fought. She'll bet her big brother took his enemies down with him.
If she looks up, she knows without a shred of doubt that she will see the blond's mouth hanging slack, eyes wide in shock. "Okay, you've really, really been in here too long."
Her brow furrows as she frowns slightly at that statement. It is pretty much true, she reminds herself, but there is obsessive behaviour and there is tradition, and right now this falls firmly on the side of the latter. (That's a lie: she knows perfectly well that this is currently performing a complicated and lively ritual dance with musical accompaniment on the fine line separating the two.) She pushes that convenient fact to the back of her mind and focuses instead on the raw wounds of memories of people, of dead names and dead faces bringing tears welling up in the corners of her eyes.
(They do not fall; she does not have that luxury. Tears will make the ink run. It's disgraceful to waste resources. Kyuubi laughs in the pit of her belly. Wouldn't your family be so proud of you, little jailer?)
A name is written, along with a birthdate, and a brief epitaph. Uzumaki Tsunayoshi. May the fire that burned in his soul ignite the wills of the next generation. It's not exactly tradition, but it's only a week after and there are a lot of people to get through. Kushina vows to herself she'll return to it next year, on this anniversary, and give the scrolls more memories to remember.
Her hands are blackened with ink and they just might be trembling; she doesn't look to find out (she can feel it well enough). She takes a wooden stamp and marks the paper by the name with it, making a little memory seal on the paper. She blows on it, letting the red solidify before summoning the smiling, awkward face of her cousin to the front of her mind, then clapping her hands together and slamming them down on the seal. A small flash of light, and Tsuna's likeness as she remembers it is drawn onto the scroll.
"I've gone through about two fifths of the clan already, and all I've been doing is writing down names and faces." She says, looking him right in the eyes. "I need to finish this, Minato. Don't try and stop me."
There's understanding in his eyes as he sighs and nods. "I'll get the ramen ready for you then," he says, already making his way towards where he knows her water boiler is. For a moment, Kushina is slightly disturbed at just how well her friend has memorised the layout and little details of her apartment; then she remembers it goes both ways.
(She wonders if he's found the book he misplaced under his couch yet. She certainly isn't telling him: that would just spoil the surprise.)
She exhales slowly, letting all of the bottled up tension dissipate outwards. Kyuubi growls, restless as ever in the pit of her stomach, but she pays it no heed. She rolls up the finished family, ties it with a little red ribbon, and places it in the pile. Then she unravels a fresh scroll, picks up her brush, dips it in black ink. Summons forth the face of great-grandaunt Umeko, wrinkled old biddy still smiling in her mind. And she writes.
AN: My love for badass lady shinobi knows no bounds. Here is my little Kushina tribute, written in a fit of insomnia and feels regarding Uzushiogakure.
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