Itachi I: When the Crickets Cry
Itachi was used to solitude, but the Nine Tails attack had isolated him further. Before, he could at least eat lunch with his clan-mates. Most of them hadn't liked him, and the rest were struck by awe, but at least he could have pretended otherwise.
Now, the cousins in his grade were dead, as were most of the younger ones. The Uchiha youth had been hit hardest by the attack, and their adults had suffered the most casualties. Most of the children had succumbed to the chakra of the Nine Tails. Many were driven mad by the premature activation of their Sharingan. Izumi had been one of the lucky older children who'd been able to withstand the pressure.
As he ate alone, Itachi mused on the irony. The clan that suffered the most from the Nine-Tail's attack was also being blamed for it. Neither the Uchiha nor the Village had taken the devastation well. In a time where everyone should be coming together, Konoha was splitting into two.
His lips twitched as he recalled the ending lines of a rather depressing poem:
spreading out my robe just for one,
must I sleep all alone?
Well, the situation wasn't yet that dire, but it certainly felt close.
The bell rang, signalling the end of lunch. Efficiently, he cleaned up after himself and went inside. The results for the last exam had been posted. Itachi scanned the list. As expected, he'd gotten first in everything—
Almost everything. Mita Kimiko had placed first each of the written portions.
She hadn't been in his class before the attack, and she wasn't from a clan or a prominent ninja family. Civilian born, then? He glanced back to the results of the physical test. Mita Kimiko placed in the middle of the class for those, keeping her overall ranking at ten. Itachi was tempted to dismiss her as a book-smart civilian who compensated for her lack of physical ability with written exams. He'd met her kind before.
Itachi turned his gaze and locked eyes with a mousy, brown-eyed girl. She looked at him calmly before turning away, but the set of her jaw suggested… apprehension? He glanced at the paper in front of her; the name scrawled at the top confirmed that she was indeed Mita Kimiko. It seemed that she was far from happy at her accomplishment. Various reasons for her behavior flickered through his mind, and he methodically eliminated the improbable ones.
He didn't have enough information to come to a definite conclusion, but the most likely reason was fear of the Uchiha. Civilians tended to either fawn after the major clans or live in fear of them. Perhaps she had bought into the rumors surrounding the Uchiha after the Nine Tail's Attack—though their status as the military police and a Noble Clan was enough to cause fear. Itachi resolved to determine the truth. As of now, Mita Kimiko was an unknown, and nothing was more dangerous.
Between spending time with Sasuke, studying for the Academy, training with Shisui, and negotiating the pitfalls of intrigue that surrounded his family, Itachi didn't have much time to look into the odd civilian student. It was rather low in his list of priorities; she wasn't unique with her fear the Uchiha, even if she was capable of scoring higher than him. Mita Kimiko hadn't scored higher than him since then, however, which gave the appearance of it being a fluke. Then again, underestimating others was a rather easy way to die.
Two weeks after her first-place score, Itachi procured Kimiko's Academy file. He skimmed through her test scores, eyebrows rising as he noted her streak of firsts in the written exams. She hadn't missed a single question during her entire time in the Academy—until he'd joined her class, that was. (Itachi also had an unbroken streak of perfect answers. Kimiko had initially tied with him, point-wise, but she'd been awarded a higher score based on the quality of her written responses.) After the exam that she'd ranked higher in, Kimiko had began to miss one or two questions. Itachi flipped to her overall rankings, which only confirmed his suspicions.
Mita Kimiko had ranked tenth every single time. Even after she stopped receiving perfect scores on the written exam, she'd compensated with the practical exams. Clearly, she was capable of scoring higher, but she kept her ranking frozen. Kimiko clearly wanted to send a message.
But to who? The Academy? A clan? Itachi turned back to the first page and reread her profile. Her background was as civilian as they came. The closest she came to a non-civilian association was with Nohara Kyou, a medic that she had worked under. He paused, stopping at a formerly miscellaneous detail.
Tuition Status: Paid; Clan-Sponsored
Itachi had assumed that Mita was either paying for the tuition herself or using the Graduation Plan. This… complicated things. Kimiko could simply be a civilian lucky enough to receive a throwaway sponsorship, but Itachi had a feeling that her connection was more complex. She could be an illegitimate child of a clan member, but her utterly ordinary background suggested that wasn't the case.
The lack of a clan in her profile meant that it was a closed sponsorship; ninja clans weren't required to disclose who they sponsored to anyone but the Hokage. It wasn't likely to be one of the four noble clans, since they were rarely subtle with their sponsorships. Itachi would have known had she been sponsored by the Uchiha, and the Hyuuga wouldn't sponsor someone who was barely above average.
He closed the file. The situation wasn't as innocuous as it had originally seemed, then.
Shikaku II: The Troublesome Thing about Kids
Shikaku checked his son's room on a whim, fully expecting his son to be napping. He paused at the door, surprised to see that Shikamaru was up and about. His son was scowling at a shogi board as he recreated a match from memory. Shikaku watched from the doorway, tracking the progress of the game. His son had started admirably, but he'd faltered somewhere in the middle, probably due to—
Ah. He knew that playstyle.
"I'm jealous," said Shikaku loudly, startling his son. "Why is that Kimi-chan plays with you? She must like you better."
Shikamaru blinked at him and then the board. "She plays weird," he grumbles. "That's not how you play."
He hid his amusement. Of course, his son wouldn't be familiar with the tactics of chesu. They were similar, yes, but just different enough to give Shikamaru trouble.
"Well then," Shikaku patted his son's head, "you'll just have to learn how to play weird."
The spark in Shikamaru's eyes returned. "Okay." He reset the board, and for once, Shikaku saw determination in his son's expression. "I want to play well enough to beat her. Help me?"
"You bet I will." Shikaku sat on the other side of the board, and the match began.
The Ino-Shika-Chou trio gathered for their weekly game of koi-koi. Though Inoichi and Shikaku were doing their best to cheat, Chouza was the one in the lead. Bemused and gloating at his luck, the Akimichi snacked on homemade dumplings as he tossed his card combination on the table.
"I don't understand how you're doing this," said Inoichi, raising both eyebrows.
"That makes two of us!" Chouza replied cheerfully.
Shikaku stared at the cards like he had a doujutsu. "It's probability. If enough games are played—"
"I really don't care." Inoichi scowled, sore that he was losing for the third time in a row.
"You're such a brat, Inoichi," scoffed Shikaku. The Nara didn't even bother to hide his smirk at Inoichi's glare. It was cold enough to scare the most seasoned jounin, but Shikaku was more than used to it. Half the time, he was the cause of it.
Chouza gave them both a side-eye glance that made the two look away sheepishly.
"Anyway," the Akimichi said, shaking his head, "how have your students been? I've been busy in the last week, dealing with all the clan stuff." It was difficult for all of them, but Chouza had more or less adjusted to being the Akimichi clan head.
"My team's annoying, but they're alright." Shikaku grinned. "The best part about having a team is the lack of actual work involved. I can skip out on paperwork by using the kids as an excuse, and when I'm with them, I don't need to do anything but supervise."
"By which you mean nap." Inoichi seemed even more annoyed by his hand of cards.
"Exactly," said Shikaku. "I just have a shadow clone run them ragged." He shrugged at Inoichi's look. "What can I say? It's effective. After a week or two of teamwork drills and basic exercises, I'll get them started on their specialization. It's not like they need that much work, anyway. Yugao's already at low chuunin. She's much better than her brother was at her age, and it's no surprise that ANBU's sniffing around her. The two boys aren't as skilled as her, but they have the basics down. With a little more training, they should reach chuunin in no time."
"Iruka and Mizuki both want to become teachers at the Academy, right?" Inoichi asked.
Shikaku nodded. "They announced it during our first meeting. It's a rather unique goal, considering that most boys their age want to be legends or 'super-cool shinobi.' I found it refreshing, actually."
"You're already that attached?" Chouza laughed, and the other two smiled with him.
"Maybe," admitted Shikaku. "They're good kids. Determined, hard working, and not at all arrogant. Iruka and Mizuki will make excellent teachers, and I don't doubt that Yugao will fulfill her dream of being a swordmaster." His face grew a little darker. "She's likely to head into ANBU in the future. With her swordsmanship and sensing abilities, she'll be the perfect complement to any combat team."
"You don't seem very keen on the idea," Inoichi observed.
Shikaku sighed and scratched his head. "Yugao's more stable and well-adjusted than most ninja who ANBU takes interest in. I'm just concerned that she won't remain that stable if she joins."
Inoichi made a noncommittal sound. "You might be surprised. Besides, that's still in the far future."
The mood sobered somewhat. After all, ninja could never be certain what the future would bring.
Author's Notes and More:
The poem quoted in Itachi's section is a famous Japanese one by Fujiwara no Yoshitsune. Titled A Cold Mat, it's actually has references to older poems, and... I'll stop here. As you'll see, I actually took the title of Itachi's section from the same poem. It is as follows:
When the crickets
cry in the frosty night,
on the cold reed-mat,
spreading out my robe just for one,
must I sleep all alone?
Other poems, quotes, and pieces have appeared and will continue to appear throughout the story. When I can't find any piece that fits, I do make some up... but don't worry, I'm not going to devote a large portion of the story to poetry. (Itachi does strike me as the kind of person who'd have an appreciation of literature, though. I stick to prose for a reason.) Anyway, that's enough of that.
I thought I'd point out some changes that Kimi purposefully or inadvertently caused.
In canon, Nohara Kyou (Rin's sister and Kimi's doctor teacher) died during the attack. She'd been pushing herself to the brink of chakra exhaustion for several days, and Kyou was unable to escape from the building collapse. In this timeline, Kimi's assistance let Dr. Nohara conserve just enough chakra to escape. Of course, Kyou is technically an OC, but we learned nothing about Rin's family. I felt justified in creating her, haha.
Ino's mother survived the Nine Tails Attack in canon. She's dead in this fic, due to butterflies. Perhaps Kimi's additional babysitting services gave Misaki more freedom, so she began working/volunteering more, leading to her not being in the compound during the attack. Or perhaps it was simply a split second decision that was made differently.
There is, of course, Kimi's relationship with the Ino-Shika-Chou trios. That will be explored more in the fic. The same thing applies to the changes in Kimi's friends, Itachi, Hana, and so on. It wouldn't be fun if I wrote everything out, right?
As always, thanks for reading. I always appreciate all your support.
