339 days since the Uzushiogakure Massacre

Uzumaki Kushina

I like playing pranks. If I could get paid for playing pranks, I would give up being a kunoichi. Minato likes playing pranks with me, but he only does it with me because I like it. Kichiro genuinely enjoys playing pranks. He pretends he doesn't and will never, ever admit to it, but I know the truth. He's not very good at carrying them out, but he has the best ideas. Whenever I ask, he always has something new. There was this one prank with four mousetraps, a whole spool of ninja wire, and a bucket of sticky stuff that would stick to anything and wouldn't let go unless is was soaked in a foul-smelling liquid with a weird name. Kichiro said he wouldn't fight my battles for me, but he doesn't know that I use his prank ideas on bullies.

At the Academy, the other kids aren't very nice to me. Everyone knows Kichiro is apprenticed to a Jōnin and he's not even a shinobi yet. They also know that he works at the hospital and everyone respects him. There's even a rumor that Kichiro is secretly in ANBU as a medic. That rumor scares me. Kichiro isn't in ANBU, I know that, but I also know that ANBU agents come into our apartment a lot and Kichiro heals them. He's not supposed to. If anyone found out how much access he has, I'm scared Kichiro will get in trouble even though it's not his fault.

Minato almost always walked me to my apartment. The one time he didn't—I stumbled in to find an ANBU lying in the middle of the floor, bleeding out. It was the first time I'd ever seen an ANBU. Luckily, Kichiro showed up before I had to figure out what to do.

"Kushina?" He murmured, stepping between me and the ANBU. "Have you learned how to assist a medic yet?"

After a moment, the question processed and I shook my head, staring at the key dangling outside his shirt.

"Okay, how about you take a long shower and it'll all be over when you're done, okay?"

I nodded.

"Just forget what you just saw," Kichiro said quietly as he guided me towards the bathroom, keeping himself between me and the ANBU.

I took an extra-long shower. When I came out, Kichiro was sitting at the table studying one of my seals, pieces of the Uzumaki Library scattered around him, looking like he'd been working the whole time.

"Kushina?" He said without looking at me. "What's this symbol here? It keeps repeating like it's trying to create a feedback loop, but somehow the entire array isn't collapsing or exploding." It was a genuine question, not something to distract me and make me feel better.

I squeezed onto the seat beside him—the seat was nothing more than a crate because I still hadn't gone to look for chairs like Kichiro asked—he put his arm around my shoulders and gave me an awkward hug, as if it made everything better. Surprisingly, it helped and we focused on the seal. "That's the kanji for 'harm', Nii-chan. You were supposed to learn it two weeks ago. Also, that's not the shape of a feedback loop, it's a stabilizing spiral. It limits the amount of damage the seal will inflict."

"What's a stabilizing spiral?"

I tried not to groan, I really did. I was only a few levels away from being considered a fūinjutsu master but Kichiro learned everything backwards. He would take random seals from our library and dissect them instead of learning through the primers like he was supposed to. It was extremely inefficient. Sure, he was already drafting Jinchuuriki seals and devising counter-seals, but sometimes, beginner-level concepts, like stabilizing spirals and feedback loops were beyond him. "A stabilizing spiral is critical in almost every seal that you don't want to make extremely deadly. For example, explosive tags don't have one because their purpose is to escalate out of control. Instant-kill seals don't have one either. Make sense?"

Unfortunately, by the time Kichiro declared bedtime, I still hadn't forgotten about the ANBU. After a few minutes of not being able to sleep, I heard Kichiro's breathing deepen. As soon as I knew he was asleep, I crawled out of my bed and wriggled underneath the covers of his, careful not to wake him. He woke briefly and shifted to give me more room, then went back to sleep. I did my best not to think about the ANBU. In the morning, everything was better—almost. I hadn't forgotten and I noticed traces that other ANBU had waited in our apartment to be healed, like when the pan Kichiro used to make breakfast broke and two days later it was fixed but Kichiro didn't know how. Or when Kichiro had a night shift at the hospital and he came in the door, just as I was running late for the Academy and rushing out. We collided and Kichiro's elbow went through the wall. No one got hurt, but by the time I got back, the hole was fixed, but Kichiro hadn't moved from where I laid him on his bed to sleep. Once or twice, all our dirty laundry vanished and was returned the next morning, folded neatly and left on Kichiro's bed. Very rarely would Kichiro notice, and only when his chores were done. He would stare at what he was supposed to do, shake his head, and mutter about going crazy and karma.