Experimental bgm: 'The Way' (instrumental v.) by Zack Hemsey (on youtube). When you read "Haruka puts me in red"*, hit play. Ideally, you reach "Healer, Avenger" at the 3:29 mark. 5:00 is "Stop it! Your real enemy's [...]!" These are all section beginnings.
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Triptych
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10
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the narrow path
down the middle
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Light filters into the cocoon of my arms. I resist the urge to lash out like Madam Shimiji's old cat Tora Jr. whenever genin find him nesting in a bush. Blearily, I crack open an eye. My tent is emptier now. Half my supplies have gone to healers who aren't in danger of being exchanged. The other half I've kept for mortar sessions with Megumi, emergency cases, and yes, out of sheer stubbornness.
I yawn.
Another noise makes me look up. Chiharu shuffles at the entrance, cradling a blank canvas. "Sorry to wake you. You were having a bad dream?"
"Oh," I say uncertainly. "I can't remember."
"You were repeating things. Bo-ku-to?"
I stare at my hands.
"Do you need a new sword?" Chiharu asks.
"I'm fine."
Even children can sense landmines. Wisely, the girl changes subjects, and holds up her canvas.
"Sign, please?"
"Looks like a duck."
"You think?" I wrinkle my nose. The 'da' character does bear an uncanny resemblance to an aquatic fowl's bill. "Hold on, let me fix it."
"Don't!" Chiharu gasps. "What matters is auth-en-ti-ci-ty. Besides. Ducks are cute."
Cute? Not a winning concept for a ninja. I roll up my sleeves. "How about I add some fire?" My artistic skills don't hold a candle to Inojin or Himawari, but they don't dip into the abyss either. Still, the new squiggles under my autograph don't seem to improve things.
I set down my brush just as the Yamanaka twins enter. Naki identifies my autograph as a stylized drawing of a roasted duck. Kouki says it looks like horse manure.
But only metaphorically.
Still, Chiharu skips out cheerfully, with Naki shouting after her: "Go through me next time! I'm her manager!"
"Manager?" I echo. "I'm not some pop idol."
"Pop what?" says Kouki. "Managers are what famous kabuki performers have." He eyes me, like he's imagining me pasty-faced and in a fifty-pound wig.
"Stop," I say flatly.
"But you are getting famous around camp," Naki enthuses. "Hottest topic in town."
"Hn."
"That's your problem, Sarada," Naki tuts. "You lack self-awareness. Managers are useful. They chase away rabid fans with a broomstick."
My thumb jerks toward the exit. "Go. Before I get out my broomstick."
Kouki rises readily, grumbling: "We don't want to waste time here either. Sensei asked to see you" while Naki adds: "Are you and Sensei mad at each other? Did Sensei leave you out of the loop on some plan again?"
The opposite, actually.
I'm the one withholding. Soujiro's been subtly pestering me to talk about the hostage exchange, ever since I'd left the Senju tent, thoughts spinning and with a malaise in my bones. Megumi had noticed. Between grinding paste and pushing omiai options, she'd asked if I'd caught a cold. I'm not sick. Only heartsick. And the only bug I've caught is the one called 'choice'. The Council didn't force me to go through with the hostage exchange. It gave me two days to choose.
Return Itama.
Protect Fire territory.
Save myself.
Only, I've never been good at choosing. Soujiro will likely talk me out of the exchange. Even worse, he'll talk reason to me. But I have no energy to reason. Neither to soul-search. Unlike Naruto-sama, I don't have a way with words. Banal words like "I have to" or "it's the right thing" can only forfeit allies. Therefore, I don't want to see Soujiro.
Besides, if this is how it ends, who can blame me? I'm reuniting with kin. Even two future hokage side with their clan. Tobirama's eyes trail me when our paths cross; Hashirama avoids me altogether. According to Haruka's status reports (stalker reports), Butsuma's heir isn't sequestered. He's out and about, fighting battles by day and chumming it up with daimyo by night. Gambling again.
'Will you build a village with me?'
Perhaps Hashirama's done waiting for an answer.
After all, gambling games have a time limit.
Be careful what you say no to. It turns out that I could use a manager brandishing a broom. Though not at rabid fans. Not exactly. The morning of the second day since the Fire Council meeting, an eclectic group trails along the side of my tent. Tall, short, fat, skinny silhouettes stand outlined against the canvas. Stares and whispers aren't new. I've always tuned them out. But I can't in good conscience turn away patients. Even if four people fake the flu in succession, and the soldier I'm with now has a dubious-looking 'rash'.
He fixates on me, as I frown at his carefully sandpapered forearm.
"An Uchiha, up close," the soldier breathes. "You have demon eyes?"
"Yes," I deadpan. "They let me see through bullshit."
"Amazing."
I swallow a sigh. "You should go."
"After I get bandaged by an Uchiha," he says zealously. "So. Are the rumors true? Starting with that incident with Lord Tobirama. I mean, I heard Commander Sarutobi would have anyone who talked, tortured."
Good ol' torture threats. As scary as paper tigers.
"Also, are you really going back to your clan?"
My bandages drop to the floor.
He helps himself to the fallen roll, twirling generously round his arm. "I mean, that's the latest story."
"Latest?" My teeth set.
"I heard it just last night. That's still before most people, this morning, you know. I told myself: 'You're never gonna get another chance to see demon eyes, and live. You should seize this chance!'"
"No, you should leave."
And he does
—when I announce his prognosis (venerable skin disease) loud enough for those outside to hear. The line quickly disperses. I feel an almost wrathful satisfaction when I go outside to inspect.
Until I spot a lone remainder.
A young boy no older than Itama peeks shyly from a tent away. He's familiar. Is that the patient from that night Kouki came? Silver hair's memorable. Testament to this fact is how quickly even civilians identified the Rokudaime playing pachinko in seedy foreign bars.
Our eyes lock. This produces an interesting set of symptoms: a flush from the neck up; wringing hands; fidgeting feet. It's contagious, too. I catch a large dose of second-hand embarrassment. After a minute, I cave and invite him inside my tent.
The young boy pales as I offer him a bag of jerky (he looks like he needs it more than me), reaching into his traditional collar and pulling out a bulbous wooden thing with rounded moons and stars carved on the surface. He holds it out. "I-I don't have much."
"It's very nice," I say, confused. "What is it?"
In response, he presses the slimmer end to his lips and produces a trembling phweet.
"Ocarina," I realize.
The boy narrowly avoids dissolving into tears. "It's not enough, b-but I'll find some other way to pay. For the food. And healing me."
Oh.
"Don't pay me now," I murmur. "But I'd like to hear you play. Someday. When you're ready."
His chin wobbles a bit. "Yes, Ma'am."
"Sarada. Your name?"
"Tenji..." Poor kid says his own name like a question.
Intel must have barraged him already. Still, he consents to repeat his story to me. His farm was razed by recent fighting. His family, killed. I ask if he has other relatives. "Not nearby," he squeaks, leaking tears. "Gramps used to say that we're from up north. Came down after the great calamity."
Further drilling a sniffling boy feels wrong. But his next word banishes all niceties.
"Itama."
I stick a finger to my ear to check for gunk.
"I overheard people talk," he continues. "You're being exchanged, and everyone says—"
"Who cares what they say," I cut in. "What about Itama?"
"H-He was very nice to me."
"You saw him? Where?"
"We were in the same prison. I was going to be sold to s-slavers. He kept encouraging me," Tenji says miserably. "He's the one that left first, though. Maybe they sold him. But… he didn't look well. He had trouble breathing. Coughed a lot. I think the guards were worried it would spread to us."
Now, it's also hard for me to breathe.
"How long ago was this?"
"Um," Tenji hems. "Maybe a week."
Commitment.
It's hard to commit to a choice. Easier if someone else imputes it on you.
That's what happens. In two days, rumors spread around camp; the hostage exchange becomes common knowledge. The Uchiha girl who melted the ice wall and infiltrated the eastern camp—yes, the same girl Lord Tobirama fought—is being traded for Commander Senju's youngest son. To questions, I just nod 'yes, true' and move along.
Perhaps, in my heart, I'd already decided.
The Council, too, seems to treat it as a foregone conclusion. When I report, Lord Fukushima looks as satisfied as a cat with cream. Butsuma's there, too, but his face doesn't change. Except for one instant: when I deposit a five-sided die onto the table. But his expression spasms so quickly, I don't have time to read it. A true statesman, indeed.
From there, people around camp start embellishing the bare-bones story. One version paints me as a nihilist who failed to assassinate Tobirama, and is now trying to worm back to the Uchiha. Another version martyrs me. Another stars a love triangle with the Senju brothers, or the Yamanaka twins, or—craziest of all, daimyo geezers that gossips pick at random from the Council.
Literally heart-wrenching, that version.
While Soujiro pesters, Kouki has taken to alternatively sulking and snapping at me. Naki had to be dispatched on a mission, to prevent him from acting out. Chiharu and her friends frame their autographs, and hang them in their bunks (I'm not sure how to feel about this; I'm not dead yet). The only tolerable company is Akimichi Haruka, whose rants still feature a diversity of subject matter. But even she's not immune to all the talk.
"Seems like you didn't need beauty pills," Haruka comments over dinner. "By now, you've canoodled with half of Fire territory."
I cough up fish curry. It was too much to ask, to eat my last supper in peace.
"Lord Jounzo's the latest," she hums.
Jounzo? Ah, daimyo with the astonishingly bushy mustache (compared to the tufts desperately clinging to his scalp).
"So, is it true?"
"False," I choke out. "Not my type."
"But Jounzo's so rich. Rich is everyone's type." Haruka's nails tap the table, as if rebuking an unenlightened child whose only interest is shoveling down curry (not untrue). "Any merchant on the continent would kill to get a license to trade in Jounzo's fiefdom. The guy could have been more powerful than Ueno, if he'd succeeded in luring the Senju clan to work for him instead."
Okay, a little gossip goes well with curry. "Why didn't it work out?" I ask.
"Who knows? Could be that Jounzo's place is too far south. Plus, he's a greedy old bastard."
"But eligible?"
"Damn eligible," Haruka sighs rapturously. "The only one that came close was Ueno, y'know. Well, when he was alive. I guess it's Ryugu now, who's richest. He's just acquired all those new fishing ports." She ticks off her fingers, as if counting ports. I think of faces at roundtable. Ryugu. Slightly skinny. Air of a bloodhound.
Haruka grows solemn. "Return the favor."
I manage a 'huh' around my spoonful of rice.
"When you're back with the Uchiha clan," she says. "Go scope out the eligible daimyo on their roster for me."
"Why?"
"Ignore what the biased losers around camp say, Sarada—" Haruka's exasperation is so like Chouchou, I bite my cheek "—Your clan is powerful and well-connected. On par with the Senju. Hell, if the Uchiha weren't so isolationist and inbred, I'd go bag one myself. So. This is where you come in. I want an affiliated daimyo, okay? We're friends, right?"
The word 'friends' has been a sore point, of late.
"What about Hashirama?" I say, careful.
"What about him?" Haruka raises an eyebrow, as if she hasn't been reporting to me the heir's every move like a devoted groupie. "The Akimichi come from a backwater family. Even playing mistress to daimyo secures our finances. For clans like the Senju and Uchiha—yes, they're prime vassals, but as vassals, they still need to play their cards carefully. They wouldn't marry down, to lower clans who're just fighting for scraps to survive. Only daimyo at the top of the food chain are free to do what they want."
I must be making a strange face, because Haruka bursts out laughing. "Ugh, you live a sheltered life! Hell, if that old goblin Butsuma had any daughters, he'd have married 'em off ages ago. One for each fiefdom."
Old goblin Butsuma.
"Friends." I smile weakly.
Haruka's own grin is wide and dangerous. "Good. Now before your big event, let's us girls go freshen up." At my confused look, she says: "You can't have a good hostage exchange when the hostage doesn't have killer clothes and hair. At least a dagger up your sleeve."
Haruka, not Naki, should be my manager. "Butsuma will have a cow," I say.
"Cow?"
"I mean he'll get upset."
"Oh, I'll make sure of it."
Haruka puts me in red.
The color of power.
Vitality. Energy. Celebration.
It's also the color of my clothes, growing up. The color of my eyes, my inheritance.
I hug the scarlet kosode to my body, against the morning air. We march behind a small unit. Two masked Senju guards flank me, almost like ANBU. Earlier, Butsuma didn't have a cow (well, sentry did already confiscate my dagger). Neither did he comment, only donned his armor to leave first for the place of the hostage exchange.
Face forward. Don't look back.
Somewhere inside the camp, Soujiro's face is pinched, thinking of me marching away. He's waiting for a sign, a letter, to stop this hostage exchange. This is already a great solace to me. That he'd care. But it's too late to change things. As Soujiro himself said, his status can't match Senju Butsuma's. It's not right. But it's the way things are.
War is no time for philosophy.
Yet, to fight without cause is meaningless.
Konoha is a worthy cause. Stopping the Otsutsuki. Saving a life. Itama's. Maybe these are convenient excuses. Every step now is a step closer to the Uchiha. But Madara will likely listen to the late Tajima's advice. Poke out my eyes. Here, my pace drags. Still, I walk further away from camp. From the alliance I'd hoped could recast clan-centered loyalties.
Ultimately, it's a Senju-led alliance. An Uchiha has no place in it.
Butsuma has made this clear. And Hashirama, who I thought would revolutionize the clan system, has not spoken a word to me since our encounter outside the enemy camp. Why should he? He came on his father's orders. He's here at his father's pleasure. Hashirama is the one with his priorities sorted. Not me. Before fighting wars, forming bonds, I should have just asked myself: what do I want?
I want a friend. I want to see Itama.
Isn't that reason enough to keep marching?
A thick fog rolls in as we climb uphill. Perhaps it's a product of our increasing elevation. The white mist obscures anything beyond several feet out, in any direction. Eventually, our procession slows as steep crags soften. Deciduous trees still line the hill, but the ground up ahead seems to be level and barren.
We're here: the plateau.
Soujiro's maps denote this as the tallest in the area. In a hostage exchange, if one side decides to cheat before the trade, the other side could chase them down the mountain. Where both sides have finished the trade, both retreat concurrently down opposite sides. This makes it hard to change plans and mount a laborious ambush back uphill. It's the perfect place to do business.
Except for this mist.
"Our envoy's late," a masked guard says. "Stay here. I'm going to investigate." All too quickly, his figure disappears. Now I realize another reason I'm in red. It's a good hostage color. Easy to spot.
Suddenly, like a peal of thunder, an explosion sounds.
Incomprehensible shouts ring across the mountain. Many soldiers scatter, to meet the voices within the mist. What's happening? An attack? Butsuma's somewhere here on the hill, with more soldiers, sheltered by the trees. Should anything unexpected occur, he would act. Secure me, the hostage, from running away.
As if reading my thoughts, the remaining masked guard grips my arm.
A second explosion rips through the treeline.
Birds flee, far overhead.
"Duplicitous scum!" is shouted, somewhere. My mind feels as clouded as my surroundings. The mist thickens to a point where I can barely see my own hands.
A third explosion.
"Do it now!" a faraway voice calls. "Bring the hostage thirty steps forward!"
The masked guard's hand tenses on my upper arm. I'm led forward a few baby steps, into the white mist. A chill runs down my spine, and I wish Haruka hadn't piled my hair up into a bun, leaving my neck exposed to cold and—yes, to any other attempts on my arteries.
"We should wait," I say to my guard. "For reinforcements to arrive."
The masked head shakes no.
"Not very sociable, are you?" I scowl.
Something's off. Incensed, I tug my arm away, then—
"Wait. Don't—ah."
The mask falls with a clatter.
People see what they want.
Mist wafts into my gaping jaw. I scrub at my fogged glasses, then take them off to give them a more thorough cleaning.
Hashirama's twisted away, as if in shame.
"Don't tell Father." His voice is tight as he stoops. With nary a flicker in his eyes, the mask is back.
It's easier to yell at someone when you can't see their expression. Heart in my throat, I blurt:
"Don't forget your promise, Hashirama. That time, by the river."
'Then let the Senju make peace with the Uchiha.'
Before I can put my cleaned glasses back on, a fourth explosion shatters the eerie silence like splitting thunder.
I drop the lenses.
"Don't move!" I gasp, scrabbling at the ground.
Too late.
The rest happens in a blur. A literal blur.
A figure hurls through the mist like a torpedo, the drawn blade so close, I see condensation sparkle along the metal edge. The next instant, my nose meets the dirt. Hashirama needed no more than a second, to fling my body away.
Frantic, I crawl back, glued to the ground. Glasses!
What I find leaves my brain screaming:
Do something. Fix this.
But I can't heal crushed plastic lenses and the snapped frame. I can't even ask questions.
Because no one's here.
Hashirama's been spirited away by roiling mist. Our attacker too. A funny urge to cry trembles at my throat. My kosode has pockets, into which I stuff broken pieces of plastic and metal.
"Sarada!" a familiar voice shouts in the fog. It sounds close. But I can't see.
Desperate, I stand. Thirty steps.
Turn, turn, turn.
Mist seeps into my clothes, cloying and damp. A half-formed Rasengan would be perfect for these situations, but wind is my weakest element. Try! A few feet of empty plateau reveals itself, before furling like a curtain.
Where are the other soldiers? The enemy? Itama? Almost in answer, the mist swirls. Wind blows, stronger, as I'm surrounded by cloud. I roll myself along the only solid surface I can find. Where the ground had been pebbled before, my cheek now meets dewy weeds.
"Who's there?"
Another familiar voice. One I haven't heard in a long time.
The mist doesn't stand a chance against my newly energized wind jutsu.
"Itama!"
I rush forward; envelope his small figure in a hug.
He's firm and solid and wonderful.
He's also burning, to the touch.
"Itama," I hiss. "It's me, Sarada! Let's get you home."
Thin hope I'd felt lacing every step here now vanishes like moonbeams. Wrapped in my voluminous red sleeves, Itama trembles, smaller and lighter than he has any right to be. A malaise rampages through his body. Fever's written over his thin, blanched face.
"Sarada?"
I try to smile.
"Y'look different."
I swallow. "No glasses."
"Your face…"
Is on the verge of tears. But I know what Itama really means.
I've changed, since our first encounter. I was ready to become a cold avenger. Yet, people in this era have reminded me of who I used to be, and perhaps, still am. One of them is here with me now. But fading.
My voice rumbles through the boy's bones like thunder. "What did they put you through?"
"M'fine." But his trembling body's honest. "I… escaped. Wanna see my brothers."
"Your family will be here soon," I rasp.
Itama's eyes are dry, unable to shed tears. Maybe that's why mine overflow. I'm crying for two. Futilely, I pump chakra to his body. It's a loss, against deep-rooted malaise. He's a rattling skeleton, feverish and crumbling away.
I guide his drooping head, leaning his forehead against my cheek. "D-Don't leave me. You're my first friend here."
A wheezy laugh. "… I got to see… family after all."
Hysteria laces my voice. I remember.
"My friends are family. That includes you, Itama. That includes you. That includes you," I chant.
Itama's mouth curves against my cheek.
"I hope we're not the last," he smiles. "Not the last Senju and Uchiha who're… are…"
Healer.
Avenger.
I'm neither. Yet—
Gradually, the mist clears, dousing the plateau with flecks of color. Dark figures across the way dance to a cacophony of scraping metal. A presence slides behind me. Lightning lacing my hand, I nearly gore the figure. But he's fast. The fastest I know here.
Natural camouflage. White hair on residues of white mist.
"Tobirama! It's…!"
Tears and snot muffle the rest. It's good I can't see. I don't want Tobirama's expression burned in my brain. Wordlessly, he takes his brother from my arms. Cradled to the larger frame, Itama looks every inch a baby brother.
"Get your best healers! Hurry!"
"He's…" Tobirama's words fail, too.
"You don't know!" I half-kneel. "You never know. Please. Please! Give it a chance!"
I watch the two fade into the mist.
A strange emptiness settles over me. My eyes are pinched and hot from crying.
What does it matter?
An Uchiha who can't see is useless.
Stand, Sarada.
Walk.
Forward.
Before I can take my first step, a wave of chakra assaults me. Madara.
I don't need to see to feel. A great winged thing rises out of the trees, height enormous even as it stands down the slope. A long blade made of chakra coalesces around its main bulk. I don't need my glasses for this. The vision's burned into the back of my eyelids. Every time I've seen Papa's.
Susanoo.
One flap of wings sets off new explosions around the base of the hill. Fear uproots soldiers on the plateau, as they clamber down the mountainside. The earth beneath groans. Then the trees. Moving, again. Hashirama. Your brother! Itama's dead! But no words come out. Thick trunks spiral into the gray skies, knotting into a fuzzy, but unmistakable, silhouette.
A dragon, to answer the tengu.
The splintering wood dragon roars and grows, until it too towers above the plateau. I can't see Hashirama's face. Nor his intentions. Overhead, the sky stretches gray. And against that gray, there are monsters.
Madara's voice booms through the wind.
"Death. Vengeance. The cycle repeats."
Repeat.
Repeat.
"Stop it! Your real enemy's not each other!"
Don't you see the damage you've done?
Anger strips away my tiredness. Layer after layer. What's beneath is just bones and chakra. Burning. Unrepentant. What I cannot see, I feel. Violently, like a storm. The unbearably hot feeling erupts into a cocoon. I command it to be my tool.
This is the only dojutsu which does not require clear vision. The storm of chakra condenses, its epicenter too close to the beat of my heart, caged in an exoskeleton of chakra and fire. It doesn't feel like my body, burning the sky, trampling the ground.
It is my voice, however.
"Choose, now."
Lifted by my Susanoo, I still can't see the world. But the world sees me. Madara and Hashirama see me. Across the plateau, chakra collides with turbulent air. Down on the ground, people shout things swallowed up by the squall.
My first swing blusters through the wind.
"Choose peace."
My second swing decimates the trees. The tengu's sword is a promise. From a monster. Or just a girl who's lost a friend. Either way, I can barely control myself.
"Otherwise, vengeance will be mine to take."
(But I'm not the only one who knows loss.)
My third swing slices the mountain.
Three-way battles never go smoothly. Attacks meld and combust, and the mountain crumbles underneath. My exoskeleton grates and collapses as my chakra quickly runs dry.
I fall.
Wind rushes past.
A tengu hand veers toward me. Misses.
I hit the tree line. Branches, vines, leaves—all are astonishingly close, but I continue to fall, as branches shift subtly. Every time I'm caught, my breath whooshes out again as I continue downward. But I can't fall forever. Eyes clenched, I brace for impact with the ground.
Instead of hard dirt, I hit what feels like a pool of water.
How? No nearby lakes or rivers were marked on Soujiro's map.
A mouthful of liquid sloshes up my nose and mouth. It has a sweet taste.
Suiton?
I force my eyes open.
Underwater, my vision's even muddier than before... fading to gray.
Your hand in mine felt like ash. I clutched, harder, and it became as dust.
I shouldn't have held you
So tight.
.
.
.
When I wake, I see blue eyes.
The same eyes had been pouring tears when I'd drifted into unconsciousness. Now, they drink in the sight of me like a man in a drought. Me too. I soak in the sight, too. It feels unreal.
"Did you wanna kill yourself?!"
I flinch.
Boruto's unrelenting. "Pulling that stunt? At least tell us, so we can help you!"
"It was the right thing to do," I retort. "And help? How, by blubbering all over your sleeve?"
The hospital bed frame jerks with the sudden weight of his hand. "You've been on edge all week," he murmurs. "This is about something else, isn't it?" My silence doesn't dissuade him. "Is this about that talk between Dad and the ambassador last week? About Sensei? You said you didn't hear—"
"Stop, Boruto—"
"No one thinks of Sensei that way anymore! That guy was just trying to get a rise!"
"Let me sleep—"
"Sensei's sensei. What happened in the past doesn't change anything."
My fingers wring the starched blankets.
"Easy for you to say. I'm his daughter! Papa… he tried to kill the Hokage. Destroy Konoha. What if I turn out the same way?"
"Stupid, you have me."
"So?"
"I'll bring you back to your senses 'ttebasa."
"You're not the Nanadaime."
Briefly, an old hurt peeks through.
"And you're not your father, Sarada."
Only the IV drip makes sounds, for awhile. Boruto's fingers trail up the bedding, toward my own hand. I tell myself that it's too much hassle to pull away with a needle in my arm. Morphine makes me bold.
"Then stay with me," I say. "That way, I'll see you in my dreams."
Boruto smiles.
Nods.
The earth shudders around me in snatches of sound. A thundering engine rumbles over rough road. Am I on a train? No. Can't be. But I am moving, somehow, because in the small, unlighted space, I sway. Side to side, back and forth. My forehead bumps the dark murk in front of my nose, as I press up against a rough surface. Wood. Smells of varnish and rot.
On reflex, my fingers skim the bridge of my nose. That space is empty.
The last few hours feel like a dream. The last few days? Weeks? How long have I been in this dark, rolling space? My head is filled with the same murk that surrounds me. I roll over.
Try.
Sleep.
(That way, I'll see you in my dreams.)
My memory slips between half-formed thoughts.
Part of me wants to forget. None of me can.
Itama. Tobirama. Hashirama. Madara.
Then, another cast of faces. The same waking dream, starting with the stone faces, their solemn features crumbling down the mountain. It's a strange mirror of the last vision I saw before I came to be here: the barren plateau, splintering.
Sleep comes, eventually.
One is the dream.
The other is reality.
Blearily, I crack open an eye. As the world settles into vague outlines and colors, another thought creeps to my brain.
What good is an Uchiha who can't see?
It's a reminder that I'm in the past. That this is real.
All my other senses are fine, however.
Where am I?
I touch the grass beneath my limbs. There's something else, too. Hard chips, but rounded and convex.
(Shells. Bribes.)
I sniff the salt tang of the brisk breeze.
I taste a sweet syrup on my lips.
(A familiar sweetness—a sleeping drug?)
Finally, I sit up and wait, in the still silence.
There's nothing to hear at first.
Then, the sound of waves crashing, frothing.
The ocean.
I can hear the ocean.
.
.
.
tbc
.
.
.
Suzu: so ends lacquer.
This finale tested and terrified me. It's subtle; chaotic. But we move on from war camps, though I (and Sarada) leave pieces behind.
Notes (with guest question replies): The Valley of the End in canon is between Land of Fire and Land of Sound. So, northern Fire territory, hint. / Itama has tuberculosis. / Sarada turned sixteen in chapter 5. Hair length started off around the same length as her twelve-year old canon self. / Sarada has recently been among the pro-Senju faction of Fire territory. This faction is more expansive within Fire. The Uchiha arguably have a more extensive foreign network than the Senju.
Next up: besides (finally) getting answers, next chapter's an oddball.
Your encouragement boggles me. Short. Long. Detailed. Crisp. I delight over them all. Thank you. Please look forward to the final arc.