Prologue - The Beginning
Summary: The story of when, how, and why my life turned into a self-insert fanfiction saga, and how I accidently broke myself trying to fix the world - all while pretending to be someone else. Badly.
(In which inappropriate humour becomes a coping mechanism for terrible things.)
In other words:
What (Not) To Do When:
Your New Otou-Sama Is A Mad Scientist
Determined To Reincarnate His Dead Father
He Gets You Instead
Or:
The Phrase:
"You Poor, Unfortunate Soul"
Unexpectedly Becomes A Lot More Relevant
Alternatively:
How I Disgraced The Name
Of
Senju Tobirama
AKA:
Joining Root
Other Fun Times With Danzou-Sama
Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto, or any of the rights to the story created by Kishimoto.
Remembering happened in stages.
While I was born with an awareness of my reincarnation, a newborn's brain simply isn't physically capable of holding and processing all of the information that was passed along with my spirit. Even just containing that much was almost too much – infant brains aren't born developed enough to contain anything more complex than the basics of existing. To be blunt, the only reasons I survived my first rebirth at all were that my new body's sire was expecting and prepared for reincarnation-related complications, along with chakra bullshit.
My theory for how I survived my various subsequent rebirths is that the seal he put on me right after that first one taught my soul how to automatically repress everything from my new body when I was reborn, only gradually releasing it as my new brain developed enough to handle it. The fact that the only universes I lived long enough to be aware of being reborn in were ones where they had advanced or metaphysical means of sustaining me both long enough for my newborn self to recover from going into shock and to allow my brain to speed through development at a much faster pace than would normally be possible supports that.
I have the vague impression that I have been reborn more times than those I can remember, and simply didn't survive long enough to form any solid memories of the events. There's just no way to know for certain whether or not that's actually true. It's only the faint, wispy recollections of something like forgotten dreams teasing the edge of my memories, along with the occasional life where I awaken feeling both more rested and with the impression of more memories of the womb than usual which lead me to suspect it at all.
While one of the seals I've placed on myself over the years ensures I won't ever forget anything, I suspect that dying instantly after being reborn may be as impossible to recall in detail as the memories of the womb prior to that. The experience would simply be so fleeting in comparison to the length of time spent in the womb that it can't be recalled consciously.
Regardless, that suspicion does strengthen my belief that my theory is correct. Especially given that now that I've finally experienced the process enough times for it to stop sending me into traumatic shock immediately afterwards, I've survived rebirth in a world without those means.
Don't misunderstand me – it hasn't actually gotten any easier; I've simply grown used to it, to the point where I've become numb to that particular form of trauma.
It's still a very harsh experience physically, and my infant body still suffers the fallout; but my infant brain is no longer immediately overwhelmed by the trauma, horror, panic, and grief which characterized my earlier rebirths. The only thing which now separates my experience of childbirth from that of any other newborn are the brief moments of awareness I have before my consciousness suppresses itself.
Even that is still more than a newborn brain is physiologically able to handle; which means there are still complications. It's just that the lack of complex, powerful emotions flooding it all at once mean there's only the strain of containing an adult awareness for those initial seconds between awakening and full suppression to cause problems. I privately suspect that my initial rebirth in this life only made my brain more susceptible to further damage, and my health complications are more of a direct result of my spirit releasing information faster than my brain could develop without those additional ways of sustaining the process – at the very least it explains the seizures I've had from infancy.
However it took many lives for me to reach that state of weary resignation and acceptance following reincarnation, and I was most certainly not prepared for my first rebirth. I no longer recall how my original life ended; it was one of the many memories lost to me before I created the seal that preserves them. I do know, though, that it was sudden – I remember ruminating on the subject following my full awakening that I had been unaware of dying at all.
I was therefore doubly unprepared for reincarnation, and the overwhelming fear and confusion I experienced at the time made it impossible for me to register anything that happened with any sort of coherency. While I now know that the feeling of waking up to discomfort, disorientation, and a somewhat painful and abrupt adjustment to the outside world are typical of the experience of childbirth from a newborn perspective, I had no idea what was happening at the time. Add in that I suddenly seemed to have lost all of my motor skills, proper vision, and ability to communicate; and was somehow naked, wet, and freezing cold. Then I was swiftly lifted into the air and moved about and manipulated by something enormous beyond understanding; the sheer, unadulterated terror and panic I felt at the time was entirely justified.
All I could see were indistinct blurs, I had almost no control over my body, and was in a completely alien environment which was jarringly loud and absolutely everything seemed so vivid and intense it was acutely painful. I lacked even the faintest inkling of where I was, how I might have gotten there, or what was happening to me; or even when and how I had fallen asleep. I had no explanation for my naked state or my wetness; no idea when, how, or why any of it had occurred. My cognitive skills were horrifyingly impaired, and the continuous and inconsiderate man-handling of my body by whatever incomprehensibly massive creature had me was personally violating and uncomfortable. I couldn't even communicate to ask anything; any attempts merely resulted in hysterical screaming.
All of that would have been traumatic on its own, but the addition of chakra made everything so much worse.
Chakra bullshit may have facilitated my survival, but it also added to the shock I experienced. I may have felt some awareness of it in the womb, but I was also insulated and sufficiently comatose that I didn't consciously notice it. Loosing my warm, insulated cocoon at the same time as my consciousness was forced into awareness brought me face to face with it, in a very startling manner. The contrast between a world with chakra from a world without is quite sharp – and for a naturally-attuned chakra sensor even more so. And my new body was gifted with an extremely powerful natural attunement to sensing chakra, along with the massive chakra pool usually possessed by Uzumaki descendants.
The experience following the process of being born can best be described as a complete, simultaneous assault of all five senses; being a naturally-attuned chakra sensor meant possessing a new, unfamiliar sixth sense which could then be assaulted as well.
Moreover, chakra sensing is a function which is performed by both the mind and body acting in concert; and it is as much a spiritual ability as it is a physical one. Most people only gain the use of it upon unlocking their chakra, at which point it is both weak and primarily concentrated in the body, and must be trained to be useful – though only gifted sensors are able to use it beyond the normal range of their other senses. But a naturally-attuned chakra sensor – or natural sensor, as they're commonly called – is born with this ability active; automatically functioning like the other five primary senses are.
Of course, just because a baby is born with the ability to use their senses doesn't mean they're born able to understand the information those senses give them. Naturally-attuned chakra sensors are no different in that respect – they simply have six senses to learn rather than five.
The disadvantage of this, however, is that chakra sensing is by far the most intrusive of the senses – and a natural sensor cannot ever turn it off or avoid using it. Encompassing an awareness of all life within the radius of the sensor's range that is registered concurrently with the body, mind, and soul; the fact that part of it involves the constant transition of sensory input directly to the sensor's soul makes it indescribably intimate.
Therefore the "assault on the senses" that occurs after birth is a far more violating experience for babies who are natural sensors. Fortunately, naturally-attuned chakra sensors possess a very limited range prior to the unlocking of their chakra.
Being reincarnated with an adult awareness meant that unlike normal newborns, I did understand the sensory input my new body was giving me, confusing though it was. I did not have this advantage with my new sixth sense, and I did not know what it was.
What I did know was that it made me feel violated in a way nothing else ever had; it accessed a part of me that had never been accessed before, and made me feel exposed in a way that went far beyond nakedness. Because of it, I somehow knew the thing manhandling me was alive, not a machine; though I didn't understand how I knew it, nor did I understand anything else that sense was telling me.
It was upsetting in a way I can't really articulate – there are no experiences in this world that would give me a way to translate accurate descriptions regarding chakra sensing, the closest approximations I can give all fall short of the reality. It's simply so far outside the limits of human understanding in this universe that we literally have no words for it.
In the end, it simply made an already traumatic situation even more traumatic and violating. Even if I'd had any way to expect reincarnation, I very much doubt I would have been in way prepared for what actually occurred to me.
My creator in my new life, however, was prepared; he immediately placed me in a sealing array designed to supress my adult consciousness into my subconscious, where it would gradually awaken as my brain became equipped to handle it. My panic and horror were quickly doused as I lost awareness, and he moved on to the business of helping my tiny body recover from an experience which it was in no way capable of surviving without his deliberate intervention.
Therefore I lived.
As I said before, remembering happened in stages; in fits and starts, bits and pieces coming to me as I gained the capacity to be aware of them, something that happened far more quickly than should have been possible.
Again – chakra bullshit.
The end result was that I was a very advanced baby, grasping concepts and retaining knowledge that by all rights should have been years beyond me. While my intellectual development should (and did, to a degree) have outpaced the physical as a result, it wasn't simply one portion of my brain developing rapidly while the other sections fell behind. Part of my increasing cognitive ability involved a desire for control over my mobility and autonomy of bodily functions that led me to push my physical limits as far as they could go, as fast as they could. Which with the assistance of chakra bullshit enhancing things was quite a lot.
That's not to say that I had an adult mind in a baby's body – it's not physically possible, even with chakra. So all those fanfictions where the character is born knowing and understanding and remembering everything were still unrealistic. A baby brain can't do that. I had an adult consciousness, but the seal Otou-Sama used suppressed it into my subconscious to keep it from killing me until my brain was equipped to handle it.
It wasn't that my soul entered my body right at the moment of birth, either – the idea that exiting the womb magically imparts a soul is kinda ridiculous. There's no mystical moment during childbirth that suddenly makes the baby more alive than it was a few seconds ago. It's just that childbirth is a pretty terrifying experience and it was enough to jar me awake again from the dream-state I'd been incubating in. Like cardiac resuscitation - necessary due to the circumstances, but nonetheless violent and unpleasant.
I have some really indistinct memories of the womb, but after the hell that was reincarnating I basically shut down out of self-preservation and spent some time in a semi-vegative state. I alternated between sleep and half-asleep; like drifting in and out of a sort of coma. Dreams were formless, fleeting things, and everything was so dark and quiet, warm and comforting that I really only existed.
I didn't think; I just was. I was alive in a technical sense, but I didn't really live. There was a sort of unreality to everything that made it impossible to worry or care about anything; it was blissful. Being in the womb is the most beautiful, peaceful thing I've ever felt, and I really regret my inability to hold onto any clear memories of it.
To be honest, it felt like the sort of thing you'd normally expect to happen after death, if you expected anything to happen at all. Maybe that sounds slightly morbid, but there's no room for higher thought processes or complex emotions in the unreal serenity before birth. If that's what death is like for other people, than I envy them.
Not paradise, just… Peace.
Coming on the heels of that, childbirth was like being thrown abruptly into hell. It was violent, uncomfortable, frightening, exhausting, even painful. Because after cocooned away and insulated from everything for so long, the world was just too cold, too loud and bright, and just too everything to deal with. It was too vivid and too open, and it was painful like nerves being scraped raw. I was just so terrified and overwhelmed that I couldn't make sense of what was happening, and I came screaming awake and aware in desperation to figure out what was going on.
Then my consciousness overwhelmed my infant brain, triggering seizures, heart and respiratory failure as my body went into shock.
As I said before, it was only extensive pre-birth planning and chakra bullshit that kept me alive in my first life, then Otou-Sama applied the seal he'd created. There's a part of me that wonders what would have become of me if he hadn't been prepared enough – would I just exist in an endless cycle of reincarnation to womb, to birth and death and back again for eternity? How many stillbirths, miscarriages, and infant deaths in the multiverse are some of my would-be older siblings, or alternate selves?
The suppression of my consciousness was both a blessing and a curse.
A blessing, because it allowed me a measure of innocence and freedom I wouldn't have had otherwise – I acted like a child because I was a child; and any memories or thoughts that were too advanced for me were promptly reburied in my subconscious where I didn't have to worry about them.
A curse, because the event that broke the barrier and caused me to remember completely came too late for me to use those memories to avert a tragedy and save people that I loved.
Instead I was left to remember after the fact, hating myself for my ignorance.
In the beginning, I didn't really possess a strong sense of self – advanced as I was, I was still a baby, and I still wasn't capable of complicated thought. For this reason, I had no qualms about emotionally latching onto my new parents with all of the adoration and love babies usually feel for them. It was this love that eventually led me to feel so betrayed; and over the course of subsequent lifetimes has evolved into a black, bitter hatred.
If I force myself to look at things objectively, my new birth mother wasn't horrible – she just had no spine. She wasn't a bad person, and she did love me very much. She was simply incapable of standing up for herself, let alone her children. And she was so very concerned with keeping everyone around her happy, even at her own expense, that she unconsciously pressured her children to be the same way. She was aware of own weakness, and even did the best she could to ensure I would have additional protection in her place. It truly wasn't her fault that circumstances took that from me; my dissatisfaction with her stems from the fact that it was necessary in the first place, and that she could offer me nothing once it was gone.
I just can't forgive her for abandoning us to Otou-Sama's non-existent mercy. Perhaps if she had managed to protect my otouto I would feel differently, but she didn't and I don't. I know she tried, but her efforts were weak and ineffective. Even I was able to do more to protect him than she did, despite being largely helpless to protect myself. Despite my inability to forgive her, I've never truly hated her – I pitied her too much for that. She was broken early on in her life, and simply never recovered.
My resentment wasn't really directed towards her – part of it was carried over from my past life; where my mother had no problems standing up for herself, but didn't think her children deserved the effort. Nana's self-effacing nature might not have been such an issue if she had married a decent man, but she hadn't.
For all that my new father was a monster, he tried his best to be a good parent. He was simply as bad at parenting as he was at being a decent human being. I knew, due to his chakra, that he cared in his way, and really did want what he believed was best for me. It led me to blind myself to the exact sort of man he was until too late, because his interpretation of the best for me was very twisted.
Nana's chakra was as gentle and unobtrusive as she was herself – a small, still pond afraid to even ripple, but refreshing and cool to bask in nonetheless. It was calming and soothing, and very comforting to my infant self.
Kajima's was much harsher; it held a sense of barely-leashed violence and destruction, contained by a deep well patience. I was too young when I met him to do more than naively assume it was only due to his primary lightning affinity and secondary of water. Part of it was; but I should have remembered that tone of a person's chakra is indicative of their true self – it can be hidden, or concealed; but not actually changed.
But he was my father, so I suppose I can't be faulted for thinking the best of him at the time.
In the beginning, I loved them both.
Enough that I was very foolishly blind to some things I shouldn't have been, and that I tried to make excuses for things that are inexcusable. In a way, the worst part is wondering what they could have been if they'd been born into a less screwed up world with less screwed up morals.
Was Senju Nana a doormat because the reality of the shinobi world was too much for her gentle heart to be otherwise?
Was Senju Kajima born a psychopath, or was it growing up in the Elemental Nations that made him into one?
How much of his depravity was born of his own sick mind, and how much was the influence of Danzo?
As I already mentioned, he was prepared for potential reincarnation-related problems with my birth. This is because in my second life, I wasn't conceived so much as created in a lab.
On the surface, it seemed reasonable.
After all, Senju Kajima suffered from a low sperm count, and artificial insemination is a perfectly acceptable method of conception for couples who can't conceive otherwise.
What was less reasonable was his decision that, since he would be creating an embryo in a lab anyway, he might as well tinker with it prior to implantation; so as to create a superior child.
What was completely unreasonable was his egomaniacal determination to father the reincarnation of his own father, Senju Tobirama.
He took viable embryos and implanted Tobirama's DNA, running them through a seal matrix that he intended to trigger reincarnation – rather, to grab a soul in the process of reincarnation before it could forget its past life, and ensure it attached itself to the foetus. Or perhaps it would be more accurate to say that it was intended to force the soul originally meant for the foetus to recall its previous incarnation, in the assumption that the soul would be Tobirama. He incorporated the seals along with the DNA to make sure that the soul he grabbed was correct.
Souls don't have DNA, however, and in the end he got me.
There was nothing particularly special about me before that; I just happened to be the unlucky soul attached to the first foetus to remain viable throughout the entire process, up to and including delivery. I have no idea how many embryos he went through to get to that point, only that Ka-san had a few miscarriages and a stillbirth before me. Kami knows how many never made it out of the lab.
The DNA just passed along some of Tobirama's characteristics; such as appearance, affinities, intellectual capacity, and talents. Not in the sense of my being born with Tobirama's abilities, but in the sense of my possessing the same potential; gifts which still needed to be learned and honed into useful skills. The seal matrices he used on me before and after my birth might have influenced me to take after Tobirama more strongly than I would have otherwise, even with the addition of his DNA; but they were designed primarily to affect the soul. I very much doubt that he had any idea that their effect on me would last beyond a single lifetime, which is really the most charitable thing I have to say about it.
When I first learned of the circumstances behind my rebirth, part of me thought it might have been sentimental – that he might have been motivated by a deep desire for a chance to meet the father he never knew. It was the small, childish part of me that loved him, despite everything; the part of me that wanted to think that in spite of everything else he'd done, he wasn't completely irredeemable. A part of me that didn't completely die until the full scope of the consequences of what he'd done to me hit me in my fourth reincarnation, no matter how much I wished otherwise.
I had learned in my first life that love and hate are not mutually exclusive; that sometimes the worst part of an abusive situation is that it isn't all bad, all the time. That there can be moments of good, of love and affection and happiness that make you love your abuser; that make escaping the situation feel so complicated because of it. That lead you to excuse and justify things that shouldn't be excused or justified, and make you feel as if it's really your fault, even when it isn't. Even when you logically know that it shouldn't be happening and you don't deserve it, that love can mess you up emotionally and keep you from recognizing how bad things actually are.
I don't know how much of an impact my first childhood had on my complicated feelings for my parents in my second, and whether it made things better or worse. While the experience of a happy, normal childhood in my original life might have made adjusting to my new circumstances harder, it might have also made it harder to connect emotionally with my new caretakers, and part of me wonders if that might have made things easier in the long run.
My parents in my first and second lives were miles apart in some ways; but I think one of the things that made me so reluctant to let go of my affection for Kajima was the suspicion that in another, kinder universe, he might not have been all that different from my original father – a man who, for better or worse, I'll probably always love as much as I hate him.
Regardless, it means that I was reborn with a skewed sense of normal – my intellectual understanding of good parenting didn't match my subconscious expectations, and there was nothing that prevented me from imprinting on Nana and Kajima.
So I was reborn into the Elemental Nations, in the Senju compound in Konoha. I arrived in the early dawn hours of the 3rd day of the 10th month; Kaminazuki, the Month of the Gods, in the 45th year After the Founding of Konohagakure no Sato; the year AFK within Hi no Kuni.
Funnily enough, the AFK Standard was only really acknowledged within Konoha – everywhere else preferred to use the International Standard Calendar; ISC, which was reckoned from the establishment of the Five Great Shinobi Villages, 6 years after Konoha was built.
There were actually a number of differences like that between the world portrayed in the Naruto manga and the reality of living in the Elemental Nations – I was inclined to assume immediately after my first rebirth that they were as much divergences from the original universe as Tobirama's marriage to Uzumaki Ayame in that first world had been, but I later came to understand that those seemingly less important discrepancies were simply lost in translation. It was simply the difference between a manga which is written to be recognisable by those in our world and an actual reality which differs from our own.
Differences in language, timekeeping, calendars, and some traditions and beliefs – it all came down to differences between this world and our own, which led these things to develop differently. While the overall culture of the Elemental Nations was very similar to that of Japan, the most obvious differences laid in language variances, and the overall lack of Westernization.
For example; Kishimoto automatically interpreted the calendar to the Gregorian one which became standard in Japan following the Meiji Restoration. The Elemental Countries, however, were never influenced by non-existent western cultures.
The Elemental Nations followed the Chinese Calendar standard throughout a large portion of East Asia in our world. This means that their 10th month was November; not October. It was still called Kaminazuki; like it had been in our world before the Japanese rearranged their calendar – hence the likely source of Kishimoto's mistranslation.
Now, I don't mean that no western cultures existed in that world; only that if they did they never had a chance to influence the Elemental Nations. The Elemental Countries evolved in a separate universe, after all, on a different planet from Earth. The Countries themselves were surrounded by a vast and dangerous ocean, impassible by any technique or technology that had been developed there.
Unlike the oceans here; these were constantly stormy, with inconsistent tides, powerful and treacherous undertows, and gigantic, ever-present whirlpools. One could only sail out so far before encountering phenomena similar to localized storm fronts which surrounded the continent.
On top of that, the deep, treacherous waters were home to a large variety of gigantic prehistoric-type sea monsters. Chakra-enhanced, gigantic prehistoric sea monsters. Even if navigating the area had been possible, surviving them was not.
Together these things essentially resulted in an impenetrable barrier, and the constant warring state of the Elemental Nations meant that attempting to pass it was never a priority for anyone other than the Uzumaki; who had not yet managed it before Uzushio's destruction.
So on the 3rd day of that world's equivalent of November, I was born Senju Sayanoma – the grandson and supposed reincarnation of the Nidaime Hokage, Senju Tobirama.
Although 'grandson' is not entirely correct – the first indication Otou-Sama had that not everything had gone exactly as he'd planned was that the embryo he'd performed the procedure on turned out to be female. While it was also not entirely incorrect, as the male DNA he'd incorporated into my being resulted in making me a hermaphrodite, the addition of my memories ensured that I was uncomfortable identifying as male.
While he was prepared to ignore my unclear sex and simply raise me as the boy he assumed I was, Ka-san protested – possibly the only time she ever went against him, and the only time he ever conceded to her wishes. She pointed out that depending on how I developed as I grew, it might be awkward to explain why their son was growing breasts and curves, and that it would be best to give me a more gender-neutral name than Tobirama and wait until I was older to determine my gender. It was something that the midwife and other relatives – namely Uzumaki Kushina – agreed with, so he probably didn't think he could argue.
I think the only reason he gave in to her was that he was confident that 'Tobirama' would affirm his original decisions eventually, and that allowing her to coddle and enjoy her 'Saya-chan' in the meantime was a lesser evil than having the truth of what he'd done exposed to people who might object.
'Sayanoma' (meaning "the space between a precious building and a building built as a protective covering over it" – basically a kind of very fancy veranda) was sufficiently traditional-Senju enough to placate Otou-Sama and gender-neutral enough to satisfy Ka-san. Senju tradition involved being given vaguely arcitectural-themed names; males of the main line often having names that referred to "the space between" things. Sayanoma did not sound especially masculine, however; thus they were both satisfied with the compromise.
To this day, I believe that making Kushina my godmother was Ka-san's way of protecting me from Otou-Sama. Probably not consciously, because for all her submissiveness I don't think that she had any idea what her husband was actually capable of, but she was aware that he was a hard man, and she did recognize that she was not capable of standing up to him and likely wanted to give me a strong female role-model who could.
She and Kushina were not particularly close, nor were they the nearest relations of the various Senju and Uzumaki survivors and descendants Otou-Sama had convinced to move into the compound. However, while my father likely chose my mother for her timid and reserved nature as much as for her bloodline, he didn't realise that she secretly admired her distant cousin's outspoken personality until after Kushina had already agreed to be my godmother.
Without even realising it or intending to, Ka-san complicated and interfered in Otou-Sama's plans for me from the moment Kushina became involved in my birth. I have no doubt that, had her life not been cut short, she would have continued to be a thorn in his side, thwarting her schemes for many years to come.
Ka-san was young – almost twenty years younger than Otou-Sama, and only just sixteen when she married him. She was his second wife; the first being a kunoichi named Hikari who died during the Second Shinobi War.
From what I understand, their marriage wasn't very happy – while she thought she loved him when they were younger, she eventually became disillusioned with the uncaring man she'd married, and he became frustrated by her willfulness as she became less and less inclined to simply go along with everything he wanted.
Their inability to have children was a source of much strife between them, and even when she proved that he was the one at fault it did not stop him from blaming her. If anything, he resented her even more for daring to 'shame him'. Supposedly, he became unfaithful in an effort to prove he was capable of siring children with someone other than his wife, which was both ineffective and created new problems for them.
In the end, she refused to agree to artificial insemination, and he was concerned enough about his political position not to try with someone not his wife. Her death gave him the freedom to find a new spouse who was more to his tastes. After a respectable mourning period, he began searching for a bride whom he could rule with a firm hand, interspersed with planning out the seals and processes necessary to achieve his goal.
So he turned his eyes to Senju Nana – a meek, soft-spoken civilian girl with Senju blood, much too painfully shy to enter a courtship with someone of her own volition. Her gentle nature was all but crushed under her own mother's overbearing ways, resulting in a quiet girl who kept her head down and tried to avoid notice. She was pretty enough, with long, dark brown hair and eyes, a slim, delicate build, a soft face and a sweet smile.
However she wasn't striking or a great beauty, and her reticence left her overlooked by boys her age and a few years older. When Otou-Sama expressed interest in an arrangement to her mother, the woman was relieved to have such a prosperous match for her wallflower daughter; I doubt Ka-san was consulted.
While it took a few years for them to have a child, due to Otou-Sama needing the time to perfect his experiments, Ka-san was relieved when I lived. Losing so many babies beforehand was very hard on her, and he certainly didn't care how it effected her. I think it was that relief that allowed her the strength to argue against him when I was born, that determined hope that led her to seek a strong female protector for my godmother.
She was only nineteen when I was born, and my earliest memories are of being quietly cherished by her. I probably wouldn't have ever been able to muster up a single negative emotion towards her if I hadn't been the only person hurt by her ineffectuality – as it is, the person most harmed by it was herself, and I pity her too much to hold on to my anger. But as a newborn, she met both my physical needs and my emotional ones. At that age, all I really needed her to do was love me, and she did.
After a short adjustment period to acclimate to the world outside my mother, I settled in as a surprisingly happy baby. Everything fascinated me, and I was constantly captivated by each new thing that caught my attention. It helped that our section of the Senju compound was something of a garden paradise – the rest of the compound was built around it, and it had been created by Hashirama and Tobirama as a home for the their family. It was lush and green, with flowing water, and a variety of trees and plants laden with fruit or flowers. The chakra of my ancestors flowed through every inch of it, and it was intensely comforting, long before I knew what it was.
The inhabitants were as colourful as the garden itself – Senjus in a mixture of blonds and browns with damp or earthy chakra, and occasionally fire; Uzumaki's in brilliant red, with voices as loud as their chakra in a variety of combinations – wind and water, with lightning and without; water and lightning; lightning and wind; and wind and fire.
Otou-Sama generally ignored me; he wasn't really interested in involving himself before I became 'useful', so other than checking on my progress occasionally he simply left me to Ka-san. My early memories are vague, blurry things; largely indistinct and unclear due to my infant brain's inability to process or store long term data well. Even developing at an advanced rate, it's still pretty unbelievable that I remember as much as I do.
The first time I had an inkling of my reincarnation as a fact rather than a subconscious awareness – the first time I had any concept of when and where I'd been reborn, and what it might mean for me, was the first time my godmother 'kidnapped' me to explore Konoha. Kushina-ba-chan was cackling madly as she dashed out of the Senju-Uzumaki compound, and I was giggling helplessly in her arms, infected by her wild enthusiasm.
Kushina's chakra could only be described as "wild". It was a stormy whirlwind of fire, rain, hail, and lightning; whipped into a frenzy by gale-force winds. The fire was as unnatural to her own chakra as it would be to a natural storm of that type, though it blended into the wind seamlessly enough that I only really recognized it in retrospect. It was the result of her mastery over the Kyuubi's wind-and-fire natured chakra added to her own blend of wind-water-lightning most Uzumaki shared; with the added talent in using additional, non-native affinities also characteristic of full-blooded Uzumaki allowing her a slight skill with earth.
Her chakra was as chaotic, impatient, and excitable as she was; while not exactly safe, there was a twist of joyful laughter and a playful, teasing edge to the whole thing that assured me I was in no danger from her.
I was around six months old when I saw the Hokage monument for the first time. While my brain wasn't quite developed enough to comprehend or retain all of the memories triggered by the sight, it was startling and frightening enough that I burst into tears, and the subsequent crying jag and accompanying fever left Kushina sufficiently contrite that it took almost another six months for her to repeat the adventure. Even though I'd had a flashback of sorts, I couldn't understand what any of it meant. I was simply left with a vague knowledge that there had been a "Before" and now was "After", without any clearer picture than that or interest in pursuing more.
Pain is a strong deterrent, after all; especially for a baby.
At a year old, my understanding of my circumstances was still rather simplified, but I had been aware enough for long enough to have come to terms with them to a degree. It helped that I was not aware of specifics at the time, so much as uneasiness and fears that were not clearly defined enough for me to determine their source. Thus our second break-out from the compound went much more smoothly, and paved the way for further ventures.
While the details of my memories from my baby years are much less detailed than they became as I grew older, certain things made an impression on me.
Things such as meeting Namikaze Minato for the first time. Part of me knew that he was important, but the knowledge was drowned out by my brain looking at him and going, "Shiny!" Thus he was dubbed, "Aka!" Even when my speech and comprehension improved, I still referred to him as "Akaaka" – essentially calling him a "bright thing".
This was partly due to his appearance, and partly due to the bright, overwhelmingly sunny impression of his chakra. While not precisely accurate, his chakra really was reminiscent of a bright and beautiful summer day.
It was the warmth of the sun, accompanied by the scent of damp earth tinged with ozone suggesting a recent summer storm; overlaid by a strong, playful breeze keeping the air from becoming too humid to be pleasant. Gentle and relaxing, with a hint of seriousness hidden beneath the friendly exterior; the only warning of the violence and danger the elements were capable of summoning.
While he was too busy to spend even a fraction of the time with me that Kushina did, he still managed to become one of my favourite people very early. His chakra was as open and friendly as his demeanor, and to this day I regard him as not only one of the most charismatic, but also one of the most genuine people I've ever met.
So he became Akaaka – my bright, shining thing; and I loved him.
That next trip out of the compound was another of those landmark moments – I was not actually Kushina's only godchild, and my rapid development led to her concluding that she was the godmother of two prodigies, not just one. To be fair, no one but Otou-Sama expected reincarnation, so it was a reasonable assumption.
At any rate, Kushina had decided that her godchildren had to meet – she understood enough of how isolating prodigies found their gifts from her experiences with Kakashi that she felt it was important for us to grow up together so that we would each have a peer to relate to. The problem was that her godchildren were the clan heirs of both the Uchiha and the Senju – and neither father was eager to have his child begin consorting with 'the enemy' at such an early age.
Kushina's best friend, Uchiha Mikoto was not quite ready to bring her son out of Uchiha territory for extended periods of time, much less taking him visiting to the combined Senju-Uzumaki compound. So Kushina simply decided to take me along with her on one of her visits.
That was how I ended up meeting Uchiha Itachi.
While a large part of Kushina's motivation from bringing me with her on her visits to her godson stemmed from wanting to help us both make a friend, part of it was also due to the increasing difficulty she was having interacting with us; particularly Itachi.
Her personality tended to overwhelm him, and even as young as a year old she was beginning to notice a lot of similarities between him and Kakashi; in personality as much as intelligence. While Itachi was still generally very mild-tempered and sweet, she hoped that in being proactive and giving him a friend she could prevent him from developing many of the Hatake's bad habits.
While the issues she encountered with me were more mild and less noticeable – I generally enjoyed her enthusiasm and became enthusiastic right back – there were enough similarities between us that she concluded they were simply quirks that came with being a prodigy. She hoped that properly socialising us both would lead us to being less Kakashi, and more Minato.
While details of my first foray onto Uchiha land are fuzzy and indistinct, I remember being stunned by Mikoto's beauty. I was vaguely aware that the people I was being introduced to were significant, but I was much more focused on staring at the pretty lady. She was unquestionably the most beautiful woman I'd ever seen, and I wondered if she was a princess, or an angel.
(This resulted in the phrase Tenshi-Hime becoming my preferred honorific for her, going forward. While not a actually proper honorific, Kushina was deeply amused by my stated reverence for her best friend, and encouraged me to continue using it. Mikoto was both flattered and charmed, while Itachi nodded solemnly and agreed it was a completely reasonable title – something that delighted her, given the distance she sometimes struggled with between herself and her precocious son.)
When Kushina set me down on the floor I was upset that she had blocked my line of sight to Mikoto, but I was quickly distracted as my attention was arrested by the fact that there was someone else there as well – someone the same size as me!
While life in the Senju-Uzumaki compound had impressed upon me the fact that people came in all sorts of different colours, shapes, sizes, and varieties of loudness, it was the first time I met someone my own age.
He was pale, dark-haired, solemn, and just as small as I was. The sight of me was probably just as much of a novelty for him – not only because of our similar age, but because my snow-white hair and bright red eyes were probably wholly unlike anything he'd ever seen before. We stared at each other for a moment in fascination. Then I beamed at him and offered him a wave.
He offered me a tiny smile and a shy wave back. My baby mind was as delighted by his returning the gesture as my more mature subconscious was awed by his cuteness, and I decided there and then that Itachi Was My Favourite.
Kushina startled us both by squealing loudly, and exclaiming that we were, "Just too adorable for words, dattebane!" and crowing about how she "Just knew that we were gonna be the best of friends – just wait and see, 'Koto-chan!"
While the rest of the visit is murky and fragmented in my memories, that moment of introduction was one of the most pivotal of my existence, and has never lost its clarity.
Thus went the first year of my new life; and I was happy.
A/N: I don't have a beta; while I'm not opposed to the idea of having a beta in theory, every time I've tried to use one something goes wrong and it causes more problems. Seriously - I have horrible, terrible luck with betas.
Whether it's the beta not actually knowing how to beta, or not being dependable by forgetting to respond regularly, taking much too long to get back to me, or needing to drop me because of RL situations coming up; there's always something. If I was more superstitious I'd think I was cursed; since even trying to have someone I knew and trusted to do it right went bizarrely wrong as soon as we started trying to communicate over it. Her computer and internet issues didn't stop acting up until after we'd agreed to put the arrangement on hold indefinitely, and the timing was suspicious enough for her to claim I was cursed.
So, if anyone's interested in offering to beta for me, I'm willing to take you up on that; I just want you to have fair warning. I may not believe in curses, but I've seen enough of the pattern to be pessimistic about the odds of it going well.
That said - I'd just like to go on record as saying that the amazing GremlinSR gave me permission to borrow her Nara Ensui. He won't be showing up for quite a while, but I'm pretty excited.
Also, if anyone wants to add to the series, feel free to let me know so I can link to you. (Read the first installment "Introduction" for details.)