XXX

Kisame Hoshigake

Barefoot, he walked upon the surface of the gently swaying water towards the spouted pillars. Around him, but at a perhaps wary distance, the sharks inhabiting the water swam around them.

Recognize your alpha.

He stopped before the central pillar, where Bruma looked down on him from. "Kisame," he said gently, but the words carried on the mist coming off the water, floating through his eyes. At the shore, he knew the spray was bringing the same words to Ryuuga, Shizuma, Tusina, and the rest of the clan.

And Itachi. He was glad he was awake to see this.

"Kisame, of Clan Hoshigake. Bearer of Samehada, one of the Seven Ninja Swords of the Land of Rain. For as far back as our history goes, we have been the protector of this blade, claimed by our clan's progenitor. Since then, it has passed through the hands of those both from and not from this clan, but always have we had a say in where it went."

"And always, has Samehada had such a say in that decision as well."

The water from the elder's water spout sprayed Kisame's face, but he did not so much as blink. His eyes were transfixed upon Samehada itself, unwrapped and writhing in the grip of Bruma's weathered hand. The blade had the ability to release spikes from the handle if its holder was not someone it wanted or owned it, but even the weapon seemed to respect the old man's firm grip. It was patiently waiting with as much sentience as a lion waiting for its prey to enter the kill zone, but little more than that.

"You have returned to us defeated, carrying this revered weapon of ours in tow. Though you have long since sacrificed your bond to both clan and village, Samehada still yearns for your touch. But as is in its nature when it senses weakness, you must prove you are strong enough to use it." He held Samehada aloft, hanging it downward over the lake. "Do you accept your Trial of Conquest?"

"I do." No hesitation. Just the same strong desire from when he had first come here as a young man.

Without another word, Bruma released the handle of Samehada. Its small quivering and panting immediately evaporated into a carnivorous maw that leaped midair to swallow Kisame whole-

He exhaled and released the chakra holding him upright, quickly sinking below the surface of the lake. He had scarcely disappeared beneath it that the living sword shot over his head like a torpedo to sink into the lake with him, but it did not pause. As soon as it his smell, it was cutting through the water to him.

"Good to see you too, girl."

Kisame grinned, breathing deeply through his gills as the maw of his beloved blade opened to see him. If he strained hard enough, it almost looked like it was smiling.

XXX

Itachi Uchiha

On the other side of the explosion of water from Samehada's impact with the surface, the clan gave jeers and gave good luck to either man or sword. Even though they could not see whatever struggle was going on beneath the surface, their animation was excited and hopeful.

Itachi, on the other hand, remained as aloof as ever. His Sharingan peered through the thin glass film, studying the water for any sign of chakra.

But there was none, besides the two contained blue blurs of Kisame and his ravenous sword. No jutsu? Is it just that fast that he can't make the hand signs?

"Excuse me... you must be Itachi."

The small tug on his right sleeve was not a dangerous one, so he did not do much to acknowledge it. "I am," he said briefly, his eyes still trained on the two clashing forms of hazy blue chakra. "May I help you?"

"Not really. I just wanted to speak with you."

That's curious. He deactivated the Sharingan and looked over. As he expected, it was one of the clan, a woman of weathered beauty and strength. Holding her hand was a small boy with floaty black hair that was already down to his shoulders. "We can speak, then."

She smiled in gratitude, then turned to her son. "Shizuma, you can watch Uncle Kisame perform his trial while Mama talks to Mr. Itachi."

The boy beamed at the escape of possible boredom and joined a gang of other small boys standing by the waterfront.

Uncle? But though she had the same facial markings, there was little else similar between the two. A formality then, but someone close to Kisame. Itachi bowed his head. "I did not know Kisame still had connections here with his kinsmen. The way he said it, he had no chance of reestablishing contact with anyone here."

"I don't think he did, until he came dragging your half-dead body in." She smiled a little faintly at her own words, then bowed her own head deeply. "As strange as this is to say, thank you for that."

"Thank you for almost dying."

"Yes. Without that reason to fill him with desperation... I don't think he would have ever found the strength to return to his family."

Her sincerity ought to have struck him as something warm and wondrous to behold, but instead he felt a poisonous knife twisting inside his stomach that had nothing to do with his disease. No family of my own to return to, even if I was driven to such a corner. That path is forever closed to me-

"YOU FAILED US!"

"I mean no offense, but I hope it doesn't happen again," Itachi said without the sarcasm the tone demanded. "We have too much to do before I can fall in battle again like that. You'll likely not see us again, at least for some time."

She shrugged, though her face betrayed her surprise. "I see. He mentioned that you were chasing your own family-"

Itachi's eyes focused on hers. "What did he say?"

"There's no need to beso hostile," she said coolly, crossing her arms in disappointment. "He did mention it was a sensitive topic, but I didn't think it would blind you in such a way. Seems like despite how bloodthirsty he once was and how he described you, he's cared for you more than you ever did for him."

Annoyed, Itachi turned away and said nothing.

To her credit, she did not walk away but also moved to watch the unmoving surface of water. The live sharks were creating a slowly tightening circle, and Itachi did not have to use his Sharingan to tell where the battle was taking place.

"Do you know what is happening below the water?"

"They're fighting."

"But you've noticed by now he isn't using any jutsu, I take it."

"I have," Itachi replied begrudgingly, looking at her from the corner of his eye. "I've seen Samehada in action, but I did not know it could be so fast once it was free within the water."

She shook her long hair. "It's fast, alright, but that's not the reason. Samehada is alive, granted, but it does not have the sentience to understand something like a jutsu. It was built to feed, like any shark. Therefore, it would not understand being conquered by anything as grandiose as a water dragon or liquid cocoon."

Her lips drew into a curt smile. "Nope, this is as primal as it gets. He'll beat it... with his bear hands."

Itachi's right eye twitched. "Surely that's not possible. That weapon-"

"Possesses the raw strength of a herd of elephants, yes. But Kisame will overcome it."

Someone's confident. Kisame is certainly bloodthirsty enough, but to go hand to hand with that thing requires a bit more of a level head. He's not strong on tactically approaching things. That sword gets one bite out of him, and he's as good as finished. His hands clenched. If he gets injured, I might have to leave without him. I can't let any more time pass.

"When I knew Kisame, he had the side you saw openly." She was still talking to him, her gaze trained on the ring of sharks. "He was more controlled then, of course, but he had his ravenous side. We all did, during the Age of the Bloody Mist. After his graduation from the academy, it started to come out more and more often. Sometimes in a controlled manner, sometimes to the point of near-sociopathy. It was scary, to be around him then."

"He's always been someone to leap into the action, rather than think about the action," Itachi agreed, not really knowing why he was still carrying the conversation. Maybe a bit guilty for having tried to cut her off so sharply before?

"But he wasn't always like that. There was a time when he was even a good little boy, as normal as you or I at that age. And during then... I think he was happy." She shrugged. "Did you know he used to play the koto?"

"No."

"No," she agreed, her lip twisting slightly. "No, you wouldn't. Because he's just been a tertiary figure in your own story, hasn't he? While he had the respect to make you a main one in his own." She folded her arms and lifted her chin to the water. "Maybe this is his chance to change your mind."

XXX

Kisame Hoshigake

His hands were bloody with grappling Samehada's stinging hide, but the pain hardly phased him. As the sword came for another gluttonous pass at his abdomen, he drifted out of its line of attack as if he were surrounded by a cloud vapor rather than dense water. As Samehada missed again, his hand chopped down on its back for another bleeding blow. But the living sword, always meant to bite and tear rather than weather sustained attacks like this, was wearing out.

Around him, the sharks' agitation at the smell of blood was growing firmer.

He closed his eyes, his sharp teeth grinding behind his lips. Samehada swirled around nearby, but it did not attack just yet. Knowing it, it was doing a simple tactic of going to his back for a blindspot strike. In a few moments, the surging of water would come behind him, and the decisive move would play...

"... out as we have planned. You understand this simple order, yes?"

"Yes, sensei."

Fuguki looked down at him, a gargantuan of a man with Samehada strapped to his back, and grinned. "You'll make a good tool, Kisame Hoshigake. I see our exams are still producing bloodthirsty and promising results." His eyes suddenly narrowed "What are you looking at?"

"Your blade... it is of my clan. Sharkskin, Samehada."

"It is. What about it, boy?"

His words came out hesitant but with a curious weight. "Did you complete the Trial of Conquering for it?"

Fuguki barked out a laugh. "Ahhh... I see. You've spent too much time playing that infernal instrument of yours, Kisame. You get airheaded when you do, less focused on what's important. You'd do better to practice with a sword rather than that stupid thing. That'll never serve you on the battlefield."

"But... it makes me happy."

"Happy?" A large hand grabbed him by the roots of his hair and in second had him flat on his back. Before he could protest, his sensei's equally massive knee was digging into the middle of his rib cage. "Why are you worried about happiness? You're a grunt. I was there, once, too. You serve those above you and make them happy. That's the cycle, see? Then one day, when your senior is all gluttoned up on their own self-interest, you strike." He pointed a thumb to his back, where the wrapped blade rested. "That's how I got this, see. No stupid trial, no idiotic right of initiation. I killed its previous owner when he was too drunk one night, and that was it. Doesn't have to be more complicated than that."

"But... Elder Bruma always said-"

The knee deepened as Fuguki laughed again. "You're wasting the little breath you have left on trying to lecture me? Wake up, Kisame. I shouldn't have to be the one to tell you that, when the academy exam should instead. This is the world you live in, and this is the truth: the strong will do as they please, and the weak will do as it pleases the strong. Understand?"

"Now, burn your damned koto before I do it myself..."

He'd always carried that first conversation between them to heart. A lesson from teacher to pupil, learned and taken to heart. Most teachers would have been proud, Kisame thought, but he always had a feeling Fuguki wasn't thinking like that when his student had assassinated him. He'd tried to stay alive against the many blades piercing his bodies, and Kisame had almost wanted to tell him why stop the way the world worked?

It was ironic, in a way. Fuguki had said the strong would do as they please, but Kisame suspected he'd never known that particularly phrase came from a Hoshigake proverb.

"The strong will eat the weak, and the weak will feed the strong."

He'd lived by that saying for a long time. But for the first time since he was a small boy, he was beginning to think maybe he didn't need to.

Who was I before the Akatsuki? Before Madara? Before Fuguki? Before the graduation exam? Was I always a victim to the proverb, or was I something different?

Tusina was living proof that Kisame Hoshikage had not always been Kisame Hoshigake, Monster of the Hidden Mist. The frayed strumming of the koto in his mind was proof that inside, some part of who he once was still very much existed.

The question he could not easily solve was how he would bridge the gap between the who he was and who he is.

His eyes snapped open and his hand rose sharply as he turned. Samehada took the brunt of the blow but continued its momentum, its talon scraping over his face and narrowly missing gouging out his eye. But before it could entirely swim away, he grasped its tail-like handle and squeezed hard, yet confidently. The blade wriggled, but no talons came out of the handle.

"It's still me, Samehada," he said in the water, letting his chakra carry the intent of the words so the weapon could understand. "I'm still Kisame."

The blade's struggling lessened, and it curled around to look at him. Though there were no eyes or other distinguishable features, it seemed to be carefully studying him.

"That's right," he cajoled, pulling it in slowly. "How long has it been since you had a Trial, huh? Fuguki had you for at least twenty years, and I another fifteen... it's been quite a while. Do you even remember how these are supposed to go?"

There was a guttural whimper and it rattled slightly.

"Well, I'll tell you what. I don't really want to fight you, Samehada. Why conquer when we can work together?"

The whimper stopped. Silence. Was it considering the offer?

"Here." And as he squeezed, he allowed some of his chakra to be absorbed. The beastly sword growled, but it was one of contention. It increased in size-

Then quite plaintively, opened its maw wide and attempted to chomp his head off.

"Well," he said with some exasperation, keeping the top half from closing with his spare hand. "It was worth a try to do something different. But looks like you're the one thing from my past that isn't going to change, isn't it? HYAAA-"

He honed his chakra back into his feet and propelled them both to the surface, breaking the gentle surface with a flurry of foam. Samehada struggled in his grasp, whining, but he did not give it any second chance. He smashed the blade down onto the surface of the water again, holding it's mouth open while his other hand on the handle kept the beast from getting away.

Slam. Slam. Slam. With each one, Samehada's struggling grew weaker and weaker...

He released the handle, but it did not slink back below the waves. Instead, it meekly crawled up to his leg and re-offered its handle to him once more.

"A clear winner of the trial," Bruma said, his voice again carrying clearly on the lake's mist. "Kisame Hoshigake again proves he is worthy of wielding Samehada!"

Kisame breathed a sigh of relief as the crowd cheered. To his surprise, he spotted Itachi and Tunisa standing right next to each other, waving. Standing out his mesh underclothes', Itachi looked frankly mute and stoic, but Tusina was much more lively. She jumped up and down and waved her hand frantically at him, her enthusiasm seemingly unable to be bound.

"Well done." He looked behind him to a beaming Bruma. "You've proven yourself as skilled a fighter as ever. It makes me proud to see it so."

He bowed his head, letting droplets fall off his hair freely. Plip. Plip. "Thank you. I hope to turn a new leaf over with this trial."

"Oh?" Bruma cocked an eyebrow. "What do you plan to do? You are still a wanted man, my friend. Kirigakure will sooner execute you than allow you back into the fold."

Kisame shook his head. "Nothing like that. I have to help Itachi see his own issue through... to the end. But during and after such, I hope to rediscover myself. See this world in a new light, even."

Plip. Plip. Bruma's gaze hardened. "The world has not changed since you last left it, Kisame. I can understand a shift in optimism, but your talents have excelled because you know what it is like out there. Is this not what drove you to Akatsuki?"

"Perhaps. But... I know there was once a part of me that was not filled with such cynicism. I wish to find that part of me again, and see things for how they are meant to be, not what was told to me."

The elder's gaze squinted. "Then what of Akatsuki?"

"I..." Kisame paused, tilting his head. Plip. "I... don't know. I will see what Itachi says, I suppose."

"And here I thought you were becoming your own man." Bruma sighed in relief, and his water spout descended until he was level with Kisame. He put an arm on his shoulder. "I'm glad Madara was wrong. There is still a good chance to convince you against this foolish crusade."

Plip. "You-"

"I knew you were beyond such foolish nature," Bruma said, smiling. But it was no longer a kind elder's smile. The features on the face were blurring, dissolving, melting away into a completely unrecognizable face. The cheers from the crowd dimmed, and the other four elders echoed cries of dismay and shock.

The body of the unknown man keeled over to fall onto the water, and almost immediately the sharks were tearing and gnawing at it. Blood ran freely between their teeth, but no one had eyes for the display any longer.

Behind Kisame, there was only the gentlest of sounds as someone touched down.

"It's time to stop the lies, Kisame," the Leader intoned gently, putting their own hand on his shoulder. "It's time we embrace the world for all that it is. A place full of unbridled, callous, and familiar pain."