Fun Fact: I initially wanted to fit the entire Danzo training arc into one chapter, but it didn't quite fit.

Chapter Twenty-Seven - Scion

[scion—noun 1: a descendant 2: a shoot or twig, especially one cut for grafting or planting; a cutting]

6,057.

"I didn't talk to him about you, right? I never mentioned you?"

"Not even once? I'm hurt."

"This is no time for jokes."

"You hardly mention me to the real Shiranui."

I took a deep breath, running a hand through my hair. "So I didn't tell him about you?"

"No." He tilted his head to the side. "Your Uchiha."

My chest squeezed. "Shisui," I breathed. "I talked to him about Shisui. I, I mentioned feeling his chakra. Is that, is that it? Did I say anything else?"

"I don't know."

I sank down to my knees, hands on my head. "Ku. Ku, I mentioned Anko. I said I'd keep it a secret and I, I mentioned Anko. Whoever Not-Genma is, he's going to tell Danzo. Isn't he?"

Kurama considered that for a moment. "Probably."

"Oh. Oh, kami, I can't remember everything I've said to him."

"Don't tell him anything else."

"I know."

"He can't know that you know."

"I know!" I pulled my knees up and wrapped my arms around them. "I need to keep interacting with him. As if he's Genma. Nothing can change."

"For how long?"

"Until I figure out a plan."

5,721.

Yamanaka was on the ground with his nose bleeding and his right arm dislocated as I stood over him in shock. Did I, did I just—

Kit!

Kurama's warning came just a moment too late. Yamanaka swept my feet with his own, and I hit the floor hard. Then he was on top of me, pinning me with his weight and his good arm pressed into my throat. I bucked up, twisting. He had to move his good arm to catch himself, and I took the opportunity to bring my hand up and box him in the ear with one end of my manriki. I rolled away and up to my feet. As he followed, shaking his head, I swung around behind him and grabbed his hair. Yanking back, I took the opportunity to snake my arm around his throat, tucking my hand into the crook of my elbow. I leaned back, forcing him off-center as I squeezed.

Initially, Yamanaka clawed and scratched at my arm. He tried to stand, but the way I had him bent didn't allow that. And then his scratching faltered and slowed.

"Enough."

I glanced at Danzo. He nodded, and I released Yamanaka. He crumpled, barely catching himself with his good hand and hacking. I stepped back, eying him and rubbing my sore elbow. And then I settled back into my stance, ready for the fight to begin anew the way it always did.

"Yamanaka," Danzo said, expression not quite readable. "Fetch Dajimu and Tera to continue sparring in your place. Take a small break, Uzumaki. And then you'll continue."

5,717.

Any bit of victory I'd been feeling about my spar with Yamanaka had been soundly beaten out of me by Tera and Dajimu in the two-on-one spars, and I retreated to my room to nurse my bruises and what were probably cracked ribs. I paused in the doorway, eying the two empty beds and weighing my options. Then I dragged myself to the lower bed and climbed into it, struggling to keep my eyes open. Struggling to stay awake.

"Pumpkin?"

I blinked. Not-Genma was crouched beside the bed, brow furrowed. I groaned. Lifting my head from the pillow was a struggle, but I managed. I reached for him blearily. "Genma?"

"What are you doing?"

"I'm— I got hurt during training," I rasped, trying to sit up. My ribs . . . didn't hurt. I brought a hand up to my chest, pressing there with a frown. A moment later, Not-Genma's hand came and covered mine. "Guess it wasn't as bad as I thought," I mumbled. "How was Kubi no Kuni?" I looked up.

I gave a gasp, freezing with my heart pounding in my chest. Not-Genma's face was blank. Not expressionless, not unreadable. Blank.

"Mirai? What's wrong?" he asked. But his mouth didn't move because there wasn't a mouth to move.

"I—" I swallowed. Tried to swallow my fear. "Nothing. Nothing. It's nothing."

"Okay." He nodded. He still didn't have a face. "You have training to get to."

"Oh." I fumbled my way up from the bed, careful to keep my gaze down. "Okay. What does Danzo want?"

"Yamanaka messed up. Danzo wants you to take care of it."

"Oh." Quietly, I said, "I don't want to do that."

He gripped my chin tightly and forced me to look at his empty face. "We hardly get to do things that we truly want to do."

I jerked back. "What?" That's what I'd said to Itachi. That's what I'd said to Itachi. That's what I'd said to—

"Pumpkin?"

The air burned my lungs as I sucked it in. I stared up at the metal above me, head spinning. My eyes were burning with tears.

"Mirai, what happened?"

I stared at the hand holding mine. Then I followed the arm up to the person. "Genma?" I mumbled, staring at him. Not-Genma had a face this time. A bandaged, bruised face. I tried to sit up, but this time my ribs did scream in protest. "You look like shit," I managed.

Not-Genma made a slightly distressed sound. "That's one way to put it." He turned and sat down with a groan, his casted arm kept from moving by the tight sling binding it against his chest. Not-Genma stayed hunched, leaned forward to keep his head from hitting the bed above us. He reached out with his good hand. "You're okay?"

I stilled as he brushed his thumb over the bruises blooming on my cheek. Revulsion turned in my stomach, and I leaned into his hand just enough to hide that fact. "I'm okay. Are you?"

"I'm alive."

"Wouldn't recommend Kubi no Kuni for a vacation anytime soon, then?"

He laughed hoarsely. "Not especially." He moved his hand and carded his fingers through my hair instead. I had to look away to keep myself from gagging. He paused. "Mirai? Are you okay?"

"Tired." I finally moved to push myself up. At least then if I threw up, I'd be able blame it on the pain. I hissed, wrapping an arm around myself in the false hope that the pressure would help my ribs. "And pretty bruised up. Apparently my reward for finally getting the upper hand in a fight against Yamanaka was . . . having to survive in an even harder fight. Maybe I should just stop trying."

He moved his hand to my back to support me. "No, don't do that," he said softly. "If you give up, he wins."

I looked up at him, stomach turning over. "What am I supposed to do, then?"

"Fight. Until he can't make it difficult for you anymore. Until he has nothing to hold over you, because he has nothing left to throw at you."

I smiled palely. "Thanks," I murmured. "I'll try."

5,002.

When I tried to whittle away at the stick with a blade of air around my fingertip, I ended shredding it instead. I tried to sharpen the wind, tried to make it more precise, but then it just tore through the stick and into my hand. I gasped, closing my hand but not ending the chakra fast enough. The air bit into my palm just before it snapped away.

"What the fuck are you doing?" Not-Genma asked, reaching out and grabbing my wrists. "Pumpkin, you can't just—"

"Sorry," I mumbled. "I can fix it. I didn't— It won't mess with the mission. I can fix it."

"I'm not worried about the mission," he hissed. "I'm worried about you."

"I'm fine." I pulled on Kurama's chakra. Just a pinch. Just enough, mixing it with my own to try to keep it muted. "I said I can fix it." Then I caught a breath, sucking in air between my teeth with a hiss as my hands burned. When it smoothed away, I wiped the blood on my pants. Then I held my hands up for him to see. "Good as new."

His expression pinched. "Right," he said slowly. "You're ready?"

I scrubbed the rest of the blood away with the hem of my shirt. "Almost." I formed a seal. Two clones appeared on the branch beside me, swaying to find their balance. "You'll be close by?"

Not-Genma glanced across my clones and then gave me a tired smile. "Yeah. I'm not supposed to help—he wants to see if you can do it alone—but if it comes down to it—"

"It won't. I'll be fine." I nodded to my clones and they dispersed, Ichi heading across the road and slightly north and Ni farther north on our side.

"Okay. Be careful. And remember: the target is Jun."

"He's going to have guards, so he'll hardly be my only target. But the thugs shouldn't be too hard. He should really consider investing in hiring actual shinobi for protection. Far more effective."

"He's not exactly going to have time to consider that."

"True." I did another series of hand seals, casting toton. The look Not-Genma gave me was proud and so accurate that I shuddered. At least he couldn't see my grimace. I cleared my throat, drawing my tanto. "I'm ready." With my free hand, I fit my Root mask over my face.

Not-Genma nodded, putting on his own mask. "Good luck." He vanished.

I took a deep breath and focused on circulating my chakra as a way to keep myself distracted from my anxiety as I waited. It took well over an hour. Arguably one of my favorite hours under Danzo so far; no bleeding, no bruising, no drowning, no poisoning. And I even got to be outside.

And then I felt the chakra arriving before I saw it. Still distant, just barely brushing against my senses. Ready?

Your last kill was disappointing.

This shouldn't be. I listened carefully. It was hard to distinguish the energies from this far away, but they were small. Untrained chakra. Definitely regular mercs, numbering somewhere from six to— Shit. Ku, that's a—

Just one?

Feels like it. It's not, not a huge chakra pool, but it's more than a genin.

Calculate.

I stared off down the road at the carriage peeking over the horizon. One shinobi. Presumed missing-nin. Most likely level . . . chunin? Or a low-chakra jonin. Six to eight non-shinobi mercenaries. Jun is probably inside. Mercenaries will pose a threat in numbers, not much else. I'll leave them to my clones.

And the shinobi?

We can take care of him, I said, hoping I sounded as confident as I was trying to pretend I was. If Jun is stupid enough to run, we know what his chakra feels like. I squinted. There was a figure on the top of the carriage, just lounging there. Target sighted.

I felt a rush of chakra and saw the figure on the carriage straighten up in alarm just before two spheres of roaring wind crashed into the caravan. People started yelling, screaming, but I ignored that in favor of tracking the chunin as she disappeared in a blur from the roof of the carriage just before it splintered apart. I couldn't see her, but her chakra shifted farther north. Behind the rest of the group.

I drew on a shunshin to get closer as my clones engaged in a brawl with the remaining mercenaries. As I circled around, I found the chunin prying open the back of the carriage. I could do another shinku taigyoku, just like my clones had, but I had felt that chakra before it had ever hit. The chunin clearly had too. So instead, I activated a shunshin and lifted my tanto.

She started to swing around just as I reached her, and my tanto slashed into her right arm instead of her back. And then—

And then she fall apart into water.

Before I could even register what the really meant—was this the first time I'd had an opponent use a clone? surely I should have recognized the chakra difference, right?—the world closed up around me. I sucked in a breath in surprise, only to inhale water. I gagged, dropping my tanto and scrabbling for my throat. I tried to cough, but my lungs burned. I could see a hand, blurred by the water around me. Beyond that, everything was far too distorted to see properly. Someone might have been speaking, but it was muffled and indiscernable. My chest was screaming for air, screaming around the water in it. I fumbled for my tanto, but it was floating just out of reach and it wa so, so, so hard to . . . to breathe.

Kit.

And then I felt him trying to push more of his chakra into my system. I opened up my tenketsu to let the heat in, shaping it into something sharp. It tore at my skin as I pushed it outward. It felt like when Naruto had pushed me off that cliff, and I'd fallen into the ocean. Only backwards. And I was left crumpled on the ground and hacking afterward.

Move.

His warning helped, but I didn't really need it since I heard the shinobi's jutsu like an alarm. I rolled to the side and to my feet as the water whip sliced through the ground where I'd just been. Clearly my toton must have dropped at some point, because she easily tracked me and swung at me again. I rolled back to where I'd been before, snatching up my tanto as I went and managing to cut open my palm where my own wind had done so over an hour before. I had to dodge another lash from her water whip.

She was a distance fighter, then. Not exactly my strongest suit, yet, and I knew I needed to work on that. I rolled out of the way of another hit and realized she was herding me away from the carriage. After all, he was her client.

And my target.

As I dodged her next whip, I activated a shunshin. I practically tumbled into the wood, but at least I was where I wanted to be. I flipped up and backwards, landing on top of the broken carriage and watching as she pulled her jutsu back just before it hit where her client was hiding. Her gaze settled on me and she honest-to-kami started laughing.

"You're a kid," she howled. "I thought you were just small, but you're a motherfucking kid."

I kept my gaze on her and tilted my head, using half of my attention to listen to the trembling chakra below me. I adjusted my stance, holding my tanto out in front of me with both hands.

She grinned. "You really want to try to fight me, huh?" She shrugged. "Alright then."

Just as she started to blur, I charged a large pull of fuuton chakra into my tanto and slashed it down across the wood below me. The sharp wind coating the blade and extending it sliced through the carriage quickly. Efficiently.

I snapped the tanto up in an attempt to block, but I was just a bit too slow. And it would have been pointless against the water anyway. It crashed into me, and I could have sworn I felt my bones creak. The undertow dragged me down—could a suiton jutsu have its own undertow?—and crashed me into something hard. And I couldn't breathe and—

The water splashed around me, running out, and I coughed, hauling myself up. On my knees, I squinted through the water on my lashes at the carriage. The chunin was peering into it, one hand on her hip. Then she leaned back on her heels, mouth twisted with displeasure. She threw a look in my direction, looking more annoyed than anything else. I scrambled up, fumbling to unseal another tanto and then holding it up in front of me. Her lips curled into that laugh again. Then she waved a hand dismissively and turned. She vanished in a shunshin.

I didn't move at first, listening for her chakra. Listening for— Where had she gone?

"C'mon, Pumpkin. You're going to learn how to clean up a combat scene."

I jumped, snapping my gaze up to find Not-Genma standing beside me. "What— We should go after her. Right? She saw—"

"Her client is dead. She doesn't care anymore."

I frowned. "She's a witness."

"If the mission parameters say no witnesses, then we do that. Our mission parameters are to kill Jun and bring his body back. Now." Not-Genma gave me a odd sort of sad smile that was so like Genma's that it wasn't fair. "We have work to do."

4,183.

It wasn't the first time I'd woken to find that the water I was drowning in wasn't real, and it probably wouldn't be the last. I surged up, reaching for a necklace that wasn't there. Was never there. Why was it never there? Why hadn't I brought it with me?

"Shh, Pumpkin, it's okay."

I had practice now. I had practice in letting Not-Genma touch me and hold me and talk to me like he knew me. Like he cared.

"It's okay," he said again, pulling me up against his chest. He ran his fingers through my hair, and I suppressed my revulsion with practiced ease.

I didn't want to do this forever.

Something had to change.

3,707.

Not-Genma was sitting quietly, mulling over his options, and I took the opportunity to sharpen my kunai. They didn't need it, but it gave me something to do. Finally, he nodded. "You're functioning as support for this mission. Matsuda is lower B-class. He's not that much of a threat, but he's fast. And non-confrontational. I want you to box us in so he can't run. That's the only reason Konoha hasn't caught up with him yet; he's a runner."

"Box you in," I echoed. "How?"

"You did doryuheki successfully. I need you to do four. Can you do that?"

I frowned. In that brief second, in that split moment when my plan formed, I could hear Kurama stirring in my mind, pleased. "No," I lied.

Not-Genma paused. I could practically see him raising an eyebrow behind his mask. "You can. I know you can."

I made a show of hesitating visibly. Just a bit. "I'm not sure. I'm not confident with it."

"You can," he pushed gently. "That's the plan. I'll engage, and you put up four walls. I'll take care of the rest."

Kurama rumbled happily in my head. I squared my shoulders. "Okay."

3,706.

I fumbled the jutsu. I poured far too much chakra into the technique and watched as the dirt wall crumbled apart before it was ever fully formed.

Matsuda really was a runner.

3,692.

"And why didn't you provide the support Shiranui requested?"

I kept my shoulders square, my hands at my side, my stance strong but loose. "I couldn't. I've performed the jutsu before in a controlled environment, but doton is not my natural affinity, and my grasp on it is rudimentary at best. I did disclose concerns prior to the execution of the mission."

Danzo kept his gaze on me for a long moment. The itching on my skin burned, and I distantly registered that his KI didn't make it hard to breathe anymore. He nodded and shifted his stare to Not-Genma. "Did she?"

Not-Genma cleared his throat, leaning to the left as he favored the right side of his body. Matsuda might have been a runner, but he was still a shinobi. "She did. Based on her success in training, I thought—"

"I see." He tapped his fingers across the top of his cane. "A clear failure on your part. Not just that, but you then allowed a Konoha missing-nin escape. You are aware of the potential consequences, aren't you?"

"Danzo-sama, I—"

"Aren't you?"

Not-Genma gave a visible flinch, but he quickly schooled himself. "Hai."

"Good." Danzo cast an appraising look across me. Then he took three steps back. "Kill him."

What.

What.

"What?"

"No reason for this not to function as additional training, of course. It will be a fight. Shiranui, your goal is to survive. Uzumaki, you goal—"

"Is to kill him?" I asked incredulously. I knew Not-Genma being killed for his failure was an option. That was why I had— But—

If you say yes, he'll think you're agreeing to killing the real Shiranui.

I swallowed thickly, glancing to the side at Not-Genma. That was still Genma's face.

He'll think he's broken you.

At that, I took a step back and turned to face Not-Genma. Something flickered across his face, and he glanced from me to Danzo and back. "You don't have to do this, Pumpkin," he murmured.

I looked towards Danzo, making sure not to hide the conflict in my eyes. Danzo lifted his chin, regarding me solemnly. I looked back towards Not-Genma, drawing my kama. "Pretty sure I do," I rasped.

Not-Genma paused. And then something settled in his expression. Danzo made a pleased sound. "Good. Begin."

Not-Genma was fast. And he wasn't using senbon. Genma always used senbon. Instead, I found myself blocking a tanto with my kama, and poisoned needles didn't factor into the equation at all. But what he did have was superior strength. Superior size. I wouldn't win against him in a straight-up tanto-kama fight.

My wrist burned as I snapped out a chain, trapping up his ankle. I tucked under a slash of his blade and came up with my kama, keeping the chain taut as I did so. He leaned out of the way, fumbling a bit with his newest impediment, and I followed up with another chain from my other wrist. He batted it away with his blade, and I dispelled it just before summoning a new one. This one managed to wrap around his upper right arm. His movements were hampered, now. I had him trapped.

In a way, I was trapped too.

My movement was limited, and I wasn't able to move as quickly or as far as I wanted when he slashed again. And I couldn't swing my kama around to meet it, not with how I was holding my chains. Despite my attempts to twist away, the tanto bit into my shoulder. I retaliated with a snarl and a shock of sharp wind chakra down both chains. I took his gasp of pain as an opportunity to release my chains and shunshin. As I landed, skidding a bit against the concrete, I let my left arm scream again as I forced out another chain. This one wrapped around his neck, but he managed to get his fingers in under it.

I twisted my left hand around and around, wrapping the chain up tight. Pulling, I kicked out at his injured right knee. As he buckled, I swung my kama. I threaded wind chakra down my chain and pulled. Not-Genma stabbed backwards with his tanto.

My kama ripped into his side and my chain into his neck, but I was more focused on the pain stabbing through the right side of my face. My hand slipped from my kama, and my chain shattered. I fell to my knees, the impact jarring its way through my body, and scrabbled against all the blood on my face.

He cut into bone, Kurama informed me, sounding surprisingly level even as his chakra started burning in my face as it worked. I pressed my hand against the injury hard, hoping that it would keep me focused on that. Rather than what was in front of me.

Not-Genma had collapsed.

And he wasn't Not-Genma anymore.

His throat was open, bubbling with blood. Somehow, somehow, his adam's apple bobbed as he tried to swallow. As he breathed. He was alive. He was still breathing, and he was staring at nothing with pale, pale, pale eyes. And I stared back as Yamanaka continued to die right in front of me.

That . . . that wasn't right. Was it?

"Excellent job."

I couldn't look away. Was I supposed to be feeling something? I was definitely feeling something. Of course I was.

. . . right?

"Your fighting style is crude. Barbaric. Initially, I thought that would change as you improved, but it seems to have only strengthened into something even more . . . ."

I blinked, only dimly aware of Kurama trying to call me back to myself from the recesses of my mind. It was a struggle, a fight, to pull my gaze away from the body and up to Danzo, who was standing there and analyzing me as if I hadn't just killed the man—the liar—that I'd been letting hold me for months.

Danzo seemed to have finally thought through what he wanted to say, because as he stared at me from across that body, he finally settled on, "Savage."

3,127.

It started with the tanto. Truth be told, it looked like . . . a tanto. Tantos didn't look particularly unique, didn't have different styles, didn't have anything differentiating one of them from the next. But I knew this tanto. This tanto was special, because it was Itachi's.

And it was laying on the ground next to Genma, who was bleeding out from where I'd slashed open his throat.

"Oh," I said, looking at my bloody hands. "I did that."

And that was true, wasn't it? I was standing over the body. I was familiar with the weapon. With the face. And I almost always went for the throat.

Genma was dead in front of me, and it had definitely been me to kill him.

That probably should have bothered me more.

"You're not actually surprised, are you?"

"Of course not," I responded immediately, a knee-jerk reaction. And then I looked up, spinning around to face the speaker. But that wasn't . . . right. I couldn't be talking to Sophie. I was Sophie.

"You're not," she said, letting her head lean to one side and then the other as she considered me. "Though, technically." She shrugged. "I don't like those technicalities. I try to ignore them, but it's like you make it your job to remind me that I can't ignore you."

Then she was walking, and I scrambled back to get out of her way. The look she gave me at that was half-amused, half-affronted. She tilted her head down to consider the body. "Huh, you really did a number on him."

The world around us shook. Briefly. Just for a second. Sophie looked up, annoyance flickering across her face. "Shut up," she muttered.

"I killed Genma?" Oh. This time it was a question.

Sophie shrugged. "Why not? You've already killed all the other good things in you." Then she turned her arms out, palms towards me as if to show that she wasn't holding anything. As if to show that she was unarmed. "Am I next?"

The world shook again. Sophie's expression darkened. "It's a valid question. It gets hard to breathe here, sometimes. Which is ridiculous, because I don't breathe." That darkening turned to a scowl. "Do it. Get rid of me."

I blinked. "Why would I do that? You're me."

"I'm not—" Sophie leaned back, appraising me. "Let me go. Kill me."

"But—"

"Kill me!"

"Stop," a voice—the voice? I didn't recognize it, did I?—cut in. The world shook again, one final time.

I gasped awake. Awake to an empty room with no Not-Genma. Awake to clean hands that weren't bloody. And to a dream that I just couldn't quite remember.

3,030.

Danzo had introduced him as Torune and then immediately sent us off to kill Matsuda for real this time. No mistakes, he had warned us.

Torune was younger than Yamanaka. Yamanaka hadn't been young, exactly. Not for a shinobi. But Torune was, and for a bit I questioned whether we'd succeed or if Matsuda would be able to run again.

Torune was an Aburame, and Matsuda screamed when the rinkaichu touched him.

When Danzo asked for a report on our success when we returned, Torune didn't tell him how easily I executed doryuheki with just a handful of seals and a tap of my foot.

2,401.

Storage seals were familiar. I knew them well. Knew where each and every line and kanji went in the design. I should be able to do them easily.

Or, according to Danzo, with just a touch.

I did nothing else for over three weeks straight but try. Torune came and went, sometimes occupying the bed where Not-Genma had been and sometimes disappearing for missions in parts unknown. Danzo wasn't even there most days, but I didn't dare stop trying. I didn't want to.

My hands were stained grey from chakra ink and suffering from too many failed seal touches that had burned and snapped against my fingertips. It had become a habit to expect searing pain with each attempt, because it wasn't normal. Chakra was meant for turbulent ninjutsu or delicate genjutsu, not for painting ink from nothing.

But eventually, I pressed my hand against the paper and tried and it worked. Danzo had me seal and unseal object after object until he was satisfied and I was exhausted. And then he moved me to a new task. And another. And another.

1,337.

It was my first time truly alone, truly separate from Danzo, and I couldn't breathe. It was a mission—a solo mission—and I couldn't even sense a Root shinobi following me. Not that there might not be one, at a distance and well hidden, but as far as I could tell? Well.

If I really wanted to, I could run.

But instead, I spent a half-day beforehand pouring over the missions parameter's and known information. And then I headed for Yu no Kuni.

The hardest part was the fact that I, quite simply, had no real experience with where I was going. I had memorized a map of the shinobi nations, yes, and I knew where Yu no Kuni was in relation to where I was coming from, but it was hardly a GPS. I did my best and set my sights where I knew generally I should be and shunshined that way. I might not get exactly where I wanted to go, but at least I'd get there quickly.

I heard it before I found it. The roar. I eased out of a shunshin and paused, listening through the trees. It didn't take me long to break through the forest, into the open air and direct sunlight. The water was louder here. Thunderous as it crashed down between the statues, sending out shockwaves into the valley. And I was left staring up at Madara, letting him loom over me.

I blinked. Well, that wouldn't do.

I made short work of climbing upwards until I was standing atop Madara's head, looking out at Hashirama from across the raging water. The air was hazy with the mist from the waterfall, and I closed my eyes and focused on the feeling of the water on my face. When was the last time I had been able to stop like this? To actually breathe?

I took one last look at Hashirama's towering visage. And then I continued on my way.

1,316.

Hasegawa Botan was in no way an especially dangerous missing-nin, according to the mission's file. When he was still a part of Kusagakure, he'd only ever made it to chunin, and had never been anywhere close to amounting to a frontline fighter. Where he did excel was thievery. When he'd fled Kusagakure, it'd been with countless artifacts in hand. Enough that he'd landed a large bounty on his head.

Danzo didn't care about the bounty. He just wanted one of the jutsu scrolls that'd been stolen.

I made it to the general area that he'd been estimated to escape to. Between myself and nine clones, we scouted and found his hideaway in eleven hours. It was Roku who found the cliff-face that didn't look quite right. It took me another twenty minutes to get to where she'd been after she dispelled.

As I stared at the wall that was clearly meant to be accessed with a doton technique, I considered my options. I could feel a single chakra source past the wall, so Hasegawa was there. It was likely—hopefully? fingers crossed?—that I would win in straight combat. But a quick stealth kill would be preferable for the sake of time and secrecy, although it'd be hard to get inside without him noticing.

A happy medium, then.

I leapt up to stand at the top of the cliff. I brought my hands up into a T, creating a clone. Ichi tilted her head at me. Then she jumped down, falling into a stance in front of the wall and withdrawing the tessen. I brought my hands up again. Rabbit. Boar. Rat. Horse. Tiger. Then I bent and slammed my hands into the side of the cliff-face below me. It split, and then erupted. I jumped backwards as the cliff-face crumbled with a crash and dust clouded into the air. I could hear the roar from my clone and her chakra as she blasted out a wind jutsu, and the loud flare and jump of Hasegawa's chakra as he quickly tried to retaliate. The fight was kicking up too much dirt for me to see clearly, but I could feel his chakra and that was all I needed. I didn't have to worry about friendly fire, after all. It was just a clone.

But still. The memory of my own kama ripping through me in order to reach my main target was enough to knock me unsteady as I stood over Hasegawa's fallen body. I wanted—needed—a moment to collect myself.

But two new chakra had just started burning against my senses.

And I knew one of them.

Panicked, I summoned another clone. As Ichi, henged into a nondescript brunet shinobi without a hitai-ate, sped off to leave a trackable trail, I squashed down on every possible bit of my chakra and vanished with toton. Pressed down against the cliff, I listened. And I watched. It took six more minutes for them to reach the scene, and they dropped from the trees as one, their black and red cloaks billowing around them.

"Huh." Kisame stepped forward and nudged Hasegawa's body with his foot. "That's not right."

I stilled, my chest squeezing. Then I caught my breath, holding it. Not making a sound. I rotated my chakra through my body, burning at my scent to try to keep myself hidden. Just like Danzo had taught me.

"This is fresh," Itachi noted. "Recent."

"Tch. They can't have gotten far. What if they have the kiseru?"

"Then they must be caught."

Kisame huffed. "You search here, then. I'm going after them." And then he launched himself off in the direction Ichi had gone.

I listened to his chakra retreating and watched as Itachi stooped down and started digging through the pouches on the corpse. After just a moment of hesitation, I released my toton and dropped down from the cliff.

Itachi whipped around, sharingan blazing and a kunai in hand. Then he stilled, and that spinning sharingan faded only to be replaced by unadulterated horror.

I tilted my head, considering my options. I wanted to tell him that Sasuke was safe. And happy. I wanted to tell him that I'd missed him. But then I flicked my gaze to where Kisame had gone. I frowned behind my mask.

"Mirai," Itachi breathed.

I turned my gaze back to him. "Kisame, huh? Scared Orochimaru off already?"

His grip on his kunai tightened. "What?"

I sighed, shoulders slumping. Then I nodded to the body. "I didn't do all that work not to get the scroll I need."

Itachi's gaze, sharingan alight again, turned to where Kisame was, still a ways away. Then he stepped to the side. "Why?"

I crouched down and started my own search of the pouches. I went through a couple storage scrolls before I found one banded black and labeled jigoku messatsu. Sealing it away in one of my own storage seals, I got to my feet and considered Itachi again. The teen was watching me cautiously, warily. I reached up and took off my mask.

Something in his eyes tightened when he saw me, and I realized abruptly that I hadn't actually seen what I looked like for almost a year. I wasn't even sure what he saw when he looked at me. I forced myself away from that thought, instead carefully saying, "It's part of my deal for him to keep his hands off people I want him staying away from, including Naruto. And Sasuke."

Itachi caught his breath for just a second. Then he motioned to me, waiting until I put my mask back on. When I'd done so, he murmured, "You should go." Then he knelt down again and continued his own search for his own objective.

"Hai," I said softly, moving to leave. Then I paused. "I've missed you."

"Go," he ordered, not looking up. And then he hesitated. "And thank you."

I smiled behind my mask, only to wince when Ichi's dispelled memories hit me. Memories of her bursting just in time to avoid a painful death from Samehada. Without another word, I jumped into the trees and ran.

1,303.

My wrist ached. It burned. I stared at the numbers and willed them to drop, willed them to lower. They didn't.

You shouldn't be here. You should be returning.

I know. Just . . . just another moment. Please. I lowered my arm and tilted my head back, focusing on the spray on my face and the cool water I was standing waist-deep in. It's so much easier to breathe here.

Seeing the Uchiha really undid you.

And just like that, all the tension I'd been pushing down was back in full force. Trying to ignore that, I ducked down to splash water on my face.

Panic burned in my bones, and I stumbled, falling backwards. I splashed down into the water and it closed over me. In that moment, I was back in the chunin's water prison and I couldn't, couldn't—

I surged upwards, scrambling for the bank. On my knees in the dirt, I coughed and hacked until I could breathe properly again. Then I sighed, leaning my forehead down into the grass. You're right.

Kurama huffed, clearly unimpressed.

Sighing, I reached for my mask. Time to go, then.

541.

Chains were chains. They were one link after another in a long line.

They weren't meant to change shape.

The kunai sat in front of me like it had been for days now, waiting for me to copy it. Waiting for me to figure out how to force my chakra into the right shape, the right size, the right sharpness.

All I'd discovered was how to make it hurt more.

288.

"Would they kill me?"

Torune turned his face to me, but his expression was near impossible to read from behind the mask he always wore, even under his Root one. But even with that, I could see the mild way his lips thinned. "What?"

"Your rinkaichu. If I touched them, would they kill me?" I tilted my head at him. "I'm resistant to poisons. I heal quickly. I could probably survive touching them."

"I don't want to test that."

"Hmm." I smiled. "I like them. Your rinkaichu."

"Thank you." And then he returned to sharpening his tanto as if I'd never spoken.

1.

Dajimu was at least three times my age and definitely over twice my size. He hit hard, and he liked to feel things break under his hands.

My face ached from a punch I hadn't dodged properly, and my shoulder hurt from when I fell the wrong way on it. And when I ducked under his next hit and retaliated with a kunai to his ribs as I went, I was painfully reminded of just how exhausted I was. I was so, so tired. I just wanted—

Absolute agony ripped through my veins, lighting up like fire through my chakra pathways. I let out a shriek, dropping to my knees. The shocked flare of chakra from Dajimu just scraped against my skin. The concrete bit into my hand as I scrabbled for something to hold onto, something to ground me.

Time's up.

Something stung, but I barely registered it through the pain. I hadn't realized it would hurt this much. My left wrist was burning, something hot forcing its way there, and I didn't know if—

You need to end it too.

Gasping for air, I forced chakra down my arm. More, more, more—

And then the pain snapped away so quickly that the very air stung against my skin in its absence. My leg was twisting, twisting, twisting, twist—

I forced a chain out and up against the man that was wrenching my leg, snapping it across his face. When he reeled back from that, I surged upwards with kama in hand. I stabbed it into his shoulder and then ripped it to the side. As he reached for me again, his tanto closing the distance between us, I shunshined backwards.

"Enough," I growled out. "I'm done."

Dajimu stalked in front of me, eying me as if he was looking for the best opening. In the corner of my eye, I could see Danzo watching in interest. I turned a look towards him. "I'm done," I repeated. "We're done."

Danzo held up a hand, and Dajimu stopped his pacing. "Is that so?"

"Unless you intend to keep me here against our agreement." I tilted my head to the side, considering. "You got your year. And now I get to leave."

There was a look in his eyes, and I knew he was surprised. After all, his techniques were effective, tailored to break and rebuild any child that came to him.

Too bad I wasn't exactly a child.

I tossed my kama to the ground and gave a bow that wasn't low enough for me to take my stare from him. "I look forward to seeing you at the council meeting." And then I limped past Dajimu and down the hall, shuddering as Kurama's chakra got to work fixing the damage that'd been done to my body.

It'd been weeks since I'd left the concrete rooms, and the sunlight burned my eyes when I stumbled out into it. I stared up at the Village walls in the distance and brushed a hand over the mask at my hip.

It was time to go home.

0.

Never in my life had a school looked more beautiful to me than the Academy did in that moment. I sighed out every worry, every anxiety I'd had in the past year and closed my eyes, leaning heavily into the tree's rough bark. Across the street, their chakra burned bright, Naruto's louder than the rest. I sucked in a sharp breath, eyes stinging. He was okay. He was okay.

Once I wasn't shaking any longer, I forced myself to focus again. They were all there. They were all there. There was no window. No way for me to look inside. No way for me to actually see them. But I could hear their chakra, and that was far more than I'd had in a year. It wasn't quite enough, wasn't exactly what I wanted. But it was what I had. I dragged my hand up to my mouth and bit down on my knuckles in order to keep all my sounds inside.

You have to meet with the Hokage.

I know. I shifted, wincing at the stiffness in my uniform from dried blood. I didn't want to leave. I wanted to stay here, listening to Naruto's bright chakra because, kami, I had missed him—

Mirai.

Fine.

I was so tired, and with each passing minute that I spent sneaking my way to the apartment, my limbs got heavier and heavier and heavier. Finally, I stumbled up to the apartment. The knob wouldn't turn, locked. With a sigh, I leaned my head forward against the door. I didn't have my key. Hadn't had it for a while.

I unsealed my lockpicks and carefully broke my way into my own home. I shuffled inside, staring hazily around.

It was . . . practically empty. All the books were gone. No pillows or blankets in sight. No dishes in the kitchen sink. No shoes by the door. No cleaning that was waiting to be done. And I was left standing lost in the middle of the living room, staring around. Finally, I unclipped my mask and let it clatter to the ground.

My skin was starting to itch from all the dried, crusted blood.

I peeled off my uniform bit by bit as I stumbled to the bathroom. I fumbled for the light, squinting up at it when the room barely lit up. Three of the four lightbulbs were out. Huh.

The shower was missing all of Naruto and Sasuke's things. Mine were untouched, sitting exactly where they had been when I'd left. I turned the shower on, wincing when the icy water hissed against my skin. Cold, cold, cold, cold—

And then it was hot. I gasped in surprise, tilting my head back and letting the stinging, steaming water work at the blood and grime in my hair. All my showers in Root had involved near-freezing water, drowning, or both. So the way this water made my skin red and the way it burned at my sore muscles and injuries was more than welcome.

I wasn't sure how long I stayed there, but eventually the water ran cold again and it dragged me back into that water prison. I gasped, wrenching at the handle and turning the water off. Then I scrambled out of the shower, jerking on the shower curtain to get it out of the way. There was a crack, and the curtain gave as the rod snapped. Scowling, I ripped the curtain down the rest of the way and dropped it into the tub. I toweled down and then wrapped the towel around my body, stepping up to look in the mirror.

Tilting my head to the side, I reached up and pressed my fingers into the scar Not-Genma's tanto had etched into my face, a straight shot from my right ear to my chin. It was deep, and added to the twisted way my whisker marks looked like I'd been clawed. I swayed, shaking my head to try to clear the black spots encroaching on my vision.

I had to squint in order to see my arm clearly, pressing my chakra into the fourth seal and retrieving a new Root uniform. It was the only thing I had that fit, and it would have to do for now. After dragging myself into the uniform, I rubbed my eyes with one hand and used my other to feel my way back out into the living room. When I bumped my knees against the couch, I sighed in relief.

The couch was the softest thing I'd felt in forever.

You're supposed to meet with the Hokage.

I'm taking a second. That's all. Just a second.

"Oh, kami. Mirai!"

I jerked in surprise and hit the ground hard. Gasping, I forced my dry eyes open and squinted up at the ceiling. Where was the concrete?

"Mirai! Look at me! Where— Kami, what happened—"

I flinched as a hand touched my shoulder and yanked away in a shunshin, slamming into a wall and sinking to the ground. Groaning, I squinted. My heart squeezed. "Yuugao? Hayate?" I sucked in a breath. "Shit. I didn't mean to fall asleep." I scratched the sleepiness from my eyes and stumbled up to my feet. "I have to—"

"Mirai—"

I shunshined again when Yuugao reached for me. "I have to meet with the Hokage," I rushed to explain. "I wasn't supposed to fall asleep. I was supposed to go there right away." I threw one last look at them. "Sorry." And then I escaped out the door.