Uchiha Itachi walked through the streets of his clan's district, his five-year-old brother Sasuke following at his heels. Despite being only ten years of age, Itachi was already a genin whose talent was well-known throughout the village. In spite of this, Itachi was a pacifist who much preferred spending time with his baby brother to going on missions. In fact, he was looking forward to this particular excursion.
"Good afternoon, Itachi-kun, Sasuke-chan."
Itachi turned toward the voice and smiled warmly, "Oh, good afternoon, Megumi-san, Nichi-san. And hello to you too, Aiko-chan."
Uchiha Megumi was a woman who had married into the Uchiha Clan, at the cost of being disowned by her own clan. She was a renowned behavioral analyst who currently served as an advisor to the Third Hokage. Her husband, Uchiha Nichi, was a somewhat secretive man who was best-known for having rescued Megumi during the last war before deciding to spontaneously elope with her. However, to say he was secretive was not to say he was unfriendly. Quite the opposite. Nichi had a warm and unassuming personality that put the people around him at ease.
In fact, it was their daughter, Aiko, who was the most mysterious of all. A year younger than Sasuke, Aiko was a quiet girl who mostly kept to herself and seemed to be a be a bit shy around anyone except her parents. However, from the way that she often gazed at her surroundings with her large, black eyes, Itachi felt that she was simply observing people in order to form an opinion about them.
"Where are the two of you off to?" Nichi asked warmly. Sasuke was looking quizzically at Aiko, who was more or less hiding behind her mother's legs.
"We're on our way to Sora-ku to run an errand for Chichiue." Itachi replied.
"Ah! What a coincidence!" Megumi said with a smile, "We were just about to head there ourselves!"
"Oh, really?" Itachi asked.
"Yes." Nichi confirmed with a nod, "I need to restock on ninja tools and Megumi needs to deliver something to Nekobaa."
"This will be Aiko's first time going there. Why don't we all go together?" Megumi suggested.
Sasuke pouted, not liking the idea of having his precious alone time with Itachi interrupted, but Itachi smiled at him. "It's all right, Sasuke. Aiko-chan can help you with your mission while we're there. It will be good practice for you two in working with others." Sasuke immediately perked up at this being a way to train and enthusiastically agreed.
"Mission?" Megumi asked in confusion.
"I'll explain when we get there." Itachi told her.
兄弟
A few hours later, the group had arrived at Sora-ku, and after greeting Nekobaa and her granddaughter, Tamaki, Itachi accepted a book from the old woman, flipped through the pages, and then found what he wanted.
"Okay Sasuke." He began as he knelt down to his brother's level. "Today you need to find this ninja cat and get its paw print." The older boy held up a photo of the cat in question, "Work together with Aiko-chan to do it. Figure out the best way to make the greatest use of your individual abilities."
"Right, Niisan!" Sasuke said enthusiastically.
Itachi smiled warmly and turned as Tamaki brought a pair of cat ear headbands to him before holding them out to the younger children. "You'll need these to locate your target."
"What are these?" Aiko asked as she took the pair beneath the ones that Sasuke had grabbed.
Sasuke grinned as he fitted his on his head, "They make the cats think that we're cats too!"
Aiko's eyes widened and she looked back at her headband, "Really? With just these...?"
"That's right." Itachi said as he stood back up. "You two have until we're finished with our business to find him, so you'd better get started."
"Right!" Sasuke exclaimed enthusiastically before running out the door.
"Oh!" Aiko said in surprise, before hurrying after the other child.
"What's this thing with gathering paw prints?" Nichi asked in confusion.
Itachi laughed slightly, "Sasuke's been coming here with me on errands for a while, but he would get bored and throw tantrums, so I came up with this as a way to keep him busy."
"He seems to greatly enjoy it." Megumi said with a smile.
"Yes, and it's fun watching him." Itachi said with a nod.
兄弟
A while later, Sasuke and Aiko stood on the rooftop of a building, where they were able to see their target. "There he is." Sasuke remarked. "Now it's just a matter of capturing him. Normally I'd set up a trap and herd him towards it, but since you're here, it would probably be easier if one of us lies in wait and the other chases the target."
"In that case, you should be the one to chase him, Sasuke-senpai." Aiko remarked, "You know how to do it. It's easier for me to lie in wait. Papa has taught me how to suppress my chakra and move without being seen."
Sasuke nodded. Even if he didn't quite like playing the distraction, Aiko's plan made sense. He handed an earpiece to Aiko, put his own in, and then headed out.
A few minutes later, Sasuke chased the ninja cat through the streets, occasionally using kunai and shuriken to prevent it from straying from the path that he wanted it to take. The cat turned a corner, and then yowled as it was caught by the awaiting Aiko.
"There, there." Aiko said gently as she scratched the cat in a place it liked, soothing it almost instantly.
"Wow, you really are good at stealth." Sasuke said as he panted after coming around the corner, "And how did you learn to soothe cats like that?"
"Mama taught me before we came." Aiko replied, apparently forgetting that the cat in her arms thought that she was a female cat herself.
"You're great at massage, kitten." The cat purred, "But don't you think you're a little young for me?"
"Huh?" Aiko said in confusion. Sasuke resisted the urge to laugh and walked over to the girl.
"You'd better hand him to me." He told her with a grin as he held his arms out.
"Oh, okay." Aiko replied before transferring the cat to Sasuke's arms, "Here, hold him like this."
Sasuke smiled as he cradled the cat, "Now all that's left is to take him to Nii—"
Suddenly Aiko gasped, glancing over her shoulder before instantly taking the cat back from Sasuke. Before Sasuke—or the cat—could react, she whipped out a small scroll and an inkpad.
"Hey, What are you doing...?!" The cat exclaimed in protest, but he still didn't have time to react before Aiko took hold of his right foreleg, pressed it into the inkpad, and then to the scroll. The cat essentially fainted from shock, but Aiko swiftly rolled up the scroll, grabbed the inkpad, and then grabbed Sasuke's hand and began to run.
"What kind of kittens are you...?" The mortified cat mumbled in a daze.
"Hey! What gives?!" Sasuke demanded as Aiko dragged him along while slipping the scroll and inkpad into a pouch on her waist and retrieving a small object from within the pouch.
"Somebody was watching us! Even now, they're following us, I'm sure of it! We need to find a place to hide!" She pulled the cap off the end of the small object she was holding with her teeth, spit it out to the side, then licked the end of the paper. It began to spark and she tossed it into the air as they ran. The object launched into the air and exploded in a small burst of flame.
"So you give away our position?!" Sasuke demanded in alarm.
"That was a signal flare designed by my father in case of emergencies." Aiko explained, "The fuse is made of litmus paper, and can be lit by coming into contact with the fire chakra inherent to our clan. Furthermore, the small flame it produces contains the chakra of the one who activated it."
"So even if your parents don't see the flare, they'll feel it." Sasuke realized.
"Right." Aiko replied, "But until they find us, we need to play hide-and-seek, and we need to play really well."
兄弟
Meanwhile, Aiko's parents and Itachi were still chatting with Nekobaa, but Itachi looked toward the door with slight worry. "I really thought that Sasuke and Aiko-chan would be heading back by now, but their auras don't seem to be heading this way..."
Suddenly the eyes of all three Uchihas widened as they felt a burst of Aiko's chakra.
"What was that...?" Itachi questioned.
"It was a signal flare I gave to Aiko in case of emergencies." Nichi said grimly, "Once activated, it releases a burst of the user's chakra, so that even if their allies aren't in a place where they can see the flare, they can still feel it."
"Aiko would never use something so important as a toy. They must be in some kind of trouble." Megumi said with equal gravity.
Itachi's frown deepened, "There aren't any ninja cats in Sora-ku that could pose that much of a danger to them..."
"I know." Megumi replied, "You would never send Sasuke-chan out to gather their paw prints if you thought it would place him in genuine danger. Which most likely means that Aiko activated the flare because of a human."
Nichi nodded in agreement, "Aiko's an observant girl. If someone was watching them, she probably noticed them. There's no choice, we'll have to track them down. They're probably going to suppress their chakra, so we'll have to use the Sharingan to find them."
"The ninja cats might be able to help you as well." Nekobaa remarked, but Nichi shook his head.
"Aiko's smart on top of being observant, even though those headbands won't fool a human, she'd probably insist on keeping them in place to avoid being noticed by the cats and causing an uproar among them. Beyond that, if the cats think that she and Sasuke are cats too, they may be able to enlist their aid."
兄弟
Just as Nichi had predicted, Aiko and Sasuke were currently hiding behind a pile of crates in an abandoned warehouse, a ninja cat by their side.
"You kittens hide here." The cat told them, "We'll deal with any human that comes in here."
"Thank you." Aiko whispered back, "Oh, but, if you see a human wearing the Uchiha crest, let them through. They're our allies."
"Got it." The cat said with a nod before jumping up to lie in wait with the other cats.
Aiko sighed and looked at Sasuke, "We need to suppress our chakra as much as possible. Papa and your brother have the Sharingan, so they'll still be able to find us. We need to avoid being found until they get here."
Sasuke nodded and focused on doing as Aiko said.
A few moments later, a man stepped into the warehouse and looked around, only to immediately dodge as a ninja cat leapt out at him. "Heh." He chuckled, "I see you kids managed to recruit some help, but it's not going to matter." A moment later, all the cats collapsed. Sasuke and Aiko looked at each other in confusion, before Aiko placed a finger to her lips. She looked around the crates carefully and caught sight of the man's eyes, before she quietly gasped and covered Sasuke's eyes with her hand while shutting her own eyes tightly.
"Don't look." She hissed as quietly as possible, "He has a visual prowess... without the Sharingan, we—"
"Oh? So neither of you have the Sharingan?" The man asked as he stepped around the crates, causing Aiko to gasp and whimper as she instinctively curled up tighter next to Sasuke, "That's too bad, but at least the potential is still there."
"What do you want with the Sharingan?" Nichi suddenly asked as he and Megumi dropped down from a hole in the roof of the building, "You have the Ketsuryuugan, so you shouldn't have any use for the Sharingan."
"Oh?" The man said with interest, "You know of this visual prowess of mine?"
"The Ketsuryuugan... the visual prowess wielded by the Chinoike Clan, who were thought to have been destroyed by the Uchiha Clan during the Era of Warring States." Nichi answered, "Its genjutsu abilities are said to rival those of the Sharingan."
"Heh. You're well informed." The man said, "But I have no interest in the history between our clans. As for why I want the Sharingan, well, that isn't quite accurate. What I really want is a child who possesses the Sharingan, or at least the potential to awaken it."
"A child?" Nichi asked with narrowed eyes. His own Sharingan was active, while Megumi had her eyes closed.
"That's right." The man said with a nod, "You might say that I am a collector. That is, my hobby is collecting Kekkei Genkai, or more specifically, children who possess them. The more rare the trait, the better. That said, the Sharingan isn't necessarily the rarest of abilities, but since the Uchiha live in the safety of a large village like Konohagakure, obtaining a child who has it is quite difficult. I actually came here to Sora-Ku on other business when what do I see but two talented children running through the streets with the Uchiha Crest on their backs. It was an opportunity I couldn't waste. That said, while I wasn't going to great lengths to conceal my presence, I didn't expect the little girl to notice me, or to have that signal flare on her."
"I'm a cautious man." Nichi remarked calmly, "I've trained my daughter to be aware of her surroundings and to be prepared for emergencies."
The man grinned, "All the more reason to take her then."
Nichi's eyes narrowed and he readied a kunai, "We won't allow you to take either of them! Megumi!"
"Right!" Megumi replied as she and Nichi dashed forward to attack the man.
"Where's Niisan?" Sasuke asked nervously, still keeping his eyes closed.
"Probably hiding nearby." Aiko whispered back, "Papa probably told him to hang back in case he and Mama need support."
"Will they be okay?" Sasuke asked. He knew nothing of Nichi and Megumi's abilities.
"I-It's okay." Aiko managed uncertainly, "Mama has sparred with Papa a lot to be able to fight without getting caught in genjutsu."
The two children remained huddled as the battle raged on, but suddenly a cry of pain pierced through the chaos.
"Papa!" Aiko screamed at the same time her mother called out to her husband. Both had recognized his voice and had instinctively opened their eyes to look. What happened next took mere seconds, but time seemed to slow down to Aiko.
Her father was falling, a gash across his torso. Her mother was caught in a genjutsu and crumpled lifelessly to the ground. The man turned and ran toward the two children before he was stopped by the ten-year-old Itachi. Somewhere in all of this, Aiko screamed.
"I won't allow you to take them!" Itachi declared as he held the assailant's kunai back with his tanto.
The man chuckled, "You have good eyes, but I prefer to avoid older children. They're more difficult to train. Besides, judging by your skill, I'm guessing that you're already a full-fledged shinobi in Konoha."
Itachi said nothing as he glared at the man, but the stare-off was interrupted mere seconds later by the frightened voice of Sasuke.
"Niisan! Aiko passed out!" The younger boy cried in a panic.
'The trauma probably awakened her Sharingan, which quickly drained her chakra.' Itachi reasoned to himself before turning his head slightly toward Sasuke, "Sasuke! Carry Aiko-chan back to Nekobaa's place! I'll catch up with you!"
Sasuke's lip quivered, wanting to protest, but then his eyes steeled with determination and he nodded, "Right!" With strength that defied his age, the five-year-old lifted the unconscious Aiko onto his back and ran off as Itachi continued fighting the strange man.
"Oh? So the boy is your brother then. I suppose that explains the angry look in your eyes." The collector remarked.
"Tell me who you are." Itachi demanded calmly.
The man grinned slightly, "My name is Oyashiro En."