I'm proud to announce, ladies and gentleman, that the introduction of this story is officially over. Today we start the salty arc! (I know, it's a shitty name, but I used all my creativity in this chapter already so sue me.)

Also, I've been asked about Obito's grandma. She is an anime only character, and I'll only be taking characters from the anime when I deem it necessary for the plot, so sadly Obito's grandma never existed in this universe. He does have a nice neighbour with a lot of cats though.

For those of you who want Reishi to be friends with Rin, don't worry it will happen. Eventually.

Finally, you might notice that I have changed Reishi's surname from Tenka to Ikotsu.

Reishi isn't really the most popular kid at the academy, as you could imagine. She's not approachable. She's not fun. She doesn't try to make friends either, and the only time the other kids saw her smile was that time she made a boy cry with a kick to the gut. If they knew the word sadist, they would have probably used it to describe her.

So it's completely understandable that, to her, it's a mystery why suddenly the other kids seem very interested in her person.

She decided to come again this morning as if nothing had happened because nobody told her not to, basically, and she's already regretting it. The moment she sets foot on the academy all the kids on her class gather around her, excitedly asking questions about her 'special training' and how did she get so good so fast. She's very confused for a second, until she realizes that news of her evening with the Uchiha clan head must have spread and reached her classmates.

Wow, for people that lives off of secrecy, Ninjas aren't very discreet, are they?

Her teacher practically saves her from the swarm when she comes in and announces to her in a kind voice that she will skip a few years ahead and that she's moving to a new class. She looks genuinely happy on Reishi's behalf.

Reishi herself isn't so happy as she is resigned to her fate, but she forces a smile through anyways for some reason. The rest of the kids suddenly look unsettled; she knows she doesn't smile much, but damn, it doesn't look that scary, does it?

Oushi-sensei, who doesn't look near as unnerved as the rest of the class – but could be faking –, guides her to a class on the second floor, and asks her to wait for a while until she is called in.

Reishi tries to direct some chakra to her ears to hear what is happening on the other side of the door, but fails at it. The sound comes and goes constantly like trying to find a radio channel, which is something normal because she hasn't been training that sort of sophisticated chakra enhancing yet, so she's not too disappointed.

She can hear a male voice on the other side, muted. She deduces that it belongs to her new assigned teacher, he's probably informing the class about her.

After a few minutes more of waiting, the door opens and she gets a glimpse of the classroom from behind a burly man; there's at least three rows of curious children staring at her. On the far end of the room and sitting on the first row, she sees Obito and Rin sitting together. While Obito seems ecstatic at seeing her and waves enthusiastically, Rin seems fairly uncomfortable with the situation.

Reishi doesn't blame her, this is very awkward.

When she finally looks up at her new teacher, she finds him frowning down at her. She probably took too long to scan the room and he felt she was ignoring him. Boo-hoo, what a tragedy.

"I take it you're the new addition to my class?" He takes out a sheet of paper and reads something in it with an arched brow. Like hell he didn't read it earlier, he's just making her wait because she ignored him. "Well, what are you waiting for? Go ahead and introduce yourself to the class."

She feels the urge to punch that man. She feels the urge to punch him very hard. This is the beginning of a beautiful relationship based on hate and spite, she just knows it, she can see it in his eyes. What he doesn't know is just how petty she can be. He probably won't know until she graduates, but he'll know, eventually. Probably. If she remembers.

(She probably won't even remember his name after a week.)

The moment Reishi walks to the front of the class and sees all the eyes fixate on her, all the anxiety and fears she used to have as a child in her first life come back. There's just something terrifying about talking in front of a crowd, it doesn't matter the experience you have in life.

She takes a deep breath and focuses her eyes on Obito, who is beaming at her, and mechanically speaks the memorized speech. Thank goodness that the introduction thing has somewhat of a script or she would have started to stutter, she was never good at improvising in front of a crowd.

She scans the room in search of an empty seat and finds one at the back of the class, near a boy that's giving her the worst glare she has seen coming from a kid in a long time. He is wearing a black bandanna and a simple black outfit over some mesh and his face looks like somebody had just farted an inch away from it. Still, that's the only empty seat left, so she'll take what she can get.

Soon enough it's apparent that his constipated face isn't because of her; he has, in fact, a bad case of the resting bitch face. Reishi is glad that she's not the only one with that problem in the class. She's also glad that their combined aura keeps the rest of the children at bay, she's not in the mood for their curious stares.

The class is nothing special, the teacher is explaining the concept of guerrilla warfare, and she has already studied about its uses and probably about any strategies or tactics the teacher can come up with. It's not that she likes the subject, but the library has a depressing lack of fiction books and she gets very bored really fast. It's not like she has anything better to do than reading or hanging out with Obito, normally adults don't get into interesting conversations with kids. It's usually 'what's your favourite ice-cream flavour?' or 'what do you want to be when you grow up?', which is a stupid question, because at least seventy percent of the children in the village answer 'ninja' anyways. It's a fucking ninja village, what were they expecting, an archaeologist? She would pick that over mindless soldier anytime, but it's not like she has a choice.

At recess the teacher insists on her staying behind so he can make sure she's keeping up with the class. It's mind-numbingly boring, so boring she wants to pluck her eyes out with a kunai, but she's a grown up woman and she endures. Also it's a very good excuse to avoid Obito and Rin. She doesn't like awkward situations and she doesn't want Obito to feel like he has to pick between her and Rin. It would be nice if he just picked Rin and got it over with, but knowing him, having to pick at all would tear him apart.

After recess they have the more physical classes, like throwing weapons, sparring and physical tests (to keep track of their growth). Now that she can stop holding back – because what would be the point now – she is pleased to see that she is in the top ten of the class. She's not in first or even second place, mind you, but considering that the rest of the class has been training two years more than her it's not so bad.

All in all, the day ends without her having to interact with Rin, and Reishi is pretty satisfied about it.

She feels satisfied, that is, until she sees the ANBU waiting at the gates of the academy. She hopes it's not for her. She really hopes it's not for her.

But alas, life is pain and destiny is a cruel thing so the ANBU – this time it's easier to tell that it's a man – walks up to her and asks her to follow him. At least he isn't Fugaku. And he is going at a normal-ish pace that she can follow without dying.

To her surprise, he leads her into the Uchiha compound and then into Fugaku's house and then just- he leaves. He leaves her alone. In front of Fugaku's house. Alone. She's starting to hate ANBU. Creepy sexy bastards, the lot of them...

She has no instructions, and also nothing better to do because it isn't like Fuhaku is waiting for her home or anything, so she rings the bell and waits until the door opens.

Fugaku looks in front of him and frowns when he doesn't see anybody, then looks down and sighs when he spots Reishi. He seems resigned and Reishi is quite offended, to be honest, she also doesn't want to be here but at least she isn't showing it. There's this thing called 'being polite', he should try it sometime.

He ushers her inside, where the smell of something delicious wafts from a nearby room, probably the kitchen, and guides her to where a very busy Mikoto is. She seems to be cooking some sort of stew. She also seems to have some difficulties reaching a wooden spoon that is on the counter while she stirs something in a frying pan so it won't get burnt.

Reishi rushes in to help with whatever she can, remembering how she would help her own mother in her first life. For a moment Mikoto blurs and a shadow takes her place, the shadow thanks her when she hands it the wooden spoon that it was trying to reach, but the voice sounds wrong. She realizes that it's Mikoto talking to her and the shadow vanishes, a wave of nostalgia washing through her.

"I'll finish that, you should rest," comes Fugaku's voice from behind her. For a moment she had forgotten he was there. Mikoto smiles at her husband and goes to sit at the kitchen table, squeezing Reishi's shoulder as she walks by. "Ikotsu-san, please set the table," he says.

"Uh, okay," she says, a little confused. Apparently, they expect her to eat with them? Well, not that she minds much, but she would have appreciated some sort of notice. Not a formal invitation via letter but an 'hey, so, tomorrow you're eating at my house' would have been nice.

When she's finished setting the table she hands three plates to Fugaku, once he has filled them she puts the first one in front of Mikoto and the other two to her left and in front of her respectively. This way Fugaku is at the head of the table with Mikoto by his right and Reishi at his left. Who would have thought that the lessons about protocol that Fuhaku insisted on giving her would be useful one day?

"How was the academy today, Reishi-chan? Fugaku told me you had skipped two years!"

Of course he knew, why wouldn't he? "It was... interesting. Thank you for asking Mikoto-san." Reishi doesn't really know what to say about her academy experience today, other than it was rather boring and dull, so she settles for being polite.

Mikoto isn't deterred by her evasiveness, so she keeps asking about things. About her friends, about her favourite subject, about her life in general... about her family.

"Oh! One day you could invite your mom over! We should have a girls day!" She says enthusiastically, until a look from Fugaku makes her frown. He must be trying to convey what a messed up event would that be with his eyes alone. Reishi agrees internally with him.

Mikoto looks at Fugaku, and then back at Reishi, who looks like she has retreated back into herself and is now moving a piece of carrot from one side of the plate to another. After that, Mikoto tentatively tries to lift up the mood, and Reishi smiles politely at her, if only to reassure the woman that she isn't mad at her. It was an honest mistake, not everybody knows that her 'family' is basically nonexistent.

They clean the table together, Fugaku and her, while Mikoto goes to rest – or that's what Reishi guesses – after eating. It's an awkward silent affair, because Fugaku barely acknowledges her presence unless he has to instruct her to do something and because it feels oddly domestic for Reishi and she finds herself thinking about Ryouji. In four months it will be the anniversary of his death. It confuses her, how time passes so quickly and yet so slow. She feels as if it had happened yesterday, and still, it's like a decade has already passed with how different her life is now.

Fugaku distracts her from her thoughts by calling her, he has already finished washing the dishes and is waiting for her at the doorstep. His face is carefully neutral but she knows she has spent too many time lost in thought, because his eyes say that he's thinking. He's trying his best not to frown.

Reishi follows him to the room where she took the tests last time and sits on the table in front of him.

"I had a talk with Lord Hokage," a pause, "about your skill level." He pauses again, this time to see if she has anything to say on the matter. She doesn't, and so he goes on. "Your intellect is clearly above that of your peers, way above any student at the academy," he adds almost begrudgingly, "though your reflexes and physical prowess have room to improve. You haven't had anyone to train you outside the academy, so it is expected that you wouldn't have reached your full potential. However, with this in mind, the Hokage decided that it was best to put you in a class with your skill level, so you could spar with your peers. I take it you took the physical tests today?" He makes a pause so Reishi can answer and she nods. "What did you rank?"

"I'm on the top ten, the eighth." At this Fugaku frowns and rubs his shoulder, the same shoulder she incidentally kicked yesterday, and she sees that there's a bruise peeking out from under his kimono. It's nice to know that she's not the only one that ended a little bit purple after their spar. Fugaku notices her staring and their eyes meet for a second, he rises an eyebrow, daring her to comment on it, and she looks away and clears her throat loudly.

"That is something I can work with," he concedes. She forgets for a second what they were talking about but recovers instantly. Right, the class ranking. "In case you haven't realized already," he pauses to glare at Reishi when she snorts, then he clears his throat and keeps talking as if nothing happened, "I am going to be your assigned tutor, or shishō, until further notice. To do that I am going to need you to tell me what you think are your worst flaws so we can work on them. I trust that you are mature enough to at least do that?"

He phrases that as a question but Reishi knows that it's actually a statement: if you're going to be my student you must show at least some lever of intelligence and/or maturity. It seems like a sensible standard, but Reishi would have respected it more if he had said it out loud instead of being passive-aggressive. As it is, she's slightly offended. However, she doesn't let this show when she answers.

"I have to work on my endurance, I can stand short bouts of action but I falter in the longer spars. I have to work on my senbon throwing skills and I have zero experience with jutsus," she lists, and Fugaku acknowledges each one with a nod.

"We will work on your chakra control for now and later we might move on to throwing practice."

They go to a training ground, this one a different one from last time, and he hands her a paper. Before he has any time to explain she channels a wisp of chakra into it, making it scrunch up between her fingers, and she looks at him expectantly. Inside her head she's shouting and doing cartwheels because she finally knows what chakra nature she has, a question that has been stored on the back of her mind for five years.

"Lightning," Fugaku states, "it has piercing capabilities, as well as being able to paralyse your enemies and travelling through conductive materials."

Reishi nods along his explanation, she had already read on it but she isn't going to interrupt him over something so small. When he's finished, he guides her through some chakra exercises, activating his sharingan to make sure she is doing them correctly. The leaf exercise is a given, and she passes that test with flying colours. He also has her try picking up bigger objects, like twigs, with short chakra strings. This takes her almost an hour to get correctly, but when she does she gets a grunt of approval and, surprise surprise, more exercises.

The new exercises turn out to be tree walking and water walking, at which she shows various degrees of success.

At tree walking she fails, she fails horribly everytime and she would swear that during one of her falls she hears Fugaku snort, though when she looks at him he has the same neutral face as minutes before her ass met the ground. By the end of that particular exercise she is proud to say that her butt cheeks have developed quite an intimate relationship with the ground. They are going steady, some are talking about marriage.

To her immense surprise, and Fugaku's, even if he doesn't show it, she is decent at water walking. She isn't sure why has Fugaku made her try it, given her terrible failure at tree walking, but she has managed to keep a steady enough stand on the surface of the nearby lake. After a few minutes of silence and her not moving, a kunai cuts the air inches away from her right ear, making her lose control and sink to her knees.

"Dodge and don't sink," is all Fugaku says before throwing three more kunais at her.

She quickly scrambles to keep herself afloat, her instincts kicking in, and dodges the attack. Two of the kunais have been thrown way off-target, on purpose, no doubt, so she only has to worry about one. Fugaku is decided to not leave her space to breathe though, and he throws two more, this time both directed at her.

They keep this for a long while, until Reishi's breaths come short and puffy and her lungs burn. She has fallen into the cold water several times and even though she's freezing, she's too stubborn to stop.

Finally, Fugaku calls her when the sun has set, examining her wet appearance with a critical look. They both walk back to his house, mostly because Reishi left her bag with the books – that she has already read because she has too many free time on her hands – of the academy there and she kind of wants them back. Or at least that's what she thinks is the main motive until she's gathering her things and Fugaku walks back into the room she was in with a towel and looks at her... offended? Alarmed? She doesn't know, she's confused. And what is that towel for again?

Her last question is answered when Fugaku sends her – it's a command, not a suggestion – to take a bath upstairs. She's not going to disobey the man that has been throwing pointy objects at her the whole evening so she rushes upstairs, where she finds a single room with the lights on. Mikoto must have already gone to bed then, just how late is it?

She leaves her wet clothes on the room right before the bathroom and sinks into the hot water, suppressing a gasp of surprise at how hot it is. Against her cold skin it feels like it's boiling. She relaxes in the tub, feeling her muscles loosen up with every second, until the water doesn't feel like it's going to cook her alive, and then begins to scrub. Usually you clean yourself before entering the tub so you don't dirty the water too much, but she was in a rush and she forgot, so she'll have to make do.

When she comes out to the room where she left her clothes, they're nowhere to be seen, and a small kimono that definitely wasn't there before is resting on a chair. When she tries it on, she confirms that it's her exact size. She can't decide if this is thoughtful or creepy.

She goes back to the room with the table, where Fugaku is sipping some sort of warm beverage, probably tea. He takes a look at her and nods almost imperceptibly.

"It's Mikoto's. A welcome present."

"I will thank her when I see her." Thoughtful it is then.

Fugaku suddenly frowns and leaves, making her think that maybe she said the wrong thing, or that maybe he went to wake his wife up, though that's ridiculous and she doesn't know why would he do that. Is it that important to thank her right now? Has she offended the entire Uchiha clan because she wasn't going to thank her right away?

The Uchiha clan head comes back a moment later, without his wife and with another, smaller, towel in hand. Then he sits in front of her and proceeds to dry her hair. Or try to. He's trying his best but he's not very good at it. She wants to tell him that she can do it herself but she is too weirded out to do so.

"From now on I expect you here all evenings at five sharp," he says, like he's not drying her hair as he speaks, "on Saturdays you will be here from eleven in the morning to six in the afternoon. Sundays are off, but I do expect you to keep a minimum training routine."

"I usually train with a friend on Sundays," she mutters, still very confused. He hums non-committally, he seems to be getting the hang of drying children's hair, because it isn't as disorienting as before and he is being gentler. She wonders if the only reason he accepted to have her as an apprentice was to use her as training for his future son. She is still weirded out.

"Is he good?"

"He's an Uchiha."

"Is he."

"Obito Uchiha."

"...I see."

Fugaku doesn't say anything else until he is finished and examines his work – Reishi's hair – with a frown. She is sure that it has puffed out and looks fluffy like a cloud, it doesn't help that her hair is the colour of stormy clouds.

He produces a comb from... somewhere, and tries to tame the mess she calls hair. With various degrees of success. The same degree as her tree walking, to be precise. He doesn't seem satisfied with this outcome when she finally leaves the house to go back to her own and she doesn't hold it against him, she knows this battle too well.

This has been... a weird incident, some would say. Though when she thinks about it, she does look like a five year old, with big eyes and pudgy cheeks and the like. She examines her reflection in a shop window and remembers that she is also wearing the kimono Mikoto gave her. It's simple, of a yellowish orange with an orange sash. Some autumn leaves, the same colour as the sash, swirl on the sleeves and lower part of the kimono. She guesses she has been adopted by the Uchiha family, albeit temporarily (she hopes).

Reishi sighs, it seems like the more she tries to avoid people – people that are going to die horribly and she can't, won't, do anything about it – the more they flock towards her, as if they smell her reluctance in the air.

She keeps walking, trying not to think too much about the Uchiha massacre. It's none of her business. Her one and only priority would be Obito, but he will be long gone by that time, so she has no reason to feel bad about it. She doesn't know these people, that's it. Not. Her. Problem.

The kimono she's wearing seems to double its weight.

When she arrives home, Fuhaku is up and well dressed, seemingly ready to go out. The woman spares a glance at her when Reishi stops to stare at her, notices the orange kimono, and frowns, but makes no comment about it.

"You're home late," she says instead. It's a fact, not an accusation. An invitation to explain why, to make some cordial small talk. Reishi doesn't answer for a while, watching the woman fumble with her purse, no doubt making sure she isn't forgetting anything.

"I've been busy... And it looks like you have too."

"My sisters convinced me to go have dinner with them," Fuhaku answers. Once she would have said 'your aunts'.

"That's good."

There really isn't anything else they have to talk about, and it doesn't seem like Fuhaku wants to elongate this conversation, so Reishi takes her leave and goes to her room to change into her pyjamas. She hears the front door open and close while she's changing.

After heating up some left overs from the day before – because right now she isn't in the mood for cooking – and eating them while reading a book, she decides it's time to go to sleep. Tomorrow she has to go to the academy, and apparently now she will have to incorporate 'training with Fugaku' to her personal schedule.

She's already exhausted after just one training session, she doesn't want to even imagine what is going to be like doing that every day of the week. Like hell, probably.

A door slamming shut wakes Reishi hours later, and she's up and ready for a fight in seconds. Her brain tells her that it's just Fuhaku coming back, her adrenaline tells her it's a threat. She hears the familiar clinking of glass coming from the kitchen, confirming that it's Fuhaku, pouring herself a glass of wine probably.

Even though all she wants to do is crawl back under the covers, she decides to go and make sure that everything is alright.

When she arrives at the kitchen, Fuhaku is slumped over the counter, the glass now forgotten as she clutches a wine bottle with her right hand. She seems to be having some sort of panic attack.

Reishi walks towards her slowly, with the intention of... something, she's not sure what but she'll figure out something when she's close enough. When she is besides Fuhaku, she tries gently prying the bottle from the woman's fingers, just to have her jolt upright and send an accusatory glare her way.

"You!" Fuhaku is mad and Reishi doesn't remember having ever seen her like that, not since the day she had to take Reishi to the hospital in a hurry and had that fight with Ryouji. "Of course you are, why wouldn't you? You're so... sso..." Her words are slurred, making it difficult to understand them, though Reishi has no idea what she's talking about.

"Fuhaku, please-"

"No! This is my house, with my rules, and you- you can't, you can't just-!"

"What are you talking about?!"

"I told you I didn't want you to be one of those- of those rats! Always- always crawling in the shadowss like, like verrrminss! Like your father. He was always- aaallways away, doing who knows what, coming back filthy with blood and- and guts! Dis- disgusting!"

"You don't talk about Ryouji that way! Don't you dare! He was- he was a good ninja and-"

"And look what it got him!" Fuhaku accompanies those words by flinging the wine bottle to the wall behind Reishi, leaving a red stain on it. On the darkness of the room it looks like blood.

The silence after that is deafening, Fuhaku's eyes are wide open, as if she surprised herself with the seething rage and spite that came with those words. Or maybe she remembered who was she screaming at, and saw her daughter for the first time since she opened the door. Either way, tears begin to gather in her eyes and she covers her mouth, as if that would prevent her from hurling more hurting words at everyone in her vicinity. She rushes past Reishi and into her room, closing the door quietly behind her. The house is very silent.

Absent-mindedly, Reishi takes note of what must be cleaned and tries to remember the best way to scrub wine stains. She wonders if it will work on a wall. She also notices that the panel window that leads from the kitchen to the back garden is open, and that an ANBU is standing there, apparently he – he's the same one that came to pick her up at school, Reishi realizes – has yet to decide on a course of action. He must have come hurriedly when he heard the broken glass, expecting to have to break a domestic fight or something like that, and now he isn't sure of what he should do.

"Pick up the glass shards and throw them on that trash can over there," she instructs him. He starts working almost instantly. If it is because he feels like he should help a little kid, or because commands work very well with confused people that have been trained to follow orders mechanically, Reishi doesn't know, and she doesn't really care.

Meanwhile she gets some paper towels to start dabbing at the wall so the stain isn't too deep rooted. A small touch on the shoulder makes her turn her attention back at the ANBU, who has a broom in hand and is signalling her to move over so he can sweep under her feet. She doesn't know how he found the broom but she decides that it doesn't matter. Less work for her.

Once he's finished she goes back to clean the wall with a mix of clear soap and some chemical she can't pronounce and cleans it as best as she can, though she supposes that she will have to finish it up tomorrow, maybe with bleach. Probably with bleach.

She is surprised to find the ANBU still waiting behind her, he is handing her the paper towel roll. Reishi is very confused until the ANBU motions to his face and she reaches to touch hers. Her hand finds a wet substance and she realizes that she has been silently crying. She wipes the tears away as best as she can, angry at herself for showing weakness in front of a stranger. She doesn't want anyone pitying her. She feels the sudden urge to yell at the ANBU to mind his own business, but she knows that that would be uncalled for.

"Thanks," she says curtly. The ANBU gives her a nod and suddenly he is no longer in the room.