Summary: In death, Uchiha Izumi fumbled and fell, and in life, she struggled to rise. Thrown into a world at war, grief helped guide her sword, revenge sharpening her blade. Yet, the cruel gods took pity on the fallen soldier, for underneath her thick armor hid a lonely woman in search of a place she could finally call home.
Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto or any characters and stories affiliated with it. All credit goes to Masashi Kishimoto.
Rebirth, n. re· birth
The process of being reincarnated or born again; a period of new life, growth, or activity: a revival.
Revival
Chapter Four
Izumi stopped screaming for her older brother.
Instead, she stared numbly in the direction of her home, the trees blurring past her as the man who had stabbed her brother hummed to himself. He continued to hold her like she were a bag tossed over his shoulder; every bump and turn strained her already worn and tiny body and she wanted nothing more than to curl up in a ball and hide.
She was just so tired.
The memory of today would forever be imprinted in her mind, tinted in a red haze that would never allow her to forget – the way her brother had looked at her, broken and afraid, eyes bright red with anger and horror as blood dribbled down his chin – and she wouldn't understand, not really, not until she was older when the cause behind her perfect memory would become clear.
By the time the man had stopped running, she had noticed how pale he had become, even watching him wince in pain when he dropped her onto the ground. For a brief moment, she considered running away from him and from everything that had just transpired, but as she readjusted herself on the ground, her body hurt in ways she never felt before, a deep ache that continuously throbbed with every beat of her heart. She barely had the energy to move, let alone think about actually running away. Even in her young mind, she realized that being lost in a large forest would have meant certain death; had she succeeded in her escape attempt, she would still be lost in the woods and an unfamiliar location, hurt and tired. She'd get injured or worse – killed and eaten by the animals that inhabited the area.
So she opted to remain silent and limp – defeated.
Izumi remained rooted in the spot staring blankly into the darkening forest, trying her best to stay awake, when Hiro pulled up his shirt. She saw the large wound that Katsumi had inflicted and turned away, squeamish at the sight of the blood that was oozing out of the cut.
"Oh, the little girl doesn't like blood?" Flinching at the voice, she pulled her knees up to her chest and wrapped her arms around her legs, choosing to remain silent as she clenched her eyes shut. "Well, good thing Hiro here knows how to patch up a wound like this, am I right?" The shinobi cackled alongside the sound of ripping cloth. "Your brother sure did a number on me though – I'm surprised, truly, especially for how tiny the kid was. How old was he? Eight? Nine?"
Izumi continued ignoring him, squeezing her eyes as she sat against the tree he had dropped her against. Her body was rocking itself as she began thinking of anything to stop his voice from terrorizing her even more than it already did.
"Hey, brat, are you listening?" There were footsteps until she felt a body too close to hers. Heart racing, she yelped as a foot connected with her leg, eyes shooting open. "I asked you a question – I don't like being ignored."
His crazed stare unnerved her, prompting her to quickly answer. "He's ten," she mumbled.
"Huh, older than I thought then." Taking a few steps back, he returned to treating his wound, leaving them in silence until he looked at her a few minutes later. "You meant was, right?"
"W-What?"
Hiro finished tying his makeshift bandage around his waist, looking at her as if she was stupid. "I said, was."
"I don't–"
"The kid's dead, idiot. So he was ten – not is."
Her eyes slowly widened at his words as disbelief coursed through her body. "T-That's a lie – Nii-san wouldn't…he wouldn't die! Not to the likes of you!" she vehemently countered, clenching her fists with a sudden burst of anger.
Hiro looked taken aback at the fire in her voice before throwing his head back with a laugh. "You're a spicy one, I'll give you that! Too bad your older brother died; he would've been a good kid to bring back too."
He then spat at the dirt in front of her, his saliva tinged with blood.
With these words, Hiro had made sure to kill whatever hope she had before it was even allowed to take root in her heart, and while she didn't believe him, a part of her couldn't help but think what if–
The sound of a whistling momentarily froze the thoughts that had her wanting to shoot up and attack her kidnapper. Hiro had straightened his back with a slow smile, the whites of his teeth stained with blood, before he called out in response to the whistle.
"I'm over here!"
A barrage of sound came from the trees as a handful of individuals, dressed similarly to Hiro, materialized out of nowhere from the shadows of the trees. There was one child who untied and awake amongst the group, most likely taken from the compound as she had been, and one unconscious preteen bound in rope. Both were unmistakably Uchiha children, their clothing embroidered with the clan symbol, had their black hair and pale complexion not indicated otherwise.
"Where Toshiyuki– and what the hell? Why are you so bloody?" The tallest one with red hair asked Hiro, dropping the boy on the ground next to her. The other two kept the teen away from the children, opting instead to make sure she was still unconscious and bound. There were obvious markings of fighting on them, the darker-haired man hissing in pain as he rolled his shoulder, his shirt covered in scorch marks, while the woman was attempting to bandage the various injuries that marred her own body – the one on her arm looked suspiciously like a burn, already blistering. The unconscious teen herself was also quite bloody with one of her eyes swollen shut, her hair matted with what looked to be her own blood.
"Probably dead now; this brat had her brother with her when I found..."
Izumi chose to tune out their voices, opting to turn to the boy next to her who had also been taken. She observed him for a moment, watching as a myriad of emotions shift through his eyes before they settled on something she couldn't quite make out. "Hi," she whispered with a shaky voice, attempting to gain his attention. "I'm Izumi."
He whipped his head, looking dazed as he shook his head, lips thinning as he said, "D-Don't talk, they'll get mad." He looked to be about her age, perhaps a year or two older, but Izumi couldn't be too sure. She hadn't really interacted with children her own age, having private tutors to mentor her instead of being taught in a classroom. She only ever saw her brothers –
Her brothers.
Arata.
Madara.
Izuna.
Katsumi.
At the thought of her older brother, Izumi felt herself grow numb, her own eyes growing wet as she recalled what Hiro had said to her. Whatever strength her body had found at the sight of more children like her quickly dissipated as true defeat weighed heavily in her bones. She had no energy to struggle nor speak anymore, especially given how quickly the boy next to her had shut her down. So she simply nodded to the kid and mumbled a quick apology, turning back to observe the kidnappers having nothing else to do. It seemed like whatever they had planned had been a success, as they all looked satisfied with themselves.
They continued speaking for a few more minutes, voices ringing around her but not really registering when the boy next to her suddenly coughed, bringing their attention back to them. The group froze before turning to them, a frown on the redhead's face. "Should they be awake?"
Hiro gave this a second thought before bursting out laughing as if he had said the funniest thing. "You're right, we should knock them out!" One moment he had been across the clearing and the next, he kneeled in front of the two kids. "Lights out kiddos!"
A hand reached out at her but when she scrambled away – as did the boy – her back collided with the tree behind her, bringing her to a halt.
There was only the echo of his laughter before – nothing.
0O0
Izumi opened her eyes slowly; her head felt heavy, thoughts muddled and sluggish. It took her too long to realize that she was in a moving cart, the groaning of wood and the sounds of horses around her. Only then did the events of the past day rush back in a fury and she shot up despite her body's protests, startling whoever was next to her.
"What the–"
"Sorry," Izumi muttered. Her eyes lingered on the boy's bound wrists for only a second as she couldn't help but just stare at him; he was unlike anybody she had ever seen before, with shockingly white hair and strange crimson eyes that looked back at her as well.
A few seconds of awkward silence passed between them before his gaze shifted to the Uchiha clan symbols that had been expertly embroidered into her kimono, blending in with the floral motifs that were still visible through the caked-on dried mud. His expression darkened. "...You're an Uchiha?"
Her brows drew together at the sudden question, put off by the accusatory tone in his voice, and took a moment before slowly nodding. "I-I am?" she said. He didn't react to her answer; instead, he just…didn't respond nor did he bother talking to her again, turning away and leaning back against the cart, closing his eyes.
They were crammed into a tight space, with slivers of light filtering through the small gaps between the wooden boards in the otherwise dark enclosure, and everything rattled around her with each bump the wheels hit. They were all wearing strange metal cuffs and when Izumi examined hers closely – after choosing to ignore the strange boy as well – she noticed inscriptions on it that she couldn't quite make out. There were too many people around her, mostly children or slightly older. Some were awake and crying, while others, such as the boy next to her, were silent.
It was then that Izumi noticed the teen from earlier who she had seen unconscious in the forest speaking to a girl wearing a kimono with the Uchiha clan symbol on her sleeve. Seeing this, Izumi cautiously rose up, only to grimace at how sore she was, barely managing to catch herself from toppling over onto the others due to her shaky legs. When she was certain she wouldn't fall, she carefully began stepping over the various children to approach the girls.
"H-Hi." Her voice cracked when she introduced herself to them, a result of her parched throat from a lack of water. "I'm an Uchiha, just like you guys." She pointed to the symbol on her kimono. "I'm...um, Izumi." The teen's eyes widened for a split second when her name left her mouth, and Izumi suddenly found herself being roughly shoved down, prompting a yelp in surprise at the unexpected manhandling. "What are–"
"Are you Tajima-sama's daughter?" the teen hissed, glancing around to ensure none other than an Uchiha were listening. "The clan head's daughter? That Izumi?" Confused, Izumi looked at the young girl next to the teen, hesitating for a moment before turning back and nodding. The older girl quickly let her go, her bound hands falling into her lap. "Shit. Did…did any of the kidnappers mention that to you when you were taken? Do they know your name?" Izumi responded with a quick shake of her head.
"Okay, that's good then – that's good. They don't know who you are," the teen muttered but more to herself than to anyone else. After a few tense seconds, she proceeded to lean in uncomfortably close, eyes wide. "You can't reveal your identity to anyone, okay? They can't know you're a member of the head family," she whispered, her voice barely audible over the cries and groans. The sheer number of people in the wagon meant that it wasn't completely silent but neither was it extremely loud either; had any of them listened closely enough, they would have been able to hear their kidnappers' conversations with each other from the outside. "Izumi is a common name so I think we can risk it but…I'll think on that."
"But–"
"–No, you need to listen to me because if word gets out that you're being held hostage, who knows what'll happen to you, to all of us. Were any of your brothers taken?" The teen tilted her head up and began scanning the people around them. "Were Madara-sama or Katsumi-sama–" At the mention of her brothers, Izumi felt a sob rise in her throat, and her expression must have revealed something for the teen's face fell, paling in response. "No, that's not– " She appeared to be lost for a moment, but she quickly pulled herself together. "Okay. Okay. D-Don't cry! It'll be fine – we'll be fine. I…you can call me Hitomi, okay?"
"A-Alright."
"I know it might be hard, but can you tell me what happened?"
"...K-Katsumi–" Izumi bit her bottom lip, desperate to keep her tears at bay as she recalled the events that led her here– "He was stabbed by that crazy blonde man. I don't know what happened next."
Hitomi was hesitant to touch Izumi again but recognizing that she had already broken clan etiquette with her panicked actions earlier, she grabbed Izumi's hands which had been clenching her soiled and ripped kimono. The state of the girl's clothing, with the dirt and holes, had most likely saved her. It successfully concealed just how well-made and expensive her kimono truly was, made with fabric reserved only for those of the upper class.
"I'm so sorry." With a deep breath, she shifted around to let the other girl join their conversation. "Let me introduce you to Kazuyo." The younger girl next to Hitomi twitched at the mention of her name; she looked to be Izumi's age and in a similar state as the rest of them, her own kimono bloodstained and cuts on her face. "She said she's been in here for a few days but that this is the first time the wagon's been moved since she's been awake."
"Yeah." Kazuyo sat back against the wood, her arms curled around herself, choosing to ignore every part of the previous conversation concerning Izumi's status as a member of the head family. "But some of the other kids in here aren't just Uchiha – some are Hagoromo too. If I remember my symbols right, I think some might even be from the Senju."
When the Senju were mentioned, Izumi watched Hitomi's only opened eye harden, but she stayed mute as the young teen murmured to herself again once more. "So they're taking more than just Uchiha? But why? This isn't making any sense – and why children?"
Everyone suddenly slid forward when the cart violently jolted, the sounds of creaking wood and muffled laughter from their kidnappers ringing throughout the transport; several children began to wail even louder in response. There was a loud banging from the outside, preceded by a sharp, shut up, that scared most of them into quiet sniffles and whimpers instead.
Kazuyo bumping into Hitomi interrupted the older girl's train of thought, bringing her back to their current situation. She looked at both of the girls, observing their shifting expressions. Both had unfocused gazes and the tightness with which they held themselves betrayed just how terrified they were. In her mental spiral, she had quickly forgotten that these two weren't the shinobi-trained kids she worked with every day – they were civilians, children.
With a dejected sigh, Hitomi let her head fall against the wall, wood digging into her scalp. What was she going to do?
Fortunately, they continued towards their destination with relative peace – or as much peace as one could get while being kidnapped. There were simply no strange sounds nor movements, the road they were on was as smooth as gravel could be, and none of the enemy-nin had bothered to check in on them.
As time passed, Hitomi was gradually able to release some of the tension in her muscles, the rocking motion of the wagon forcing her eyes to grow heavy due to the nearly overwhelming fatigue that plagued her. She had only been chakra-exhausted once before and it was nothing compared to now; back then, she still felt the steady flow of her chakra, even when it had been depleted – but now? She felt empty, a loss unlike any other; her attempts to reach for her chakra yielded only anguish at the emptiness that responded.
She was completely useless – she couldn't access her chakra or sharingan, she had no weapons; she had nothing. In her present state, she wouldn't have been able to kill a fly if she so had to.
How pathetic, she thought to herself before succumbing to the fatigue.
While she hadn't actually fallen asleep in the literal sense, still somewhat aware of her immediate surroundings, when Hitomi opened her eyes sometime later the sunlight spilling through the cracks had shifted directions, and several of the others appeared to have calmed down. She felt as rested as she could be in her current circumstances – or, at the very least, she had more energy than earlier. She turned to see Izumi and Kazuyo sitting next to each other whilst hugging their knees, mumbling to one another; about what, she couldn't hear.
Kazuyo was the first to notice her, eyes widening a little, prompting Izumi to do the same. They both appeared relieved, a small smile on each of their faces.
"Everything okay?" she quietly asked in response.
The two looked at each before Izumi answered. "We…we weren't sure if you were going to wake back up. You're really hurt, Nee-san, and we didn't know what to do."
With a forced smile, the young teen sucked up the aches in her body and ruffled both of their hairs with her bound hands. "Don't worry about me, I've gone through worse." That was a lie. "I'm a kunoichi, after all." Not a lie.
"You're a…kunoichi?" Kazuyo seemed to perk up. "Like, actually? That's so cool! You know, I've always wanted to be one. I'd play ninjas with my friends but they'd make fun of me because they were all boys, saying that I couldn't be one. But I still really wanted to, so my mom–" But as soon as she mentioned her mother, the little girl froze, taken aback by her slip up, because now she couldn't stop thinking about her dead mother, murdered while attempting to protect her. Kazuyo quickly clamped her mouth shut, desperately trying to forget those final moments; she held herself even tighter, opting to bury her face into her knees before any of them could see her newly formed tears. "She…she tried to enroll me in the school anyway," she finally managed to say after a brief pause, her voice muffled by her kimono.
Hitomi's heart sank at how shattered the two girls were, each having lost someone dear to them as a result of their kidnapping.
"Well…I was a special case, they said," Hitomi began, hoping to divert their attention to her. "I activated my sharingan when I was around ten when my home was attacked by bandits." Hitomi tapped the side of her uninjured eye. Although she couldn't activate her dojutsu due to the block they placed on her, the young teen found solace in the fact that when the shackles that trapped her chakra were removed, she'd be able to properly fight back. "I didn't live at the main compound, you see, so when it was activated it shocked everyone. Then I had to start my training to protect our clan and while it hasn't been easy, I make do with what I've got."
Before they could continue talking though, a hiss escaped her mouth at the sudden sharp blistering pain from her wrists. The culprit was the rope binding her wrists together, rubbing them raw with every slight movement, aggravated the burns even more. "Shit," she grumbled, wincing as she struggled to find a comfortable position for her hands.
"Your wrists…is that why they're tied?" Izumi pointed to herself and the others around them. "Most of us aren't."
Hitomi was forced to recall her fight with the kidnappers. "I'm assuming so. Anybody that probably put up a good fight is most likely tied up."
There wasn't much else to say and they lapsed into an uneasy silence, the severity of the situation weighing heavily on their minds. "Have…have you seen the boy I was kidnapped with?" Izumi abruptly asked, breaking the silence. "We were knocked out at the same time."
Kazuyo was the only one with the answer, as she had seen the three of them arrive. "I'm pretty sure you're talking about that kid over there, right?" She pointed somewhere behind Hitomi, towards the back. "He won't stop mumbling to himself. Hitomi-neesan and I both tried talking to him earlier because he's, you know, like us, but he kept tellin' us to shut up and to leave him alone."
"He's most likely in shock," Hitomi quickly added. She saw how…dead he looked, his eyes wide and unblinking, staring off into nothing as his body trembled.
"He was like that when I first saw him too." Izumi sniffled, holding her tears back as she recalled their brief conversation. She was just as scared as he was, but she couldn't just…do nothing. Talking with others just like her – that was all she could really do, finding comfort in the familiar.
Their conversation ended there; the cart came to a sudden halt, forcing several of the children to tumble over top of each other. There was banging from the outside – in a span of a few seconds screaming and crying erupted, ringing in Izumi's ears, as the sudden smell of urine wafting throughout the tight quarters caused her stomach to lurch. Her nose wrinkled at the stench but before she could bring her hand up to cover her nose, a door slammed open, flooding the otherwise dark carriage with light.
Several kids threw up a hand to block out the sun, as did Izumi, their eyes readjusting to the unexpected brightness. A man she didn't recognize appeared at the door, flanked by six others, all of whom were large and intimidating, wielding spears.
"Alright you brats, don't try anything funny, you hear me? I know some of you probably have shinobi training, but around here –" he motioned with his spear– "There's nothing for miles. No towns, nothing. We will use these if you attack us, so don't bother trying." He narrowed his eyes and glared at everyone, but specifically chose to meet the gazes of those who had their wrists bound. "I mean it."
It took a few minutes to get them all out of the cart, and while some of the older children ignored his warning and struggled against them, the kidnappers soon squashed any dissent with threats of violence, which everyone saw when they slapped a boy who tried to flee.
They were divided into groups organized by clans: there had been a few Hyuga in the cart, and alongside the handful of Senju were the Uzumaki, easily distinguishable by their bright red hair. There were also mentions of two clans that Izumi had only heard about once: the Iburi and the Chinoike.
It was unsettling – every single child belonged to a clan, none were clanless.
Once the men did a headcount – there had been a total of nineteen of them shoved into the tiny transport cart – they were promptly dragged down into a basement. There Izumi noticed even more people of all ages sitting in cells in different states of disarray; some were injured, while others sat on the floor, watching the newcomers as they passed by.
The kidnappers were nondiscriminatory in choosing the cells: some of the Uchiha were thrown in with the Senju, others with the Hagoromo. Izumi was lucky enough to be tossed into a cell with familiar faces, all of whom were from the cart she had been trapped in.
"Is everyone all right?" Hitomi asked once the armed men left. She rubbed her wrists, relieved that the ropes were finally off but unhappy with the single metal shackle around her ankle – around all their ankles. She quickly counted a total of eleven of them, herself included, in the dark cell.
"I'm okay."
"Yeah."
All of them were huddled around members of their own clans, and with a quick glance, Hitomi noticed the various symbols on everybody's clothes – the Uchiha, Senju, Uzumaki, and even an unrecognizable one.
Taking a good look, she couldn't help but frown; only one other person appeared to have had some sort of combat training, and this was just an assumption based on the identical rope burn that marred the white-haired boy's wrists. But unlike her, he kept silent and to himself, not bothering to interact with anyone. He merely sat in the corner, three others sitting beside him. While they weren't speaking to each other, the boy had a demeanor that seemed to be protective of the smaller children, glaring at every person who dared to approach or even look at them.
Hitomi was just exhausted. She rested a hand against the wall to somewhat catch her breath, but then proceeded to run her hands along the cold rock, palms slipping on the bumpy stone as she heard the echo of water dripping down from the ceiling. They were clearly in a derelict prison cell of some sort, judging by how many people were being held captive; she observed at least a half-dozen additional cells while being brought here.
The cell itself was rather vast, deeper than she had initially thought. There was one tiny window high up on the wall near the ceiling that hardly let any light into the damp cell, and it was barely wide enough for one of the smaller children to fit through but barred from the outside by metal bars.
Just what were those shinobi doing here?
She turned her head to the entrance, clenching her jaw at the sight of the iron bars that ran both horizontally and diagonally from the ceiling and walls in a grid-like formation. There was only one door and lock, and judging by the shuffling of feet, a guard was patrolling the area every few minutes.
"D-Don't bother trying to escape," a voice called out to them from the dark – it was the same boy Izumi had asked after earlier. "There's n-no point."
Izumi was the first to speak up. "How can you be so sure? Maybe we'll get lucky."
The boy shook his head, grabbing his ears painfully as he clenched his eyes. "N-No, n-no no!" With a sob, his whole body shook. "We're going to die down here!"
Hitomi rushed over to the kid, placing her own hands over his in a pitiful attempt to calm him down. The last thing any of them needed was a child wailing in panic – she could hear one doing exactly so in another cell and the frantic hushes of others that accompanied said crying. "Hey, kid, it's okay." She gently pulled his palms away from his ears. "We'll figure something out, okay? I'll figure something out. I'm a shinobi, after all."
He slowly opened his eyes, where he looked at her with a broken gaze as he shook his head. "You can't promise something like that though. If you were a shinobi, you shouldn't be here then. Which then means you lost and we're going to die."
She sighed and pinched her nose with her fingers, thinking for a moment what to say, but her mind was blanking. "I… You're right, I shouldn't promise things like that because I did lose – but I won't next time. Besides, I know I don't want to stay here and you don't either, right?" With a forced smile, she decided to introduce herself. "I'm Hitomi."
The boy looked at Kazuyo then to Izumi, who had trailed after her. His eyes lingered on the clan symbols on their clothes. "...I-I'm Yuji. Hagoromo Yuji."
"Hagoromo?" Izumi tilted her head where they all looked at the Uchiha crest on his shirt. "But you have our symbol on your clothes."
"Oh, I-I'm half Uchiha. I was visiting my grandparents." With a sniff, he wiped his nose with a sleeve before touching his embroidered sleeve. "My f-father is a Hagoromo."
Hitomi quickly ushered them to the other side, away from the Senju and Uzumaki. The cell was large enough for them to keep their distance from each other if they so chose to. From the corner of her eyes, she saw the white-haired boy talking to the other three children, two of whom had Uzumaki red hair, but he hadn't moved nor even acknowledged the Uchiha.
Typical, Hitomi thought, internally sneering at him and the Senju as a whole. Her hatred for his clan was ingrained into every Uchiha, and even in situations such as this, the boy's unwillingness to engage with them, with those in the same predicament as him, fueled the flames of rage that burned within her.
Once they all sat down and began talking with one another, asking about ages and whatnot, Hitomi began to scheme. She would need to if she were to flee from here with three other children – and perhaps more if there were other Uchihas being held hostage here. She had no choice. No choice. It was her responsibility as a shinobi to protect the clan and its people – after all, how could she call herself a soldier if she couldn't even accomplish that?
She would find a way to save them all – even if it meant her death.
0O0
By the time Hitomi had finally acquired any sort of information on the everything about their situation, five months would have passed, putting the date somewhere around March – she couldn't be too sure, having been unconscious at the beginning, so the exact date was most likely off. Izumi's birthday had come and gone, and each day Hitomi had grown increasingly despondent with their situation. It just…wasn't looking too good for them, with no indication of rescue from any of their clans and while nothing drastic had occurred yet, she had a feeling that their time was soon coming to an end.
Every day, like clockwork, they would all hear the sound of screaming echoing off the stone walls, ringing in her ears as it grew closer and closer as the weeks passed. A fear that tormented Hitomi daily, that pushed her to confront the realities of their predicament in this prison hellhole, was that one day those cries would be from someone in this cell, tortured for information that they had no knowledge of. Would she be the first to break…or would it be one of the Senju instead?
She assumed that no one here held top-secret information that could be revealed to the enemy or, in general, had any sort of intelligence that they would have had over their adult counterparts.
And despite her…dislike for the rival clan – she used the word loosely – Hitomi liked to think of herself as someone who understood right from wrong, who didn't take pleasure in cruelty. She wasn't blinded enough by her hatred to see that they were all children here, stolen from the safety and protection of their homes.
They were just children.
And yes, she also considered herself as one in their current situation because, at the tender age of fourteen, she was still considered a minor – albeit a minor who knew how to kill a man creatively in a dozen different ways with a dozen different weapons.
After the first few weeks into her abduction, there was a sudden realization that practically everyone here possessed some form of kekkei-genkai – but even with this knowledge, she couldn't explain the kidnapping of the Senju or Uzumaki. To the best of her knowledge, they lacked the ability to wield the unique techniques of a kekkei genkai like the Uchiha's sharingan or the Iburi's smoke-release jutsu.
It just made no sense – and while Hitomi was well aware that she wasn't the smartest shinobi to have graced this earth, she was also, undeniably, not a brainless idiot of a human being. She had enough awareness to recognize the patterns when something wasn't right.
Were they being held for ransom?
But had that been the case, that would require them to know who Izumi was – and as far as Hitomi could tell, their captors were a bunch of brainless fools. Hell, she was sure of it. If they knew that they held the goddamn heiress of the Uchiha clan in their dungeon, they would have separated her by now, keeping her alone and away from her own people to use as leverage over the clan. They wouldn't have treated her the same way they did for the past five months.
Nothing made sense.
"Tch."
Hitomi stormed over to where the singular window lay, the grass swayed in the wind. She stood there, attempting to calm the storm waging in her mind, as she watched the sky gradually grow darker and darker as blue melted with the hues of the sunset into an eventual black, until the next thing she knew, only the twinkling of stars lit up the night sky.
She slowly looked back to the cell's occupants, a permanent frown etched into her face. The Uchiha – and Yuji, the only Hagoromo here – had maintained a sort of mutual agreement between the Senju and Uzumaki, no thanks to her and the boy on their side. They hadn't fought, surprisingly enough, recognizing that their situation was not one to fight in; it did not mean, though, that they were friends. Any interaction had between them was still cold – downright frigid – and Hitomi saw it best fit to keep to their side of the large cell.
The other clan imprisoned alongside them had been the Iburi, with the three of the children being the youngest here. With no older child amongst them, the role of ensuring they were being taken care of had fallen onto either the Uchiha or the Senju, and Hitomi guiltily admitted to herself that she initially had no desire to do so. Her hands were full enough as it was, trying to ensure that Izumi and the other two were as okay as they could be.
Yet, it was Izumi, the youngest of the Uchiha, who had taken it upon herself to take care of the kids. And the times she couldn't, Hitomi turned a blind eye to the white-haired boy, seemingly the oldest of the Senju and Uzumaki group – and he couldn't have even been nine – who also went out of his way to look after the kids as well.
Hitomi did find out that the boy was called Tobi. Why the name sounded so familiar, she couldn't put her finger on why.
The teen sat down, her back slowly sliding down against the rough stone. She absentmindedly picked at her iron shackle, a habit she developed during her imprisonment as she wasn't quite used to the emptiness of where her chakra used to be. She just wanted these damn things off – she was slowly going crazy from not having anything to do here. During the first few weeks, she attempted to work out and somehow keep up with her warmups, but the lack of chakra that threw her off paired with the fact that her captors only fed all of them barely enough to keep them alive, forced her to give it up. She was burning more calories than her body could afford to, and even though they gave her the most to eat – but not enough – she always shared portions of her meals with the three Uchiha children she felt responsible for.
There was shuffling beside her, bringing Hitomi out of her thoughts. It was Izumi that sat beside her, resting her chin on her knees as she wrapped her arms around her legs. "Nee-san, do you think the Senju boy will be okay?" she asked, tilting her head to look at the young teen. "They've never taken any of us alone and…and I don't like it."
Izumi was afraid, to say the least. These past few months had been stressful and even in her young mind, she knew that the lack of demands from their kidnappers was making them uneasy. They were just being held here, trapped with nothing to do. But for the first time, someone had come to take Tobi away – it was someone she had never seen before, and the look on the man's face had been downright terrifying. Tobi had looked afraid but when he caught her watching, he had wiped all emotion from his face as he was dragged out.
"I'm not sure, Izu-chan."
Hitomi had forced herself to call Izumi by a childish nickname rather than the heiress she actually was. Dropping the sama from her name had been uncomfortable for the teen, but what was she to do? Expose the biggest secret that the Uchiha in this room was holding to keep not just her but themselves safe?
A loud screeching sound of metal on rock flooded the space, halting all conversations. Two men shoved their way into the cell, with one holding a spear pointing at the children. No one moved, as they were all looking at the limp boy in the man's arms. His eyes were wide open with marks of tears on his cheeks, and the guard dropped him onto the pathetic excuse of a straw mattress they used to sleep on without a word, slamming the gate closed when he left.
The cell was deafeningly quiet, with none of the other Senju and Uzumaki children going to check on the boy. The air was tense and no one dared to move, too afraid of the chance that the guards would return, change their minds and take another one of them. Tremors ran through his body every few seconds, and Hitomi found herself looking at the other three of his companions – they were six at best, old enough to know something was wrong but too young to be of any help.
But before she could even entertain the idea of checking up on him, Izumi had left her side and was slowly walking towards him. Damn her and her soft heart, Hitomi thought, quickly standing up.
"S-Senju-san?" Izumi called out, giving a brief glance and the three kids huddled near him. "Hello?"
"Izu-chan, don't–"
When she kneeled down, she cautiously reached a hand out to touch his shoulder when he shifted – he still remained laying on the ground but his hand caught her wrist, their eyes locking onto one another. She gulped, her own eyes widening, but a sob tore itself out of Tobi's mouth as his tremors grew in intensity. This seemed to break whatever spell over the room as Hitomi found herself heading toward the boy, holding a hand out to the smaller children he watched over to tell them to stay put.
"Hey, Senju, what's wrong?" Hitomi quickly asked, trying to see any injuries on his body. "What did they do–"
Izumi helped him sit up, glancing at Hitomi every few seconds, when Tobi shook his head, eyes welling up with tears.
"There…there were so many bodies," he whispered, voice devoid of any emotion as his eyes stared off into nothing. "O-Of all of us, from all our clans."
Hitomi's heart stopped. "W-What?"
"Children, teens, adults – there were just so many." When he finally met her eyes, she forgot about all the hatred she held – because at this moment, she was looking at a kid who was terrified beyond belief. She was looking at a child who sought nothing more than comfort and protection because he was just a kid.
And she was the eldest amongst them, the closest thing any of them had to an adult, despite the fact that she wasn't even one.
But Hitomi found herself placing a gentle hand on his arm, kneeling in front of him, fulfilling the role that was forced upon her. She softened her voice, forcefully releasing the tension she was feeling in her shoulders. "...What did they do to you?" Izumi continued to hold onto him, her own eyes reflecting the alarm they must have all felt at the new development in their situation.
"T-They're trying to…" he hiccuped, clenching his eyes shut, "They're trying to turn us into p-puppets."
"Puppets?" Hitomi sat back on her heels, confused. "That makes no sense–"
"T-They've figured out how to control dolls with chakra threads. I-I've seen it done at home when a traveller put on a show for us." When Tobi finally opened his eyes, she couldn't help but note how similar his red eyes were to her sharingan; it was strange to see the eye color but have no power behind the red, as she was just so used to seeing the renowned power that had made the Uchiha so feared but sought after. "B-But he was from the Land of Wind."
"...And the people here are trying to figure out how to do it with people despite being nowhere near those damned deserts." He silently nodded as she finished his sentence. "Fuck." She felt like punching something – anything, really – and took deep breaths to try and calm her pounding heart. Her hand was on her forehead, grimacing as her thoughts ran wild, feeling a headache coming on.
Izumi sat near Tobi as he wrapped his arms around himself. The flames from the hall danced across their faces, illuminating the dark cell, but the shadows only intensified Hitomi's fear and anxiety. When the teen discreetly took a closer look at the Senju, she noticed chakra burns that resembled threads in the locations of the body's tenketsu points – if she had her sharingan, she would have confirmed it as well.
This was far worse than she initially thought what going to happen. This was so bad.
But the worst thing of it all?
…She had no idea what to do.
Chapter Four – End
A/N: I hope I'm not rushing through anything because that's the last thing I want to do, but I desperately want to get out of Izumi's child arc, so please let me know if you think I need better pacing! Other than that, there have been so much changes from the previous story and this one and I'm loving it – rewriting LIHE has just cemented how bad of a writer I really was before lol. Please do forgive any and all mistakes – I don't have a beta.
