"Papa once told me that tomorrow an asteroid would descend,

And in a single moment,

Everything we know and love will meet its end,

So I try to smile a bit despite the end I see,

After all, tomorrow I'll finally be free,"

-Melty Land Nightmare, splendiferachie

"You're still warm," Naga murmured, hand dropping away from my arm.

The road was empty, except for us. It was familiar, in a way.

"I don't feel anything," I said. I didn't know where we were, but I still saw the ghost of an overturned cart in the middle of the road.

"It was a mild fever," Naga told me, stopping at a sign. Something that wasn't there before. "You had them so often when you were little you became asymptomatic."

I stopped, looking down the road, and heard an echo of Konan's voice, telling Hidan that he needed to move more quietly. Another prick, dots of blood on the tip of an imaginary weapon.

"Asymptomatic?" I asked.

"You won't show symptoms. I don't think you would until it's much higher," Naga answered. "Your normal body temperature is only a little lower than this."

I hummed. "Why are we going to Suisai?"

Naga paused, looking back. "You remember this road?"

"It was only—" a lifetime ago. "—three years ago," I answered.

"I didn't mean it like that," he said, glancing at the sign again. "I don't remember it. But back then I was more focused on looking for threats and protecting everyone. I was terrified someone would sneak up on us."

"And now?" I asked, walking backwards.

Naga followed me, his smile small, but somehow sad. "You don't need me or Namekuji to look out for you anymore," he admitted. "And I don't feel afraid. I was more scared when we fought a real battle in the village."

A water dragon. Chaos. The confused, bewildered eyes of the shinobi who didn't want to kill me.

"How did you know about—" I stopped, the words sticking in my throat. The 'other me'.

The ocean was under my feet, a red darker than blood, almost black. Bodies floated around me, some on their backs, some on their stomachs. The purple vests and jackets of Hanzo's elite shinobi. The crossed-out headbands of the shinobi at Antei. And the 'other me' deep underwater, at the bottom of the sea, tangled in seaweed and—

"Stop thinking about her," Naga said quietly, urgently.

He was crouched in front of me. I blinked down at him.

It doesn't matter.

Naga sighed. "I didn't know, exactly. When we met the masked man the first time, I thought you met him before, somehow, when you were younger and we used to leave you alone. But the masked man didn't say that. If that was where you met, why wouldn't he?"

"Instead, he talked about the Sage of Six Paths," he mused. "And you said he killed me, Oka. It was an idea, but I couldn't be sure until now."

I looked down at the ocean again, at the bodies of the people I killed, and I saw my brother, sinking, reaching for me without eyes, bubbles coming out of his mouth.

My ankles sunk in the water.

I didn't want to think about the day Konan died. I hadn't, until Minato's question. I was too busy wanting Hanzo dead, wishing Kota back, killing our would-be assassins.

"I need to talk to Ren," Naga said and I focused on his voice, his face. "The deal with Kusagakure will help our people, but it won't fix our economy. We don't have much of one, anymore. People use food and clothes to trade, not ryo. We're the last choice for mission requests and even if Yugakure pays us what they promised, it won't last. If we have a reliable source of money, we could pay for what the village needs."

I stared at him.

Naga frowned. He took my hand and squeezed. "What are you thinking about?"

"I don't want you to die," I answered.

His frown deepened. "What happened to it not mattering?"

"It doesn't," I agreed, but the ocean was still there, just under my feet.

I won't let him. But I still don't want you to die.

Naga was silent. "And if I won't?"

I tilted my head.

"What if I won't let him kill me?" Naga asked. "Even after everything you said he did to me, I was still alive, wasn't I?"

My eyes widened. The stab wound. His missing eyes. And then not-Madara peeling his face off like a mask, hiding behind the façade of my brother.

"Remember the story about the lonely rabbit from the moon?" Naga asked, squeezing my hand again.

The eyeless version of him sunk, disappearing into the depths. But the 'other me' was still there, would always be there.

I looked at him.

"The rabbit grew up all alone on the moon without parents or friends," Naga began. "They sat under the stars and watched earth, but it was always too far away to visit. Then, one day, the rabbit was visited by an alien, a wolf in a spaceship that got lost on their way home. The rabbit, who never saw another person before, was too scared to go to the wolf—"

"You made up the wolf," I said, but couldn't be sure. I didn't remember it.

Naga smiled but ignored me. "But the wolf cried and cried about being alone and lost, and the rabbit couldn't stay hidden any longer. The rabbit came out and the wolf, surprised, attacked the rabbit. But the rabbit didn't fight back. They told the wolf they lived on the moon and had always been alone. And the wolf put away its claws."

I glanced down at the ocean, only to be surprised when I saw that I only stood in a puddle of red. The rest had soaked into the road. The bodies were gone, too.

I could still see the 'other me' in the reflection of the puddle.

"And then—" Naga paused, distaste flickering across his face. "And then, once the spaceship was fixed and the wolf about to leave, they asked the rabbit to come with them. The rabbit was afraid to leave, but didn't want to be alone, and left with the wolf. They explored the stars, but never found the wolf's home planet. But they found many other lonely friends. In the end, they made their own family."

I looked down again, but the puddle had disappeared, too. It was only me and the road and my brother.

"That's not how it ends," I said. Why else would he have reacted that way?

Naga stood and let go of my hand. He lifted a shoulder. "I like my ending better."

He started walking again and I followed him. "What's the other ending?"

"It was Papa's favorite story," Naga mused. "But I never liked it."

"How would I know if I like yours better if you won't tell me the other one?" I asked.

Naga didn't answer right away. "The fox leaves the rabbit on the moon," he finally muttered.

I thought about it. "I like your ending better, too."

寂しい

We followed the road until the grass around us gave way to barren fields of dirt.

The soil was dry, but unburned, separated into raised, mostly even mounds. I couldn't tell if they held seeds.

It was an earth jutsu, I thought. Earth-style chakra forcing the ground to shift and roil, burying burned wheat deep under layers of fresh dirt.

Suisai's gate stood at the far end of the road and farther in the distance the top floor of the palace stood out against the sky. It was taller than any other building in the town.

"Does Yahiko know we're here?" I asked. There were ghosts here, too.

Hidan, haunted by the dead. Konan looking at Yahiko, at the road, anywhere but at the destroyed crops.

"I didn't talk to him about it," Naga admitted. He stood in the middle, staring up at the palace. "I wasn't sure I would do this, but I'm Taiyōkage, too. And that means more than giving Yahiko a week off or being sent out on missions like a regular jonin. It means seeing a problem and doing what I can to fix it. Yahiko is focused on Kusagakure. I can do this."

I crouched at the edge of the road, looking at the soil, but I still couldn't tell. "Do we need money that badly?"

"It can wait," Naga answered. "But we'll have to deal with it sooner or later. When we start rebuilding, we'll need steel and iron. Yahiko can melt down the ruins around the village into stuff we can use, but we'll run out eventually. And we don't have a way to make steel on our own."

I stood. "Would the other nations trade with us?"

Kakashi said Amegakure never agreed to the ceasefire.

"There are other countries with metals, Oka," Naga said mildly, and started walking again. "Like the Land of Iron."

"They wouldn't trade with us," I pointed out, behind him. Not when they didn't like shinobi. Not when Joji was one of us. A betrayer. An abandoner.

"We don't have to tell them about Joji-sensei," Naga mused. "And I don't know if the other nations ever tried to negotiate with them. Why would they? What could samurai give shinobi that we can't make ourselves? The only other country that uses half as much metal as Amegakure is Kirigakure."

The pillars of the gate were painted red.

"What do they use the metal for?" I asked.

"They specialize in kenjutsu," Naga answered. "But it still not as much."

The arch wasn't fixed, but the empty space looked intentional, the top of the pillars smoothed out, the curves cut off. A wooden sign painted white hung between the pillars on a chain.

"We don't need to build with steel or iron," I said.

"We don't, but it's stronger than stone or wood. The last of the towers fell in the last war, but it was built when the village was established, before the first war."

The burned grass around the gate had been cleared away, the road wider than I remembered.

The first war. The second war. The third war.

How many ceasefires had been broken? How many armistices abandoned?

"The first war was a long time ago?" I asked.

Naga paused. "Before Mamoru-sensei was born, at least."

That sounded like a long time ago.

The road on the other side of the gate wasn't dirt, but cobblestone. The shops on either side of me had been repainted a lighter shade of brown, sliding doors or curtains where boards used to be, but I could still see nail marks in the wood. Darker colored wood had been used to patch holes.

A brown-haired man pushed aside a curtain as he came out of a doorway on my left, pushing aside a curtain, a broom in hand. A menu was taped to the window.

He froze when he saw us, eyes shooting wide.

"He's staring," I told Naga.

He dropped the broom, wood clattering against stone, and an elderly woman poked her head out of the door next to his. Her gray hair was tied in a bun. She looked at him, then at us.

Naga stared straight ahead. "I'm trying not to look." His mouth curved up, despite his efforts to keep a straight face.

"Do you have a plan?" I asked.

Naga's eyebrow twitched. "Find Ren?"

"Lord Nagato?" the brown-haired man called out to him, disbelief in his voice.

Naga stopped and I looked at the row of shops on the opposite side where more doors were open. More people paused to stare at us.

A girl with pink-brown hair leaned out of a window on the second floor, waving wildly. There was still a gap in her smile. I remembered her younger, smaller, cheering up at us.

"Lady Oka," a black-haired man called from a first-floor window, shocked as he stared out at us.

I looked at the wide smiles, the people calling out to us, and it reminded me of the way the civilians stared at me when I found the bearded man.

I hadn't known how to react to it then, either.

A small, scattered crowd began forming around us and I wondered if they still didn't know we were from Rain, if we would've been welcomed like this if they did.

Would Yahiko know what to say to them, what to do, or would he have the same overwhelmed look in his eyes that Naga did?

A woman drawn by the noise knelt at the back of the crowd. There were frown lines around her mouth, but I remembered her basket, her bread.

How I told her I'd never forgive her.

"We thought we'd never see you again," the brown-haired man said, wringing his hands. "We were never able to properly thank you."

Others followed her lead, bowing, kneeling, lowering their heads to us.

"You don't have to," Naga finally said. "We didn't help anyone here for a reward."

His words were met with silence and stares.

"I'm looking for Ren," he told them.

What should I say? Konan knew how to make people smile.

All this time and I still didn't know how to talk to civilians. What words should I use in the face of their adoration? What should I say when they looked at me the way Gidayu did?

"Chief Ren is at the palace," the brown-haired man said. "He's almost always there."

I glanced around the crowd, but I didn't see Hanako or Haruto.

.

.

.

"Let them get to their business," the elderly woman eventually called out, standing just outside.

The broom laid on the stone, forgotten.

"At this rate, they'll be kept at the gate all night, and I'm sure they didn't travel all this way solely to be accosted by greetings and questions."

The brown-haired man looked suddenly abashed.

"Apologies," an older man murmured. He took a protesting boy by the arm and led him into a building on my right, the door sliding shut after them.

The brown-haired man took a step back and hastily bowed. "I didn't mean to keep you, Lord Nagato, Lady Oka," he said. "May you walk in Great Inari's shadow."

He looked at us again and backed off, scooping up the broom as he hurried back inside.

The bread woman stood, lingering, until she decided against coming to us and left, too.

A window above me clicked shut and Naga gave the elderly woman a grateful nod.

She had power over them, like Haruto.

I faced her. "What made them listen to you?"

Naga discreetly pinched my arm, a question I shouldn't have asked, but I didn't look at him.

"I'm old," she answered, humor in her voice. She was shorter than me. "It's proper, generally, to defer to your elders, and show them a good amount of respect."

"Why?" I asked, and she looked briefly stunned.

"It's a difference of culture, I suppose," she answered. "How do they treat older people where you're from?"

Older people?

"We don't have any," I said, and her lips turned down.

The oldest person I ever met was Hanzo.

"It makes sense," she murmured, almost to herself. "I may be the oldest person in the Land of Fire," she told us, but didn't smile.

No one spoke.

I heard Konan's voice in the silence, a quiet whisper betting against Yahiko.

"Sorry, but we don't know your name," Naga eventually said.

"Rini," she told him.

I saw an afterimage of Konan standing on the last roof down the row of shops, convincing Namekuji to stay with Ren, paper wings tucked against her back. It was the quick sting of a pinch.

Rini looked between us and smiled, too wide to be genuine. "I'm sure you've had a long day, hm? Come inside, eat, I'm sure my granddaughter hasn't put away our dinner meals yet."

Naga took a step back, holding up a hand. "Thank you for the offer, but we can't—"

"Nonsense," Rini cut him off. She shuffled closer and Naga stilled when she reached out but didn't stop her from taking his wrist. "You're quite pale, aren't you? Have you been getting enough sun?"

"I—" Naga's voice pitched high and he cleared his throat.

She pulled him after her and he only lightly resisted.

"We should really—I need to talk to Chief Ren—"

"You might see him," she said. "He comes down for a meal if he's in the mood. Particularly favors Sayaka's pudding bread, across the road."

I looked up at the palace. It was blocking the sun. One of the middle windows flickered with orange light.

"Will you stay out here with the depressing mood then?" Rini asked, standing in the doorway.

I glanced at her, then at Naga. He looked exasperated, but subtly nodded.

"Guess not," I answered, and followed them in.

Rini released Naga to slide the door shut behind us.

There were rows of black cushions on the floor. Long tables were in front of each row with enough space to walk between them.

A golden fox hung on the back wall above a counter with round, metal pots on top. A staircase in the corner disappeared behind a peach wall.

"Take a seat anywhere you like," Rini said, walking to the back. "We mainly serve soups and stews. Ohta and his father next door favor meat-based meals. Across the road Rie's little girl, Sayaka has an eye for desserts. Kaemon three doors down runs a bar. Can't cook to save his life but swears he can. Avoid him, if you can."

I ran my fingers along the wall. It wasn't the gravelly feeling of stone or too smooth like steel or warped like wood. It was bumpy, like hundreds of small balls just under the paint.

Naga hovered in front of the door. "I don't have any money," he told her.

Rini lifted the lid off a pot and peered in. "I could offer a thousand free meals and never repay the debt owed to you," she said. "I was bedridden, you know. Before. Slowly starving to death, wondering if I'd wake up to my grandchildren or Inari."

I sat on the second mat in the first row and crossed my legs.

"My daughter—she—" she stopped, moving to look in the next pot. "It's a terrible thing, watching your own child pass."

Naga knelt next to me on the first cushion. "I'm sorry," he said.

I looked at him at that but he only shook his head. Knowing I didn't understand but telling me not to ask.

"Where did all the food come from?" I asked instead.

"Our Honored Daimyo, Lord Aoki," Rini answered. "Chief Ren convinced him to spare us a team of genin from Konohagakure despite the war. Because of it, maybe. It kept them out of the fighting, at least. Took 'em six months to fix our fields, another three to plow the land, separate the seeds that were still good enough to use, and be shouted at for planting them wrong."

She went behind the counter, ducked down, and came up with a stack of wooden bowls. "But that was two years ago. Once we were producing wheat and dye again, the Honorable Lord Aoki started to see our little town as a boon. He graced us by offering funding, but Chief Ren talked him into handing off their excess goods to us instead."

"He gave you his leftovers," I mused.

Rini scoffed. "Best you never meet our Daimyo if you're going to talk about his generosity like that. Or any."

"Ren told everyone about his talks with the Daimyo?" Naga asked, surprised.

"No, Bashira did that," Rini answered. She moved back in front of the pots. "She's been transparent about the whole thing since the beginning. So, we have Miso, Nabeyaki Udon soup, and Sukiyanki Udon stew left. What'll it be?"

Naga's eyes widened. "Bashira?"

"The same one you're thinking of," Rini said. "She really stepped up, once she was well enough. It was a difficult transition."

Rini waited and Naga hesitated. "Any fish soup?"

She blinked at him. "We'd have to pay for it if we asked it to be imported from the coast, so no."

"I don't know what any of those soups are," I said.

Naga shifted, uncomfortable under the weight of her stare.

I heard footsteps on the stairs, loud, civilian, and a woman with dark hair peeked around the wall. She froze as she looked at us, gasping.

"Grandma, are they—"

"You can bother our guests after they finish their meal, girl," Rini said, taking the tops off each pot.

"But—they—"

"Shoo!" Rini said, waving violently at her, and she ducked out of sight.

Naga smiled a little. "What's her name?"

"Ryoko," Rini said. "Her mother was Rina."

She picked up a bowl and scooped out watery orange broth from the first pot. White, square cubes and greens floated on top. Putting it down, she scooped tan broth out of the second pot and into another bowl. Carrots, noodles, cut pieces of chicken, mushrooms, and eggs crowded at the top.

She shuffled close. "Nabkeyaki Udon," she said, and Naga raised his hands for the overfilled bowl. "Miso," she said to me, and I took the other bowl.

"Do visitors come through here often?" Naga asked.

I touched the side of the bowl. It wasn't cold, but it wasn't hot either.

Rini went back behind the counter and came out with two wooden spoons. "Almost exclusively shinobi and kunoichi returning home," she said, handing us the utensils. "Usually exhausted, and more than happy to pay for a quick meal."

"Kunoichi?" I asked.

Naga looked down at his bowl, his lips twitching down. He scooped up a spoonful of chicken, carrots, and broth and ate it.

Rini's brows furrowed at me. "The female counterpart to a shinobi."

Female counterpart?

"What does a kunoichi do different than a shinobi?"

"Kunoichi tend to take on infiltration and espionage missions, be less involved in the front line—"

Naga coughed, slapping a hand over his mouth to muffle the sound. Once he stopped, he wiped his mouth with his sleeve and I caught Rini's frown, a second before she schooled her expression.

"Does this have salt in it?" he managed.

"A pinch."

Naga stared down at his bowl. I scooped up orange broth with my spoon, greens sticking to the side. It tasted like onions and seaweed.

"If you don't like it, you could try the stew," Rini offered. "Or I can drain the broth."

"It's fine," Naga said, dipping his spoon back in his soup. "I just thought the taste would be different, that's all."

Rini looked skeptical.

I glanced towards the staircase when I heard footsteps again, and a boy stood at the bottom in a sleeveless shirt and shorts, staring, wide-eyed. He was at least half my age.

"Gou," Rini said, a reprimand, already turning to face him. "You know better than to bother our guests while they eat."

Naga scooped up a carrot, drained the broth out of his spoon against the side of the bowl, and ate it.

Gou was almost bouncing on his feet. "I know," he said. "But it's them."

I took Naga's bowl, his spoon going still in the air above it, and pushed mine towards him with my other hand.

He looked at me. "You don't know if you'll like it."

I shrugged, dumping carrots from the bowl into the other one.

"Gou—" Rini began, exasperated, but he ran towards us and didn't look at her.

I didn't look up until he shifted around Rini and knelt on the other side of the table. "I'm sorry," he said hastily. He leaned down, forehead nearly touching the floor. He clasped his hands together above his head, asking for forgiveness, then shot back up.

Naga watched him, smiling, indulging.

I ate part of an egg soaked in broth. The egg was soft, but I didn't taste the salt.

Gou dug around in his pocket and held out a folded slip of paper. "Can you give this when you see Inari again?" he asked, and I stared at it, eyes widening.

Naga sucked in.

Even Rini looked surprised.

"Pretty please?" Gou asked, glancing up at Rini, then back at us. "I knew you'd come back, so I was savin' it until now. It's the only one I'll ever send, promise!"

I looked up at him and I saw a little kid.

He wasn't jaded like Hanako. He didn't have horror hidden behind his eyes like Hidan. He didn't distrust like Kota or throw knives like Enyo.

His hands were soft, fingers unscarred by kunai or shuriken.

Naga hesitated and I watched Gou's smile falter, his hand droop. "We're not—"

My hand reached out, all on its own, and took the note. I leaned back and slipped it into my pouch. "I'll give it to Inari," I said, and watched his eyes light up.

Naga and Rini stared at me, but I only scooped up a spoonful of mushrooms, chicken, and broth and ate it.

Gou pushed away from the table and hastily bowed. After a quick look at Rini, he smoothed out his expression. "Thank you, honored guests. I won't intrude again."

I watched him dart back, footsteps on the staircase, mop of brown hair peeking out from around the wall as he looked at us again before he ducked down and ran back up. He believed we were more than we were, messengers for a god I didn't believe in, but it made him happy.

He didn't have chakra burns, or scars, but maybe he would, one day.

Naga sighed, looking at Rini, whose gaze still lingered on me. "Why does he think we can deliver a message to Inari?" he whisper-asked.

Rini glanced back at the staircase, quiet for a few seconds. "Nearly everyone here is of the belief that the lot of you are in some way affiliated with Inari," she finally answered. "You're ninja, but you don't act like it. When people tell the story they talk about how you came without headbands, how you arrived right when the town needed you most, how you solved our problem and asked for nothing back."

Her eyes slid to the golden fox on the wall. "If it were a village-sanctioned mission, you would've had flak-jackets, things to identify yourselves. Missing-nin would expect compensation. They say you came here in cloaks, as if summoned. They talk about how, when you left, it was like you were never here at all."

Naga squished the white squares into paste with his spoon and slowly mixed it around in the broth.

"Ninja that don't follow the rules of ninja. Who else could you be, if not messengers of Inari?" Rini added.

"Do you believe we are?" I asked.

Rini didn't look at me. "I'm not sure what I believe."

A/N: 寂しい - Lonely

Reminder that Nagato, by the end of the series, could sense across a battlefield he wasn't even on to find Kabuto. Only a handful of people can sneak up on him. Minato, because Minato. A could, but he'd punch first and eavesdrop later. And Zetsu, because he's a walking, talking 'no u' to most abilities.

tldr: Nagato talks openly about sensitive information because he trusts in his abilities.