Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto

First light found me meditating again on the porch, trying to reason out what Shikaku was trying to say to me the previous evening. It seemed however that I was just chasing my own thoughts in circles. His logical puzzle followed a trail that at some point just ended in darkness.

I was brought back to myself by the sound of the door sliding open.

"Jeez, are you always up so early?" Shikaku's tired voice complained from behind a yawn.

I nodded and fell backwards so that I was laying on my back looking up at him.

He looked down at me for a moment before asking, "Do you always meditate?"

"It helps me to keep myself..." My hands fumbled for a moment as I tried to think of the right word, "Myself?" I finished, my half heartedness sort of framed it like a question though and Shikaku laughed seeing me look frustrated with my attempt at explaining myself.

"I can understand that, we Nara cloudwatch a lot and to us that is just like meditation. Keeps us together, keeps us true to who we are. Have you thought about what I asked last night?"

"Yes," I replied, "Not that it helped."

He laughed again, "You're the first person outside the clan that I've even tried to explain these concepts to, if they came easily to you I'd be kind of insulted. I was going to stick with the baser elements of strategy, at least by our standards but as soon as you played Shogi I could tell you had the potential to understand much more."

I widened my eyes, "The first?" clans were usually secretive with their knowledge this much I knew, I must have made some kind of impression for him to try teaching me what I was beginning to understand was coveted clan knowledge.

Shikaku nodded absentmindedly and looked towards the trees, "We Nara have never been much of a trusting people. We joined the village more out of necessity than the benefits it offered, after all it's not like we could have moved away from our forest. But even if we were trusting it takes a special kind of mind to understand the knowledge of our clan. Well, I guess knowledge is a bit misleading. It's really more of a mentality."

He was beginning to lose me again. He was teaching me something but he wasn't giving me knowledge? I shoved the thought away before it brought more headaches.

"Will we be shepherding again today?" I asked

"We will." He confirmed. "But you won't be with me, today you'll be with Maen. I think he might be able to help with that mental block you're feeling."

I sure hoped so.

Maen on first examination seemed a brusque individual, his face was hardened and his expression meeting me didn't betray any feeling he had about taking care of me this afternoon. He shared few words at first but I quickly learned that the reality was he just had different priorities. When Maen watched the deer his expression softened, it seemed he felt a real connection to his work, the few words we exchanged that morning seemed to confirm it, unless it was about the work, the deer or forest any attempt at conversation was usually one sided.

When it was finally my turn to shepherd in the afternoon Maen grew more and more frustrated as time went on, I hadn't lost any deer - yet! But his face grew harder and started to twitch until he eventually started to try and give me advice.

"You're not going about this right." He began.

I rose an eyebrow, "What am I doing wrong?" I asked.

Maen looked like he wanted to say something but after a few moments of internal turmoil held his tongue.

That was until a few minutes later.

"You aren't thinking this through right." Maen eventually ground out.

Thinking this through right? I was just trying to keep ahead of the flock, as impossible as it seemed at times. I knew where they all were but predicting the moves of the flock as a whole was something that was taking all of my concentration to head them off before a movement became a migration.

I nodded to Maen to indicate I had heard and tried to think more about where the deer might move next rather than where they were going now.

This didn't placate Maen though who let out a groan of frustration and finally said, "No you're thinking too much, don't think more."

"Think… less?" I asked unsure.

"Well. Kind of yes."

"Kind of?"

But Maen wouldn't be drawn anymore and the day continued with him looking more and annoyed.

By the time I returned back to the clan compound I had gotten frustrated myself. When I saw Shikaku that evening I asked if he wanted to play anymore Shogi. At least that I understood. When he played Shogi there were lessons of tactics to be learned the rest of what he had tried to teach me though seemed banal at best and incomprehensible at worst.

Shikaku looked at me with his calculating eyes for a moment before shaking his head "Not yet. You still don't understand."

"Understand what?" I asked frustrated.

"I can't say." Shikaku replied.

"Minato chose you to teach me tactics why won't you tell me what it is you're trying to teach" I finally let out in an explosion of sign language.

"You misunderstand. It's not that I won't say. It's that I can't."

"How can you teach something you can't communicate?"

Shikaku smiled, "Very carefully. Come inside, my wife has been trying to get me to sit down so she can change my bandages all day, we can discuss this in the living room whilst she does."

I followed Shikaku inside and sat across from him at the now empty Shogi table as he took a few moments to gather his thoughts. Whilst he was Yoshino came in with a pail of water and some medical equipment.

Finally Shikaku seemed to decide where to start, "How did your Shepherding go today."

I told him about how I had tried and whilst I hadn't lost any of the deer that day Maen had seemed frustrated at my attempts, I told him about the few things he had said about me thinking too much.

Shikaku thought for a few minutes when I finished occasionally flinching as Yoshino poked at a particularly sensitive area. It was the first time I had seen the injury he had gotten. He was definitely scarred for life, the wounds had cut up his face in two strokes.

"Maen wasn't wrong but… hmm he wasn't entirely right either. I suppose the easiest way of saying it is what I'm trying to do in teaching you is teaching you a different way of thinking. Maen was wise to stay silent though. It's more than a different way of thinking." Shikaku stopped speaking for a few moments with a ghost of the same frustration that was on Maen's face.

Suddenly his face lit up, "When you meditate, you're not really concentrating on anything are you?"

I shook my head. I generally didn't. It helped me to put my mind in order more than anything.

"And yet you would not say you had stopped thinking would you?" He continued.

I thought for a moment, I suppose some part of me was still thinking, they were fleeting thoughts though, nothing really recognisable as a cognizant thought. Eventually I nodded.

"It's kind of similar to that." Shikaku said as if that explained everything.

I hung my head, that didn't really help.

"Hey Kei." I looked up at Yoshino who was finishing putting the last of the bandages on Shikaku, "Don't beat yourself up about this, Nara's are brought up learning this and some don't even begin to grasp it until adulthood, my husband here is just bad at explaining because it came naturally to him before he even started at the academy. They can't speak about what they're trying to explain so they should remain silent."

I lay awake that night considering Yoshino's words, how could they not speak about what they were teaching me? They were obviously making an attempt to but it wasn't really helping me to understand what I was missing.

Just over a week passed from then with me still considering what everyone in the clan had said. Shikaku had shepherded with me since that day with Maen and he seemed to be at a loss to make me understand so he had begun asking me questions about Shogi as I shepherded the deer, questions I had begun to answer almost absentmindedly as the main part of my focus was on the deer, I was on a 3 day streak without losing one so I didn't want to ruin my record.

On this day we were shepherding further into the forest than we had before and Shikaku had told me to keep close as people had gotten lost this far in. I had gained the trick of walking silently through underbrush without breaking any twigs, it was of the tricks I envied the Nara for when I had first taken up this work. Just one snapped twig could be enough to make a nearby deer bolt so being able to move without that being an issue was invaluable. It would also help in my missions as a shinobi, walking silently in a forest was not a skill we learned in the academy but thinking on it now it seemed to be one of the first things we should be taught.

Shikaku had been asking me questions for most of the day, sometimes about Shogi but occasionally about other things, I couldn't remember a great deal of what he had asked, the enquiries washed over and through me without affecting my concentration on the deer.

It was approaching the end of the day when he brought everything to a halt with a one word question.

"Why?"

I flinched in surprise as I glanced away from the area before us and looked at him asking to reiterate the question.

"If the pieces on the Shogi board represented various elements of the village why would you think the King represented that?" He asked.

I shrugged before answering "It's what really matters right? I mean you'd protect it at all costs as well wouldn't you?"

Shikaku nodded to himself considering before seeing the fading light.

"Come, we have maybe 20 minutes of remaining light, let's head back to the compound before we're tripping on roots."

When we got back Yoshino had just started cooking dinner and didn't want us under her feet so I took the opportunity to meditate outside and Shikaku lay down with a sigh in the grass.

"There are tales," Shikaku began after a few minutes, "Of civilisations beyond the borders of the elemental nations that have different languages."

I opened my eyes and looked at Shikaku to show I was listening. Where had this come from?

"I've done some small study of these languages myself, something that I have come across is that these other languages invariably have words that we have no word for in this language. Or at least no single word, we could probably describe the concept or idea they were trying to convey but we'd only ever be able to approximate the true meaning that members of the culture that speak that language understand inherently. What do you think that tells us about language?"

More questions. I frowned into the evening thinking and eventually said, "It would mean that language is formed from the needs of the cultures that speak it. The words that they bring fruit to are brought about by a necessity of their view of the world."

Shikaku nodded, "With that being the case do you think that using our language we can come up with an answer to any given question - even using multiple words?"

I thought on it as the darkness of night deepened, luckily we could still see each other from the glow permeating the paper doors. "You're saying that there are some ideas or concepts we can't communicate because we don't have the words to?"

"Just so!" He exclaimed, "But those ideas, those concepts still exist don't they? Regardless of whether we can communicate them or not, they just have not been given the form of a word between two or more people that understand what they are speaking of."

I nodded, that they existed couldn't be doubted just as it couldn't be doubted that there were things I didn't know even if I wasn't aware of what they were.

"There is a frame of mind that the Nara inhabit more and more naturally where they do not use words to think of solutions to problems instead they allow their mind to take in the parameters of the question they are trying to answer and their minds produce an answer outside of language for them to interpret and carry out."

Shikaku seemed quite animated saying that, like he had finally talked himself out of a box he had been stuck in and I think I was finally trying to understand what he had been trying to teach me.

"You're trying to teach me to think… without thinking?" I asked.

Shikaku laughed, "You see the problem, we have no way to communicate what we do."

"Then how do I learn to think that way?"

"You are close, I can see it in you. I would meditate on it Ko, that's how many of the clan first enter the state of mind."

I nodded, "But how does this help me with tactics or strategy?" I asked

"Think Ko, when you see a problem in battle or even in Shogi and you think through a problem you are restricting yourself to the thoughts and concepts of the language we speak, imagine if you were unrestricted."

My eyes widened in understanding but I got no further as Yoshino called that dinner was finally ready.

It was at the end of my second week when I first discovered what Shikaku was trying to communicate and it happened when I was shepherding the deer. I had fallen into the habit of entering a quasi meditative state when I was out in the forest, sat in my usual pose when possible but with my eyes open. I was being bombarded by questions as usual whilst my concentration was mainly on the deer when I realised Shikaku had fallen silent, and it suddenly seemed so obvious how the deer were going to move. It was like I had been concentrating on winning a small battle when herding them but there was a larger war going on I hadn't been paying attention to.

Of course I was so surprised that I fell out of that state of mind as quickly as I realised I had entered it. Shikaku though was openly grinning at me for the first time.

"I Told you Ko. You're the first none Nara that has even been able to comprehend the idea all you needed from there was some guidance. Let's head back to the compound, you're done with shepherding for now."

Privately I was equally happy that I didn't have to do anymore herding as I was that i had finally managed to do what Shikaku had been trying to teach me. I wondered on the way back if this state of mind was only possible in this world, perhaps because of chakra, or whether it was possible in my old life as well. Certainly the limitations of language existed in both.

Shikaku spent much of the next few days leaving me to try to meditate to induce the state on my own whilst he went out into the forest during the day. It was much harder than it sounded on the surface, the trick wasn't to not think it was to think without using words and since at this point I had the better part of 4 languages up there it seemed like they were taking up a lot of space. I managed it sporadically which was frustrating but Shikaku told me that the time I would be able to keep myself in that state would increase if I used something to focus myself. Many Nara within the clan when first learning used a handsign to focus their concentration which didn't seem to make sense at first but the more I tried using a bird handsign I was surprised to find that it worked in a very counterintuitive way. When entering the state it's very easy to become distracted by something and find yourself snapping out of it but with something already there using up your attention there is nothing short of physical interruptions that can take your mind away from the task.

In the evenings when Shikaku returned he would set up the Shogi board in different starting positions, often with different rules that he explained beforehand and we would play. There seemed to be some method to the seeming madness with which he made up rules and starting positions since he often asked me my motivations for different moves. Rarely did he offer any counter argument but we would continue to play and more often than not come to a promising position at which point he would reset the board to a different position. When I did not come to an advantageous position though Shikaku would ask where I thought I went wrong and I would sometimes spend hours considering the board before giving an answer. He had yet to show disappointment at something I said so I assumed what I had given was the right answer.

With a week of training remaining I found I could maintain what I had dubbed the 'Nara state' for up to 10 minutes, Shikaku told me that when figuring out a plan in advance often that was all I would be given if not less so it should suffice for my purposes but he encouraged me to keep trying. He gave me the option of coming with him to shepherd the deer during the day or staying at the compound to train and I quickly chose the option to stay behind. I spent the mornings training physically since I hadn't had the chance for the last few weeks and the afternoons training with the Nara state.

On the first evening of the last week though Shikaku finally brought me into his living room to play a real game of Shogi.

Shikaku returned from his day working in the forest looking pretty animated, at least for a Nara. I opened my eyes and broke out of my meditation when I sensed him coming, "Hey Shikaku, what have you got planned this evening. Finally going to teach me something? You've still got a week." I teased.

Shikaku rolled his eyes at me, "How'd you like a real game of Shogi?"

I leapt to my feet in enthusiasm and Shikaku snorted, "Alright I can see I'll get no complaints about that."

When Shikaku opened the door to the living room I heard Yoshino let out a sound like "Eep" from inside and saw something colourful set on some wooden apparatus be pushed quickly out of sight before I entered the room.

"Shikaku, you're back early." Yoshino said, it sounded almost like she was scolding him.

Shikaku shrugged before saying, "I thought it was time I gave our guest here a rematch."

Yoshino's eyes lit up, "You're finally going to give him a rematch?"

Shikaku nodded as he took his place at one end of the Shogi board and I took my place at the other.

Yoshino looked torn for a moment before she announced that she would watch this game.

Shikaku layed out the pieces before looking at me, "Ready kid?"

As ready as I was going to be I supposed I nodded and looked at the board as Shikaku took his first move.

I had learned in my time practicing the Nara state to meditate with my eyes open, it was harder but the handsign definitely helped and as I adopted the pose and made my first move Shikaku grinned visciously.

The opening game was contentious, both of making moves to take control of the center of the board, an area that was traditionally key in the early game of Shogi. We both made losses and as time went on the game looked to swing either way, we entered the mid game with me technically ahead but my concentration was slipping. I wasn't sure how long it had been since we started but it was far longer than I had held the Nara state before. I visibly perspired as Shikaku leaned further and further in as the game took shape.

Shikaku gained back the difference between us with a trap I saw far too late to prevent towards the end of the mid game and he slapped down his spoils next to the board with satisfaction. I had to hand it to him, it was an extremely intricate trap he had to have been putting it into place for the better part of the game.

As we continued into the end of the mid game I saw a change come over Shikaku, he took longer to take his moves for the first time. His hand occasionally hesitated over his pieces. Not that I was doing much better.

Finally we saw it at the same time. The result. Shikaku leaned backwards to lay on the floor even as I laid my head on the table in consternation.

"What happened? Who won?" Yoshino demanded. She had left only for a few moments during the game to put some food from the previous day on to reheat saying she didn't have time to make a new meal.

Shikaku saved me the trouble of replying, "It's a draw."

Yoshino gasped, "You're joking! Shikaku Nara didn't win a game of Shogi?! Wait until the clan hear about this!"

Shikaku mumbled something that sounded like "Troublesome." before he sat back up and looked at me. "We'll be playing again tomorrow." It wasn't a question and something I could see in Shikaku's eyes was hungry for another match right now. If it wasn't so late he might he might have pushed for one, as it was Yoshino ushered him from the room to go to bed and they left me next to my futon looking at the game. I had played as well as I thought myself able, how could I improve?

The next day I couldn't calm down enough to meditate and Yoshino wouldn't let me in the house saying that she had some work to do inside the house and couldn't be disturbed. I spent the day practicing my katas until I thought I was going to lose my mind from waiting.

Eventually though evening began to fall and Shikaku walked back from the forest, he too one look at me and said "Let's go."

When we sat down this time the door was left open, apparently Yoshino had told someone about Shikaku nearly losing a game because Maen had shown up sitting on the porch to watch. I didn't mind, I barely noticed my surroundings when I was playing Shikaku.

Unfortunately this game was as close as the last and both myself and Shikaku were on tenterhooks right to the closing stages when at last we finished we looked at each other. "Rematch tomorrow?" I signed at Shikaku.

"I wouldn't miss it." He answered.

"Could someone let the dullards among us know what the result was?" Yoshino asked, Maen was looking at the board as if he was trying to work out what had happened.

"Another draw." I explained with a grimace.

"Argh! I was really hoping for you to win this time Kei." she complained.

"When was the last time you didn't win a game Shikaku?" Maen asked from over a bowl of rice Yoshino had cooked for dinner.

"Not since my old man took that head injury. So nearly 12 years." Shikaku replied, though he like me was not really paying attention still staring down at the board.

I didn't win the next day much to the disappointment of the onlookers we had now garnered, hoping to see Shikaku finally lose a game of Shogi. Over the next few days though the crowd grew and grew regardless of whether I lost or drew until finally on my last evening at the Nara compound there was an entire twilight vigil watching as we took our places across each other. Maen was still at the front on the porch but the crowd stretched off the porch into the back garden, there were even some Nara watching from the hallway at the entrance of the house. Yoshino had jokingly said a few days before that she wasn't going to be feeding everyone who showed up but apparently they had already thought of that for they showed up everyday with hampers full of bowls of rice and cooked eel.

I had put a lot of thought into my games with Shikaku, analysing every part of every game we had played looking for a weakness, finding none I had started looking at some of the assumptions we made as wrote in the game, setups for traps, ways of dividing the opponents pieces, of gaining a tempo of attack when on the defensive. Eventually I came to the opening. Traditionally the main aim was to take control of the center of the field before the opponent could, after all control of the battlefield was a major boon when the battle truly began. I had begun to consider other methods however, maybe mounting a better defense from the start could be a better way to go, or perhaps making the main aim to be the disruption of the enemies pieces. After long meditation on the problem I felt I was ready when I finally sat across from him and he laid out the pieces looking somewhat embarrassed to have so many coming just to see him play, or more accurately hoping to see him lose.

As soon as we opened I could see Shikaku was taken aback by my apparent change in tack. It was a tactic I had only fully thought out earlier that day and it combined an attempt at mounting a solid defense whilst simultaneously developing the stronger back row into more advantageous positions to divide his front. Shikaku was slow to respond but he eventually made his first developments, still trying to take control of the center of the board but setting up safeguards should I make an attempt on those pieces which controlled that territory. I let him. I continued to develop my back pieces and Shikaku continued to create his moving fortress of attack in the center field and as we entered the mid game we were both only one pawn down, it was a much less aggressive opening than we had seen our previous games and there was a sense of both of us feeling out each others tactic going forward.

Halfway into the midgame my true trap began to become apparent, at least to me and as I made every painstaking move I sweated more and more over Shikaku's response. Both too soon and too late he saw it though and I thought I actually saw him rock backwards a little from his seiza position, then he sat forward and his eyes practically crystallised as he examined the board with onyx eyes.

It was a few minutes before his next move, the longest delay in the match and the onlooking crowd were beginning to mutter, apparently one or two of them had seen the trap as well and had communicated it to the rest of them.

Shikaku though was nothing if not masterful. He deployed a method of retreating the pieces that had advanced too far into my waiting trap whilst bleeding off the weaker ones. It was still a considerable conquest from my point of view with 4 of his pieces taken for the mere single pawn I sacrificed.

He continued though and fought every moment of the way. I lost concentration deep into the end game and very nearly lost the game to a last ditch trap Shikaku had set up with the artful execution of a master of his craft. I managed to negate it though and pressed my advantage and at last I looked up at Shikaku who was still looking at the board looking for any way out of the position that was still 8 moves in coming at last though he too raised his face and he gave me warm smile.

"You've outdone all my expectations Ko. I'll be wanting another game soon."

"I look forward to it." I replied.

To answer the muttering crowd he finally turned to them, "OK. I lost. Get it out of your systems."

All of the Nara present gasped before a ripple of laughter started among a few and then another pocket of them and then suddenly it was spreading like wildfire and everyone was laughing at the ridiculousness of it. From their point of view the Clan leader had just lost in Shogi to a mere 6 year old.

"You're awake already." Yoshino grumbled sleepily.

"mmm" Shikaku replied

"It'll be a shame to see him go." Yoshino said, correctly diagnosing her husbands focus.

"You know," Shikaku said as he shifted onto his side and balanced his head on a hand, "When I was testing him on battlefield tactics he gave me some answers that I really hadn't considered. I've actually devised a new method for how we regiment our forces on the border from one of his own ideas."

"He's a smart kid." Yoshino yawned.

"Smart doesn't come close," he snorted, "I've spoken to kids twice his age who couldn't pick up some of the concepts he learned and combined together in minutes. Do you remember that question my old man used to ask me about the King?"

"That thing again." Yoshino groaned, "Your father was obsessed."

"That kid gave me an answer I had never considered. He may come away from this having taught me more than I taught him"

"He does seem wise beyond his years."

"Sometimes when I look at him I feel like he has plenty of years on him already."

The next day I made preparations to set out. It would be my first time outside of the Nara compound in a month and I was sure I was going to miss it. They didn't live that far out from the center of Konoha but life here seemed much less complicated than it was in the village proper.

Before I left Shikaku and Yoshino had asked to see me off so I waited on their front porch meditating the morning into daytime when eventually they came out from the house.

I stood up to greet them and Yoshino gripped me in a hug, "You make sure to visit Kei, I haven't seen the entire Nara clan come together for something in a long time. I made this for you."

I was about to ask her what but I felt something draw tight around my hair and grabbing my mane and bringing it to the front so I could examine it I found that Yoshino had tied an artistic looking cloth binding, obviously made by her, keeping my tail neat before it spread out further down. It was a dark green binding that was emblazoned with the Nara clan symbol. I knew it would be a permanent element of my wardrobe from then on, it was both practical and something which already meant a lot to me.

Shikaku came next and gripped my forearm in his hand, "You'll have to visit or I'll have to chase you down for my piece back."

I was about to ask him what he meant but as he moved away I felt him drop something into my hand. It was the King from his personal Shogi set, it looked like he wanted to win it back. I grinned and nodded before signing "You can count on it."

I headed back towards the center of the village and towards the other side of the village to our team training area to meet up with Minato the entire time a large grin stuck on my face.

I wonder if Kakashi's training had gone well.

AN: As I'm writing this its 2AM on Monday and I have work in 4 hours but I'm really happy with how this chapter turned out, I think this is actually my best chapter so far. Despite this being my second attempt at writing it since my first draft went and deleted itself. I really hoped you enjoyed this too. Those eagle eyed among you may have seen the easter egg I left for the inspiration I had behind the "Nara State" with the paraphrased quote from the source of my inspiration. I hope you enjoyed this chapter. I'll see you in the next one. Also leave a reviews really do help if you have time!