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Chapter Thirteen

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So maybe spending the rest of my birthday money hadn't been the wisest thing, but I deserved it. Five hundred initial seals were waiting for Isami under the watchful gaze of her mother. I felt like a college student.

And true to type, now penniless. I slurped the last inch of my chocolate milkshake as irritatingly as I could. Asuma had given me more money than I'd remembered—just enough for a movie and a milkshake.

Apparently "romantic comedy" was not the same thing as watching a very inebriated Anko chase Daddy around the kitchen table. Although I'd found that just as funny. Besides, Daddy didn't need a wife. He hadn't been exactly mentally stable when we were young, and by now he'd settled into his bachelor ways.

I lobbed the empty cup at one of Konoha's prevalent waste recepticles. Sorry, Itachi. Looks like your public perception has been tarnished. I think that old man and his granddaughter saw you drop that cup. She probably has ties to your fanclub, and it will break itself up. Which would be a general favor to the world, myself included.

Better yet, I could find a better default movie-going-age person to henge into. Suzume was old enough. So what if I were tired of making seals? I couldn't abandon Isami or Daddy. Walking around town as Suzume wouldn't hurt me.

I'd spent too much time away from home, though. Kato never complained, but at the very least it was my job to distract him from his incessant chakra practice. Pakkun, unlike Kato, commented. Sneaking out was a family thing, he said, but family was supposed to be family. Well, if Daddy were home more, I'd be home more, too. Pakkun always snorted at that.

It was one of those days that covers the sky in monochromatic gray and threatens both rain and sun. As I wasn't up to predicting either, I leaned against a friendly telephone pole and let my eyes drift shut.

It hadn't been a good movie. The transitions and angles had been horrible, minimized by good acting but emphasized by terrible costumes.

Either that or Nine Ninjas: World War. Night showings only. Yeah, lemme explain to Pakkun why I'd missed supper for a movie that reportedly gave grown ninjas nightmares.

No, if I wanted to explain things, I could explain them to Sasuke, who was wandering the area like a lost duckling. It was a shame that he didn't have any friends to squander his after-school hours away with—Naruto was in Shika's class, so Uchiha and Uzumaki would only see each other during lunch and recess. When they got older, they'd have spars, but by then there would only be one class. The Academy liked to weed out its nonviolent brats.

Sasuke would see me soon. I'd find out if Itachi had actually returned yesterday. If not, I should probably quit henging into him.

Sasuke's breathing slowed, but his heart rate increased, informing me of his intentions. Inoichi said I wasn't a sensor? Very well, I didn't need to find chakra. All I had to do was listen to a certain child creep up on me.

Which would end in three, two. . . .

"This morning you said that you've never been beaten by a girl. Which is it, Niisan?"

I . . . "I said that?" I asked faintly. On the plus side, Itachi had gone home last night. A little more than a riddle game, don't you think? Is it worth committing to this?

I straightened, surveying the boy I didn't really want to be around—and yet I did. Sasuke was a clever child, a child whose personality had been broadsided by the murder of everyone he loved by the one he loved most. That murder hadn't yet happened. Perhaps it never would . . . yeah, right.

My birth hadn't changed a thing in this world, much less the Uchiha's situation. What could I possibly do to help Sasuke except mold him exactly like Itachi would?

Could I help anything that wasn't one of my own stupid, abstruse motives?

"Yes." Intense dark eyes scanned my face, searching for lies. "Well?"

I was like four and already wanting retirement. I shook my head to clear it of my pathetic attempts at deciphering my motives. "The girl who fought me is a master of illusions," I explained, accidentally saying the most ridiculous lie I could. "I was out training this morning."

Sasuke frowned. "No one is that good with a henge. Father would have noticed."

Suddenly, I wanted to test that belief. Making fictional people was one thing. Fooling Sasuke for an hour was a higher level, but not as . . . intriguing? Great, I'll add suicidal to the list of aspirations.

"Hn." I poked his vaguely adorable forehead. "If you're ever unsure, ask me to train you. I'll mention the weather."

Yes, yes, let's talk about the weather. Or we could leave, because this kid is playing hooky during his lunch break.

Mom threats are a wonderful thing.

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Daddy was home when I walked in the front door with Yoshino's packed supper (Daddy never made freezer meals, and we were banned from junk food). I said hello to my brother, apparently stacking live kunai as high as he could, left my charge on the kitchen table, and wandered out the back door.

"Wakana."

"Yes, Daddy?" I climbed up onto the fence to perch beside him. His mask was off in the middle of the day, an indication that no one was outside for a decent stretch. I closed my eyes and listened to our neighborhood's sounds. The sparrow family two houses down was alive and well. The resident cat was sleeping under their nest.

"Wakana, I want to have a serious conversation with you."

My stomach lurched. "Yes, Daddy." I twiddled my thumbs, straining to hear other, more distant sounds of life. My mind raced. Would it be the seals? Would it be the henges? It doesn't do to bring everything incriminating to the front of one's mind, you know. Imagine if you were brought to a Yamanaka right now, or somewhere worse.

Daddy sighed. "How would you like to enter the Academy?"

What?

He patted my head, leaving his hand there as I angled my face toward him. "You're an extremely intelligent girl, Kana-chan. I know you've mastered the chakra exercises I taught you." He ruffled my hair. "Maa. I know you better then you think, Princess. You only like to mess up on purpose, and you like to find every possible way to mess up. I would have hated you when I was your age."

My brain finally caught up with my mouth. "Why?"

Because I was a hate-filled little prodigy who had no idea what to live for.

Daddy swallowed hard. "My father taught me his skills. My only goal was to make him proud. A ninja that did not try his hardest would not have earned my respect."

Well, that would have been shallow of him. I'd never tried for anything less than perfect, regardless of other people's opinions. "I like you better now," I said. I'd picked the wrong age, and for that I was sorry.

He looked away.

What? What's that supposed to mean? You don't like the person you are? You think I shouldn't? You think I'd like the old you better? The younger you? The one that hadn't been destroyed by a patriarchal suicide? And I thought mimicking Itachi was hard.

I put my midget-sized hand on his leg. "You're the best," I said. "I like you before, too." Yeah, younger you sounds like Neji, who—aw, shoot. I always come up with the worst parallels. I should shut up now.

"No," he said, "but I don't want to talk about that. You need something that will interest you."

Which wouldn't be sitting in a crowd of random five-year-olds, I could tell him that. "I thought Shikamaru-kun started in the fall."

He had. There was a spring class, too, but we were months away from both deadlines. "The Hokage suggested that you take a placement test instead of joining the youngest class."

Mm, I could test out of the Academy. "What did Kato-kun say?"

"He's barely unlocked his chakra. The Hokage thought he should wait."

"Why should I enter without him?" There it was: pragmatism. Daddy's one chance to convince me to let my second childhood slip out of my fingers.

Daddy met my gaze. "You know why."

If I did, I wasn't thinking about the reasons.

"I'm not starting without him."

I didn't mull over my choice until that night while I laid in bed with nothing better to do. The Hokage and Daddy thought I could test into a higher year of the Academy. Not very high—even Shika's year would be a struggle, but I could do it. I was more interested which of the two wanted me to try. It wasn't a casual suggestion on Daddy's part—he could have enrolled me much earlier.

Okay, so that made it Grandfather's idea (or a third party's, which would be disturbing). He probably didn't want me to fill in as the Kage quite yet. Instead, he'd want the potential he saw to break past any hindrance, even Kato's. It would be a better idea on his part to let time have its say and watch Kato trump our generation. Kato would be a perfect ninja one day. Eons better than me.

I had a chance to rise as high as I could and let my light shine brightly—a light that would disappear as quickly as it came. I didn't want to burn out. I didn't want to be the firefly caught in a jar.

If Hiruzen was watching me with his crystal ball . . . well, no more water-walking in the bathtub.

What else was left to say?

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Cold, cruel eyes swept through the darkness, finding me instantly. I stared back, distantly curious why I wasn't terrified by these pitiless eyes. These eyes knew death; they had lived through it.

I tore my gaze away from the mirror, hearing the stifled sound of indoors exchange itself for the expansive, collective breathing of the outdoors. My heartbeat trampled the serene night with all the grace of a raging Nine-Tails. I looked down to distract myself, but all I could see was the battered ANBU uniform I was wearing. Reddish stains were splattered across it haphazardly, most embedded in the surface scratches that marked the armor as well-loved.

Merciless eyes and now an ANBU. What choices had led to this path?

I put my hands together and released whatever henge had placed itself on me. The armor disappeared, fading into a more familiar brown shirt with a simple leaf decoration. This outfit was not painted with blood, to my relief. The relief concerned me. Why was I relieved? Didn't I know I was being hunted?

Living this life—accepting the Hokage's offer—would only bring death. Not protection. I was scared of his suggestion. I didn't want to be rushed through the ranks of killer.

Why, then, was I so calm when the trees growled death threats?

Globs of dirt spat themselves at my feet as I ran out of the forest's moonless shelter. I wasn't running away. I was . . . purposeless. I could run and hide, but that wasn't the intent of the merciless eyes. I had to decide one way or the other. A decision I never wanted to make.

How readily would I, who had been given another life, take life away from others?

The tantō slid easily out of its sheath. Killer's eyes watched the ambushing ninjas hiding in the forest and mapped out a wide arc, a path that exploited every possible weakness. I ran. The ninjas in the trees prepared more jutsus.

They fell.

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"Why am I here, Grandfather?" I asked the Sandaime, opting out of a conventional greeting. I'd been snatched out of our backyard by ANBU Wildcat without so much as a by-your-leave. I had been napping in the garden, and Wildcat had stepped on the daisies that were just starting to come up again (the poor things never seemed to make it to the blooming stage). I'd informed Wildcat of his new status as a murderer. He had informed me to shut my mouth. Which, really, did nothing but reinforce our already sunny relationship.

If I kicked Wildcat in the shin when he put me down, he ignored it.

I didn't ask where my twin was, or what unprecedented emergency had brought me to the Hokage's office. The former wasn't worth worrying about yet, not without hearing anything suspicious from Grandfather. The latter was probably a better thing to contemplate.

The Sandaime looked up from his desk and dismissed my captor. Unfortunately, the mounds of paperwork absorbed their victim immediately. Official seals and ribbons cascaded down the sides of the documents like wax flies caught in multicolored honey. The Hokage, likewise, showed no sign of emerging.

Scratch that; I'm worried. "Where's Kato?"

My adopted grandfather turned a page.

Numerous explanations bored through the troubled surface of my brain. I let them sweep me along, each slowly pulling me toward a swell of panic. Kato was kidnapped. Kato was dead. Daddy was dead and we were going to be raised under the Hokage's protection.

There just weren't many reasons I was suddenly with the Hokage instead of an ANBU guard. None of my hobbies qualified for this kind of visit.

The Obvious Reason would qualify, but Kato's whereabouts were distracting me from such contemplation. Besides, a discovery of where I'd spent my first childhood probably wouldn't be this comfortable.

I tried again. "Grandfather?"

Grandfather's gnarled fingers traced across the smooth wood grain of his desk, but he didn't respond.

What in the world was wrong? I think I liked my nice, cheery dream better.

"I'm going to go find him," I threatened, and when this, too, garnered no reply, I aimed myself at the open window. I hate heights, part of me whined, but on the other hand, something is sure to catch me before I hit the ground. That something was an invisible barrier.

Henging into the Hokage wouldn't work either, for obvious reasons. No one listens to an authority figure when the real one is doing paperwork eight feet away.

Settle down! You're not going to help anything by panicking, unless hyperventilating will get you sympathy points. Think about this for a minute. Can we be sure it's not a dream?

Well, no. But I was rational enough to ask that question, and so far everything was normal. The Hokage was ignoring me, not deaf. This could be a dream. If it wasn't, he probably had something better than me to focus on. To focus on. I ran around the desk, something I should have done in the first place.

Kato was in the Hokage's crystal ball.

I was blind.

Under any other circumstances, the glass sphere would have arrested my attention. It did that now, preening itself in the room's sunny glow. It had spied on me various times; didn't I care? Apparently not, since I was clambering up the Hokage to get a better angle of my brother.

Kato was covered in dust—that was the first thing I noticed. While he did tend to familiarize himself with the ground during any sort of practice session, he was supposed to be at a tenketsu session, and the Hyūga overseeing that hated dirt. Kato couldn't have gotten dirty on the way home, either, since Michi, one of Daddy's most obedient dogs, had been ordered to allow no wandering.

Kato was dusty, but he wasn't bloody. My next observation, therefore, did not bother me as much. Kato was thrown over an ANBU's shoulder.

I snuggled into Grandfather's arms, not glancing away from my brother's small and very pathetic figure. "Who's carrying him?" I asked. I could see the man's mask perfectly well. Snub horns pushed out of the permanent blank expression. Green lines curved around stylized cheekbones and formed squiggly whiskers.

"I thought you were familiar with Deer," Grandfather replied. "Isn't he one of your favorites?"

I frowned, squinting at the distorted image. I couldn't hear anything, so my opinion was little more than a hunch. If I could hear them, I'd be able to distinguish heartbeats or something definitive. "Deer isn't as muscly. And why is Kato over his shoulder? Wouldn't he be safer in his arms?" Relying on pure sight felt like walking on a broken leg. I should ask Daddy to buy more spot-the-difference books.

There had been a time I hadn't relied on hearing to identify people. Perhaps I hadn't noticed just how much my hearing helped. Maybe whatever fueled my hearing had been more spread out back then.

Grandfather sighed. "Have I ever told you that you remind me of Asuma?" No, and I didn't care right now. "But you are correct, my dear: the ninja carrying your brother is not Deer."

My eyes traveled to the ceiling in frustration. As a practically omniscient person, the Hokage probably exactly knew who was masquerading as Deer. My instincts were pretty certain that this guy was not on our side. Even without hearing, I could trust my instincts.

"Deer," or creepy kidnapping ninja dude, leaned to the side as something small and shiny bypassed him. I clung to Grandfather. All of a sudden, I realized just how utterly insignificant I was, stuck here in the Hokage's office. Anything I did would have just as much effect as screaming at a movie screen.

I didn't want the crystal ball jutsu anymore. I'd rather collect information in person, where it was safe. Sitting here and having no way to change things was not safe.

Kato woke up just as the kidnapper unsheathed a ridiculously long sword to deflect a second kunai. The man's other arm yanked my brother closer. Kato winced, leaving no doubt of the impostor's gentleness. Another hail of metal forced them down to the ground. The ninja kept running, though, so my baby brother took things into his own hands.

With slipperiness he'd inherited from me, Kato reached down his captor's back and opened the man's weapons pouch. The ninja didn't notice, choosing to jump up into the sparse protection of the trees. Kato stabbed him in the back, sliced off the weapons pouch, and was dropped like a live coal.

The real Deer materialized just in time to catch him, launching another volley at the creepy kidnapping ninja dude. Kato was swung to Deer's back while the ANBU blew a fireball. As if he were blowing at an overgrown dandelion. No effort at all.

Then the glass sphere went dark.

I trembled. Unlike Grandfather, I forgot to keep breathing. "Stay calm, Wakana. A mark of a leader is the ability to take charge of any situation."

My thoughts spared the effort to acknowledge his own taking charge, and how that almost defeated the purpose of his admonishing me. Besides, there wasn't much point in pretending I could be in charge of any part of this. I'd just have to pray that Deer got Kato out of there.

The black shimmered and melted into fiery debris that pelted everything but my brother and Deer. Deer was limping. The front of his armor was crisscrossed with several new slashes. He and Kato had evidently formed an agreement, as Kato was throwing kunai with far more grace than should be possible for such a young boy. Kato's body language said he was hitting his target.

Regardless of Kato's missiles, black goo was attacking the two people I currently valued most in the world. Deer had his ninjatō out to block most of the stringy black stuff, but the impostor's disturbingly long sword kept whipping past his guard. It seemed that Deer's opponent had morphed into two people (or clones), both with just enough speed to overwhelm my favorite graying-around-the-edges ANBU.

At this point I remembered just whose circulation all my clinging was cutting off and sent him some ill-natured thoughts. "Go save them, Grandfather! You're the best ninja in the world, right? You'll get there in time. Please, Grandfather. I'll be safe here."

He said something lame about reinforcements. "Please, Grandfather!" And then he muttered something about Danzō. I spared him a very brief unimpressed look.

"Deer can handle himself," he chose as his defense.

Yes, but not Kato. The ANBU was keeping up with the enemy jutsu and the weird strings. The child did not have the speed or strength to get out of the way. "Reinforcements will arrive soon," Grandfather said.

The sword kept flicking at Deer's appendages, always aiming at Kato to exploit maximum weakness. I was impressed just how much blood Deer was functioning without. I was really impressed when he cauterized some of his more serious wounds with the colossal fireballs he was spitting so effortlessly (which wasn't effortless at all by this point. He looked like he was out of everything resembling chakra).

Another ANBU arrived and took Kato, and that was when Grandfather turned off the spying jutsu. I didn't say anything. I sat on his lap and watched him sort through building permits and licensing regulations.

An hour later, an unknown ANBU reported my brother safely in the hospital. I was relieved, of course; the part of me that wasn't in shock was elated.

It was just . . . Grandfather's heart rate hadn't changed the entire time. Was I even supposed to make something of that? Count me out of being a Kage if it required that much self-control.

"Can I go see him?" I asked. "Is Deer still with him?"

Grandfather's heart tensed the tiniest fraction, barely enough for my ears to differentiate. "You should stay here for now," he said.

I concentrated on him as hard as I possibly could. "Are they safe?"

"Yes," Grandfather lied.

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~Compiled! No longer chapters 13 and 14.

Happy (late) Christmas! I was torn between posting this today, Christmas, or tomorrow, Friday. The 13th. I couldn't resist. Don't look a Christmas gift chapter in the mouth.

Q&A (I admit, not as much participation as I thought there'd be.)

floatingmangocake: Don't suppose Kana's a Uzumaki or a Senju?

I don't suppose so, either!

I've been at a wedding, and flying, and driving, and staying at hotels, and meeting new people, and reading, and adjusting. . . .

I appreciate you guys so much for sticking with me and my long delays. How do you even remember the plot? Why, even I don't—right, blatant lie. I couldn't write so confusingly if I didn't know what I was up to. (You can consider that me sharing my frazzled state of mind with you. Or I could confess that I write complicated things because that's what I like to read. Moving on.)

Scavenger hunt! Where in this chapter is an example of a frame story? (frame story: a story within a story)

As soon as I have a decent weekend, I'll reply to the reviews that have backed up. I promise. I haven't forgotten the best part of many of my days. So basically, until I reply, I owe you big-time. And even after.

At this point in time, I'm going to crawl back into my GPA-induced cave and attempt to devote my time to grades (but not sleep. Life is cruel).

I wish you all a very fond farewell . . . and the unprecedented news that the next chapter is already partially written. 'Til next time!