HybridTrash13: Haha, yeah I cracked myself up writing these chapters. Ahh, yeah…they are terrible parents and they get even worse this chapter. Thanks for your review. :3

DarkDust27: Yup, a total badass in the future! Thanks for your review. :3

Shadow of God: Haruto is going to be pulling a bunch of Itachis. She's, uhh, completely neutral. She's not good, she's not bad. She's in the grey area. The only reason why she would ever get involved with something because it benefits her or interests her because she gets bored easily…haha, thanks for your review. :3

Guest: No reverse harem, it hurts my feminist complex. Thanks for your review. :3

I wanted to post this earlier but that didn't go well…uhh. Yeah.

Original word count: 4.1k~

Recommended songs: Warrior Concerto by The Glitch Mob.

Enjoy! :3

Chapter 2: Soaring Home

Debts are annoying. Fuck debts. Debts can suck on asses and choke on shit. (Requescat en pace, debts).

The man who saved me was ordered to do so, but the order could've been rejected. The fact that it wasn't rejected made me appreciate his saving more than enough.

The bag of clothes I had were flat and small, and I was holding the gift box Yū had given me. It turns out she got somewhat attached to me—told me she already thought of me as a daughter.

That was nice. She did seem to have a kind side.

She did also tell me to visit again when I was old enough. That was fair, I could live with that. As strange as it was, I took a liking to the events that took place. I wanted to see a certain woman get slapped with a pancake at one point, because that same woman consented to be slapped with sausage and rubbed with syrup in front of all the men. They were all high on ecstasy, though…

You never knew what was inside of that drug. I've seen numerous accidents where people died trying the damned thing. The prints were cute, sometimes inappropriately hilarious, but that shouldn't deceive anyone. Sadly it did.

Sakumo (I learned his name not even a few minutes ago) patted my back gently, beaming a smile in my direction. "It'll be alright," he said.

I just frowned and nodded quietly.

"Did you like Yū? She seemed kind," he continued.

I blinked. "Well…she was different," I said. "She wasn't mean to me at all. The others were."

"And the men?"

"Pigs."

Sakumo laughed. "I like your honesty."

I just smiled, though a bubble of laughter followed.

"How long have you been in there?"

"Um…I don't know," I said thoughtfully. "I never went outside."

Sakumo looked sympathetic, but there was…a sense of mutuality. That confused me. Why was he feeling sympathy? I don't understand. It faded and he put a hand around me, his palm resting on my shoulder. We exited the ghetto—where the high, the drunk, the black market dealers were. The street had been fairly empty, but you could hear rather suspicious sounds coming from alleys.

We entered the fine line of ghetto and gucci. It wasn't much longer till we reached the busiest of the busiest parts of—what, Tanzaku Gai? We were still in this damned place.

I do believe I'll have a neutral dislike to this Tanzaku.

"Do you want me to carry you?" he asked.

I instantly nodded. My feet were already starting to hurt and the sandals were causing blisters. So he hoisted me up, and soon enough he was pushing through the busy crowds. Some people purposely bumped into us, which I glared at irritably. Don't they have respect?

…Ah, but then again I shoved past people in the old day…haha.

"Are we almost there?" I asked eventually.

"Yes. We'll be in a hotel until tomorrow morning. Then we're going home."

I frowned. "Home?" I asked.

"Konoha. That's your home," Sakumo pointed out. He smiled at me again. "You're going home, Haru-chan."

I brightened a little and giggled with happiness—but it was all fake. I never really had a home. Not since I was eight, but I never truly understood the concept of "home".

This could be a second chance, I dunno. That's probably why I was here in the first place.

The sleep was very nice. It was peaceful, too. I could get a full night of rest without waking up to the sounds of sex.

We hitched a ride with a carriage.

"How long was I away?" I asked curiously.

Sakumo blinked and looked at me. "I believe you were gone for about six weeks."

My eyes flew wide. Six weeks?! What the fuck! Yeah—sure, six days is okay but weeks?! Might as well not shave for a century and store some fat because I basically hibernated in a sex joint for six weeks!

"Maa, maa…you'll be fine. Not a whole lot has changed," Sakumo assured me. He patted my head and chuckled.

"Where will I go?" I asked.

Sakumo tipped his head curiously. "Where do you think?"

I gave him a strange look. What the fuck, did he think that I, a three year old, would know? I didn't.

…That was a lie but I had a fairly good idea. I will likely be placed in a foster, adoptive or orphanage center and I was praying it wasn't the latter. Probably was, though, and that made me feel faithless.

"Do you want to live with me? I've got a son just about a year younger, and my wife has always wanted a daughter," he said.

I was internally laughing. Oh, that poor son. A disappointment, eh? But whatever, they probably did the good parental thing and moved on. "Um…"

"I know it's very sudden," he said. "You can think about it for a little while. But your parents can't live with you. As a matter of fact, you won't be able to see them for many years…"

I blinked in surprise. "Why?"

"They sold you for money," he pointed out with a quiet voice. "That's mean and not okay. You'll probably have a choice."

"…Um…what…kind of choice…?" I asked slowly and hesitantly.

Sakumo patted my red head of hair. "You'll see."

I pouted a little, but turned my head away and stared at the ground. I didn't mind not seeing Kazue and Hiro for a few years. They weren't…very good at being parents. They taught me calligraphy and Japanese characters—how to write with both hands, kick with both legs, how to hold a kunai properly, how steady my hands have to be…the list could go on for eternity.

They often pushed me to my mental limits, which says a lot. I have high endurance physically and mentally in both lives, more physical endurance here, so for me to break…it'd have to stretch out for days on end. My sessions were twelve hours long, daily, and by the time I finished, I was way too tired to get my child urges to play fulfilled.

I hated being serious. They were too serious. I liked attention. They never gave me attention. I valued alone time. They never left me alone. I've come around to liking them to a consent.

They acted like they didn't want me.

The only reason why I kept letting it slide is because I had this mindset that it'd stop when I enrolled into school. That obviously isn't happening, and I could tell everyone about what they did.

I didn't know what their problem was, but their distances seemed to have been their downfall. They were in jail—probably having not even a small pile of ryo to give up, and therefore they would be put in community service. That's what I've seen happen multiple times. But this isn't my world.

I could tell.

There was a constant buzzing sound in my ears often backed up by consistent ringing and roaring sounds. I was used to this, have been for years. The ringing and roaring I knew for sure was tinnitus. I've had that for ages. But the buzzing sound…I didn't know what it was. It started only a few months ago, when I turned three in January.

I know for sure that tinnitus doesn't involve a persistent buzzing sound. Sometimes it would get so bad. It would become so loud that my head vibrates and I get extremely dizzy. There's an itching sensation in my gut that typically follows—and I know it's my instinct telling me that there's something there.

Me, being an instinctual human being, reached out to that gut feeling. I've been digging at it for months now. I know for sure that it's not just an audio thing—it involves my whole system.

It got so bad at sometimes that I vomited. It happens a lot, and at one time or another the vibration in my body got to the point of where there was a growing pain in my head. It went down to my neck, my back, and I had difficulty focusing. It was painful.

And it always happened right before Kazue slapped me.

I didn't understand it. Yet, it made me more curious than scared.

But god damn, I'm only three years old in this stupid body. I shouldn't be experiencing these things if I wanted to be considered normal.

Matter of fact, what even was normal? Normal was stupid. Normal can suck my ass.

…Never mind, I take my statement back: I didn't want to be considered normal.

"What are you thinking about?" Sakumo inquired.

I blinked out of it and looked up at the older man. "Is this normal?" I asked.

"The situation you're in?" he questioned. I nodded. But he shook his head as expected. "No. Kids your age aren't normally put in this kind of thing, but it has happened before."

"Really?" I mumbled. He nodded, a smile full of nerves following. I tipped my head a little. "Like when?"

The smile became more strained, and honestly I found genuine amusement towards that expression. Sakumo hummed. "Well…it's complicated. But kids in a problem like yours are taken from their moms and dads in exchange for money by evil and mean men. Sometimes the children are put to work."

I looked down again, my dark eyes somewhat wide and thinking. "What about…other situations?"

"You ask a lot of questions," Sakumo said.

I frowned. "Mama says that a lot," I stated, "and she gets annoyed."

Instantly, the older man looked intrigued. Just like I intended to happen. Toddlers don't have a theory of mind, morals, or really any control in general because they're still growing. If they can talk, they can tell. He narrowed his true grey eyes. "What'd she do?" he asked.

"Um, what do you mean?" (Justin Bieber's song instantly popped up; the damn thing is tricky to forget).

"Well, you ask lots of questions, and your kaa-san gets annoyed by it, right?" When I nodded in confirmation, Sakumo continued. "When she gets annoyed, what does she do to you?"

"She yells at me," I said. I looked at him and frowned. "Sometimes she'd smack my head if I ask why. Or she'll lock me in my room and make me sleep hungry."

"And your dad? What does he do?"

"He yells. It's scary," I murmured, looking down and shrinking back into my seat. I've been yelled at by all kinds of people, police of all nationalities included. I know how to react, and me—being a former babysitter—I can inference how children react to being yelled at. They're often confused ('why?'), scared ('how?'), sad ('what did I do?') and shrink into a shell out of fear. The latter isn't super common, but it's high up there.

"And? What else?"

"Um…they take away my drawing stuff a lot. It makes me sad," I continued. I'm so glad that we were the only people riding the carriage. "It's the only fun thing they give me. Everything else I get is boring, and I hate it."

Sakumo sighed and nodded. "How else did they hurt you?"

I frowned again. I've been smacked various times and places, all done by my stupid mother. There were the few times where I didn't know why. Kazue would just storm into my room and start yelling at me, sometimes smacking my arms or face. Hiro never raised a hand to me, he was more verbal.

"Mama hits me a lot. I don't know why. It's…scary. I don't like it," I explained, my eyes tearing up. "It hurts a lot, too…"

Sakumo instantly looked infuriated. His face was tight and the buzzing suddenly became very intense. I swayed back and fell into my seat, feeling green and disoriented. My vision was swimming and my dizziness made focusing too much to do. The instinct that kept scratching at me was now screaming at me—and finally, finally, I could identify it.

It was an alien emotion.

It was anger.

(And it was coming from Sakumo).

I do believe I fell unconscious.

I remember feeling my mind slip into a soothing darkness after I felt the overwhelming buzz crack down on me and destroy my comfort prior.

I woke up in a bed, a brown wooden ceiling overhead. The bed was soft, but not super soft, and the blanket was warm. I sat up and rubbed my eye, looking around. The room was plain, and there was a dojo door parallel across from me and my bed.

Well, I lied a little. The room was super plain. There was a plain rug on the plain floor by my plain bed and a plain night stand with just a plain clock and plain lamp.

Plain.

I felt kind of grim.

I brushed hairs out of my face, ruffling the curls and getting rid of the pins. At the foot of my bed were some new clothes—and I've never felt more happier in my life. I was quick to change. I took the skirt off, replaced it with cargo shorts, and an indigo t-shirt. I could tell it was the attire of a male, but I didn't care. I could dress in a tuxedo and would be fine with it.

I turned my head towards the door. Creeping towards it as silently as I could, I peaked out—

"What are you doing?"

I screamed in surprise, my arm shooting back and lashing out at the stupid idiot who was standing right in front of me. My hand had been balled in a fist, and I could feel it connect with a nose.

"Shit—" I screamed in English, "…fuck! I'm sorry! That was an accident!"

"That hurt!" the boy cried, holding his injured nose. "What the heck are you even saying?!"

Instantly, I gasped over-dramatically. "Don't say that!" I snapped. "You'll get me in trouble!"

"What—heck?!" he shouted back with a squeaky voice. "I say it all the time!"

But I say worse so ha. "I don't care!" I screeched.

The boy glared, his two grey eyes narrowing. "You're stupid."

My eyes teared up and my bottom lip jutted out, my eyes brows creasing upwards in faked sadness. I'm surprised I didn't take a drama class in high school. But all that science was worth it, though. "You don't mean that," I whimpered.

His eyes widened when he saw that I was going to cry. His hands waved as he frantically apologized and tried to stop me from crying. "Please, please, please don't cry," he pleaded. "I didn't mean it. I'm super, super sorry."

I sniffled, a whine escaping my throat.

"I said I'm sorry!" he cried with a hushed voice. "What do you want, candy? I know a good place where candy is!"

"R-r-really?" I stuttered out.

He nodded, grabbing my wrist and dragging me away. "Here, I'll show you."

I smiled brightly and followed. "'Kay," I agreed. "Oh, by the way, what's your name?"

"I'm Kakashi," he said. "My tou-san said that your name is Haruto."

Again, some sense of violation with a touch of a mental flinch. But I nodded. "Yup! It's Uchiha Haruto. Who's your tou-san?"

"Hatake Sakumo," he said. "And my kaa-san's name is Inuzuka Ren. Who're your parents?"

"Uzumaki Kazue and Uchiha Hiro," I responded. I kept my voice even, and years of practice backed it up. I held no true resentment towards them at this point, they were already paying the price for their actions.

Kakashi stopped walking and looked at me. He had silver hair exactly like Sakumo, true grey eyes and a face mask that covered half of his face from the bridge of his nose down. "Uzumaki?" he echoed, letting go of my wrist and facing me completely.

I nodded. "Yeah…is something wrong?"

"I hear it's a really cool clan that had enough people to make an entire village," he said. "But they aren't around anymore. That's what I've been told, though."

I blinked in interest. I'll have to research that on my own time, or perhaps ask someone with brilliant knowledge. But if the Uzumaki were that "cool", then that's probably why I was sold for so much. "Really? Why aren't they around anymore?"

"I hear they were killed."

My eyes widened, but it was out of curiosity. "What?! Why!"

Kakashi shrugged. "That's what the books say," he said. "Let's hurry to the candy, though."

Oh my god chocolate sounds so fucking good right now. I nodded eagerly and we started running on clumsy legs. His feet were surprisingly silent. So were mine. I was never the stealth type…but I guess the stupid sessions my shitty parents put me through worked.

Eventually, after a few turns, we made it to a living space. It dipped down into a large square middle, chairs surrounding a coffee table. Coffee mug rings repeated itself in one consistent spot—and that spot was where a single couch chair was.

Old pops' chair, I see, ehh.

(I'm not Canadian).

Kakashi guided me into the kitchen. It was decently large, the cabinets filled and high up. I don't remember kitchens being this huge, what the hell. I watched my fellow toddler climb up onto the counter next to the fridge. He motioned me to stand in front of the said fridge, and I did.

He was slowly pushing something over the edge. My arms extended out to catch it—and I was so glad that I did, because he pushed a large bag of random candy into my arms. I almost stumbled under the weight—

"Hey! What the hell are you two doing dattebane?!"

I froze and looked at the living room. A red haired girl who looked to be about nine or ten stood there, face round, skin fair, eyes violet and red hair a very pretty shade of tomato red. She had indigo quarter-pants, a green flak jacket and the metal-plated Konoha headband was proudly displayed over her forehead.

Kakashi instantly jumped down. "Run!" he shouted.

Run I did.

The buzzing I felt originated from her, and there was a scarily mellow feeling that my instinct told me of—but it had huge amounts of anger and rage underlying it. That…was scary. Even I didn't have that much anger and I've spent decades bottling everything up. It made me feel too wary and scared, and I knew for sure I'd be insensitive towards her as a defense mechanism.

"This way!" Kakashi said as quietly as possible. He turned a corner into an empty room, sliding the dojo door closed as soon as I entered it.

We rushed to the other side, reaching a corner and keeping as quiet as possible. Nothing happened for quite a few seconds. I'm pretty sure a minute passed before we started moving again.

"Where is this?" I asked. We were sitting and invading the bag of candy already. It consisted of chocolate and marshmallow. I don't know where it came from but I was very happy.

"Just an empty room in the compound," Kakashi replied. He pulled down his face mask, showing adorable chubby child cheeks. He had a beauty mark on his chin, and his lips were kind of thin for being Japanese. I stared for a few seconds before eating.

I could tell that he would be hot when he got older.

"Compound?" I inquired.

He nodded. "Yeah, the Hatake clan's compound," he explained. "You know, a traditional manor."

…Oh! Okay…yeah. I knew what he was talking about. I've seen pictures and have even visited some. "I know," I said. "I just don't use compound."

"What do you use, then?"

"Manor."

Kakashi scanned me, his mouth twisting in a way that made him look adorably snobby. His eyes narrowed as he bit in the chocolate he had pinched in between his fingers. "…Compound sounds better…"

I narrowed my black eyes. "Manor is better."

"No it's not," Kakashi objected.

"I will punch you again!"

"No you won't!"

I cracked my knuckles. "Try me, you peevish, inept rabbit-sucker!"

The confusion on his face was so hilarious. I instantly broke down laughing, which made his confusion worse. I loved Shakespeare insults. They were amazingly funny, and rarely made sense to most modern day people.

Well. Unless they were educated enough.

"What does that even mean?!" he cried.

I just continued to laugh, holding my stomach and doubling over. I had a difficult time breathing because I was laughing so hard. Dear lords, this was too fucking much.

'Rabbit-sucker'.

I laughed harder.

"Stop laughing," he grumbled, crossing his arms in irritation.

"Kakashi! Where are you?! Get back here dattebane!"

We both went quiet, though the sugar I had eaten wasn't doing much to help. I put my hand over my mouth, and Kakashi pulled his face mask back up, hovering over the candy like it was gonna get abducted by aliens.

I just giggled. He glared. I giggled again. He shushed me. I busted into loud laughter.

Then, I realized that this was the first time I've eaten sugar in this life.

Ah, no wonder.

"Aha!" The girl slid the dojo door all the way open. "I found you!"

Kakashi and I screamed and ran around the room, managing to dodge her as we raced out of the empty, random room. I ate the rest of my candy along the run, grabbing more fro, the bag in Kakashi's arms. I was laughing the whole way through, the sugar rush giving me extreme quantities of energy. I felt like I could destroy the world.

"Hey! Get back here!" she shouted.

We just continued running, laughing and screaming in joy of the chase. We hid under furniture and in random rooms—and eventually (I'm not sure how), we ended up outside hiding behind a tree with the bag of candy in between one another. I was too tired to continue running, so I just laid on my back chewing on a bunny-shaped, chocolate covered, marshmallow-filled piece.

"That was funny," I commented.

"I'm tired," Kakashi mumbled. "I wonder when kaa-san and tou-san will be back."

"Where'd they go?" I asked.

He looked thoughtful for a second before responding. "Um…I think to some really important meeting," he said. "Kushina-nee said they'd be back by dinner."

"Who's…Kushina-nee?" I questioned.

"The girl who's been chasing us," he said. "Her name's Kushina, but I call her Kushina-nee 'cause she's around me a lot."

"She's weird."

Kakashi giggled and nodded his agreement. "She is."

We drifted into silence, and started enjoying the sounds of nature. There were bird songs I haven't heard in a really long time, and a strange feeling came to me. It felt somewhat like the void in my soul was being filled, yet there was nothing to fill it with. I narrowed my true black eyes, staring up at the clear, cloudy sky.

Everything kind of became…faded. The sounds I heard didn't feel very real. The grass underneath me felt like an illusion, and the breeze could've just been a breath of air. The sun was just an illusion, and the sky wasn't supposed to be there.

Unmoving, I stared.

Disbelieving, I stared.

"Um…are you dead?"

I blinked and turned my heads toward Kakashi. "What…?'

He frowned. "You looked dead."

I grinned sheepishly, though it wasn't very enthusiastic. "Oh…I was just thinking. I haven't been outside for a long time."

Kakashi blinked in surprise. "Really? How long?"

"I dunno," I replied.

He glared in disbelief, but he didn't press. It was strange for a toddler to not push the subject, but not all toddlers were nosey.

I looked back up to the sky, the sensation of the world being a mere dream fading away. I sucked in a deep, refreshing breath of air. I hated forgetting that I'm physically and emotionally detached, the former meaning sometimes the world feels too dreamy to be true and the latter being the inability to know how profound a bond is—or at least that's what I've found it to mean.

"You gave us a scare, you little trouble-makers," a deep voice said.

Kakashi turned his head and I squeaked in surprise, sitting up frantically with my messy red hair a complete, utter and embarrassing mess. I couldn't help but stare when I saw Sakumo crouching in front of us, Kushina behind him and a brunette woman standing not too far behind them, an amused look on her tattooed face.

I blinked. "Um." Honestly, wouldn't this be a convenient place to find us?

"Tou-san, kaa-san!" Kakashi said happily. He pushed the bag of candy away and hugged his father, his mother following suitably.

"I see you're enjoying your time here, Haru-chan," Sakumo said.

I giggled and nodded, a big smile stretching across my face. "Yup!"

"Here, let's go inside. We need to clean you up and have a little talk, okay?"

I just nodded again, and followed everybody in to the manor. I was nervous, though…I didn't like "little talks".

They always ended up horribly for me.

"Requescat en pace": Ezio' saying, "rest in peace"