Out of the Ashes

Chapter 2

Child of the Phoenix Bird

I learned my name at some point in my first year. Fushicho, which translated loosely to phoenix bird. The irony of it was lost on everyone but me. In regards to Sasuke and myself, Sasuke progressed physically and mentally slower than me. I was crawling easily at five months after training myself to do it. I was escaping my crib at six months and I scared the shit out of Mikoto several times by escaping and exploring as far as my baby endurance could take me. I potty trained myself as soon as I could walk. Language though I was horrible at. While my motor skills then escalated to me walking and my walking became a hobble run at about a year, my speech halted drastically. I could understand things that people said at around one and a half but if they spoke too fast I would have to sit there and think. Sasuke was my opposite, he was babbling short sentences at one and a half while slowly starting to walk.

It frustrated me, the fact that I couldn't get language down. I was sure when reading and writing started I would also be miserable at that. Two and a half was when Sasuke was able to hobble run and I was running fluently. I could also climb which was hell on Mikoto and Itachi. Itachi loved me and Sasuke to bits and it was his doing that brought me to social situations.

I stared at the playground that Sasuke had sprinted to at the idea of making friends with the other children (This was after he had shyly hid behind Itachi who encouraged him to make friends). There were other almost three year olds there and I eyed the drooling snots with narrowed eyes. Then I looked at Itachi as if to ask "What the shit is this?" and he beamed down at me.

"Go make friends, Fushicho-chan!" I translated a full second after he said it. I narrowed my eyes at him further. I heard giggles of girls who were Itachi's age and had brought their younger siblings to the park or were there playing themselves. Ah yes, Itachi was a handsome little bugger. His ponytail was coming in nicely and he was adorable. I myself was a devil child.

Mikoto loved having a daughter to dress up when I was too young to escape. But now I ran free and little kimonos didn't get by with me. My hair was roughly shoulder length and I didn't let her brush it, rather I ran my hands through it to get out the worst of the knots and then left it alone. The beautiful dark blue hair fell in messy strands around me and my bangs almost hid my dark eyes. I had a high collared shirt that hid the lower half of my chin and definitely hid the "birth mark" burn scar that ran up from my rib cage under my right arm and crossed up across my chest and stopped below my jaw. My skin was still a pale white other than that and I was still beyond sensitive to chakra. The forever there burning still hurt but I was used to it now. I was sure Fugaku and Mikoto noticed my sensing ability but I found Fugaku had little interest in me. Sure I was his little girl, he loved me, but as a ninja he didn't have hope in me. And I also think my eyes bothered him as they bothered every Uchiha and every adult and now, I was sure they'd bother other little brats.

I stared at Itachi from beneath my frizzy bangs, "No."

"Why not?"

Instead of answering my idiot older brother I found a nice spot beneath a tree to perch myself. I watched the little drooling brats run around and scream with joy. Instead of trying to mingle with drooling snots who admittedly could speak better than me I picked up a stick and started to drag it around in the dirt.

"Whatcha doing?" I blinked and looked up when a shadow fell over me. A little boy stood in front of me. His hair was long and brown while his eyes pearly white with no pupils. He was still too young for the curse mark and it occurred to me this was young Neji. Hinata was probably roughly my age, so Neji would get the curse mark in a year or two.

"..." I stared at Neji with unblinking eyes, hoping he'd go away. He didn't, rather he knelt down and looked at the doodles I'd been scribbling in the dirt. He didn't even comment on my eyes which was odd.

"Drawing?" He asked, owlish eyes staring at me. I nodded after a moment and looked down at it. I kicked dirt over my drawings and Neji grabbed for my stick. I held it away from him and then had an idea. He was a prodigy, right? So he had to have some form of higher intelligence.

I drew a grid of nine boxes and pointed at them to Neji, "I'm going to... tea-ch you a game." Neji repeated my stumbled sentence with a much nicer flow to it and I proceeded to teach the little Hyuuga how to play Tic-Tac-Toe in my broken hardly coherent sentences. We played many games and I took time in between my turns to glare at Itachi who was watching with an amused smile on his face.

Bastard probably shoved Neji towards me. I saw him talking to a Hyuuga member so I assumed my suspicions were correct. Neji and I's rounds ended up with our scores becoming tied at twelve-twelve. Neji caught on fast, much to my pleasure. Itachi collected a sniveling Sasuke who fell and cut open his knee and then came over to get me to leave. I bid my farewell to Neji who promised we'd play again someday. He hadn't asked my name through our playing, nor had I asked his. I didn't see Neji at the park again.

"Did you make a friend?" Itachi asked as we walked home. He was carrying Sasuke on his back while I had a hand clenched on the bottom of his pants.

"No." I shook my head and my hair flew around me, "I don't know his name."

"Too bad." Itachi murmured, "Next time then."

Too bad there wasn't a next time for Neji.

Slowly I found myself transitioning to caring for my family, which sounds really odd but to me they used to be characters. They were real now. I slowly transitioned from calling Mikoto her name to calling her Momma and then slowly Fugaku became Father. Itachi became Ita and Sasuke became Sasu. Sasuke and Itachi stayed at their full names in my mind though, Sasu and Ita were simply me being shit at pronunciation. We started learning reading and writing at three and a half (I found this a bit odd but I suppose we would be learning to fight and kill soon enough in the short lived lives of ninja) and as I predicted I was horrible at it. Sasuke took to it like a duck to water and I spent all my waking hours trying to perfect my reading and writing. I was still shaky on speech, it was like I had a lisp with some words. I won't exaggerate to you my speech as I'm retelling this to you in English. But think of a lisp and that was how I spoke in Japanese.

"Your writing is coming along nicely, Shicho-chan." Itachi told me one day as he looked over what I had written. I had fought to get my calligraphy to be the best almost four year old hand writing ever but I was still shaky on spelling and understanding.

I didn't respond to Itachi, rather I continued with forming the various hiragana and katakana that I had trouble differentiating.

Also, fuck anything kanji. Seriously. Fuck kanji.

Itachi spent all his free time, the little he was beginning to have, with either Sasuke or myself. He was already a master of his sharingan as far as I could tell and I knew he would soon be joining ANBU. He was only nine and a half presently but I knew after a year or two he would be. He developed his forehead poke, using it most often on Sasuke who demanded attention. I was quiet and preferred to sit there with my writing.

"That's wrong." Itachi told me, pointing to one of my kanji. I stared at it and scoffed to myself quietly. I crossed it out and rewrote it several more times, each time Itachi telling me it was wrong. I got frustrated and slammed the ink pen down. I breathed out deeply and suddenly coughed as the burning intensified and smoke drifted from my nose. I put a hand to my nose in shock and Itachi blinked at it in surprise.

I passed it off, praying to Jashin and god that Itachi wouldn't tell anyone about what had just transpired, and continued with my writing. I didn't get frustrated again and no more smoke came out of my nose and the burning sensation stayed at it's usual level.

Itachi didn't tell Momma or Father about it as I was never questioned. That night at dinner I had stared at him owlishly and curiously but it never came up again.

Time went by and soon at five years old the academy would start for us. I had started actually brushing my now mid back length hair and my bangs dusted down over my eyes. I wore the typical Uchiha shirt and bandaged my neck up to my jaw so that you couldn't see the "birth mark" that I had. Momma tried her damned hardest to get me to wear cute clothes but my first day of the academy I left my hair in it's usual controlled chaos and marched off with sandals, a pair of Sasuke's shorts and a shirt I knew had to be Itachi's. You see I stole my brother's clothes because they were nice and big. I was still tiny, already Sasuke dwarfed me in comparison and that was also frustrating.

Also, I had been planning over my childhood. I knew the upcoming events and I needed to change some of them. I figured to assume myself causing some kind of ripple effect that would change outcomes. Something like, say I was placed on Team Seven rather than Sakura (Dear Jashin/god/kami please no). I had to take into account myself. I was a player in this game and I was going to make sure I got things on a track I wanted.

That was my initial thought anyway, that was before I started seeing Sasuke and Itachi and Momma and Father as actual living family members. I had taken a new resolve, to try and save Sasuke. Momma and Father were lost, I had to admit. Itachi would surely massacre the clan and I knew I couldn't do anything about it. I was six years his junior so I couldn't fight him (Nor would I ever want to even entertain that thought) and to be honest, if they weren't massacred I wouldn't have an inkling of the future. I would lose so many plot forwarding points that it just wasn't worth it. That made my new focus Sasuke and how to stop him from becoming an avenger.

I felt that one of Sasuke's issues was the fact he was a little shit after the massacre. He was an emo angsty brat who had a holier than thou attitude that got in the way of everything. So, I hatched my plan that I would try and fit into as I went. That plan became get Sasuke friends. If Sasuke made friends then when the massacre hit he would have support that wasn't just myself and he would also have reason to stay in the village. If that wasn't enough, I would also have to beat humility into him so that when Naruto seemed to suddenly improve Sasuke wouldn't feel jealousy. Rather he'd just be spurred to train harder. A side note problem would be what the fuck did Kakashi make them do as their first month at least of being Genin, D Rank missions galore? I had never seen training before the Land of Waves mission.

But enough about my plans, as I'll have to change them as I go. Now as I think back on this, I was selfish. I made plans that were convenient for me and outcomes that I favored.

Itachi and Momma brought us to our first day of the academy. Sasuke and I each held one of Itachi's hands while Momma had my other hand. When we arrived I looked among the crowd of brats and picked out a few key ones I noticed. A pink haired girl was shyly looking around from the side and I could see a platinum blonde already making friends with a couple of girls. A small girl with a dark blue bob-cut so similar to my hair in color was practically hiding in her father's robes while a boy with a puppy on his head was loudly talking with another boy. A Nara boy and an Akimichi boy were talking by their parents while sitting alone on a swing I felt my eyes drawn to a blonde with whisker marks.

"Ne, Ita." I spoke up and he looked at me, "You want me and Sasu to make friends right?" Itachi seemed to look the way I was looking and I dropped Momma and his hand's as I toddled towards the swing. I approached the swing with all intentions of starting plan Make Sasuke Get Friends.

"Hey, I'm Uchiha Fushicho," I began and instantly gained a surprised look from the blonde, "My brother over there, Uchiha Sasu-ke doesn't have any friends yet. You should make friends with him. You seem nice." Curse my lisp. Every word I spoke was tainted by it but most noticeably were longer words and some names.

"You talk funny." Fuck my plan, now I am mad. Again, looking back, I had a pretty bad temper. I was stubborn and I got angry over the smallest things. But everything I got mad over mattered to me.

I narrowed my eyes at him and hit him where I knew it would hurt, "That's not how to make friends." Then I turned on my heel, thoroughly annoyed that he dare make fun of my lisp (And I could almost feel the burning ready to rise at my annoyance), and stalked back to where Momma and Itachi were watching me. Itachi gave me a raised eyebrow.

"He made fun of how I talk." I said flatly, "I'm hitting whoever does that next." Momma advised me not to and Itachi smiled despite my threat. Eventually the senseis began calling out to their classes and I was placed in a class with my brother as I had expected. Sasuke and I both had differing views on seating, I wanted front row to soak up knowledge and he wanted middle. I ended up sitting by myself and Sasuke ended up surrounded by girls.

We were five, why did the girls already have interests in boys!? Nasty. Although, I suppose ninja don't have a very long life span.

Much to my bitter annoyance our class was broken up in two halves, the first half before lunch was basic studies. We learned how to add and subtract and while most of the clan kids could already do this, they moved onto multiplication and division. I was able to do all the basic elementary school math, after all I died in Calculus B. If I couldn't do this I was a failure to my name. After that was reading and writing which was still the bane of my existence. Then there was history which I actually took notes during. Following that we learned what I'd label as science, and it was basics on biology. All in all, I was bored.

Lunch came and I didn't recall bringing a bento or anything. Luckily, Momma had made us something and had given Sasuke the lunchboxes since of the two of us I gave less shits and would probably lose it. Sasuke was already outgrowing the other kid's mentalities but he went off and played with them. I sat against the wall of the school as the other kids wrestled in the dirt. I picked at my onigiri. My taste buds had never quite fixed themselves. Everything still fought with the taste of charcoal and I had a habit of putting sugar or soy sauce on anything to make sure I could taste it. It was funny how when I was sensing someone I could easily taste them if they sensed like a taste but I couldn't taste my lunch very well.

"Um..." I blinked and looked up at the um and found Naruto standing above me, "I didn't uh, mean to make fun of you."

"Is that an apol-ogy?" I retorted, crunching on an onigiri at the same time to make my lisp even worse.

Naruto looked confused for a moment before figuring out what I wanted, "Oh, yeah, I'm sorry for saying you talk weird."

"You should think before you speak," I lectured, accepting the apology, "Some people can be real jerks about things if you make them mad." Naruto nodded and looked around nervously. I realized he was hoping I'd invite him to sit with me. Looking around for Sasuke I noticed he was looking around for me since he had thrown his bento to me when he went to go play.

"You can have lunch with me, if ya want. Sasu's coming over to eat too though." Naruto brightened, "Oh, and what's your name?"

"I'm Uzumaki Naruto, dattebayo!"

There we go, finally a name. What is it with me meeting kids and them not giving me their names? Naruto sat down beside me and I saw Sasuke approach out of the corner of my eye.

"Sasu, Us-Uoh-Uzumaki-kun is joining us for lunch." I demurred, and Naruto exclaimed to just call him Naruto to which I was pleased as Uzumaki was a bitch to pronounce. Sasuke sat down beside me and started eating his bento. Nearing the end of lunch I heard a small growl and I looked at Naruto, whose mouth was frozen open as he had been in the middle of telling the story of how he pranked someone or something the other day. Then it occurred to me Naruto didn't have a lunch. It was stupid of me to assume a five year old who had no parents made himself a bento.

"Here." I shoved my half finished bento to Naruto, "I don't like most of the stuff in that bento."

Naruto looked like I had just given him a million dollars while Sasuke snorted, "You never eat. You hate everything."

"I never said I didn't." I retorted. Naruto inhaled the remainder of my bento and when we went back in for the second half of the day I saw Naruto move his seat from the back to beside Sasuke. A girl had protested but Sasuke was more interested in the story Naruto was telling him about yet another prank he had pulled. Naruto glanced over at me and waved. I returned it halfheartedly.

I smiled to myself as I realized the front row seat was what made Naruto choose Sasuke over me. It was no surprise as our sensei, Umino Iruka, wasn't a fan of Naruto yet. Iruka-sensei started class and the academy training schedule began five year olds with stretching. It split civilians and clan kids after stretching, the clan kids already knew how to throw kunai as they received toy kunai and etc for their birthdays or already had private lessons, while civilian kids mostly knew nothing. Civilian kids and clan kids wouldn't be together for the first half of this section. Civilian kids had to learn to spar before anything else. For the second half of this section we worked together on endurance exercises such as running laps, something that resembled kick boxing, and games that actually trained your awareness, balance, and other useful things.

But my issue at this point was I had been more focused on motor skills, speaking, and writing to touch anything ninja. I know, terrible right? Reborn into the Naruto world and I don't play with anything ninja for my first five years. I figured I'd learn all I needed to learn in the academy or when I started clan training so I focused on my biggest issue which was language. I was also hoping Uchiha genes would help me out a bit since Uchihas are typically perfect.

Of course I wasn't so lucky.

For the first half of this session for awhile the clan kids would be working on kunai throwing. I had actually not gone near a single kunai yet. Just starting and I'm a horrible ninja already. A horrible Uchiha in fact. Most certainly a horrible clan child.

Iruka-sensei handed me a kunai and told me to throw it at the target. I blinked at him then looked at the kunai. I threw Sasuke a look and he gave me an encouraging smile in return. Sasuke knew that I had trouble reading and writing and speaking, so while he had moved past that to stalking Itachi while he trained, I stayed at home.

I tried my hardest, I really did. And the kunai did hit the target. However it had wobbled and spun as it flew and the pointy end did not in fact stick in the board, or even touch the board. The side hit it though and I thought the fact I even hit the target was pretty fucking good. Giggles arose from the other kids and I frowned before glaring at them with angry eyes. My glare was useless though, my bangs hiding the majority of my glower.

Iruka-sensei showed me how to properly throw a kunai after my initial blunder and I managed to hit the target with the pointy end. Sadly it didn't stick. With an encouraging "You'll get it eventually!" Iruka-sensei had me head to the back of the dozen or so clan kids. Classes were made up of thirty-six and of that class there were thirteen clan kids.

At the end of the day we were given a supply list to bring home to our parents to get for the academy and Sasuke and I walked home. We hadn't started chakra which I was both disappointed and grateful for. My hypersensitivity would absolutely without a doubt probably cause problems for me and I also had little interest in trying to manipulate the burning I had become accustomed to. But at the same time chakra was so interesting. I could do superhuman things with it and it was a necessity if I didn't want to die in the future. I suppose it was a double edged sword.

"Ne, Shicho," Sasuke spoke up as we entered the Uchiha clan district, "Why'd you invite Naruto to sit with us?"

I blinked at the question, "Well, he was lonely."

Sasuke stared at me and looked like he didn't believe me. I wouldn't believe me either to be fair. I had never made an outward effort to make friends and I had rejected people more often or ignored people. Well, children anyway. If a nice adult wanted a conversation, keyword on nice by the way, then I'd have no issues. Sasuke was an exception to this rule and Itachi was basically an adult anyway. I believe he was in ANBU at this point as he was home sometimes and his skills were unbelievable.

"We're home!" Sasuke and I called when we reached the genkan of our home and slipped off our sandals. Momma's voice answered us with a welcome home and we started towards the kitchen. We handed her our lists for supplies and then we started on the simple homework we had. The math was unfairly easy, for me anyway, and while the reading took a few minutes because I was shit at it, it was also easy. Doing the history and science gave me a sudden determination to go to the library in my free time and study this world's everything. But I'd hold off on the library for awhile, I needed to learn how to throw a kunai and I suppose it'd be nice to not slice my finger off on a shuriken in front of everyone.

I finished homework before Sasuke and Itachi poked his head in as he was heading out, "How was the academy?"

I grinned maliciously, quite pleased Itachi was home for once, "Ita, I need to learn how to throw a kunai. Oh, and a sh-uriken. Can you show me?"

"Maybe later, Shicho-chan." And then Itachi was gone. I blinked at his sudden departure and looked at Momma who was cooking. She smiled at me.

"After dinner I'll show you, how about that, Fushicho-chan?"

I beamed at Momma and happily agreed while Sasuke demanded to also be a part of this training. Secretly though, I thought about Itachi's suddenly leaving. He hadn't poked me on the forehead like he does to Sasuke and the fact that he left me one of the very few times I asked him for help...

Was Itachi already beginning to drift away?

I didn't really want to lose my brother, I quite liked Itachi. He was much nicer than my older brother in my previous life. My previous brother locked me in my room and left me to die (Even if he didn't mean to, that shit is something you will remember forever), so considering Itachi hadn't killed me yet...

Yet.

The massacre.

What if, because I'm not as close to Itachi, what if he killed me?

I had a sudden new resolve to not only train to become strong but I also had to build the best relationship possible with Itachi in my remaining time. After all, we had two years at the very most before the massacre.

Let's pray to all those Naruto gods I don't fuck up, yeah?

AN

If anything seems off, it's probably because I assume that as they're learning to be ninja they're treated as like twelve year olds would be in my mind.

Thank you to the following for reviewing:

Rei-chan a Wandering Shinigami