Disclaimer: I own the OCs in this fic, the rest is Masashi Kishomoto's. Sorry for any spelling mistakes.

Character age:

Akane, Itachi: 18

Naruto, Sasuke: 12/13

Shisui: 21

Kakashi: 26

"I'm home!" No answers. I threw my stuff on my couch and went to my bed. Haku probably used it during my absence, we were alternating between the couch and the bed. I probably should go to the hospital or tell Yagura I was back and alive, but I was too tired. And Haku was not even home.

Let's sum up. Suna, or more like the Sand Siblings, left around the same time than us and now owe a debt to Kiri, but with Yagura still ruling it's not very good. They know the Akatsuki is after the bijuu, and so do we.

I shouldn't run into Konoha for a while, I was not responsible for the communication between the Resistance and Konoha after all. Tsunade-san, knowing the relation between Yagura and the Kyuubi attack still support us, but it was quite complicated with the village being rebuilt. It was not as if we needed a lot of them from what sensei quickly told me on the way home.

Konoha would help us protect the civilians once they were sure it was the Sharingan manipulating Yagura in the shadows. Soon, Zabuza-san would go to the Land of Wave, with sensei hopefully, to ask for shelter for the civilians. With Konoha protecting them and saving the Land of Wave before, it should be okay. However, to check our claim, or more like mine, about an Uchiha being responsible, it would be logical of them to send an Uchiha. Just for intern political reasons.

As for me, I needed to go back to Uzushio, one way or another, and find more stuff about my seal and its connection with the jinchuriki. Test the back up seal Minato came up with.

Probably find a new suitable host for Isobu.

However, with the Akatsuki attacking Konoha, a spiteful feeling was in my guts. If Obito really cared about having Kiri under his control, would he use the Akatsuki to defend it? Not...all of them, it would be stupid but...

Fuck, if some of the Akatsuki members that we've already met, us, Kiri-nin, showed up, it would be bad. Like, very, very bad. Especially with Hoshigaki-san and Dad, who knew the village.

Wait, did they even know Obito, or 'Madara', was the chief of the Akatsuki? Old Naruto told me they discovered his real identity during the war, but there was Rinnegan dude in the Akatsuki.

Yep, no, not happening today. I'll do what sensei had been telling me since I got back to Kiri: focus on Yagura and the Resistance.

I closed my eyes.

I opened them right away when I heard voices. 'Right away' might have been a mistake on my part as the morning lights were barely there outside.

"Yoooo, she lives!" I groaned at Suigetsu entering my room and buried my face in my pillow. "Haku, you don't have a bed anymore!"

"That's fine, she seems to need sleep and maybe food. Us too by the way," Haku replied with what seemed to be relief in his voice.

"Bring me takoyaki," I mumbled in the pillow and Chōjūrō delicately raised my head so that I repeat my order. I hugged my blanket tighter and closed my eyes as he placed my head back on the pillow. As I fell back asleep, I heard Suigetsu complaining about not being the designated food-boy and still being treated as such. So when I woke up, I wrapped the blanket tightly around my body and moved from my bed to the couch. My stuff seemed to have been put away and the apartment was tidier than when I arrived. "Haku, have I mentioned you were an angel?"

"You have," he told me, putting a box of lukewarm takoyaki in my open hand. "More than once." I nodded and looked up at Suigetsu and Chōjūrō who were eating and talking at the small kitchen table I had.

My place became too small when I was given my team. When you entered my apartment, you were in a small living room with just a couch and a bookshelf, weapons and storage scrolls in it, and right after a kitchenette with a table against the wall under the window with three chairs. On the right side of the living-room and kitchen, there was two doors leading to a bedroom and a bathroom.

Yeah, when Haku moved in we started lacking space to move around. I could seal a lot of shit in scrolls though and it was a great way to save space.

"So, from the flak jacket, you three became chuunin?"

"Yeah, Mangetsu-senpai gave your report and Konoha seemed to have send something when the next Hokage arrived. Mizukage-sama judged we did the mission to the best of our abilities," Chōjūrō told me with a small blush of pride on his cheeks.

"But he's pissed at you and said you were gonna regret looking so weak," Suigetsu added with a smirk. I ducked my head, already sulking about what Yagura had in mind.

"Uzu-sensei..."

"You're a chuunin now, I'm no longer your sensei. And I've told you not to call me that Haku."

"Uzu-nee," he corrected himself and I sent him a toothy grin. He shook his head in what seemed to be resignation at my antics and gazed at me with concerned eyes. "You're not sick, are you? We saw Dai-san yesterday and he was...concerned over your case. He mentioned some psychotic episodes?"

"Remind me to tell him to respect medical confidentiality next time I see him," I sighed and swallowed my last takoyaki, keeping the pick in my mouth. "It's not a disease or life threatening as far as I know. An Uzumaki thing I need to deal with and I had a temporary paranoia. I'm good now." Crap, even Suigetsu had a grave face. I waved their worry off. "I'm fineeeeee, the voice in my head has not talked to me since I fainted and almost died!" They looked even worse and I swore that Haku almost knock me on the head.

"Voice?" Suigetsu repeated, looking as if he was really scared for my sanity. "I know you've always been out of it since the Mizukage forced you into the shinobi business, but..."

"It's not a bad voice, it helps her with her seals," Haku cut him off. Right...he'd already heard me snapping at oji-chan out loud because we didn't agree on something.

"But you really have a voice in your head?" I rolled my eyes at Chōjūrō and placed a finger on my lips.

"Keep that for you, it's not the time to worry about something like that."

"Yeah, you have something else coming though. Mangetsu will fight you tomorrow," the youngest informed me. I raised a brow and he crossed his arms with a frustrated pout on his face. "You're gonna have the test to know if you're in the Swordsmen or not." I blinked and looked at Chōjūrō, who nodded.

"I'll have it too. You've been sleeping for two whole days you know." My eyes became open wide. Two days!?

"I can't fake my defeat either huh?"

"Nope!" Suigetsu grinned at me a taunting grin. "And if you pass, you'll have your teeth filed!" I froze. Right, the rite of passage. Suigetsu did it to himself and Mangetsu had to ask the guy who takes care of it to set them right, but Chōjūrō went through it when he officially became Mangetsu's successor in training. I had been delaying it as much as I could but...I put a hand on my mouth. I didn't want to have shark teeth!

"Any...anyway," I stuttered weakly, running my tongue on my teeth maniacally, "what did I miss? Your first mission as chuunin, how was it?"

"No different than before," Haku answered with a shrug of his shoulders, and the three of them were filling me up on what I had missed.

Yep, I missed them.

The next day, I took my sweet time stretching whereas Mangetsu was testing Chōjūrō with his sword. Yagura was next to me with Genji, one of the Elder who barely could stand on his legs. Strangely enough, Yagura barely spared me a scornful look before focusing on the fight. We were in a special training room in the Mizukage building, right under the reunion room that used to be use for the Swordsmen reunion when...it was fully active.

"Alright," Mangetsu yelled, stopping the fight after a hammer like sword destroyed the floor. "Alright, you pass. Take care of Hiramekarei for me now. Uzu, get here!" I took Nuibari and went in front of him. "Alright, I have a regular sword, I'm gonna test how well you use Nuibari and her particular abilities." I stretched one last time my shoulders and arms and charged.

We exchanged normal blows, and the more ours swords clashed with each other, the more I wrapped the string around my fist. My Hiraishin tag wasn't budging from the handle so it was good and no, it wasn't cheating because I could remove it from the sword.

Or maybe it was, I didn't care enough to find out.

I jumped and my blade clashed with Mangetsu's in an ear-piercing sound of metals grating. He pushed me back and I threw Nuibari. It went through him but I twitched my hand around the string I still had and made it change the direction with some chakra. It went around a pillar of the room, and another, and Mangetsu again, and another until I teleported myself to it and pulled on the sword, cutting clean Mangetsu at his ankles. Of course, he liquefied himself and crawled under the string to go next to me. When he was in a human shape again, he grinned at me and lightly punched me in the shoulder.

"Hey, I'm a great teacher in the end!"

"Or I'm a great student." He raised a brow at me and I smirked. "Okay, you're awesome, happy?"

"Uzumaki." I turned to look at Yagura and spat when his fist made contact with my stomach, knocking the air out of my lungs. There was no bone in that area to break, but it...hurt like hell... "Mangetsu, take her now before she can fight back."

"Understood." Mangetsu put me on his shoulder, the pain in my stomach paralyzing me. Fuck, did he use some of Isobu's power in that punch? I swore my legs were twitching because of the impact. I felt cold sweat rolling down my back when Mangetsu took the direction of the mountain around Kiri. There was one house there, with a crazy dude living in it. He made lots of weapon and they were good, but he was... "Stop fidgeting, it's mandatory!"

"I want to keep my teeth!" I whined in a raspy voice.

"He won't pull them out of your gum."

"I want to keep them as they are! Perfect on the top, slightly crooked on the bottom!" Yet, I was dropped in a chair and the crazy guy with wild white hair arrived from the back. I started to struggled but I was strapped to the chair. I tried to use Hiraishin, but Yagura must have pulled some nasty move on me because I couldn't mix my chakra to save my life.

My eyes went wide and Mangetsu had to push down on my shoulders to keep me from fidgeting when the guy, Natto, approached me with a wide crazy grin and a metal file in his hand. I never liked going to the dentist, I didn't want my teeth filed! So much I felt an actual tear rolling down my cheek. I shot a pleading look at my supposed best friend, who averted his eyes from me.

"It's a bad moment, it will be over before you know it."

"Treat...enapilndetoi..." Oh boy, he was liming my right upper canine. It didn't hurt strictly speaking, it was like a nail against a chalkboard, but it was in my mouth and going through my entire body. Mangetsu had to put one of his leg across mine to keep me from trying to kick Natto. He looked absolutely ridiculous and not stable at all.

"One done!" Natto exclaimed with glee and I blinked. Already. "Now time to do the incisor next to it."

I closed my eyes and focused. Mix your chakra, mix it...to your marker in your apartment...

I smirked as much as I could and managed to give them the finger before using Hiraishin.

"How did it go?" Haku asked me, relaxing in his pink yukata. I showed him my two beautiful limed teeth, still warm, and the dust of enamel in my mouth. He gaped and I ran to the bathroom, his footsteps following me swiftly. I froze in front of the mirror and touch my teeth. They were sharp, way too sharp for teeth, and stood out among my regular teeth. I closed my mouth. We didn't see them when my mouth was close, but if I smiled a little too much, if my lips opened a little bit too much, my limed teeth ended on my lower lip.

"I'm...disfigured," I snorted, "I didn't want to and they tricked me, Mangetsu tricked me...I'm ugly now!" Unlike some people may think, I cared about my look and that...that shouted 'KIRI' to everyone. It was a farewell to a regular life, and for good. Fuck, no matter what, if I came across a shinobi they'd see my affiliation with the Hidden Mist right away!

"You're not Uzu-nee," Haku told me firmly and walked up next to me, looking at me on the mirror. "You're not just your teeth."

"But now, if I ever wanted to retire and live incognito in the future, it's impossible. Yagura knows that, he wanted to physically show that...and Mangetsu was there!"

"It was an order."

"I know but...fuck, I have shark teeth!" He ran his hand in circle in my back to soothe me, but I couldn't tear my eyes away from the mirror.

Naturally, when Mangetsu came over later and tried to apologize, I very maturely refused to open the door of my bedroom. I could hear Dai and Haku speaking between them as Mangetsu was trying to coax me out of the room.

"...and it was a direct order from the Mizukage, I feel terrible please open the door!" It wasn't locked to begin with. I got up and slightly opened the door, enough for his purple eye to see my glare. "Uzu I swear I..."

"Move!" Dai yelled and pushed his head to replace him. "Open your mouth!" I stared flatly at him and ever so slowly opened my mouth. He was left speechless. "It..."

"I'm disfigured and my best friend betrayed me," I whispered, going back to bed. They stood there, frozen and gaping at me like the idiots they were. "What?"

"But...but I thought I was your best friend!" Dai protested, almost smashing my door open. "With all the hours spent together working on medical seals and...and..."

"Mangetsu is my first and best friend," I stated and his face fell whereas Mangetsu was smirking smugly behind. "Dai, you moron, we were born literally feet from each other the same day, you're more like the twin I have to endure whether I want it or not." He blinked at me and scratched his cheek sheepishly.

"That...that's good too!" He sat on the floor with his legs crossed and I heard the front door closing, signaling Haku left us. I raised a brow at Dai, and Mangetsu who sat next to him. As a reflex, I activated the seals around my place. "We have a question for you."

"A...question?"

"What's that seal on your stomach Uzu?" Mangetsu asked sternly, staring straight into my eyes. My eyes went back and forth between them and I sighed, raising my top. I put my hand above my stomach and sent some chakra to it, the black fuin symbols appearing.

"This one? If I tell you, you'll believe me?" They exchanged a look and nodded, not an once of hesitation on their faces.

"I need to know why you were psychotic when you woke up," Dai insisted on.

"It's...a kinjutsu. The seal represents the Shinigami in a way."

They stared in silence and I bit my lower lip, accidentally drawing blood.

It...was not going to be an enjoyable moment, I could feel it. Their faces frozen in blank ones did not help either.

I dropped on my knees at the hideout, my body almost completely bruised. Utakata-senpai caught me before I was totally on the floor and took in my state with wide eyes before cursing.

"He made you pay for Konoha," he guessed and I whined in pain as a reply. Yagura beat me up for an hour straight. "Dai is not here today, I'll try to fix you up as much as I can." I mumbled a 'thanks' and he carried me to a bed in the infirmary. He did fix me up as much as he could, so basically medicinal plants mixed together applied on the bruises to make them heal faster and bandages.

"So...how have you been?" I asked him in a hoarse voice. He shrugged and told me the last things that happened at the hideout, how Kimou and Harusame-san finished the genjutsu seals to replace the civilians. How his master made more chakra concealing seals based on mine but personalized, and how Zabuza-san went to patrol the small fishing harbor on the west coast of the island to get a boat for the trip to the Land of Wave. It was risky, but as an ex anbu, he knew how not to be seen. "Senpai, is there something else?"

"Dai, Mangetsu and you...did you have a fight?" I grinned at that, ready to tease him about his worry but when he squinted, I covered my teeth. "You ran before the end, that's a first. You usually never manage to run away." His smirk made me glare, and I sighed. Yagura also beat me up about that, before saying not having all of them limed was not that bad after all.

"We didn't have a fight, I just...told them something, a secret that more and more people know, to my biggest despair." Utakata-senpai hummed at that, his arms crossed over his chest, bare and visible thanks to his blue kimono. To be fair, they both believed me, me and my reincarnation story. Mangetsu and I were fine, and he understood quickly from my look that he had died long before me in my past life. It was the thing that made Dai distant. That Mangetsu and I were dead and that in some kind of parallel future, he was the last one alive of the team with his sister.

"It must be a big secret for Dai to be quiet for so long." I frowned at the fake innocent look on his face. He was a jinchuriki, Saiken probably...

"Your little friend told you there was something off with me huh?"

"What I know is that you've mentally changed, but in a good way, since you came back, and you kept Master from trying something that would have him killed," he replied flatly, amber eyes going back to me. "Maturity doesn't happen that fast, and knowing how you were before you were 'abducted', it's not really believable of you to go to Konoha without an ulterior motive." Geez, he really knew me. He called me mature too, didn't he?

"Shukaku insulted me," I whispered faintly, "Isobu and Yagura are trying to weaken the genjutsu on their side." He opened his eyes wide at that. "Sensei knows, and...does Saiken know something about it?" There was a small silence and he sighed.

"Supposedly, you can reach the furthest spiritual plan of a jinchuriki if you upgrade." I raised my brows and he shrugged. "Something about a potential offensive way to use it but it's extremely secret. I think you can find stuff in Uzushio, but who knows if it's still there now after so much time?" Point for him.

"I'll figure something out to go there, sensei wants me to too. Do...do people like me have a name?"

"At the beginning, they were called 'Yuurei' but then it was 'Spirit of the Future'." Maybe because of the change of the cause in the use of the technique? From fixing mistakes and tragedies to purely expand the Uzumakis' sealing techniques?

"Thanks senpai, thanks Saiken...it's good to have a name to put on a condition."

In theory, clans kept their secret in some kind of hidden room within the compound. I'd need to find the main house of the Uzumaki clan and look for...upgrades? Yeah, upgrades sounded good. I didn't hear from oji-chan since the attack too, it was worrying. Maybe I needed to 'reconnect' now I had more souls in my seal.

"For...the back-up seal...I'd need chakra from Isobu...we also need it to find a compatible host...shit, so much to do still..."

"You won't be useful if you're in that state, I'll get some water."

"Love you too," I teased him and he tensed, the usual glare coming back.

"And I'll poison it to be sure you don't wake up." Nah, he loved me too much.

The continuous pain in my body dulled thanks to one of the stuff Utakata-senpai gave me. I laid there, on my back, almost closed eyes staring blankly at the gray ceiling above me. Was it strange of me to find this place comforting? We were missing a lot of things and I wasn't one of the permanent shinobi here, but being within people who were fighting for, or against the same thing had a comforting feeling to it. I didn't feel the loneliness always lingering in a corner of my mind that I was trying so hard to forget, to ignore everyday. It was okay with people who were still alive in my past life, because I knew if they made it once without my presence, they could do it a second time.

The loneliness, however, was always there when I was with people I knew and who died before. I would forget it sometimes, but I knew it was there, waiting to crawl back up in the middle of the night. I was perfectly aware of what it meant.

I was terrified at the idea of having them back and losing them a second time. It was there when I was with Mangetsu, but also Utakata-senpai, Harusame-san, Naoto, even Yagura and Zabuza-san.

I was trying my best not to think of Konoha because...it was even more sensitive because of Itachi and Mom. Of course Shisui too but Itachi...I had his kids, he was family, Sarada used to call me 'oba-san' and even this version of Itachi was kind of family to me. Deep down, even if I wasn't in Konoha and had nothing to do or owed nothing to that village, I would feel guilty if they died.

However, it was surprising how much Saiken knew about being a Yuurei.

Huh, it had a nice ring to it.

I surprisingly had a few days of break where I was just spying on Yagura for sensei and going on patrols. Nothing too interesting between that and training. I was figuring out a way to push the marker on my kunai to the earth, and it turned out doing that with storage seals was easier because no living entities or chakra entities were in the equation.

Fuinjutsu was as fascinating because of its endless possibilities as it was incredibly frustrating. The slightest millimeter counted in the making of a seal, and if you were not precise enough then your seal would be unstable. Hence why making seals in fights required such a high level of chakra control and years of prior experience in the field, to be used to seals.

Later, when I was back in the village, I was assigned a mission in the Land of Grass with Naoto. However, the day before leaving, I went to the hospital to see Dai. I found myself in front of Mangetsu in front of the entry of the cylindrical stone building, the mist around us not hiding our surprise.

"Weren't you on a mission?"

"I just left the Mizukage's office, I thought I'd get Dai to talk to me because I am alive. You?"

"I have a mission tomorrow. I thought I'd get Dai to talk too." We stared at each other in silence and went into the building as one man. People actually moved out of our way. Well, Mangetsu was famous in the village and so was I. So when we barged in Dai's office at the latter's surprise, nobody dared say anything, especially after we slammed the door behind us.

"The fuck do you think you're doing you two!?" he barked at us and looked daggers at us. I frowned and Mangetsu walked up to him to grab him by the collar of his white coat. "Mangetsu let me go!"

"No, stop avoiding us you moron or one day you might regret it!" Mangetsu hissed at him with anger and Dai blanched at that, eyes filled with worry. "Stop pretending what Uzu said was not true, I can deal with you but she dealt with enough dead people already, don't make it hard for her when you were alive." It was nice of him to talk about me as if I wasn't even here but...well, he wasn't wrong I guess.

"Don't you get it?" Dai asked him quietly and I noticed how tense his shoulders were. "I'm the medic of the team, I'm supposed to fix you up. How could I be the last one alive? I..." I joined them and weakly knocked my knuckles against his temple. Conflicted and guilty emerald eyes shyly looked up in my own apologetic ones.

"It was a suicide jutsu and I knew it, I was a mother and didn't think twice about his safety," I whispered to him softly. "Do I regret it? I don't know, at least I know they survived. But we're alive now, even Mangetsu and that's not something I was expecting. I've already turned the tide by saving just one man, we need to fight now." Dai blinked back tears and I slide my arms around his waist, which was weird considering Mangetsu still had his hand firmly grasping his coat. "I'm still here this time."

"And we won't let you run back to your Uchiha boyfriend without fighting back, right?" Mangetsu replied and let go of Dai, staring at him with expecting eyes. Dai nodded slowly and wiped the snot threatening to come out of his nostrils, his other arm around my frame.

"You're right," the medic muttered, "I'm not letting this freaky eyes taking her away a second time. With what he made us believe he could get her in some kind of weird BDSM shit..." I flushed at that, knowing he was thinking about Shisui. "She can do it if she wants to but he could make her do stuff with his eyes and..."

"We get it, we get it..." I mumbled, as red as a tomato. I left his office, yet they were both at my place by evening, food in hands.

Hey! Thanks for reading! Please review so that I know you liked it :) I wanna thanks Ederisu, Tonegawa Rie and the guest who left reviews :). I want to clarify something too. As of right now, I'm writing the chapter 37 and I, the author, have NO idea of who Akane might end up with, if she ends up with someone. This is a slow-burn (I would put it in the summary if I had enough space to write it) and I really want to explore the characters and make them grow, especially the ones I come up with or those the show/manga didn't show a lot. We have the entire Shippuden part for which I have ideas, for both Itachi and Shisui, but all the secrets of her conditions have not be uncovered yet and it will have an impact on her view of romance in that life time. I understand you guys want scenes where there are improvements in her relationships with Shisui or Itachi, but please keep in mind there is still a lot of time for them to evolve. Feelings will be there, be it obviously present or implied or even denied, but I'm not forgetting any of our Uchiha boys, even if it may seems like it. Different arcs will bring different situations, keep that in mind :).

Bye