Thanks again to my beta Nap-Tyme! Check out her Naruto fic "Mona Lisa" and her newest one "Guns & Lollipops" for My Hero Academia!
Sarada was so caught up in trying to decipher the identity of the person who looked almost too much like her father that she almost missed the words Mitsuki's parent had spoken:
"Do you want me to kill these children?"
It wasn't until the mysterious man jumped in front of her and Mitsuki that she snapped back to herself, leaping backwards in a ready stance as a jerk reaction.
"Don't touch them," he hissed.
Another smirk slithered onto Orochimaru's lips as he looked between the kids and smoothly asked, "Are you protecting them because they're from the village?" He began to walk counter clockwise in a circle toward them, and both the children and his partner moved in the opposite direction to keep the same amount of distance.
"Oh, come on, Itachi," he continued, voice like butter. "If you don't want to kill them, the least we could do is bring them back to base. I'm sure we can make use of them." His gaze then lasered in on Sarada again and she immediately realized how different and cold his eyes were compared to yesterday.
"Afterall, I could really use this girl's eyes."
At that moment Orochimaru's arms flung outwards toward them as snakes, similar to Mitsuki's Sarada recognized, but his partner counteracted, slicing through the air at the same moment and cutting the snakes off. Both Sarada and Mitsuki missed it, and Sarada thought about how it seemed he had completely anticipated that attack to have moved that quickly.
"RUN!" the raven-haired man hissed back at them, but Mitsuki shot forward to his side.
"No, I know him! I can help!"
"He's more than you think," the raven-haired man warned, staring at Mitsuki in a way as though trying to get him to understand something that Mitsuki didn't understand yet.
But the pale boy just shook his head, moving to attack again. "I don't care if he's a sannin, I know him- and I learned from him."
It didn't feel right attacking Mitsuki's parent, but it was obvious to Sarada that something very wrong was going on. She was overcome by an overwhelming feeling of dread, that feeling that she was somewhere she wasn't supposed to be and she was about to get in trouble, though she couldn't pinpoint why and that in itself made her even more uneasy; it was an almost indescribable emotion she had never experienced, and it almost incapacitated her for another second until Orochimaru came hurdling right toward her.
She couldn't defeat a sannin at her level: she didn't need to be in the Anbu to know that. So all she could do was try to go on the defense the best she could, yet at that second the other man jumped in front of her and she watched Orochimaru hit the ground hard on his back, cracking his head on a rock on the way down.
"He should be there for a while." The other man looked down at Orochimaru, his voice completely even keeled as though he didn't just knock out a legendary sannin.
Sarada didn't know what he did; from her vantage point it only looked like he had jumped in front of her and didn't actually make any move toward Orochimaru before he fell backwards. She wanted to demand to know what jutsu he used until he turned his head toward her and silently gave her the answer.
His eyes burned bright red.
He had the sharingan too.
"Who are you?" she blurted.
The person held his hands up in front of himself to show he meant no harm. "I am so glad to see you two, you have no idea…" he began. "You have to get me out of here!"
Sarada didn't know what to think about the evidence in front of her. She gripped a kunai in her hand, and realized from the pressure she put on it that she was shaking slightly. Mitsuki's parent had turned on them, something completely unexpected, and even worse than that was an unfamiliar man standing in front of her who clearly had the sharingan. Which meant that he was somehow related to her.
But there was just no way.
"We don't know you- step back. Step back or I'll attack." Even while saying it she knew she was bluffing: deep in her heart she didn't think she could successfully attack a person who so swiftly and effortlessly took down a sannin in a genjutsu.
"Sarada, please. Put the kunai down. I'm not going to hurt you." He glanced over at Mitsuki who was standing over Orochimaru, a weapon in his hand as well. "You too, Mitsuki."
"How do you know our names?" She gripped her kunai tighter. "I've never seen you before in my life."
He swiftly eyed the man lying on the ground to make sure he wasn't stirring before gesturing with his head to follow him.
"Come on. Before he gets up. I'm not sure how long I can hold something like this. Genjutsu is more your strong suit than mine." He then smiled shyly at her with a glint in his eye that seemed to hold memories they shared.
Sarada's head still reeled at this person before her who acted like they had so much history. It was like looking at herself slightly warped, like a version of herself in an alternate universe where she was a boy.
"Are you my brother?" she suddenly blurted out. It was the only explanation she had. "How do you have the sharingan? Is that why you know who I am but I don't know you?" Her mind rewinded to a time a few years ago when she reconnected with her dad and she thought Karin was her mom, but even though it was debunked maybe it was still true. Maybe this is where Sasuke went when he was gone for long periods of time: his second family.
The long-haired teen just blinked at her then laughed. "Not even close. Damn, Sarada, you really don't have high hopes for your dad, do you? Now come on, we really don't have that much time. I can't explain anything here but you have to help me!" He started to walk away then looked behind him to ensure they were following, but the others stayed planted to their spot staring at each other with no explanation. It was clear to the girl that Mitsuki was also in a form of shock and struggled to move.
"Mitsuki, let's go home," Sarada begged. "Let's go home and we can get help. Lord Seventh will definitely know what-"
"You don't want to do that…" the person sighed. "You're not going to find what you're looking for there." Again his voice was calm, all knowing.
"Well, I am not going with you!" she cried. It was strange to her that he didn't take them by force even though he clearly could incapacitate them with little effort. But she wasn't about to give him that idea.
"I can explain everything once we go but I can't say anything here in case he wakes up. You have to trust me. You know me. Trust me." His eyes probed hers in trying to impart some kind of information to her but Sarada couldn't process it.
As though finally figuring out that his vagueness wasn't going to budge either of them, the man sighed and rolled his eyes. "You're always so stubborn. Fine. Hasn't there been someone missing in your life lately? Namely the last, say, three weeks? Someone you're desperately missing because you can't live without him?"
Sarada and Mitsuki exchanged a glance and shook their heads.
The person's eyes bulged. "What?! Seriously, you don't miss Boruto?!" A pout formed on his lips. "Thanks a whole lot, guys!"
"How do you know Boruto?" Sarada instantly shot back. "And what do you mean three weeks? Boruto's been with us...for the most part."
He let out a large gasp and almost tripped backwards on a fallen branch. "Hang on, what?!" he cried. "I'm in the village?! How?!"
"'I'm?'" Mitsuki repeated suspiciously.
His eyes once again wandered over to where Orochimaru was still lying motionlessly on the ground. "We really can't talk here, it's not safe," he explained again. "And I know you aren't going to believe me unless I can really get into it, so come with me and I'll explain everything I know. He's going to wake up and I don't know if I can do this again." He stopped for a second to stare at the ground and muttered imperceptibly, "You guys really didn't miss me?"
The two looked at each other again, wholly confused, and Mitsuki was the first one to shrug as though admitting they didn't have a whole lot more to lose at that moment. Sarada knew in her heart that if they were in the same spot when he eventually woke up, they may not be able to fight him off again, so without taking her eyes off Mitsuki she said, "If you're in front of us and move exactly as we say we will follow you; if you so much as move in a direction I don't like though, I won't hesitate to kill you. I don't trust you but we do need intel." She thrusted her kunai forward at him. "Move."
The ponytailed man turned in front of them and began to march them through the trees in silence back in the direction they came. Mitsuki and Sarada kept their weapons pointed at his back, which gave both of them time to think about what they were going to do if he turned on them, but Sarada's hands sweat as she realized she didn't have too much of a plan since the person in front of them clearly had more strength than they possessed.
Finally, feet from the clearing, the older teen called behind him, "I think this is good enough. Will you listen now?"
"Sure," Sarada growled and lowered her weapon to her hip as they stopped. She poked him in the back to prompt him to turn around and made sure to harden her expression."Let's start with who the hell you are and how do you know us?"
He slowly turned around to look at them and held his hands up again. "You're not going to believe me at first but you have to. ...About a month ago you were on a mission to retrieve some sort of documents on the village, and during that mission Boruto was attacked. Do you remember this?" His eyes narrowed and he looked them both squarely in the face to impart importance.
Sarada nodded slowly. "Y-yeah."
"And what happened after that?"
She stopped to think; so much had happened since then and it felt like a lifetime ago now. "He broke his back. I found him, and a friend and I got him back to the village. He had surgery but...but he's fine."
"No." His eyes narrowed further until he was almost glowering and his voice was sharp as her kunai she was gripping tightly again. "That's not Boruto. Whoever you found is not him."
"How do you know this?" she asked. "And what does that even have to do with anything?"
The man took another shaky breath and Sarada noticed his own hands begin to quiver. "I don't know why this is happening or how it even happened, but…" He closed his eyes like he was trying to gather all the strength he could muster then flashed them open again, this time dripping with determination. "I'm Boruto. I know you said I'm home but whoever that is is not me. I passed out when I was attacked and I woke up in this body."
"What are you saying?" She looked his body over again but still hit the wall of thinking he looked so much like herself. "W-Who are you?"
"Mitsuki, I've been working with your dad. Well…" He lowered his voice and leaned closer to them. "I'm not totally sure if he's a guy, I'm gonna be honest, but whatever. And Sarada!" His eyes flashed again like he just remembered she was there. "Oh god, Sarada, I don't know what's going on but I-I think I'm your uncle. Did you know you even had an uncle? Everyone keeps calling me Itachi but I'm not a part of the village and-and-and… I have these memories. I have these memories of his! Horrible things! But I'm me."
As he talked he started to pace in a circle. Sarada's brain felt fuzzy as she watched him; none of the pieces of information he was giving fit into anything else she had ever heard of before. What this man was saying just couldn't be possible, but the tone of his voice was serious like he actually believed what he was saying was true.
Clearly they were surrounded by a raving maniac. Because Sarada's uncle, as she had learned, was long dead.
She took a step backwards in preparation to run, causing a twig to snap underneath her shoe. The man snapped his neck up to look at her. "I know how this sounds, Sarada," he said, a thin line of begging in his throat. "I get it but you have to believe me. You believe me, Mitsuki, right? I'm your sun, right? You always said weird shit like that!"
He then pointed to himself, stabbing his chest feverishly with his forefingers. "It's me, your loveable teammate! We were supposed to do the Chunin exams together, remember? Did you guys even get to do that? Oh, I suppose you did, if I'm around… How did you do? What have you even been doing? How am I?"
"How the hell do we know you aren't who kidnapped us?" she cried. " You could know all of these things. Why should we trust you?"
"Ask me anything, anything that Boruto would only know! I'll prove it to you!"
The two glanced at each other for a moment, brains churning and coming up empty, before Sarada asked, "Where did Boruto get his glove that he's been wearing recently?"
"Easy. Your dad."
She crossed her arms but didn't confirm. "Your turn," she said to Mitsuki.
"This was quite a while ago, but what did my snake tell you when I left to Iwagakure?"
Without missing a beat, he crossed his arms and said strongly, "'This is my will.'"
"Well?" Sarada looked at Mitsuki for confirmation but only caught a flicker of recognition in his eyes as he held the other person's stare.
"Sarada," Mitsuki then muttered quietly, and caught her eye. She could read exactly what was behind them.
"No," she whispered. "No way. There's no way. We're at home, we're still knocked out, we're still in that cave. This isn't real."
"Sarada," Mitsuki said again.
She couldn't stop the onslaught of memories of the last month from overtaking her. All the questions she had, all the anger built up toward Boruto came spilling to the forefront. The anger because he had lied to her. Because he was so secretive. The last few weeks happened because of that, not because he was another person. There was no way her feelings had been directed toward someone else.
This person was asking her to completely eliminate everything she thought she knew about her world. Her entire concept of life tilted and caused a wave of nausea to wash over her. She bent over and placed her hands on her knees to stay up right.
"No," she choked.
"-ask me about Big Brother Konohamaru! Or Himawari, and Shikadai, and-"
But could it be true?
"-how has my mom been?!"
"ENOUGH."
Sarada's kunai sailed past his ear, just narrowly missing him. His mouth clamped shut.
"I need to think. Give me a minute! God, do you ever shut up?!"
"You believe me, don't you, Mitsuki?" He once again turned to look at his other partner, eyes widened in desperation to be believed. "You know I answered your question right! There was no way I could know that unless I was him!"
"I don't know what to think right now," Mitsuki admitted quietly but Sarada knew he believed. She just couldn't allow herself to get there yet.
The girl started shaking her head again. There's no way. "This isn't possible because Itachi Uchiha is dead… My uncle is dead. Whoever you are, you can't be Boruto and you can't be Itachi."
"He dies?!" The person's face went white. "How?!"
"I don't know," Sarada spat. "Clearly he doesn't actually die though because if you claim to be Itachi, he's obviously alive."
"That's another thing we need to talk about…" he began, but then he shook his head vigorously to erase the thought. "Nevermind, that can wait. What else can I say to make you believe me?! I answered your questions! Give me more! You know I'd never lie to you!"
You know I'd never lie to you.
Those were the magic words.
Those words hit her directly in the gut and sent her doubling over again. They hit her weakness and threw her face first back into the memories of her last few weeks, finally putting it all into the perspective she had wanted but didn't have at the time.
She was supposed to be mad at Boruto. He had lied to her, and she had gotten angry with him. So angry. Because he was clearly hiding things from her, something he never did. Like his eyes.
His eyes.
The sharingan.
The eyes that were also set into the face of the Uchiha before her who was claiming to be the real Boruto now.
Like they made some sort of switch.
Even without fully understanding, Sarada felt like she suddenly had all the answers.
"Boruto." The name rolled off her tongue like a secret codeword that would unlock the universe.
Boruto's face relaxed instantly and his lip began to quiver in seeing Sarada's eyes soften into recognition. Even if it wasn't his own face, she desperately wanted to touch it and comfort him, letting the last month roll off their shoulders. She needed something permanent she could understand, and if there was someone who somehow understood her more than anyone, it was Boruto.
She raced up to him and leapt into his arms, throwing her arms around his neck to squeeze him tightly. "You idiot," she chided into his ear. "How did you get here? How did this happen?"
"I don't know, I told you, I don't know a lot of things, but I have some ideas. Let go, you're too tight-"
She pulled back to place her hands on either side of his face in order to inspect him more closely. If anything she searched to find any sparkle of her best friend in the face of the unfamiliar man.
"It wasn't you! I knew something was up! I knew you were lying to me! I was right! We were right, Mitsuki: he did have the sharingan!"
Mitsuki chuckled beside them while Boruto pulled his face away from her hands and looked between the two's smug, satisfied expressions. "Uh, you guys," he said slowly, "I don't know if you remember what I've been saying for the last however many minutes, but THAT WASN'T ME. I don't know what the hell you're talking about!"
"Oh yeah," Sarada sheepishly replied and grinned apologetically. "Sorry."
"Let's rewind a moment before we get into our stories," Mitsuki suggested. "If you're Itachi Uchiha, and Itachi Uchiha is supposed to be dead… How are you him?"
"Mmm… Maybe you should sit down for this. It's going to be a lot."
The team settled below the shade of a tree that also sheltered them in shadows before Boruto took another deep breath to start off his confession.
"So," he said slowly, "you're not where you think you are. In my understanding we're in the past. Almost twenty-five years in the past actually."
He paused a second to allow his words to sink in, but neither of them reacted. "Excuse me?" Sarada asked after a moment.
Boruto just nodded along to counter Sarada's disbelieving headshake. "I know, I know. But from what I've gathered I'm in a group called the Akatsuki and I've been working pretty exclusively with your da- parent, Mitsuki. From the sounds of it we're going to be trying to collect tailed beasts at some point- which includes my dad. He's only twelve, you guys!" Something glinted behind his eyes as he seemed to remember something his partners didn't have access to. "And Orochimaru is not the best person. He's nothing like you know him as. He has done some pretty shady things before deflecting from the village, and I know he's trying to kill me- er, Itachi. He keeps making comments about the sharingan and that's why I snapped when he made a move for you.
"It's a completely different place right now, and I can't even go back to the village because…" Another glint flashed across his eye but this time Sarada caught it and thought she understood.
"Because he did something horrible to my clan."
"You know?" Boruto's voice piqued. "You know it all?"
Sarada nodded. "You. Um. The other person told me. I thought you had been hiding it from me, but…" She trailed off, wincing, as she remembered how she treated Boruto because she thought he betrayed her trust and she felt out of the loop in her own legacy. "That was somebody else. Do you think… do you think the other person was… my uncle?"
"I think it's very possible," Mitsuki replied.
Sarada dug her fingernails into her palms. Not only would it explain his eyes, but it would explain his knowledge base. How he treated her. Everything.
But did she want to really be nice to him if he murdered his entire clan?
Had she been spending the last few weeks with a man who killed her family? She wanted to ask why, why he had done it, but clamped her mouth shut before the words formed on her tongue. That was a question for the real him if she ever got a chance, not an interpreted explanation from her best friend who had no business knowing in the first place.
"So why do you think you're here?" Mitsuki continued. "And how did you get here? Because we obviously came to the past too and we're still ourselves."
"I have no idea how they did it, or who would even have the type of power to be able to time travel, especially so easily. But it's like somebody did this on purpose, either in sending me to the past or Itachi to the future."
"But for what? To change the past…?"
Boruto just shrugged. "Your guess is as good as mine."
"You haven't found out who may be behind this?" Sarada asked.
"Not sure. I have some guesses though just based on your uncle's memory."
"Who?" the other two asked hurriedly.
"Well, Orochimaru maybe, but he doesn't seem to suspect anything. I claimed to have gotten hit in the head and played some slight amnesia the first few days, but he bought it and I think I've been good at hiding under the radar. And some guy named Danzo. I don't think he's alive in our time anymore, but from your uncle's memories, he knew him from the Anbu but he definitely had more, uh, personal reasons for doing things than just for the village." He eyed Mitsuki. "He worked a lot with Orochimaru, I guess, from what I could gather from Orochimaru anyway, not from memories. Allegedly, from my memories, he was rumored to have done some less-than-ethical research."
"On what?" Mitsuki demanded but Boruto just shook his head, a shadow falling over his face.
"I don't think it's best if we go into that right now. I don't want to taint your view of him even more. I just want you to be aware of what this time period is like."
Mitsuki bit his lip but his face was otherwise smooth and unreadable like usual.
"Things are just not good right now, that's all you need to know. We can't go back to the village because I'm a rogue ninja and you two obviously can't explain yourselves, but I can't go back to Orochimaru right now or the rest of the Akatsuki until you two are straightened away. We have to hide you."
"So you're working with Orochimaru. In the Akatsuki." Mitsuki looked at Sarada again. "Do you think that's the group who's behind this? They clearly lied to us about who they were, and remember when my parent said he worked with Itachi but not in the Anbu like we were led to believe?"
"What are you talking about?" Boruto asked.
"So somebody in the Akatsuki now is behind this, is what you're saying?" Sarada clarified, ignoring Boruto's confused expression.
"Yes. Because I think my parent was trying to lead us in that direction and understand that whoever we thought we were working for wasn't actually who they said they were. If he was pushing us toward it being this Akatsuki group, then whoever is behind what's happening in the village may be working for the group here and now too."
"Potentially."
"Because whoever put Boruto here must have done the same to us. You can't just time travel. It has to be the same people."
"But...why?" Sarada furthered.
"That's what we have to figure out: what do they want with us and Itachi? Or maybe even Boruto?"
"Uh….guys?" Boruto nudged his way closer to the two who were leaning in together to where their foreheads almost touched. "Uh, yeah, hi. Can you fill me in with whatever the hell you're talking about? Because once again, I wasn't there."
Mitsuki turned to him. "Remember how just before all this happened we were contacted to potentially join the Anbu? A faction your father wasn't fully in charge of?"
"Yeah…"
"It wasn't really the Anbu. It was somebody using us but we're not exactly sure why. Lord Seventh asked us to be in the real Anbu so I don't think he knows anything about this."
"Don't forget about the white zetsus," Sarada said softly.
"Wait, zetsus?" Boruto asked.
"Thank you. During the chunin exams we were supposed to be watched by this so-called Anbu, but we were attacked by white zetsus. I'm starting to think those are connected as well but I'm not sure how. Remember how we saw those before with Konohamaru-sensei?"
Boruto nodded quickly, his eyes lighting up. "Yeah! Yeah, actually that would make a lot of sense if they were somehow involved."
"Why?"
"Because get this, you guys: there's one of them in here. In the Akatsuki!" He leaned forward and swiped his hair out of his face excitedly.
"A zetsu?"
"Yes! I mean he's not all white, and it's not exactly like the one we saw before, but it's called 'Zetsu' so that has to count for something, right?"
Sarada and Mitsuki locked eyes again, and a tingle zapped through her entire body as pieces of the puzzle began to connect. Whether those white zetsus were connected to the one Boruto claimed to know, she knew they needed to get as close as they could if they wanted to solve this or even figure out how to leave.
"Boruto," Mitsuki said, beating her to the punchline. "Can you take us to wherever the Akatsuki is?"
"No. No. Absolutely not." His voice was firm, and Sarada could hear the argumentative streak rising. "Hell no."
"Come on," she whined. "Please. If this is all connected we have to at least check it out. Don't you want to go home?"
"You don't understand what could happen," he muttered. "You need to stay under the radar. These people are dangerous and you can get hurt. And if this is the past, what could happen? What if you alter it in some way?"
"Wouldn't it be worth it if we can figure this all out and somehow get home? We can't stay here no matter what! We can't live under a rock until we die!"
Boruto let out a sigh.
Sarada could feel him beginning to crack, so she hooked her finger into his determination and began to pull. "Boruto, come on. You know I'm right. No one else is going to do this. And what if the village is in danger? We're just going to forget about that?"
Lightning shot from his glare as his head snapped up to meet her eyes. "Don't play that game," he snarled. "You don't know the things I know, Sarada."
"You're just going to let the mission die here? Really?"
He looked beyond them and Sarada noted the shadow over his face again as he retreated into the memories she couldn't see. She let his mind work over, and held her breath in hopes that when he responded he'd give in. They needed him to agree- they had to get home in any way they could, and the only people who held any potential of answers at the moment were the Akatsuki, to whom they had full access with Boruto. When he finally spoke again after a few minutes, his voice was significantly softer.
"If you think somebody in the past is working in our present, what if they recognize you? Then what?"
"Maybe they wanted us here. We're just giving them what they want."
"It sounded like they wanted us out of the way for whatever they were going to do," Mitsuki piped in. "I think the village is in danger; I don't think they're banking on us snooping here."
Boruto sucked in another breath and closed his eyes. "Fine," he whispered after a moment.
"Wait, really?" Sarada said excitedly. "You'll take us to them?"
"We'll have to talk about rules on the way there and come up with some sort of plan, but sure. If you're right, it's our only hope right now to get home."
"Breathe, breathe. I think you hit your head really hard."
Itachi lay panting on Orochimaru's stone floor, his head still muddled from the vision that had accosted his eyes. It was like a flash of a movie that branded his brain and left him with an intuition of where they were located. He was absolutely sure, a type of knowledge imprinted on his bones, the same type of knowing that told him Sasuke was his brother. It was just something he knew.
"We have to get them!" Scrambling to sit up, his fingers scratched at the floor to find purchase and his voice echoed off the stone walls.
"Sit up carefully," Sakura demanded again and put her hand behind his head to sit him up slowly. "You really took a fall."
There's no time, he wanted to scream but his breathing was now coming out in hard pants. He almost fell into his brother's wife, the energy he had before siphoned out of him.
"What happened?" Sasuke demanded, kneeling in front of his brother.
Itachi reached up to grab onto him and pulled him by the front of his shirt until their noses touched. "I saw where they were. They're okay. But I…" He then paused, watching a scene that happened decades ago play before him again. It didn't feel possible. What he saw just couldn't have happened. There was no way for that to have existed and for him to have seen it.
"Where are they?" Sasuke's eyes searched Itachi's unfocused ones, and he brought his hand up to shake his shoulder. "Itachi!"
"They're with me," he choked out.
"What?" Sasuke jerked back.
Itachi dragged his eyes then from his brother's up to where Orochimaru stood in the corner watching him with a neutral, albeit slightly interested, expression on his face.
Orochimaru. The changed man who made a teammate for his niece. A man who wanted to help them.
This was not the man he unwillingly worked with all those years ago who would have slaughtered him and pillaged his body if he had let him.
Yet that was the man he was standing with in the burned image in his brain. The two of them together again on the other end of the long string of time, two completely different people, unrecognizable from who they had become. But he knew what he saw, what he recognized, what had drawn his emotions back to a time and a life that no longer existed. That was who the children were with now: two versions of themselves they had shed long ago, either in death or by choice. It seemed so impossible, he reminded himself again, but he knew what he saw.
"You," he finally choked out. "Orochimaru is with them too."
The sannin's eyebrows furrowed at Itachi's words. "Excuse me?" he asked.
"We're together. They're with us-"
"You aren't making any sense," Sasuke interjected and motioned for Sakura to lift him but Itachi's body stiffened to push her away, keeping his eyes locked firmly on his former partner's.
"They're… They're with us. You were in your Akatsuki robe. So was I. It was a time you were still…"
Orochimaru stared down at him reproachfully. "You're concussed," he said curtly.
"No, I know what I saw!" he bellowed then squeezed his eyes shut to push through the residual pain and exhaustion settling in his bones. "They are with us. I know how that sounds. How we looked, if we looked like that, they are...They are in the past. Whatever happened to them, they've been transferred. I don't know how, I don't know how it's possible at all, but I know what I saw. I felt it."
He opened his eyes again and held Orochimaru's stare; he hoped he could transfer all of his remaining energy to convince him of this improbable situation. Around him he could feel everyone's suspension in movement like they were too scared to breathe, until Orochimaru finally opened his mouth to speak again.
"Wouldn't we remember it? If they went through time? Wouldn't we remember meeting these children?"
Itachi shook his head then stopped as vertigo blanketed him. "I told you I didn't know how it's possible. That's something we need to figure out…. But Naruto."
He moved his eyes to the Hokage and tried to hold his stare, even as he saw Naruto sink into himself at the eye contact. "Boruto, he's alive. I could feel it. It was like we were- were connected."
Naruto's jaw tightened and he forced himself to stare back at the man in his son's body. Again, nobody around them moved. "How?" was all he could say, his tone incredulous.
"I don't know but I know what I felt," Itachi maintained. "It's like… It's like he swapped places with me."
"Suppose this is true," Kakashi piped in, "how the hell are we supposed to even get there? What you're suggesting is something no one has figured out yet. I think if time travel were real, we'd have all gone back to change something."
Sasuke cleared his throat, only a slight sound so low that everyone around him ignored it, but Itachi recognized the noise as a habit from his childhood when he wanted to say something but didn't know how to start. His brother's eyes were darkened, and he could see his mind mulling over something Sasuke himself clearly didn't know how to word.
"Sasuke," he prompted.
He raised his head but gave a small shake. "It's...unstable," he started.
"What is?" Kakashi asked.
"I think...there's a way," he stepped lightly, "to get to where they are. But it's not a guarantee and takes a tremendous amount of chakra, so don't get your hopes up just yet- I need to think this through."
He closed his eyes in thought. "While searching in past missions, I've come upon...dimensions, as you know. But through this, I also believe I've found pockets of time. Think about, say, a hole within your pocket that when you put your hand through, it doesn't lead out back to where you've come but further into the fabric."
He put his hands through his pant pocket as a demonstration, pushing out against the fabric of his pants. "See? My finger is in the hole but the hole isn't coming directly back out."
"So, a dimension that can lead you to the past?" Kakashi clarified. "How do you know this is possible- have you actually time traveled?"
Sasuke took his hand out of his pocket and nodded. "Yes. Ultimately it was an accident when I first discovered it. I was actually within Kaguya's palace and tried to create a dimension back home within its walls, but ended up...uh...outside of the village in the past, in the same spot where I first entered the dimension in the first place. I discerned very quickly what had happened when I realized the village was in the process of being originally built and went back to the other dimension as fast as possible. For obvious reasons I did not want to engage with anyone and made every attempt to never return. But if they are there… Well, that is an option."
It felt like the air had been sucked out of the room as everyone stared around at each other silently. Itachi knew he was telling the truth, but now he knew for sure that it was possible to get there and it suddenly made it much more real.
"So however they got there, somebody else must have the same power," Orochimaru said. "Or access. That definitely limits who could be behind this."
"We have already determined the Otsutsuki as a possibility," Kakashi reminded.
Naruto balled up his fist and punched back on the wall he was leaning on. "But then who the hell was in the village using the kids? Who were they talking to?" he snapped. "Did they infiltrate and we really didn't notice?"
"If we get there we'll be able to find out." Sasuke looked around at everyone scattered in front of him: his wife; his two senseis, good and bad; best friend; his brother. What a rag tag bunch, he thought sourly. Never in his life did he think it'd come to something like this for a mission. "Again, this takes a lot of chakra and I don't know if it'll be stable enough for everyone to come. We may have to choose who goes and who stays as backup here."
"Naruto, how do you think going would affect your shadow clone?" he then asked.
"I'm going no matter what if that's what you're implying," Naruto growled. "If we go together the quicker this can be over. I know the village is in good hands right now and we just need to take care of this as quickly as possible."
His best friend just nodded silently, wanting to give him every demand he asked for to make up for as much as he could.
"I could stay behind as acting Hokage in case we needed someone here," Kakashi offered, but Yamato shook his head.
"What about Team Seven and Itachi be the ones to go?" he asked. "It's your children. And as sensei and another Hokage, Kakashi gives more power."
"Do you think it's possible to transfer us all?" Itachi asked. "Is it safe to even have that many people go…?" He thought about all the things that could go wrong, all they could accidentally trample through, changing the future in the process.
"I'm willing to take the whole damn team if it means getting our kids back," the Hokage growled.
"Yes," Sasuke agreed automatically. "Whatever it takes."
Team Seven looked out at each other. This time Naruto was the one to stare sourly at them, his trust still wounded, the shadow of the little boy eager for a mission not present at the moment. Their roles were distorted no doubt, and this time Sasuke knew he had to be the one to lead them as positively as possible.
"We'll be here." Yamato nodded to them to lock the decision. "If you need anything, come back and we can help."
The team sardonically waved goodbye and set off outside. "So," Itachi admitted as they walked into the fresh air, "I've never exactly been through a dimension before. How exactly does this work? Oh."
Sasuke had wasted no time and in front of them hovered a human sized portal. Itachi couldn't see what laid on the other side and his first instinct was to shy away from the swirling mass inside the hole. "Hurry," Sasuke demanded. "Go."
They all stepped through one by one, leaving Sasuke for last, and Itachi instantly felt his stomach drop like he was falling. But it only lasted for a second, and he hit the ground hard with an "Oof!" as he landed on his feet. He looked up at a darkened sky and rubble from castle ruins scattered about them. The jagged towers cutting the sky were foreboding and the stone structure overall had an energy that pressed down on Itachi; even without knowing what had been there, he could feel the immense power of what was crackling around him.
"Welcome-" Sasuke's feet hit the ground next to Itachi and looked up to take in what everyone around him gawked at. "-to Kaguya's palace."
"Let's just go, we don't have all day." Naruto's annoyed tone drew them back to their original mission and everyone tensed in response.
"Naruto." Kakashi turned to face him with a warning streak in his voice. "I think we need to talk before we go."
"About what?"
"About everything that has happened. I understand you're angry, but we cannot work like this." He paused for a moment to take in his student more clearly. "This just isn't you."
"How do you expect me to act when I lose a child, Kakashi?" He whipped around on his former sensei, his eyes burning again. His illumination contrasted the heavy, sagging sky and to Itachi he appeared like a danger signal that drew in the dark energy around him. "Please! Tell me exactly how I'm supposed to react! If you're dying to talk about this right now, here's your chance!"
Kakashi took a step back from him. "We messed up. I know this. We made some mistakes and people may have gotten hurt. But we have an opportunity to fix this and I'm just asking that you can put some of this aside. I've never seen you carry something like this before-"
"Until I know he's safe, and what Itachi is saying is true, I don't know if I can give you what you want. I am working here, with you, with all of you, because you are my family, but my son is obviously my family too, and I still feel betrayed because you kept things from me that I should have known. So please respect how I feel right now."
He turned on his heel to walk away and effectively end the conversation, even as he didn't know where he was headed. Itachi caught Kakashi's eye and shook his head once, though he knew he didn't have so much of a right to do that; it's not like he knew Naruto as well as the others did, but he had a mind enough to know that he shouldn't push him right now.
"Naruto," Sasuke called after the blonde making his way around the side of the castle.
Naruto turned but stopped where he was until Sasuke waved him back over. "This is where I was standing the last time," he was telling the others when he arrived back at the group, "so let's try it here. It's exhausting, so be as quick as possible when you go through. And obviously when you get there do not touch or do anything. Even if we feel them nearby, we have to make sure it is clear of others we could potentially affect. Do we understand?"
The group nodded and he took that as his queue, once again creating a large portal identical to the one he created before. Without a word, Sakura jumped first, then Kakashi, followed by Naruto, and finally Itachi. But before he stepped through he looked back one last time at his brother.
"I promise we'll find them," he felt compelled to say, once again feeling the weight of responsibility of the entire situation sitting squarely on his chest. Sasuke just jerked his head toward the portal and Itachi turned to step through.
He was greeted by sunshine and a leafy canopy when his feet touched the ground, a far cry from the ruins of Kaguya's palace. The others were already on high alert with their hands gripping weapons.
He found himself twisting in circles, trying to sense any chakra from either Sarada and Mitsuki and match his surroundings to the one in his vision.
"Is this where you saw them?" Naruto asked. He had already donned sage mode, wasting no time himself in searching.
"No. We were a little closer to a clearing," Itachi admitted, bringing another growl to Naruto's lips.
"I don't sense them," he hissed as though reading Itachi's mind. Where are you? he wanted to cry out for his niece.
"Do you think Orochimaru may have hurt them?" Sasuke's voice was low behind him as the portal popped to a close.
"If he saw Sarada's eyes…" A realization dawned on Itachi then but he shook it away. "But he has no memory of this, and neither do I. I think they are okay."
"I got something," Naruto announced. "This way." He shot through the leaves and the others hurried to keep up.
Please be okay, Itachi kept repeating. Please be okay please be okay please be o-
He saw the figure on the ground before he could stop his feet and ended up crashing into his brother. Orochimaru. He wore the Akatsuki robe just as Itachi saw in his mind, but in the present the children were gone and he lay unconscious with a head wound gushing blood.
"Good for them," Kakashi quipped as he shoved his hands in his pockets. He clearly was unphased.
"Do you think they did this?" Sasuke asked, easing closer to the body.
"I don't know who else could have or would have tried," Itachi replied. "I wonder what happened."
Sasuke leaned in slowly like he was scared Orochimaru would rise up to grab him at any second. "He is out cold."
Sakura's voice then rose from behind them all: "Do you want me to heal him?"
All four men turned to look at her and all four hesitated. They knew what could happen if he awoke to see them, but they also knew what could happen if they left him.
"We can easily handle him if he acts out," Itachi said.
"That's not what I'm worried about," Sasuke replied, "I'm worried about how this could change things if he sees us."
"I think things will already be changed in some capacity: something is seriously wrong here. But we may be able to get intel from him. Can we wipe his memory after?"
Once again everyone turned to Sasuke. He eyed them all back for a moment then let out a sigh. "Heal him, Sakura," he said to his wife and stepped back to watch.
Sakura bent down next to Orochimaru and within moments chakra radiated from her hands. They all held their breath as the man went from still to stirring, and Itachi bit down on his tongue as he watched Orochimaru's eyes begin to flutter behind his eyelids. His face began to twitch with consciousness and within seconds he finally opened his eyes. It took a few seconds for him to adjust to what he was seeing, and when he finally settled on Sakura, his eyebrows knitted together. Before he could move out from under her or make a sound, Sasuke and Naruto both swooped down to hold him in place.
"Don't move or I'll kill you." Sasuke moved his hair from his face to show his ace: the rinnegan. Orochimaru's face lit up in recognition of the long rumored eye, but didn't move any more, understanding what that power meant. "We understand you saw two children earlier. Do you know where they've gone?"
The sannin searched his face for a moment then widened his lips into a grin.
I just wanted to explain a few things, like why I've made some of the choices I have and where this story is going. I know I've said this before, but I didn't think the story would get this far. This started with a small idea I had about how Itachi would react to meeting Sarada and seeing his brother as an adult, and I knew I had the time to devote when quarantine started. But it has grown into so much more than I thought it would ever be, and my focus on Sarada reacting to her family's past has expanded to Mitsuki also learning about his own parent as well as being opened up to the mistakes of their families.
This went from not having a clear plot, mostly being an exploration of how Itachi would react to his family, to having the whole world, past and present, open for everyone to see and understand. So for plot/conflict's sake, he might seem out of character only because if he truly had learned his lesson of not keeping secrets, there wouldn't be a plot. He'd have stayed true to himself and immediately marched himself to the Hokage, and this story would have ended itself by chapter 10. I fully believe we all have flaws, and Itachi's flaws still affect his family beyond what he did when he was still alive. So now that Sarada and Mitsuki are learning about their families, there's more of the responsibility of healing placed onto them- so now that they know, will they choose to forgive? What would that healing process look like now that they have a better understanding of how the past has shaped who they are?
I'm more excited than I've been in months and feel like I'm in a good direction even as school (first year of grad school, woo!) is about to start up again. So now we've come into the part of the story where healing can occur… if the kids fully feel ready.
(Also, before anyone asks, I feel like Boruto having the Jogan at this point would be too convenient, so he doesn't have it… for right now.)