Come down and tell me that it's better
You're the one who's choosin' it
You're the one who's loosin' it
You're the one who's got no soul
You're the one whose heart's grown cold.
Heart's grown cold, Nazareth
Chapter 14: The girl who wasn't
Fugaku-Sama have been asked for a while about who would adopt me. He still had to give an answer.
Father had been sick for a while, so I presumed it was only natural. Brother had mostly been away from home; I think he didn't want to see Father go. Even though we've spent lots of time together because of the wake, I felt like he was running away from me. He always did.
Mother was dead because of me. Father was dead before me. Only Brother was left, but he didn't want to see me. I couldn't tell why.
I am Uchiha Yanagi, the willow. The weeping tree drinking the water, trying to reach the reflection of the moon with its branch-like fingers. Brother resented me for Mother's death, just like Father did. Father died while taking care of me. Maybe I was to be Brother's death.
I didn't know what to do to keep Brother near me. I wanted him to close the gaping wound in my chest, but I could only chase his shadow. Brother didn't care about me. Brother had a dream. I thought that maybe if I embraced that dream, I could stay beside him.
Itachi-Sama shared Brother's dream, and Itachi-Sama shared his warmth with me. If this was the way to keep Brother and feel again, then I'll get closer to Itachi-Sama. But I would never be able to reach him either, for he was the Heir and I was just a minor cousin he pitied. But Itachi-Sama had a little brother. A foolish little brother I might say.
I'll start by Sasuke-Chan. Step by step Brother would be mine.
I shall be complete again.
I felt slightly nauseous. I was sitting on a dusty floor apparently. My hands were tied in front of me, back against back to prevent me from making any sign.
I had been knocked out by a crow. I, have been knocked out, by a fucking crow!
Right. I'll admit crows are impressive birds with a wide wingspan. Plus, that one had a Sharingan. So yes, an impressive invocation. But it was anticlimatic! Me, the last Uchiha girl, knocked out by a bird in her face! I felt ashamed.
I didn't move, sensing someone nearby. I tried to sense my surroundings with that weird chakra thingy I had with Ino-San's body. I felt the crow again and was submerged with that feeling of déjà vu. I knew the chakra that rolled through his Sharingan. It was someone I had known well. Someone from my step family maybe? I felt somewhat sick. Someone had taken the eye of a corpse to put it on a crow.
Which means it could have been any body, and that it might not be the only desecrated corpse. I felt angry in behalf of my fallen clansmen. I had seen their bodies, I stood near their remains and ashes for days! How dare someone did such a thing.
Anger was rolling inside my body. I forced myself to relax. Given my current position I had to remain calm. Whether the invocator of this crow was Itachi-Sama or that Yamashiro Aoba, I couldn't forgive him. But my reply should at least wait my return inside my own body.
"You're up girl." A masculine voice said.
I couldn't control the flinch in my body. He was near me and I hadn't felt him! Well I guessed there was no point playing, then. I nodded in answer and opened my eyes. In front of me stood Jiraya the Sannin, the crow on his shoulder. The man was impressive. Already tall, he was towering me with his Getas. I felt the intimidating waves of chakra crashing on me. I winced. Drops of sweat covered my brow and my back.
"Tell me, why would the Heir of the Yamanaka clan stalk the last Uchiha girl?"
He was frightening me. It as telling me he could detroy me on a simple whim. This wasn't about me being outraged by his behaviour. In the end I was just a little, pitiful girl. Panic was threatening to overwhelm me. In a flash I remembered details I had never thought of the day I almost died. I remembered the grip of Tekka-San around me as he threw me away. I remembered the katana lahsing through his throat and thrusting through my body in the same fluid move.
"Do I have to tell you?" I answered bravely.
My heart was in my mouth. I didn't know where all this courage came from, what had triggered that answer. I crisped my muscles to stop myself from trembling. I was about to die. I was about to die. I didn't want to die. I was not ready! It couldn't happen.
"I can make you talk."
He was so cold and serious, deadly serious even. Haha. So my death wouldn't be fast. It would be slow and painful, until I told him everything. No, that wasn't possible. Here I couldn't think as Uchiha Yanagi, the foolish girl who survived by sheer luck. No right now I wasn't that girl. I had to take whatever that was in me. I don't know what helped me sit still, what helped me mask most of my turmoil.
Right now I was Yamanaka Ino.
"Abducting and interrogating the heir of the Yamanaka clan might not be a smart move. Even though it's slightly ironic."
He chuckled. The pressure lessened, and I found myself breathing easier. I felt a ghost pain in my left lung. In this body I was intact, I wasn't crippled. I flared my chakra up to show my discontentment. It felt good. Right. I could resist him. I had to find a plan to go back to Konoha. In the meantime, I started making Katon around my wrists. It wasn't easy with Ino-San's body, but I was confident in my own control. I glared at the man.
"What do you want from me?" I managed.
"You were following Uchiha Yanagi. So am I. I want to know the reason."
"I can't tell you."
I had found nothing consistent about that man in the library. I knew he was a soldier of Konoha. I know he fought during the Second war, but he didn't have any major role in the Third. Where had he been during that time? He had been teammate with Tsunade-Sama (who fled the village her own grandfather had built from nothing, a despicable Senju) and Orochimaru-Sama (a horrible criminal who had abducted many children and civilians to experiment on, right inside our own village). Given the people he had worked with, I had difficulties to believe in him.
Where did his loyalties laid? There was no way I could tell him about my secret mission, had Jiraya-Sama been the student of the very man who ordered me to remain in Ino-San's body.
"You can't? So I was right, it's not the silly reason you've yelled at the top of your lungs earlier on. There's something way more serious playing here."
He was cunning. I could see the wheels turning in his brain. Maybe I should interrupt the way he was thinking. The only problem was that my social abilities weren't the best. I was bad at lying, plus I needed something believable.
"If you want to know so badly, you could have asked me directly instead of abducting me." I suggested.
Right. It might give me some time.
I looked around me. I was seating on the floor of what seemed to be a wide storage room. I had no indication of the time that had passed since I was rendered unconscious (I glared at the crow).
"You're the heir of the Yamanaka clan, hence why I'll treat you with respect."
I deadpanned, wiggling my fingers. My hands were still bound. Looked like a good treatment to me. I hadn't anticipated doing the basics of chakra changes into Katon in another's person body was so hard. I had to isolate the chakra particles and make them vibrate at the right speed. It felt so alien for something I had been used to do for years.
I looked at the Sannin. He was watching me, his brown eyes wary. He gestured at my hands.
"I can't have you do your mind tricks on me, Yamanaka-San. Besides I doubt you'll have much memories of this encounter."
I frowned. I hadn't gathered much information on the Sannin, but he hadn't seemed like an interrogator to me. Well any ninja had a few abilities in that field, but he wasn't a specialist. The most obvious proof of that was the fact he deliberately told me I would have my memory wiped or something similar. Had I been him, I wouldn't have tried novice techniques of interrogation on a member of the Yamanaka clan, even if they were still an Academy student.
"You aren't an expert in interrogation." I said, more thinking out loud than really talking to him.
"No I'm not. In the meantime, I'm not the one who's the most interested in Uchiha Yanagi. I am just doing a favour for someone."
He titled his head towards the crow. I gulped hard. So the invocator really was against me. Not against Sasuke. Jiraya-Sama seemed willing to talk. Maybe I could have him say more.
"The invocator of that bird, right?" I said.
"The Sharingan kind of gives him away, right? His owner will come for him."
It didn't give me much information. That owner who was either Itachi-Sama or Yamashiro Aoba. It was more likely the latter, because I supposed we hadn't gone far from Konoha in a few hours. So the invocator was more likely Yamashiro-San. Still the Sharingan seemed to indicate more Itachi-Sama. In either case it was a recent transplant, because I still thought of this person as someone I knew. I focused on the bird. Who was he? Who had owned this eye?
A shadow came through a nearby window. I just had the time to see the dusk outside and the forest before it was slammed shut. Well, between the newcomer and the Sannin I had no chance to escape. Plus, my legs wouldn't carry me. I wasn't feeling well enough with all this pressure around.
So most of the day had passed (might be why I was hungry/exhausted), but I might be near Konoha. The silhouette was thin and tall, wearing a long black coat with red clouds. I saw long black silky hair from under a straw hat. A bell jingled when he took it off with a manicured hand. He even had painted nails (even the toes).
I discovered a thin face, older than the one I remembered from my childhood. If he had been a small child when little, he was now almost as tall as the old man near him. His eyes, hemmed by long black eyelashes, were of that deep anthracite I remembered. I saw emotions twirling in it, concealed to all but bothering him deep. Thin strands of hair danced on his face, and he put them back behind an ear. His face was white and blank as ever.
I remember kinder eyes, warm eyes on me. I remember warmth and strength.
He dipped his head.
"Jiraya-Sama." He said with a smooth voice. "You've abducted a child."
Impossible. He couldn't be here! There were protection barriers around Konoha. Plus, there was no reasons for him to be physically here. Why would he care about Uchiha Yanagi after three years? Why me and not Sasuke? What had changed? What made the difference?
Why would this happen right at the moment the Hokage wanted to be sure of my loyalty?
"I suppose you are Yamanaka Ino." Itachi-Sama said.
I nodded, unable to talk. I didn't know what to do. I was usually lost in terms of feelings, but my mind was literally blank. No plans, no backup, no nothing!
"I do not understand why you brought an Academy Student near me."
"This girl here, penetrated your girl's brain. You might want to check what she saw."
"How much will her disappearance be noted? What is our time window?"
"Probably a few hours. I had to remake the Bunshin she did and make it more solid. It should last enough for you to have the answers you're looking for."
Itachi-Sama sighed before he turned to me. His face expressed nothing, but I guessed he wished he had much time. His eyes bled red, forming a Sharingan. He'd do it a hard way. I sensed the Genjutsu coming at me. The parts of my brain that had been solicited so long by the everlasting illusion started to tingle. I immediately reacted to push him away. He didn't even show appreciation. Itachi-Sama had always been a professional.
But Genjutsu was my specialty. His used to be shuriken throws. I resisted. But Ino-San's body… Her body and her chakra coils had never been stressed the way mine were. I was already gifted when I was a child (and I got to be the guinea pig of both my brother and cousin), but I have also been regularly stressed to resist it. I might not be very imaginative, but my resistance was strong.
I don't know how long I dared looking straight at a Sharingan. He might have thought I was an ignorant girl to look directly at his dôjutsu. But even though I hadn't had my eyes for now, I still was a Sharingan user, and a good one. My mind may be shattered and weakened, I had had years of bad dreams to get at the level I was at.
I would lose. There was no way I could win. But I wouldn't bow down. Not to an Heir who killed the entire clan when he claimed he acted for peace. Not to the one who had severed the link between Brother and I! I believed him! I believed him! I believed when he said he hadn't killed brother! I believed him because he still poured warmth inside my frozen gap. I still couldn't find it, but it was there.
I increased the chakra flow in my mind, violently pushing him out.
"Konoha has many promising talents." Jiraya-San commented.
I reckon he hadn't done much, just a light brush to take over my mind. But come on! I was supposedly an academy student who had just won against an S-Rank criminal! I deserved some credit! More than a simple 'promising talent'.
Or they just didn't care about Yamanaka Ino. They only wanted to reach Uchiha Yanagi. Who was right in front of them. What a headache!
"I made the mistake of underestimating you. I am really sorry Yamanaka-San, for you're forcing me to hurt you. Yet I never thought an Academy student would be able to resist a mild Genjutsu attack from me."
Finally, I think I preferred the previous option. Given the lack of time, and the seemingly important research he was leading, Itachi-Sama would stop being reluctant about hurting the Yamanaka heir. I was talking to the guy who traumatized his own brother with Genjutsu. To him, the quick and dirty way worked well.
Again I felt him against my defences. Somehow I doubted I could talk him out of it, but I'd try anyways.
"And you couldn't just ask?" I panted. "Our minds were merely exchanged thanks to the Shintenshin no Jutsu. I don't know what information I could have for you."
"It is… surprising. You don't know your Kekkei Genkai, yet you're able to resist mine." Itachi-Sama remarked. "Please cease to resist. I'll try to make this as painless as I can. You won't remember our encounter happened."
"People know when they have missing memories. With the window frame you have, you won't be able to hide anything or to make my brain create a cover story for the lost pieces. And you won't be able to do so, because Sharingan isn't specialized in mind jutsu. Abducting me was clearly a mistake, Jiraya-Sama. First, your surest way to make me talk is torture, and I have enough importance for it to matter. Second, you don't have enough time for such an operation."
The silence coming from Itachi-Sama was eloquent. Or at least it was eloquent to me. I had always found him expressive, maybe because I had always lacked empathy, hence needing an external analyse.
"I couldn't let this chance go! You're the one who was very insistent about this Uchiha Yanagi. You never ask about anything, so I thought it was important. Who's the girl? Your fiancée?" Jiraya-Sama grumbled.
The teenager didn't answer. My cheeks had gone red at the reference. He looked at me, curious. Me, being Itachi-Sama's fiancée? What a silly idea! Yet, knowing I had such an importance to him was affecting me more than I thought it would. It was a huge change for me. I couldn't say if it was welcome or not.
I remembered the maelstrom I had felt after the elder Yamanaka had touched my mind.
"What does she have to do with anything? What's so important about her?" the man continued. "Her only interest is that she's entering the next Chuunin exam. Yet she only graduated last April and was tricked by an academy student. She makes no sense."
"When you say Academy student, do you mean me? You're aware I'm currently resisting Itachi-Sama?"
He considered the thought, staring at Itachi-Sama. I felt the continuous push of his chakra against mine. One of us would run out of chakra soon, probably me. I was starting to feel dizzy.
"Wait. The next Chuunin exam is in Kiri, right? If your girl has no skill she could only have entered through political means. Oh! Now I get why you were so worried! You were tricked!" the Sannin exclaimed.
The push stopped just as Itachi-Sama looked at the old man with annoyance. My body fell forward as I couldn't stand. Great! I'd appreciate if that break lasted forever! I felt the chakra block the Hyuuga doctors had put in place budging in my spirit. Great! I needed that now! Apparently Kami-Sama thought resisting mental attacks from my genius and serial killer of a cousin was too easy.
"I'd appreciate if you'd stop giving indication to our guest. She might not understand herself, but she's bound to have her mind searched by the best specialists of Konoha."
"What crucial information could I have?" I asked. "Like how one of the best agents of Konoha meets with an S-Rank criminal?"
"So you'll understand that no one should have access to this information."
"I'd be unable to talk if you erase the memories." I said. "That was your plan."
"It wouldn't be cost-efficient, like you mentioned earlier." Jiraya-Sama said.
So they would need to shut me up with a fast method, like I had anticipated. Well in that situation, they could just also me. Oh no… Colour drained from my face. They would definitely kill me. A corpse was way easier to hide than memories. Think! Think! Think!
"You seem more willing to talk. We know you have information about Uchiha Yanagi. You may be gifted in Genjutsu, but you're a bad liar." Jiraya-San said. "The faster you give us the information, the less he has to work on your brain."
"But I'm from a powerful clan." I remarked. "And you need the information I have. You wouldn't hurt me."
My hand was strangely calm, as if the perspective of death had torn apart my simulacra of Ino-San. I didn't have to play anymore. I wanted to live.
"Need, no. But it would be useful." Jiraya-San said. "Like I said earlier, I'll treat you with respect. Your clan buries their dead, right?"
I winced, having a vivid image of corpses in the morgue superposed with lined boxes full of ashes. At the same moment Itachi-Sama pushed and shared my vision. He retreated at the same moment I threw him out. I felt like I had just been violated. Granted I had lost our encounter, but aiming for the moment of distress! Right! The ninja world wasn't fair, but my head was a place of privacy. Yet everyone I meet wants to get inside of it!
"Get out." I growled.
"Who are you?" he asked at the same moment.
"What happened." Jiraya-Sama asked again.
Full of anger, I straightened my spine. I don't want people to help me or look inside my head The only think I'd like with my brain is to let me sleep properly and stop me from going crazy.
"The Yamanaka clan has never had so much dead people. This memory isn't yours." He muttered to himself. "It's definitely Yanagi-San's!"
His eyes met mine, and his attack was strong this time. I immediately blocked the attack by reflex. No one was to invade my mind! Not after everything that happened in the meantime. Blood spurted from my nose, dripping on my hands.
"Tell me what you want from her, and I'll let you in." I said. "There are things she doesn't want anyone to know."
"I thought you didn't like her." Jiraya-San said. "What does it matter to you?"
I gave him a disgusted smirk. I couldn't tell what the real Ino-San would have said in this situation. But I knew what my answer was. Sasuke was jealous. Sasuke wanted me to care about him. But I didn't. I had only had eyes for Itachi-Sama, for Brother, for Father. But in the end I only cared about my own feelings. That was the repulsive person I was.
"That's right, I hate that girl. She's clueless, lacks of empathy, and socially inapt. She has like that big Oedipus complex. She's full of flaws and edges. But I won't let you hurt her. She's been through enough, and she has enough troubles already. Just let her lick her wounds, would you?"
I turned to Itachi-Sama. I didn't care about running my mouth. He wouldn't kill me yet. He hadn't killed me all these years ago, and he could have repaired that mistake later. He needed information, I needed some too. We could make a deal.
"You know lots of personal things for someone who met my cousin only two days ago." Itachi-Sama said. "You have no basic knowledge of your clan Jutsu, yet you've gained so much memories and knowledge from her. And you know the effects of the clash of both our clan Jutsu."
His hands trembled. Hesitantly, he grabbed Ino-San's slender shoulders. His fingers dug in her flesh.
"Is she inside? Your clan jutsu clashed. What did you keep from her?"
"Everything. Ino-San and I literally exchanged our minds. Hence why I know the Sharingan better than I know their clan Jutsu."
Itachi-Sama let me go, he stared at me in disbelief. Jiraya-San looked at him, then me, then back to him. I wasn't sure they exactly believed me.
"Seems like your mistake was a lucky one, Jiraya-Sama." I said. "I am Uchiha Yanagi, currently living inside Yamanaka Ino's body."
"The Yamanaka clan left you in that state?" he exclaimed. "What were they thinking?"
I smiled. I would say nothing more. I turned to Itachi-Sama and levelled my bound hands. He immediately produced a blade which freed my hands. I stretched a bit and repressed a yawn. My stomach growled a bit. The pressure had decreased greatly, even though he still radiated danger in his chakra. I braced myself in case he attacked again, but it didn't try. I swept the blood on my face.
Once I looked a bit more dignified, I turned to them.
"Itachi-Sama, seeing that I am still alive and looking for me for whatever reason, may I question the reason of your presence here? I suppose I'm in a position to know a bit more now."
"I'd like to access your mind. Whoever you really are, you possess some of her memories."
"For what reasons?" I asked. "Are you saying I am pretending to be her?"
"Yes."
He took a thick envelope out of an inner pocket of his back and red coat (I definitely had mixed feelings towards these colours). He opened it and took out a few polaroids. I glared at Jiraya-Sama who had the decency to look embarrassed. Itachi-Sama dismissed this and handed me the pictures. I saw a young woman with long black curly hair, a nice and somewhat boyish face, black eyes. She seemed longer than me, and curiously familiar. She looked about 13 or 14.
"Is that a relative?" I asked. "I don't recognize her."
"Look at the other pictures".
It was always the same girl, younger and younger. She looked feminine, and her expression was always vague. As a photograph, I saw those portraits as informal documents. There was no intent behind that. They only wanted to show a girl growing. And undergoing surgery if I relied to the slight scars.
Picture after picture I turned back the time, the girl's hair getting shorter and shorter, her face changing slightly, getting younger. She had burn marks on her exposed skin, explaining the surgeries. She was getting younger and younger, her appearance more and more gruesome. And then the last picture, of a girl wired on an hospital bed. A girl of ten, looking like an Uchiha, unconscious in an hospital bed.
A girl who could have been me. A girl he believed he was me.
I felt a shiver crawl on my back, feeling dissected by his eyes.
"What is that?" I muttered.
"This, is Uchiha Yanagi." Itachi-Sama said. "Or I thought so until I found her."
"I am starting to know how deep you were had, Itachi-San." Jiraya-Sama said with a mocking tone. "Not only was your girl trapped in political schemes, but you were send on a goose chase as well."
Itachi-Sama glared at him. Kami-Sama! Someone had used the fact I had survived to make him believe some other girl was me. But for what purpose? Why sending all these pictures to Itachi-Sama? And who could manage to do such a thing?
I felt the world spinning around me.
"I… I don't understand… What is that?"
The pictures escaped from my loose hands, deftly caught by Jiraya-Sama. He flipped through them as I tried to process this information. Why would anyone want to trick Itachi-Sama with my survival, my identity? What use could I have for anyone? I was just a Genin!
"I have taken some pictures of your girl in Konoha. She doesn't look like that."
"She could look like anything with surgery." Itachi-Sama said.
They were trying to get at Itachi-Sama. Through what means? Why was I considered as a way to get to him? Why me and not Sasuke, who was a much more ideal target? Were they trying to play on his guilt? But I wasn't sure he had been the one to leave me for dead (I was the only one).
"Okay, Okay. So someone blackmailed you, and you sprung the trap." I said.
I started pacing.
"And somehow my existence that had been hidden by that girl was revealed, and you asked yourself if I was for real or not."
I stopped and looked at Itachi-Sama. I folded my arms.
"So you couldn't come directly to Konoha, but you could send an invocation. Plus, you've asked Jiraya-Sama to help you and he accepted. Whatever the reasons are I don't care, they don't matter now. What matters now is to know if I'm the real deal or not. Then act."
"Hn." He said.
It sounded like an admission. But why was he obsessed by the fact I was alive or not?
"So you're telling me some girl died, someone told you she was me, and now I have to prove I am me. While in a body that isn't mine. Yes, truly believable."
Jiraya-Sama scoffed, badly hiding a laugh. My discomfort was so great with my fear to die with every mistake that I found myself daring. Both of them were killers. I put my hands on my hips and stared directly at his eyes. He was confused, very confused. If I made a mistake, he might think I wanted to trick him.
Somewhat I realized I was angry. The genius of my clan had just confronted his Chakra with mine. Granted my body wasn't mine, but how dare he didn't recognize my techniques? I had trained sometimes with him, and I might have been one of the rare people to resist him (I don't think he had gone easy with me if I think about Brother's rants about him).
"Not only that!" I said with a stressed voice. "I just don't understand why everyone seems obsessed with me recently. I don't really know when you killed that girl, but I bet it changed everything. They didn't care much about me. Well, I was under surveillance, I can't access the clan documents without an authorization, and I'm being regularly monitored. But suddenly I find myself enrolled in the next Chuunin exam with a team I have yet to meet. Then everyone wants to get inside my head."
I pointed a finger at Itachi-Sama.
"Whatever you were thinking, you just wrecked my life. Again. First there's Father and you're there. Then there's Brother and you're there. Then there's the whole clan, and you're involved again. And now there's me. I'm not egocentric, but there are tons of stuff going on around me."
Or maybe it was about peace? Father was a war hero, but he had always fought against the Elders who wanted to battle each and every one. Brother had wanted peace and he was dead. Itachi-Sama, who I always believed to be a pacifist suddenly decides to kill our clan. I don't know about myself and peace (I never told anyone about my wish to pursue Brother's dream in my own egoistic desire to fill the gap in my heart), but I had been thrown in all this political mess.
I hated politics. I wanted to do nothing with politics, but I knew neither Itachi-Sama nor Sasuke would touch any business clan (except for killing or traumatizing each other it would seem). So I was the one to stick with the boring stuff like accountancy and politics. Well that would give me some business to do when I'll be changed into a baby machine to supply the clan with Uchiha babies and the village with strong and faithful soldiers to be.
I pinched the bridge of my nose while closing my eyes.
"Why do I have the impression to repair someone else's mistakes?" I huffed.
I stared at Itachi-Sama. His silent said everything.
"Why am I right when I'm being sarcastic?" I shouted before bursting into nervous giggles. "Damn, it's totally that! Someone fucked up and here we are! All hail to the Uchiha clan, with its crazy heir, its traumatized emo brother and its depressive baby maker!"
And it still didn't prove anything about me. Because someone had wanted to do things while distracting Itachi-Sama. To me, not to Sasuke. They had thrown a bone to Itachi-Sama for him to chew, and once he wasn't distracted enough I was moved forward. I felt like a pawn on a shogi board, not understanding what the strategy was.
I laughed. It wasn't funny and I wasn't amused, but I laughed anyway. I'm not a laughing girl. I was just an empty marionette moving her hole-like mouth! I stared directly at Itachi-Sama's eyes. I remember a time I had thought them pretty, those Sharingan. In the end they were just curses! What difference would it make if he looked into my eyes, or if he killed me? Things would move on, and I'd have no say in it. Sasuke would wail in despair and want to kill his brother even more, Ino-San would become me, and she'd marry into the Uchiha clan.
I could just die. I didn't matter.
It was so risible. So I laugh. I laugh that empty laugh that echoed in my inner gap. I saw the horror painted on Jiraya-Sama's face. I saw the perplexity on my Heir's face.
"What is so funny girl? Stop that sound immediately!" the Sannin ordered.
I shot my mouth, but didn't turn to him. I just looked into Itachi-Sama's eyes that weren't mine. I saw all the pain, all the guilt, all the grief. I didn't felt it.
"What is funny, you ask? I just realized how much of a pawn I was. I was used to it, but I didn't think I was in such a fucked-up world! Isn't that funny? I think it is!" I said with a steady voice.
"You're nuts kid! Pull yourself together! Itachi-San say something."
"Please." He said with his smooth voice. "I need to know if you're Yanagi-San, or if she's somewhere in you."
"Why are you looking for her so much? Why is she so important?" Jiraya-Sama asked.
"I promised I'd look after her. I will not fail again."
His voice was still. So what? Did he promise Brother? Did he promise Father? What a fool. There was nothing to look after. I gave him a smile, a sad, sad smile. Without lowering my gaze, I walked to him and slowly reached to his hands. I put them on my neck. Maybe they were warm. I chuckled. I was not amused.
"Feel that, Itachi-Sama? That steady heart of mine. It won't beat up any faster, it won't beat up any slowly." I said. "You could even break my neck in a simple move if you wanted to."
"What are you doing?" He frowned, unsure where I was leading the conversation.
"I could be another fake, just like the other girl you killed." I muttered.
I still hadn't break the eye contact. He still hadn't tried to attack me.
"I'll tell you the awful truth, Itachi-San. The awful truth about the girl who still looks up to you. The awful truth about the girl who once hoped you could help her. The awful truth about Uchiha Yanagi."
The smile that bloom on my face was like carved on wax.
"That warmth you gave her. She never felt it."
And I invaded his mind.
That chapter had been really hard to write! Jiraya and Itachi are so complicated characters, and I'm afraid I couldn't grasp them fully. Even now I am dissatisfied with the way I have written them. But the hardest part is still Yanagi who has feelings but doesn't know what to do with them. Plus, she's a good person even though she doesn't want to admit it.
Anyways, thanks for all your kind reviews :)
Girl-luvs-manga : Of course it was Itachi. I intended Yanagi to do some investigation, but that whole crow plot just blasted eerything.
Lumiax: You laughed like a madman because of the crow! Actually I never intended that scene to happen with the bird flying in her face, but it was just so ridiculous I couldn't help myself! With Yanagi being such a serious character, I have to bring most of the fun from the situation. Glad it worked!
MusicOfMadness: Wow, everyone loved that crow ending or what?
Thanks for taking the time to comment! Don't hesitate asking questions in the reviews or by MP :)
