It was already midday, and Sasuke stood out in the yard, hanging laundry on a clothesline. The sun was shining, its rays beating against the back of his neck. It was early spring. Akiyoshi was almost 10 now and in his second year at the academy.
In an hour, Sasuke had a meeting scheduled with one of the new ANBU captains - a woman - to go over some newly implemented tactical strategies for four-man cells. It had been one of Sasuke's suggestions to Shikamaru, so for the past six months, it became a pet project of his to put together guidelines that offered suggestions regarding the amount of equipment a four-man cell needed on short-term vs. long-term missions; the most efficient formations of a cell during long-range vs. short-range battles according to each individual's affinity and combat style; and a section on practical team-building exercises for newly appointed captains trying to take control of and gain the respect (and submission) of the other members of the team. Sasuke had been an ANBU and a captain but hated the inadequacy and inconsistency of the training process. Being ANBU was entirely different than being a jounin; therefore, it required a different approach for a captain, because, often, the teams were put together at random and the ninja had not necessarily built relationships the same way as genin teams did after graduation from the academy. Trust and loyalty did not materialize within a cell just because they were told to get along. That was the reality of forcing together exemplary and skilled ninja egos.
As he finished hanging up the final piece of laundry - a cobalt blue shirt of Aki's - said boy walked out of the house and into the back yard, his shoulders hunched and hair falling across his face.
Sasuke's reaction was immediate. "Why aren't you at academy?"
Aki stopped approximately 10 paces from Sasuke and looked up at him. He was sporting a black eye. "I got sent home. I'm suspended for a week."
Sasuke stared in mild disbelief for a few seconds. He'd never heard of Akiyoshi ever getting into trouble at the academy. He strode over to the 10 year old, expression quite stern, but Aki did not seem all that intimidated. Sasuke got down on one knee to examine the boy's eye, pressing the skin just under where the bruising reached. Akiyoshi winced a little.
"You're grounded," said Sasuke. "Let's go put some ice on it." He started to get up and go toward the house, but Aki grabbed his wrist.
"That's not fair! Don't you want to know what happened? I was defending you!" he shouted in a voice that cracked.
Sasuke narrowed his eyes, first at the small hand gripping his wrist and then at the young boy whose sky blue eyes shone with determination and anger.
"I don't need you to defend me," Sasuke retorted more coldly than necessary and loosened his hand away from Aki.
Akiyoshi looked hurt as he let his arm fall to his side. "But this boy in my class was saying all sorts of awful things about you!" He fisted his hands, "He called you a traitor! He said you were a bad guy even though you used to be friends with my Dad! So, I told him he was a liar, and we got into a fight!"
Sasuke took this in with a calmness that only age and experience made possible. "I see."
Aki stomped his foot. "Aren't you mad he said you were a traitor?"
"I have a meeting in an hour. I don't have time for this. Akiyoshi, you're old enough to know better than to behave like this, and you should've been able to avoid a punch from a fellow classmate." Sasuke began to walk away again when Aki called out to him quietly.
"It's not true is it?" he asked Sasuke. "You're not a traitor to Konoha, are you? Why would my Dad be friends with a traitor? It doesn't make sense."
Sasuke paused before answering, "Life isn't so generous that everything we encounter, even what causes us pain, makes any logical sense when it happens. Consider it a lesson learned."
Inside the house, Sasuke had only just gathered some ice cubes into a rag when he heard Akiyoshi run upstairs into his bedroom and slam the door. Sasuke sighed, letting the rag unravel. The ice landed with a clunk at the bottom of the sink. He was too old for this sort of crap, and the way Aki had looked at him out there was almost identical in expression to the way Naruto used to do. Even after all these years, he hadn't forgotten that moron's face or his fierce convictions that his sense of right and wrong was absolute. Sasuke's past was something he'd kept guarded from Akiyoshi. He would not deny or apologize for what happened in the past, and it had never been required of him to do so.
In the end, Sasuke consciously chose not to go up to Aki's room and tell him the truth. It didn't occur to him to comfort the boy. He did not want to see that expression again, so he left the ice to melt in the sink, grabbed his jounin vest off of the chair and headed out of the house.
The meeting went on longer than expected. The female ANBU, Haruka, had been incredibly intelligent and pragmatic. Sasuke could understand why she'd been assigned captain at the young age of 21. She was attractive, too, Sasuke guessed. She had dark purple hair tied into a high ponytail and eyes that were almost gold in color. Her skin was tanned and her figure athletic but curvy. So impressed was he with her that he had every intention of adding several of her suggestions to the proposal's next draft. However, her professional demeanor relaxed at the end of the meeting when Sasuke was about to excuse himself and she asked if he wanted to get dinner. At first, Sasuke thought it was a joke - not that Haruka seemed the joking sort. His first inclination was to refuse. Being a ninja was already difficult enough, but that he was also raising a child made it impossible to have a personal life. But, something in the back of his head wouldn't let him refuse, and, while tonight wasn't good for him because he knew he couldn't leave Akiyoshi alone, he did say he was free for dinner in a couple of days.
Haruka seemed surprised but extremely pleased, and they parted amicably. If anything, at least Sasuke could get laid. He couldn't even remember the last time he'd had sex, and he had some serious stress to work through.
On the walk home, he happened to be passing by Ichiraku, so he decided to pick up a couple of bowls of pork miso ramen and a large side of fried rice and some takoyaki. Not that he should be rewarding Aki's suspension, but he really was a good kid. He did as Sasuke told him, his grades were always the best in the class, and when Sasuke took him out to the training grounds, the boy was an incredibly quick learner. It was almost a shame that he wasn't part of the Uchiha bloodline, but given his mother's hereditary background, there was still the chance of a bloodline trait. After only seeing a technique once, Akiyoshi was usually able to perform it within a few attempts.
As soon as he was inside the house, he was certain it was empty. There were no lights on, but the sun hadn't completely set yet, so the dying colors of the day bled through the windows and scattered across the floor and furniture. He walked into the kitchen and set the paper bag on the counter. As he went up the stairs and into Aki's room, he found clothing strewn everywhere (usually Sasuke made him keep it fairly clean) and there was a note folded into a triangle on the desk. Sasuke unfolded it and read the contents:
I'm going away for a while, so don't come looking for me! You won't find me anyway and you'll probably be better off without me and you'll have more missions and can get married and have kids of your own!
-Aki :-(
Maybe it wasn't the greatest first reaction, but Sasuke really wanted to laugh. It probably had to do with the face Akiyoshi had drawn. It was just so... Naruto. So ridiculous. Such a cry for attention that Sasuke took a seat on the side of the bed that faced the second balcony. He put his hand to his forehead and laughed.
"Of course your son would be a pain in the ass, Naruto. Why would I expect him to be any different than how you were at this age?" Sasuke shook his head, re-folded the paper, and stuck it into his pocket.
There was no way a 10-year-old ninja could have made it very far. He certainly wouldn't be allowed outside the borders of Konoha. Someone would have seen him, and plenty of people recognized Akiyoshi given his father had been a Hokage and Uchiha Sasuke was his current caregiver. So where would he go? Iruka's? Sakura's? A friend's?
Sasuke opened the door to the balcony and jumped onto the roof. Dashing around, he scouted for a tuft of blond hair in the crowds below, but he was sure he knew exactly where Akiyoshi had gone. When he reached the training grounds, there was a genin team sparring with their sensei, who Sasuke knew as Wataya Renshou. Wataya noticed Sasuke's presence and came toward him, a hand raised in greeting. As soon as he stepped away from his team, the two genin boys started picking a fight with one another.
"Friggin' brats these kids," said Wataya. "Anything I can help you with Uchiha-san?"
"Have you or your team seen Akiyoshi here tonight?"
Wataya scratched the back of his head. "Can't say I have. Hey, Togame," he called over his shoulder to the small girl with bright red curly hair, "Have you seen Uzumaki Akiyoshi anywhere?"
"Oh, Aki-chan?" She said, twirling her hair around her finger, speaking more to Sasuke than her sensei. "I saw him about an hour ago. He was having an argument with some kid I didn't recognize and then he disappeared that way." She pointed in the direction of the Forty-Fourth training ground, otherwise known as the Forest of Death.
Suddenly the situation wasn't so funny anymore. "Wataya, sorry to cut your training short, but would you mind finding Sakura and telling her what's happened?"
Sasuke didn't wait for Wataya's acknowledgment before sprinting toward the forest. The chains to gate No. 6 had been broken. Sasuke hurried inside, immediately recalling all the possible threats hidden within the grounds. He operated solely on adrenaline as he searched the forest floor and branches for signs of a trail. He discovered a pair of footprints that went on for 30 yards before they disappeared. Akiyoshi must have thought to cover his tracks after that point. Overhead in one of the trees, a large bird with feathers the color of sapphires flapped its wings in warning and let out a shrill call that sounded like a siren.
Sasuke must have been searching for nearly 20 minutes before Sakura caught up with him, planting herself behind him on a branch.
"What took you so long?" asked Sasuke snappishly. He turned around to glare at her, a kunai in his hand after he'd used it on a poisonous two-headed lizard that still writhed in pain under his foot. Without even blinking, Sasuke stomped his sandal onto its head, putting it out of its misery.
Sakura looked disgusted as the blood splattered across the bark. "I was at the hospital, not at home! I got here as fast as I could!"
"Whatever."
Sakura rolled her eyes at his attitude. "Anyway, exactly what happened? Why would Aki-chan come to such a dangerous place? He knows better than that."
Sasuke stared out into the forest. The air had grown so humid that his skin was already coated in sweat. "He's mad at me." He reached into his pocket and tossed Sakura the note.
She scanned it quickly and seemed to be caught between laughing and trying to remain serious. "Oh my God, is this for real? This is so..."
"Naruto?"
"Yeah," she said, and the look in her eyes became momentarily distant, but she shook it off and started to chuckle
Sasuke put his kunai away. "Well, I'm glad you think it's funny considering he could be in the belly of a giant snake by now."
That seemed to sober Sakura a little. "I doubt that. He's at least above the level Naruto was when he started the chuunin exams."
"That's what worries me," said Sasuke. "It'll be better if we split up. I'll head toward the temple. You head toward the creek. Send a signal if you find him."
She took a few steps toward him and put a hand on his shoulder, squeezing it. "We'll find him."
Sasuke's eyebrow arched dubiously. "Are you consoling me? I'm not worried. Like he said, I'd be better off without the brat."
Sasuke left her and darted off in the direction of the old temple built at the center of the forest. Akiyoshi better hope for his sake that Sakura found him first, because Sasuke's wrath could be a lot worse than any oversized reptile, and, after all, he had spent a considerable amount of time around those.
Another 40 minutes passed before one of Sakura's slug summons materialized onto Sasuke's shoulder and informed him that Sakura had found Akiyoshi about three kilometers northeast of the creek and that he was stuck in a deep hole with several leg fractures. There was a flash of relief he was very surprised to feel. It took him 10 minutes to travel a distance of 10 kilometers. Sakura leapt up from the bottom of the hole, her hands smeared with blood.
"I thought it was only a broken leg?" asked Sasuke, eyeing the red stains on her fingers.
"Apparently he fell into some poisonous vines. The outer part of the plant is protected by a sharp row of thorns that excrete a pretty toxic substance. I fixed the leg fractures, but I need to go collect a few things for an antidote. I wasn't able to remove all of the poison yet. Just give me about 10 minutes to gather some things." She put a hand on Sasuke's shoulder again, but this time it startled him. Sakura offered a fleeting smile before dashing away in a hurry.
Carefully, Sasuke leapt down into the darkness of the hole, latching onto sporadic bits of roots that stuck out so he would be able to avoid the mass of poisonous tangled vines at the bottom. Akiyoshi was lying in the dirt, his skin pale and covered with sweat and blood. His hair clung to his forehead, and his breaths were shallow. There were multiple scratches all over his arms and legs. Sasuke moved slowly over toward the boy and sat on the ground, bringing Aki's head to rest on his lap. It was a weird thing to think, but he was suddenly reminded of Karin from when he'd formed Taka all those years ago. Her body was always covered in his bite marks. He used to push himself so hard back in those days. He was always so reckless, but this was different. Sasuke had broken all his ties so that it wouldn't matter what he did to himself or what he did to others, but Aki was not him. This boy had no right to be so reckless, especially when his father and mother had protected him at the expense of their own lives.
He suddenly felt very furious.
Akiyoshi's eyes fluttered open. "Ow, that hurts."
Sasuke realized he'd been gripping Aki's wrist tight enough to empress blotchy red fingerprints on his skin. "It's going to hurt a whole hell of a lot more once I get you home."
"You didn't even," he wheezed, "W-want me to begin with."
"What? Who told you that?"
Aki sealed his lips shut and shook his head.
"It's no matter," said Sasuke. "That's no explanation for why you'd run away and come here of all places. You worried me, and you worried Sakura."
The boy only stared at him stubbornly, his cheeks growing red. Sasuke put a hand to his forehead to check for a fever. Aki felt warm, and he hoped Sakura would return soon. She said she hadn't gotten rid of all of the poison. Sasuke's body was resistant to all kinds of poison, so he took hold of Aki's arm and began to suck the poison out of the marks and spit it on the ground. Aki squirmed at first, but Sasuke scolded him and told him to be still. He finished the right arm and then went onto the left before Aki started to complain of dizziness. Sakura arrived right around then and administered an antidote that smelled like a pile of garbage left out in the sun for a few days. She smiled apologetically as Aki gagged on the medicine, some of it dribbling out the corner of his mouth. She pinched his nose and made sure he swallowed all of it while murmuring soothing words of comfort. Aki's head still rested in Sasuke's lap. It was only a few minutes before his breathing evened out and his complexion took on a healthier glow.
Sasuke gathered the boy in his arms as he stood. "Thank you, Sakura," he said to her earnestly.
"Uh. It was no problem. Naruto would've killed us if we let anything happen to his son, ne?" Her smile came somewhat forced, but he nodded at her anyway.
"Are you able to accompany me to the house or do you need to get back to the hospital?"
Sakura started putting her tools away into the pouch strapped around her lower back. She dusted her black gloves free of the dirt. "I have to get back to the hospital." She brushed Aki's bangs to the side and pressed her lips to his forehead. "But I'll come to check on him in the morning. Just set him in a tepid bath and wash out the cuts thoroughly. If he spikes a fever during the night, let me know." She was looking at him. "Are you going to be okay?"
"Why wouldn't I?" he asked, hushing Akiyoshi as he mumbled in his sleep.
"You should've seen the look on your face when I came back with the antidote."
Sasuke gazed at her blankly as if he had no idea to what she was referring.
"Anyhow," she said. "I've got to get going."
Sasuke nodded and watched her as she zigzagged back and forth against the crumbling dirt walls until she cleared the surface. He took out some rope from his pouch and made sure Aki was tightly secured to his chest. The hole was as deep as the ninja academy was tall. He chose his footing carefully as he jumped upward until his sandals were finally on grass. By then, the sun had set and all sorts of dangerous creatures would be lurking. It was good they'd been able to find Aki when they did.
It didn't take very long before he was out of the forest and on the training field, the genin team long since having gone home. He'd have to thank Wataya later.
When they arrived home, Sasuke stripped Akiyoshi of his dirty clothes and threw them in the hamper. He drew a warm bath and thoroughly washed out the rest of the wounds, sucking out the remaining poison from the cuts on the boy's legs. It was a process that took nearly an hour. Aki floated in and out of consciousness, barely aware of his surroundings or what was happening. Sasuke dressed him in the clean clothes he'd hung out to dry earlier and set him in the bed. He let Aki rest a while and went into the kitchen, where he poured some of the miso broth from the ramen into a separate bowl, re-heated it, and brought it upstairs. Akiyoshi slurped it greedily from the spoon as Sasuke lay in bed with him, feeding him like he was a toddler all over again. After Aki finished, Sasuke set the bowl aside and got him to take a few sips of water before he fell into a restless sleep. Sasuke continued to lie in the bed with him, watching for any signs of severe distress or fever.
It was an hour later that Sasuke started to nod off.
He wasn't sure how long he'd been sleeping, perhaps no more than a couple of hours, but when he awoke it was to the sound of turning pages. Akiyoshi was reading one of his academy books: The Fundamentals of Defense Against Genjutsu.
Maybe it was because Aki looked so much like Naruto under the light, that rare serious expression his former teammate had worn sometimes that Sasuke boasted casually, "I'm a genjutsu expert if you have any questions. I can teach you more than that book."
"Is that so?" asked Akiyoshi, grinning widely at him, but then the corners of his mouth tugged downward and he rubbed his lips together nervously. "I'm sorry for running away. I'm sorry for causing you and Sakura-onee-san trouble."
"You should be. You should go and apologize to Sakura tomorrow, and thank her for treating you."
Aki shook his head. "I will. I promise." He flipped the book around and showed Sasuke a picture of the sharingan. "You have this, don't you? It says only members of the Uchiha clan receive this doujutsu, right? Do you have it?"
Sasuke tilted his head and activated his sharingan. Aki let out an impressed boyish squeal of surprise.
"So cool! It looks just like in the picture! How old were you when you got it?"
Sasuke touched the glossy page and traced a circle around the eye that had the sharingan. "It wasn't complete until I was 13, but the first tomoe appeared when I was 12."
Aki squeezed against Sasuke's side so that they could both look at the pictures together. "Oh yeah? How did it happen? It says that it requires the user to have a strong emotional response to something or be under duress. Is that true?"
"I think that's true with most bloodline traits. It becomes activated under certain circumstances. It usually happened for me thanks to your Dad being an utter moron."
Aki laughed and punched Sasuke lightly in the arm. "My tou-chan wasn't a moron. He was Hokage! Morons can't be Hokages!"
"Then your Dad was the exception."
"So what happened?"
Reluctantly, Sasuke ended up telling him the story of Team 7's first high-ranked mission that led them to Wave Country and how they met two Mist ninja named Haku and Zabuza and how they all worked together as a team to fight the duo. He told Aki about what happened with Haku. That wanting to protect a friend had led to the first tomoe appearing, how the second came during the chuunin exams when he had fought a bad guy in the forest.
"That was Orochimaru, wasn't it?" Akiyoshi had asked. "We learned all about him in our history class with Ino. She said those who are ignorant of the past are doomed to repeat it."
Sasuke was impressed. "Your Dad had called me out on being a fake when I was unable to make a move. He fought Orochimaru on his own until a sealing jutsu knocked him unconscious."
"Wow. My Dad was only, like, 13 and fought a former sannin on his own?"
Sasuke nodded. "It wasn't the first time either, but I was in a coma during the time Naruto was traveling with Jiraiya in search of Tsunade."
All of this new information caused Aki to get overly excited. He bounced on the bed, like he hadn't just suffered some severe injuries a few hours ago. "A coma? Holy cow, why were you in a coma? Weren't you really, really, really strong when you were young?"
"Sit down." Sasuke pulled at a piece of Aki's hair playfully. "I'm still strong. I'd run into my brother Itachi, who used his mangekyou on me." He pointed to the picture of the generic mangekyou on the page. "This. He used a powerful genjutsu on me called tsukuyomi. His mangekyou could be used to manipulate time."
"Wow. He sounds really powerful. In our history books, they say Uchiha Itachi died a hero who dedicated his life to keeping Konoha safe."
Sasuke's lips parted and he held his breath for a few seconds. "Yeah, your Dad made sure that was written into any future history books once he became Hokage."
"That's why I thought that kid was a liar. The Uchihas were really great, weren't they? Your brother was a hero, and you were a hero. You had to be. I mean, Dad was Hokage. And I'm his son. They wouldn't give me over to just anybody."
Sasuke couldn't help but laugh. "Your Dad would've scolded you for saying something like that. It didn't matter to him whether someone was the Third's grandson or the First's granddaughter. He never cared about stuff like that."
"I'm the grandson of the Yondaime, right?"
"You are."
"So cool."
"What's important is that you be a good ninja and a good teammate."
"I know, I know. I won't bragabout it. I'm just... really proud." Aki shifted around in bed, and almost shyly, he grabbed for Sasuke's hand and squeezed it. "I never got to know tou-chan. I'm glad Sakura-oneesan and Iruka-sensei always told me stories about him, but I always wanted to hear things from you. And, my Dad is my Dad, but you're... like a Dad, too. And you're Uchiha Sasuke. So, it's like I have two heroes as fathers. Mom, too."
Sasuke bowed his head, incidentally squeezing the small hand he held in his.
"You okay, oji-chan?" Akiyoshi asked, full of concern.
"It's nothing. I wish you'd been able to know your idiot father. You're a lot like him as much as I've tried to raise you not to be. Obviously he wouldn't allow me to live out the rest of my years in peace."
"Ha ha. You always say the weirdest things! But, even if you did bad stuff when you were young... I don't think you were ever a bad person. I just don't think that'd be possible. 'Cause, you've always taken care of me, and," Aki's cheeks turned a beet red.
"And?" Sasuke used two of his fingers to poke Aki in the forehead.
"And... and...," he stuttered and then defiantly yelled, "And I love you! I'm not embarrassed to say it like other boys. I really love you!"
Sasuke's heart might've stopped in his chest. Akiyoshi's eyes were big and round and full of conviction and sincerity. Sasuke had to cover it all up with his hand.
"This is obviously a side effect of the poison," he mumbled.
Aki took hold of Sasuke's wrist and moved his hand out of the way. "It's not! It's really how I feel!" As the boy started to cough, Sasuke eased him back down in the bed and made sure his head rested on the pillow. He felt his forehead again.
"See, you have a slight fever," he said to Aki. "You don't know what you're saying."
"You know, oji-chan," Aki's eyelids started to close, "I have this feeling tou-chan felt the same way. Or else he wouldn't have left me with you."
He flopped Sasuke's hand a couple of times and then let it go to curl up onto his side while giving a big yawn.
Sasuke sat a while, unaware of how his fingers kept stroking Akiyoshi's hair. He traced the curve of the child's ear and jaw and neck. After another minute, he picked up the genjutsu book and let it fall onto the floor. He turned off the lamp on the bed side table and listened to the sound of Aki's breathing. It wasn't the first time he'd wondered why Naruto had left him of all people with his only son. Was Naruto desperate? Did he really think Sasuke would make a good parent? Had Naruto expected him to stick with it and learn something from it?
"Damn it," Sasuke whispered as he fought such a strong desire to want to beat the crap out of Naruto for no other reason than he couldn't think of anything else that would make him feel better. It had been ten years, after all, so why did he think of that moron nearly every day?
As he settled into bed with Aki, he couldn't help but recall Naruto's outrageous speech where he'd assured Sasuke they'd meet in another lifetime, where Naruto wouldn't be a jinchuuriki and Sasuke wouldn't be an Uchiha. The thought of not being an Uchiha greatly disturbed him on some level, but now that Naruto was dead, was he free of his burdens? Was he somewhere waiting?
Sasuke rolled onto his side and threw his arm over Aki's waist, drawing him close to his chest. Aki let out a contented sigh. Sasuke sighed, too, and kissed the top of the child's head.
"Goodnight, Akiyoshi."