Chapter 6:

Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto. Iwish I owned Naruto. This is just a dedication to its awesomeness.

AN: Kay, so the ball is rolling. Slowly rolling, but there is now movement. Enjoy and please review. It makes it better.

It had been five days. Five arduous painful days, and he was still there, a silent ominous figure in the corner of my eye. Not Itachi, but some menacing ninja with bulging biceps and broad shoulders. A dusky blue scarf wound around a beefy neck. Tanned
chapped skin and lips peeling with dehydration, bloodshot shadowed eyes that never left me. I had tried to look closer get a better view, but as soon as I turned to glance at him, he was gone. Only leaving me with flashes of his serious face and a
strange prickling feeling of being watched, all of the time.

It was disrupting my sleep, I would wake gasping in the night, sure that I just saw him standing at the foot of my bed, his large fingers playing with the blanket at my feet. I didn't walk around mirrors anymore because just as I turned away, his reflection
would be staring over my shoulder from the recesses of the closet or the window.

For a while, I tried to leave notes with small snacks. However, after the fourth day of browning apples and an untouched letter, I stopped. The letters chastised him for terrifying me, but was sprinkled with a hint of understanding as I was sure he was
under orders from the Uchiha. They remained untouched and sealed. Even still, my watcher gave me the chills.

I didn't want to bring it up to anyone. Especially the Uchiha, as I was sure that the assignment may as well be to terrify me. Instead, I snuck a kunai from my dad's spare set, and found a rather interesting place for it in my boot, and made sure that
I never went anywhere without it. Rationally, I knew a paltry knife wasn't much protection. However, like any other safety blanket, I was beginning to need it to feel safe.

"Kai-chan!" Naruto called out, his smile wide and unabashed. He rushed over, a streak of orange and black.

"Hey." I smiled. Since we went out for Ramen, Naruto and I began to hangout quite frequently. I enjoyed his exuberance and sunshine disposition and he liked me because he could brag about his missions and I still thought he was amazing. Sometimes I would
catch him after training for lunch and sometimes it was a bit later where he normally got dinner at the shinobi bar. No one should eat out that much, so today, I brought him a bento I made and packed myself.

"What's that?" He said pointing at the box dangling from my hand.

I laughed.

"It's a bento, silly. I made them because I'm tired of eating out. C'mon Let's find a grassy spot to go eat." I motioned him over.

"Kai-chan, you made me bento?" There were sparkling tears of appreciation in his eyes.

"Hmmhmm, it is not a big deal." I looked at him, one eyebrow raised.

"You're the best!" He hollered and slung an arm around my shoulders. "C'mon, I know exactly where to go."

He led me to an empty field, a genin training field. There were no traps or any hazards. It was a far cry from the jounin training area. We settled in the soft grass and I passed him the boxed lunch. He dug in with gusto, noisily vocalizing his appreciation.

"Kai-chan, where did you learn to cook like this?" He questioned with his mouthful of half masticated rice.

"My mom though it was a good idea that I learned how to keep a house and husband happy, since apparently that is the only thing I am good for. She wants to marry me into an affluent ninja clan, so I have to know how to cook, clean, and sew." I said with
a small amount of bitterness.

He stopped eating, his face grave. "What do you want to do Kai-chan?"

I also stopped, considering his question carefully. There were so many things that I'd do in a heartbeat. I want to see the nations. I want to meet more people, outside the village. I want to have a friendship that will transcend time. I want to fall
in love. I want to make something worthwhile with my own two hands. I want…to be happy. But above all, I want to be free.

I looked over at Naruto. I didn't really think that he would understand, but I wanted to tell him anyway. He was looking up at the impossibly blue sky, the serious expression placed on his face was foreign, almost like it didn't belong, but at the same
time so wise. That expression was one that I fancied would grace his face when he was Hokage.

"Sometimes, when I close my eyes, I imagine what it would be like to be a ninja. I think that I would be great at it. It would be hard, and sometimes I imagine that it would break my heart. But…I would see the world, and protect my loved ones. I would
meet the most interesting and varied people, make connections to them that can't be articulated. I would be able to make something, make an impression on the world that would last longer than two generations." I smiled at him, at his serious face.

"What's stopping you?" He demanded in a harsh voice. "You don't have to be a ninja to get those things. You just have to pursue it."

I was silent for a moment. What was stopping me? I was single, so there was no one physically tying me to the village. I was young and perfectly capable, and full of wishes. Nothing was going to make them a reality but me.

"Nothing is stopping me, except for myself." I whispered into the air. For once in my life realizing that the bland lifestyle I hated so much was all my own doing.

"How do you do that? Chase after what you want without giving up?" I asked turning to face him. The grass under my knees sunk in just a bit.

"It's easy. I know, without a shadow of a doubt, that I deserve to get what I want. I deserve to be Hokage. I'm not going to give up till the rest of the world sees it too."

"I see it." I grabbed his hand, smiled, and planted a kiss on his whisker marked cheek. "I know that you'll be the best Hokage that this village has ever seen. "

"Kai-chan!" He stuttered. His cheeks flushed red.

Once his embarrassment faded, he looked away and grumbled. "You have it too. You have the ability to achieve your dream."

A broad smile crept up pulled at my lips and I laughed joyfully. "If I have you at my back, I don't doubt it."

He grinned in response, and settled back, and once again began shoveling the food I made into his mouth.

Moments like this is why I enjoy being with Naruto.

Once he was done, He told me about his most recent mission. The story was complete with voices, faces, and wild actions. I laughed, and listened raptly. As comical as his story was, I caught the things that he wasn't saying. Like how one of his teammates
hurt their arm, and was now in intensive care at the hospital. How, for just a moment, he was in danger of losing his own life to the ninja he was fighting. He glossed over those bits, and made jokes. However, I saw that he was worried. I read between
the lines, recognized the mask for his worry and fear, and my heart quivered just a bit in empathy. It never stopped amazing me how hard the ninja profession was.

"You have to meet the Uchiha tonight, right?" He asked the narrative finished and he settled back with his hands behind his head in the grass.

I copied his position and let out a groan. "Don't remind me. Hatake-san will be there, hopefully. I really don't want to face him alone. He scares me."

"Teme and I talked about it." Naruto confessed. "He thinks that you should back off. You'll just end up getting hurt."

Frustration crept into my tone. "How am I supposed to 'back off'? I haven't done anything to encourage this behavior in the stupid Uchiha. He is the one who is obsessed with me. AND it's not like I can tell him no."

"Don't worry; Kakashi is under threat of EVIL Sakura. He'll be there." Naruto reassured. "And if he isn't then Yamato-taicho will."

"I know, but it won't make him back off. I'm stuck waiting until he tires of me and finds a new plaything."

"Don't think of yourself like that." Naruto scolded. "You're more than just a toy. You are a person with thoughts and feelings. Itachi is only as detrimental as you let him."

I looked at my friend, wishing I could make him understand. He was equally as determined to prove his point. It didn't matter if I thought of Itachi as an insignificant peon with no power over me, the fact of the matter is, Itachi could control my thoughts,
my actions like he was a puppet master and I was his marionette. I probably wasn't even aware of the strings of control he masterfully had placed on me.

"Kay, I'm not a toy" I agreed once I realized that he wasn't going to back down. "I won't let him get to me." There was a lack of conviction to my voice, but I didn't think that Naruto caught it.

If I was serious about my safety, then I would learn taijustu and evasion tactics now. It would also help me to develop a chakra pathway.

However, I was never ever going to be as skilled as Itachi, or Kakashi, or even Naruto. It was too late for me to change. My fate was decided. It was decided the moment that I didn't attend the ninja academy. What was the point of struggling against a
power greater than my own?

The morose thoughts were too much. It was too much, too dark, and too fatalistic for me. It left a bad taste in my mouth, acrid. I was going to change, I was going to better myself, I was going to learn what I needed to. I was going to fight, not because
the fight was almost impossible to win, but because there simply no other logical choice.

"C'mon Kai-chan." He stood and held out his hand. "Let's get you to your meeting."

I glanced at my watch, to my surprise I had only a half hour before I had to meet the Uchiha. Just as I turned my head look at the ninja towering over me with an extended hand, the shadows to my right caught just a glimpse of dusky blue scarf and tanned
skin. My watcher was still around just as he had been for the past five days.

"Kai-chan!" Naruto's impatience shook me from my avid perusal of the deepening shadows.

"Coming." I placed my hand in his warm one, and he pulled me up like I was nothing. Sometimes I forget how strong ninja are.

Naruto walked beside me, his feet tromping the earth, and his hands behind his head. He was smiling, he was always smiling.

"So you have a mission tomorrow?" I asked

"Yep, a protection detail." He scrunched his nose. "Mostly it's standing around pretending to be statues."

"Sounds, exciting." The sarcasm in my tone was not lost on him.

"Very." He assured.

We fell in a comfortable silence. Well, as close as silence as Naruto could get, he whistled haphazardly under his breath. There was no rhyme or reason to the tune...

We passed villagers, intent on grocery shopping and eating at the many restaurants in this section of the village. The majority of the patrons were clad in the green flak vests of the chunin uniform. They watched us with an air of slight distaste. It
was weird, to have a ninja walk side by side with a citizen, It violated all of the unspoken rules of segregation. I violated the rules of segregation.

That is what I attributed the glares and whispers that followed us. The man at my side was completely unperturbed by the murmuring ambience. I suppose he was just oblivious…

Our journey ended in front of the non-descript T&I building. We stood for a moment both looking at it, me with dread, trepidation, and a bit of horror. Naruto grabbed my hand in reassurance that I needed badly. His large calloused fingers tightened
once briefly. That contact was the only thing that gave me enough courage to march up to the building, pull on the large door, and enter.

Less than two minutes later, I was standing in front of the door to the interrogation room where this all started. I wasn't early, nor late. I opened the door, but hesitated before entering.

"This is new." I turned and flinched backwards.

Itachi was right behind me, twirling my stolen kunai in his long tapered fingers. I didn't even feel him take it. I knew it was mine because I had attached a small red ribbon on the end. He was dressed casually in his traditional black with the fishnet
underneath and his circle necklace.

"Yea, I stole it from my father's spare set."

I turned and caught a little of surprise then a new emotion, I think it was some form of concern? He caught my eyes with his own and held them as he very slowly raised one eyebrow. The eyebrow was a remark of my stupidity. It wasn't really like I had
the skill or capability to actually use it against him.

"Would you give it back to me, please?" I ignored his unspoken question of my sanity and held one hand out.

He smirked and instead of returning my stolen kunai to my hand, he placed it in his kunai pouch, the little red ribbon just barely visible, tantalizing me. I spluttered in indignation.

"Excuse me? That's mine and I'd like it back." I protested. The infuriating man didn't respond.

Before I could protest further, Yamato and Kakashi walked down the hall. I was very happy to see them. Good, now I had people on my side.

"You know, it's not uncommon for boys who haven't matured fully to take things from their crush and taunt them with it." I pointed out to the Uchiha just as the two jounin drew adjacent to us. I was mostly in the room and Itachi was blocking most of the
doorway, as they approached, he had pivoted so his back was closer to the door and I was able to slip back out into the hallway.

I pushed just a little harder. "What's next? You going to dangle it above my head?"

His eyebrow twitched.

Yamato intervened on my behalf. He took one of his own kunai from his pouch and handed it to me ring first. I accepted it, met his eyes, and thanked him gently. It was slightly lighter than my fathers. The balance was higher on the hilt, and it was less
cumbersome in my hand. I puzzled over the difference for a moment; I suppose I could attribute it to the size difference between the kind shinobi and my father. Father was built like a tank, had hands with thick blunt fingers, and calloused broad
palms. Yamato was thicker than Itachi, or even Kakashi next to him, but none of them came close to the breadth that my father did.

Reverently, I knelt to place it in my boot where the other one had been. I had simply never noticed before that there were differences between kunai knives. I felt a slight disturbance in the air that tousled the flyaway hairs at the top of my head; it
was followed by a cling and a crack. Touching the toe of my boot was my father's kunai. It was buried several inches into the stone floor, its red ribbon fluttered like a solitary flag.

I snapped my head up and glared at the Uchiha. As soon as I opened my mouth to yell at him, his eyes flickered crimson red with the sharingon, and he flicked a small black pill into my mouth down my open throat. Surprise made me swallow and halt in my
rebuke to cough.

"What was that?" I demanded once I caught my breath. He said nothing, just watched with clinical detachment, as if I was a specimen at a lab.

It happened so quickly that neither of the Jounin on either side of me had time to prevent it. I was panicking again, my breathing got faster, and my chest started to ache in the way that it normally does when your heart beats to fast. I felt a rush of
energy radiate outwards from the center of me, feeling jittery like I drank too much tea, but burned like alcohol on the way down to my stomach.

Small black pill…I had seen some in my father's stash. They weren't labeled, but I had picked them up and examined them briefly before picking up one of his kunai. Assuming that they were the same, which means I had just ingested a soldier pill.

"You are insane!" I yelped once the realization sunk in.

The feeling of the pill hitting my stomach was like getting punched by a large animal with a fist made of pure energy. It sizzled along my nerve endings and circled each of my organs, alighting each with a searing flame. It coiled inside of me spinning
counter-clockwise in ever tightening spirals.

I don't know what to do!

Kakashi and Yamato watched me with alarm lightening their gazes. Soldier pills were strictly prohibited to anyone under high chunin rank. It was just too dangerous for citizens and genin. It wasn't talked about, but there was a faded poster in the apothecary
shop a public announcement from at least ten years ago detailing the dangers of taking the pills.

From what I gathered, the pill boosted physical energy, and then acted as a catalyst to convert that energy to Chakra, it sucked all of the available spiritual energy away, making the user weary and drained. In that regard, I suppose I was lucky that
I wasn't a more spirited person, that I wasn't centered, that I didn't take up Tai-chi or meditation in my free time. At the moment less spirit equated to less chakra.

The pressure in my chest increased, and I panted, I couldn't seem to draw a breath deeper than a swallow. I didn't have a defined network and I inferred that the chakra, having nowhere to go, was pooling in swirling eddies around my organs.

This was nuts. The Uchiha was completely bonkers! I gasped, and bent over in a futile attempt to control the energy. I didn't have a network. I wasn't a ninja, from childhood they practiced constantly to develop the pathways and the ability to handle
vast amounts of chakra. Of course I had enough chakra to keep me alive, but I didn't have anywhere for this burst of energy to go. It was entwined with my organs. If I didn't focus it away from them, then I was going to sizzle like meat on a grill.
I would cook starting on the inside then out to crisp my skin.

I mentally tugged on a strand that circled angrily around my lungs. Maybe if I eased the pressure there then it wouldn't be so hard to breathe! It didn't budge. I strained, but the flow was too fast, and I couldn't alter it. It raged like a river and
my efforts to pull it were effective as sticking my hand in and trying to pull a rapid off course. It wasn't working.

I looked up at the tall forms of Kakashi and Yamato. My hand crumpled my shirt right above my heart, and it thrummed a rough rhythm against my knuckles.

"Help, How do I?" I trailed off. The pressure was so great. "Help me move it. It's swirling around my lungs." I gasped and squeezed my eyes shut again, feeling for the typhoon in my chest again.

The expression of the men right before I closed my eyes wasn't encouraging. They were both slightly stunned. Kakashi's eye widened infinitesimally, and Yamato started.

"You weren't kidding." Yamato murmured to his companion.

He was the one who acted first. He knelt next to me, one hand gentle in between my shoulder blades, the other landed on the my hand clenched above my heart crumpling my shirt. His black eyes, so different from the Uchiha-jerk, looked into my own. His
face was achingly gentle, his calm was infectious.

"Breathe, Takahashi-san. Slowly, in and out." His guidance did some to calm the acid around my heart.

The strange energy seemed to pulse, and fire trailed up and down my sides. I lost the tenuous grip over my concentration that I had achieved.

I coughed, the sound was wet, and it brought a coppery taste to my mouth. With disgust, I leaned over to the side and spat. Clear saliva was tinted red glinted strangely against the stone floor. I stared at it, not quite understanding that it came from
me. The chakra, my chakra, was hurting me internally.

I tried to concentrate again, closing my eyes, breathing slowly, each one more painful than the last, each one rasping and bubbling through my lungs. The energy didn't stop swirling. I needed something to draw it out, like a leech.

Bugs! When my father went on the mission with the Aburame, he mentioned that the clan has these bugs, and those bugs eat chakra. They eat chakra, and I had too much. Opened my eyes again, I caught Yamato's gaze and I tried to voice my idea, only to have
it come out as a cough.

"Ugh, You know any chakra draining jutsus? Or an Aburame?" I finally gritted out. Yamato paused, his hand on my back stiffened.

"No." Came the voice of my personal antagonist.

I didn't even have the energy to be angry that my plea for help was so flatly denied. Kakashi took up my cause with whispers and a straight posture. So, apparently this was serious. He shed his overly casual slump and was acting every bit the jounin.

I coughed again, gurgling helplessly as Yamato tried coaxing me through ever shortening breaths. I couldn't. I was going to drown in my own blood injured by my own chakra. This calming down thing wasn't working.

"Here." Yamato grabbed my hands that were clutching my shirt above my tortured lungs and arranged them in a seal of concentration.

"We'll do a clone jutsu, just the academy version." He directed. "Concentrate, the pressure around your lungs, focus it into your hands and sort of push it out into the general shape of the clone."

What? How was I supposed to control the rushing typhoon of my chakra? His directives lacked the direction I needed to even begin. I gave him a look that apparently voiced my exasperated confusion because a tinge of pink entered his cheeks and he began
again.

"Focus." He urged. "You'll feel the rush and flow of your breath, and just beside that is the rush of your chakra. Now, your pathways are not developed, so nudging your chakra down to your hands is going to feel really strange."

My eyelids shut as I turned my focus inward. Falteringly, I inhaled, the discomfort was immense. However, there right beside the air, was a pressurized stream. It felt like I had mentally grasped a rope and the friction of it tore at my nerves.

"Found it?' Yamato asked. I nodded once my grip on it was tenuous.

"Good now nudge it outwards, along under your collarbones, down your arms, and channel it into your hands." He directed, his sure hands tracing the path that it was to take with gentle fingers.

The soft hold was immediately contrasted by a sharp jab right where my arm met my shoulder.

"oww." I snapped. The look that I shot the ninja crouched beside me was not pleasant.

He huffed. "Try again."

I found my concentration, and did as he asked. I tried tugging at the rope of energy, following the faint heat of his touch and the throbbing of the bruise. It didn't work. The chakra resisted and then backwashed. It wavered, and spun ever faster.

I pushed at it strained to break the detrimental circle. There was headway, a slight straining, fraying at the ends of the rope and the threads burned as they trailed fire that stopped right above my elbows. It began spiraling again, running up and down
my arms, connected to a lengthening oval.

Success. I pushed again and with another helpful jab and another tingling rush it reached my wrists, then another to my fingers.

Yamato was speaking again, but I was not paying attention. I pushed the threads out, the outside world faded as I felt a poof. The pressure on my lungs eased. So I did it again pulling, coaxing more of my chakra into the process. It came easier once I
knew how it felt.

The breath I took in was deep and it didn't hurt. I curled in on myself and panted. I glanced at where the poofs had sounded and twitched.

My handiwork was beyond pathetic. Both clones were weak, pale, sickly imitations. They were collapsed on the ground and floundered there. Each flopped helplessly like fish out of water. I watched them with a morbid fascination. I think one was missing
an arm, and another was not put together quite right. Its face was sagging and almost looked like a melted wax figure.

"You actually replicated." Kakashi commented. He sounded more surprised than impressed.

The clones dispelled with clouds of musty white smoke. I didn't really care that they were Picasso versions of myself, I could breathe.

I slowly stood, a haltering process that involved dragging myself up with the assistance of Kakashi and Yamato. I sagged like a withered flower. Kakashi tucked me neatly into his side. His arm braced me around my waist. The heat radiating from him was
awkward, but comfortable.

The Uchiha wasn't pleased. It was stunningly apparent at the slight tension in his shoulders, in the flat line of his lips. Kakashi and Yamato weren't pleased either. I wasn't pleased. Then I decided that I was less pleased than he was, considerably less
pleased. What did this particular trial tell him? What did it prove? Perhaps it was to confirm I could use the most basic ninja techniques. However, the suspicion that I was a sleeper agent was unfounded. There was no way with my chakra paths.

So that means that there was another reason. There must be another purpose to these "trials". Now, my anger overwhelmed my fear, my hesitancy, and most of all my common sense. It was time to confront my tormentor.

"Why?" I demanded. I pulled away from the solid side of Kakashi to meet the Uchiha head on.

I borrowed my mother's combative tone.

"Why in hell would you flick a damn soldier pill in my mouth? Did I offend you in some way? Trip you in a past life maybe? What are you looking for?" I spat each question at him. Each word contained so much feeling that the sounds were choppy and abrupt.

Itachi Uchiha didn't respond. He just stared with soulless black eyes looking at me, through me. I paused in my tirade. I gave him several heartbeats to respond. He didn't. My ire cooled into ice that flowed through my veins.

"Actually, consider this experiment over." I made sure to speak with deliberate slowness. "I'm out."

I turned away from the Uchiha. With as much steel in my spine I could inject, I stomped out of the building. I was not going to play this game anymore. I was not going to let him do what he wanted with me. Heaven help him if he tried to continue, because
I was done rationalizing. I was done giving him leeway. He was going to stop, and I was going to find a way to make him.

Dark was just settling over the village as I burst outside the T&I building, and there, just in the corner of my eye was a dusky blue scarf that wound around the neck of a serious face. My stalker was still there. A frustrated grunt escaped me and
hollered at the ninja.

"Go AWAY!"

My yell startled a lone cat skulking in the alley. It yowled and knocked over some garbage. That felt good. The war was on. It was time for me to fight back. I clenched my jaw in determination and headed home. I was going to need my parents for this.