.
.
"Mama!" Their daughter screams. They rush into the bedroom.
"Sayaka!"
"Mama!" Bones explode out from her shoulders, tearing her skin and spraying blood across the wall.
"Sayaka!" Anko throws herself on her, but a shard of bone slashes against her arm. Kimimaro yanks her back, grabbing their daughter and shielding her with his body. Bones jut out like spines but Kimimaro keeps holding her, face screwed tight.
Anko's eyes widen. The bones calm down, but she can see the gashes on Kimimaro's skin; only small plates of bone had kept those shards from piercing him.
Their daughter cries. Blood drips down the side of Kimimaro's arm.
xXx
.
Their daughter. Eight years old with pale green eyes and dark hair that fell in choppy spikes like her mother's. Anko watches as Kimimaro kneels and presses the red marks of the maro-mayu of his clan onto their daughter's forehead, then gently swipes the red marks under her eyes.
Sayaka is asleep. It took nearly all night for Anko to heal the gashes in their daughter's back, and even then there were still scars, pale pink and translucent; but every so often chakra would flare beneath her skin and their daughter would be screaming again, shards of bone erupting as her skin split like an overripe peach.
"I was about her age when I manifested," Kimimaro says. He sits next to Anko, gingerly. "I am sorry," Kimimaro says. "This is all my fault."
"Why is she still bleeding?" Anko asks. She looks up at Kimimaro, agonized. "How come you never bleed like that?"
"I use my chakra to seal my skin," Kimimaro says. "She does not yet have that control."
Anko blinks hard. She touches her daughter's cheek, gently.
"Does it always hurt?" Anko asks.
"Yes," Kimimaro says. Anko's face wrenches. She looks down at their daughter and tries not to cry.
"They haven't even taught them chakra control yet," Anko says. "Those are genin techniques. She doesn't even know how to hold a sword." She looks up at Kimimaro, who is standing beside her, quiet. "How was it when you manifested?" Anko asks. Kimimaro shakes his head.
"It was painful," Kimimaro says. "I did not understand what was happening to me. Only that I was a weapon and that I was too dangerous to be with the rest of the village. They locked me up the next day."
"I'm sorry," Anko says. She rests her chin against Kimimaro's shoulder. "I just don't want her to hurt, you know?"
Kimimaro nods.
"I know."