Chapter 76 - Kyanite Balance
They wouldn't find out what had become of Kurunari for many years. But Karin had theories about what they had done, from checking on his chakra every chance she could and sensing how strange and unsettled and mixed it felt, and they were later confirmed when news began to trickle in from her refugee patients that the Land of Mist had a new six-tail jinchuuriki.
The news didn't exactly devastate her, but Suigetsu could see how upset it made her, regardless, and tried to ease her mind by saying that, hey, even though the government was crooked, they had seriously better living conditions up at the top. But her mood remained dour, and she walked more slowly, and sighed a lot more.
Though this, of course, could have been due to the fact that Karin had another kid in the works, and it was a delicate one. Karin had her house abnormally chilled—thanks to a climate system paid for by the Taki syndicate, who were delighting in the addition of Kiine to their numbers (and Suigetsu was certainly delighting in the high-paying work they now gave him whenever he went to check on her)—due to a painful revelation she had made about Haku's clan that required her to keep her body temperature at dangerously low levels in order to prevent a miscarriage. Suigetsu couldn't complain about it, at any rate. That was her deal, and he didn't want to cause extra trouble.
But Ooda was suffering quite a bit, because cold weather made him sluggish and unresponsive, and it really was pitiful, the way he tried to carry on when he was obviously barely able to stand.
(And the things that Suigetsu didn't see, like Karin, in the middle of a miscarriage, screaming at Ooda to take her temperature.)
(Even though she always went to him and held him tightly and apologized, when she was recovered, saying that things would be better next time.)
(Ooda always believed her.)
Suigetsu, feeling sorry for him or something, bought him the thickest sweater that he could find on what he called a whim with the earnings from some mercenary work. Ooda had been almost entirely without words in receiving it, even though the sleeves extended well past his hands and the hem went almost to his knees.
"It's… it's so warm, though, thank you," he said.
"Eh, don't mention it," Suigetsu replied, with a casual shrug. "You just take care of your mom, so she stays off my back."
And Ooda nodded, smiling that angular smile of his. "I will, Suigetsu-san."
Nine, almost ten years old, Ooda took very good care of his mother. He was nearly as skilled as she was in caring for patients, and Suigetsu frequently found him manning the clinic and treating the minor stuff himself, so Karin could rest when she wasn't feeling well.
(He was also, finally, comfortable at looking Suigetsu in the face. Though he would never remove his bangs from his eyes.)
(Suigetsu was weirdly pleased with this, regardless. He was finally comfortable with looking the kid in the face, too.)
(No way in hell could a kid as nice as Ooda turn out to be like… Well, it didn't even need to be mentioned. So there was no need for discomfort.)
But the fact was that this latest kid was giving Karin a lot of trouble, especially compared to the ease—well, as far as Suigetsu could tell—that Fuzan and Kiine had given her. Suigetsu told himself that he was only staying at her place because it seemed to smooth her mood, when he offered to do things around the house for her. It was easier than mercenary work, anyways, and he got Ooda's cooking to go with it. Still too cold to sleep there, though.
Yuki was also the first one he had almost seen enter the world. Suigetsu let himself in, with his usual reports (and a smuggled-in letter from Mikan—jeez, was that woman friendly) but he found the house to be cold as well as empty.
Eventually, he attempted, "HEY, ANYONE HOME? Hello!"
Ooda rushed up to him shortly afterward. He had his sleeves rolled up and he was gasping for air; his pale cheeks were shining slightly from sweat, despite the cold. "Suigetsu-san… please come back tomorrow…"
"Why, what's up?" Suigetsu's eyebrows lowered in worry.
"My mom… she can't be bothered right now, I'm sorry."
"Is she sick?" Suigetsu stooped a little lower, his teeth on his lower lip.
"It's, um. The little one. I'm sorry, I can't be long, she just sent me up to tell you to come back tomorrow." His shoulders moved awkwardly with the dismissal. "She's fine, she just can't be bothered. You can tell us about everything tomorrow. Okay?"
Suigetsu found himself biting his lip. "Well, uh. Then—then tell her I said good luck, and I'll come back later—but the reports are good overall, okay? At least tell her that."
"I will, Suigetsu-san, thank you," Ooda said, with a very quick nod, before disappearing.
Suigetsu, to his surprise, found himself actually worrying about her in his cheap hotel room that night. Which really made him wonder. Yeah, of course she'd probably be okay, she knew what the hell she was doing, she'd done this before, and she had Ooda so whatever.
…but her health had really been looking like shit, lately, and the house had been so cold that even Suigetsu thought he'd have turned to ice if he wasn't careful. And if something were to happen to her…
…well the seal on his tongue would go away if she died, but Ooda would be all alone and.
And he wouldn't ever get Mangetsu back.
And it had already taken so damn long. She'd started on the new one—she said she was going to name him Yuki, and he'd given her shit for it because what the hell kind of name is that, and she'd pushed back in her own way—because she couldn't make any headway on his brother's clone, so she figured she'd try something else.
Well who was to say she wouldn't just try "something else" when she got better?
…not that he'd say that to her when she was still recovering. When she was better. She had priorities. After all, she chose Haku over the Uchihas, right?
…he still hoped that nothing would happen to her.
And nothing did. She was in her bed when he went to meet her the next day, with the baby on the pillow next to her. "I'm letting myself enjoy my hard work for once, okay?" she explained, weakly. She looked like she was having a difficult time keeping her eyes open, and she had taken her glasses off. "How are the other ones, are they all right…?"
And Suigetsu, trying hard not to get distracted by the miniature angel-thing squirming on the pillow there, said, "Yeah, they're all doing just fine. Oh, and Mikan-san sends a letter. You, uh, want me to read it to you?"
And Karin, sleepily, replied, "I'd love that…"
He took out the letter, unable to really smile—he could barely hear her!—and had unfolded it when she said: "When the hell did you get so nice, Suigetsu…?"
Was this being nice? "I'm just… doing my job," he replied, and began to read.
She'd long since decided what to do with Yuki, having negotiated with Mikan through letters while she was still pregnant with him. And while she discussed with Suigetsu what they were going to do, what sort of note they were going to leave with him ("I liked your approach last time, with Fuzan, it seemed to help a lot."), there was a great hesitance in her actions as the three months trickled away, and the going-away date arrived.
And when she finally put Yuki—already beautiful as a newborn, but even moreso as an infant—in Suigetsu's arms, for the final trip out, she kissed the baby on his forehead and swallowed before speaking. "Good luck in getting him there, okay?" Her voice sounded squeezed.
"Don't worry, we'll be fine," Suigetsu replied. And wrapping his cloak around him, he left.
He had to stay anonymous, he always had to stay anonymous, so he took care to keep his face covered as he approached the gate of the Taki compound in the early morning. And things went well.
Until Yuki started crying. That got their attention.
Suigetsu had to melt into a puddle and scoot for his own safety, because they were tossing arrows at him. Though he took care to run away from the bundled-up screaming thing that was Yuki, to make sure that, if they hit anything, they hit him and not the baby. Because Suigetsu could handle it, but certainly not Yuki.
He stuck around to make sure that they had taken him in before leaving, and coming back a few days later as himself.
"No work for you today, Hozuki, unless you're up for diaper duty," Tensho replied, with a bristling smile. "Nobuhiro's family has expanded a little bit and we're all kinda trying to adjust."
"Boss, c'mon…" Nobuhiro's face seemed to be fixed into an angry, plastic position.
"Oh, really," Suigetsu replied, and asked about it, with crossed arms and a smile. "What happened?"
Mikan, holding the kid in her arms as he left, winked at him, and sent Karin a letter shortly afterward giving detail to everything Suigetsu had to tell her upon his own return.
Karin was relieved, but she took her time in recovering.
Suigetsu eventually got around to asking her about Mangetsu. Again. "Seriously, you promised me."
"I'm working on it," she replied.
Suigetsu had to trust that she was, given that he didn't stick around terribly much, nor observe any of her research. All he could notice was when she started looking sicker, started acting more irritated, when Ooda got more apologetic. That usually meant she was trying to get something to work, and it wasn't working.
And there was a time, maybe two years after Yuki had been born, where she had been irritated for months. Sometimes Ooda had to turn him away at the door.
"She's not seeing anyone, not even patients. I'm sorry, Suigetsu-san, I'm very sorry."
"…well just tell her get well soon from me," Suigetsu replied, trying to deny the uncomfortable squirming in his back, and the prickly worry that always came afterward. This was happening far too often for him to be comfortable with.
He discovered, later, that she was on the verge of a breakthrough with the Uchiha cells. And she honestly looked so elated when she told him, "I'M FINALLY OUT OF THE FIRST TRIMESTER! I CAN'T FUCKING BELIEVE IT, OKAY!" that he couldn't bring himself to be terribly angry.
Though he could bring himself to be disappointed. Some part of him had hoped that, maybe, it was his brother making her this sick.
And his disappointment was impressive.
"Remember, you made a promise-" he attempted.
"I remember your promise, and I'll get on it when I can! This is kind of more important, though, okay?"
He couldn't decide if he wanted to laugh or sigh in his reply. "Fine! Just… whatever."
Karin was ridiculously careful with this one, however. Resting far too much. "I don't… know if this will persist. I have to be careful, okay?"
She didn't want him to scout out a home for the Uchiha baby just yet.
"And why is that," Suigetsu replied.
"I… don't know if I should… keep him or not."
"What happened to leaving it with Sasuke?"
And she considered this for a while.
"…leaving a clone of an Uchiha, much less Itachi, with Sasuke might work out for the first few months, but it'd get so difficult for him, as he grew up and started to resemble his original more, I don't think I could bear it," she replied. "Besides, it'd attract far too much attention, and we can't have that, okay?"
Suigetsu, who had known of and shared information about Sasuke and his now five children and his steel expression, just nodded.
(Figuring, rightly, that Ooda had something to do with this. Even though he was incapable of saying Ooda's "father's" name, and he made this point most sarcastically to her when she brought it up, Karin had very suddenly put a moratorium on Orochimaru-talk one year, around the time that Ooda stopped going to school.)
(Frankly, Suigetsu couldn't blame either of them. But he left the pep talks to Karin where he could help it.)
(Which meant to say that his advice definitely made its way to Ooda on more than one occasion.)
"But think about it," Suigetsu continued, "do you honestly think you could handle a baby now? I mean, your—other kid's grown up a little and maybe he could help, but at the same time, attracting attention."
The sheer amount of time that it took for Karin to answer was enough to speak for her, her painful expression besides.
"I don't know," she replied, finally. "But I'll know when the time comes."
Unsurprisingly, she didn't. But Suigetsu didn't find himself looking for homes for the kid. And it wasn't because he figured she'd keep it. In any other instance, he'd do it anyways, to keep her from yelling at him for being unprepared when the time came.
But not here. He just didn't feel like it. He wasn't in the mood.
He had very little excitement for the thing when it was born, finally, too. Even though Karin was so overjoyed, but in a melancholy way.
"Suigetsu," she told him, on a November day, maybe a week after it was over, "did you find somewhere for him to live…?"
She sounded so weak, so depressed. For fuck's sake. "I'll find somewhere," he said, almost growling.
"The Land of Rice," she said.
"'scuze me?"
"Look for somewhere in the Land of Rice. Somewhere Sasuke won't find him, okay…?"
This was a recent development. Suigetsu scowled. "He won't fucking find the thing, don't worry," he replied.
And he found a town, eventually. Full of scared people. Lots of towns full of scared people, though he recognized this one, especially when he passed the grown-over secret entrances to the nearby, underground labs.
Town full of lab rats, and the children of lab rats. Great.
Fine, okay, found a town, and he found a family, two people, they were of the right age but they didn't have kids but they wanted kids, that was good enough, fine, whatever, that would be good enough for her.
And he returned to Karin and said he had his location picked out and he could move out at any time.
Karin's reluctance annoyed him. And it took him a very great amount of effort not to snipe at her for it, when she handed the thing to him and kept him for far too long so she could "say goodbye."
Because if he had, she'd have gotten angry at him. Like he wanted that. Her mood was already awful enough.
He moved quickly. Sooner he got this over with the better. When the thing cried, he bounced it back to sleep with well-practiced motions, but there was no care in his actions.
He descended upon Tamina like a terror, with a great, black fury. And he entered the home of Satoko and Gishi Honbo in the dead of night, without knocking, nor asking for trespass, keeping his face in shadow. It was snowing, hard. Fucking figured.
"I need you to take care of this child," he said.
"Wh-who are you? What are you doing in my house?" Gishi, rightfully, replied.
"I have a child, and you're going to take care of it for me," Suigetsu said, "or when I return, you're going to seriously regret it."
"Where did you come from?" said Gishi, his stance like a hissing cat.
"Same place you two came from," Suigetsu replied. "Now listen to me and take the kid, or else."
It was Satoko that moved forward to take it from him. She looked fearful, and her eyes were trembling. "Gishi, we, we should do as he says…"
"Who are you?" Gishi said again. His courage was pathetically shallow.
"Nobody you should be messing with," Suigetsu replied. He practically shoved the thing into Satoko's arms. "Remember. I come back, you haven't taken care of it? You don't want to know."
He turned to leave, when he remembered.
"Yakata, his name is Yakata, you have to tell them this…" Karin had instructed, almost desperately.
"Why the hell is it so important that it has that name?" Suigetsu replied.
"So I know who he is, if I ever hear about him again," Karin said. "So I can always remember where he came from. His... name, it's made up of the kanji for Itachi, after all... Just like all the others."
Just one more condition. "The kid's named Yakata, by the way. You change his name, or if you hurt this kid in any way, and I'll know, and I'll come back and I'll hurt you. So listen to me and don't mess up."
Suigetsu was clearly terrifying them, by now. But he didn't care. He was feeling mean.
And he left, his cape fluttering in the bullet-wind as he went, making solid, steel steps. He didn't bother sticking around to see if they'd actually take care of it. That wasn't his business.
He told Karin that everything had gone well. His further reports, one, three, five months after the fact, were similar, despite his reluctance in even going near Tamina. She'd put that seal on its neck, hadn't she? That was good enough for her.
And he waited. He knew, by then, that Karin always took it easy for six months after each birth, before starting on anything serious.
He asked in August, after a brief, clipped, uncomfortable status report. "So yeah, enough about the fucking Uchiha. When are you gonna get to work on my brother? I've waited fucking long enough."
"…Suigetsu, what's with the attitude?" Karin said.
"What attitude."
Karin sighed, shaking her head. "You know, you've been extremely rude to me these past few months, okay. What's bothering you?"
"What's bothering me? Oh, gee, I don't know. Maybe I'm just… a little miffed that your precious Sasuke got his brother back before me. When you promised me fucking years ago."
"Suigetsu, I don't-"
His temper boiled over. "It's been over TEN FUCKING YEARS! You fucking PROMISED me! This is why I'm doing all this shit for you, and y'know what? I'm pissed! Where's my payment?"
He was starting to move forward, shoving his face closer to hers. He could feel his anger over his back, like steam.
"Suigetsu, I've—I've tried, okay? Honestly!"
"BULLSHIT." They moved, together, a little further down the hallway.
"HONESTLY."
"Where's your fucking PROOF."
"If you could read my reports you'd know that I made a fresh attempt with Mangetsu's cells in between each of the ones that stuck, okay?" she said, sourly.
"Don't fuck with me, don't insult me, don't—fuck you." He pointed a finger, continuing before she could. "Then why hasn't it worked, huh? If you've tried so fucking much."
"Because it's HARD, Suigetsu, okay? It's HARD." And suddenly she was standing up straighter, her eyes locked with his. "Your family's cells are ridiculously unstable and I haven't been able to do a damn thing to get a viable embryo going. I've tried EVERYTHING. NOTHING works!"
"Then try HARDER!"
"YOU THINK THIS IS EASY?"
The volume of her voice caused him to balk a little, and she took the opening mercilessly.
"Don't you fucking DARE devalue my work, okay? I have worked my ASS off for your sake, and I deserve MORE fucking RESPECT, OKAY!"
"Well what should I know, if I'm such an illiterate, huh?" Suigetsu replied, in a sneer.
"You don't have to be literate to show respect," she shot back. "I work hard, okay? And you're lucky I'm even trying to do this for you."
"Then what's keeping you from just dropping everything and trying to make it work, hmm? Like your beloved little Uchiha?"
"I came up with that breakthrough while working on your clone, you know," she said, through pressed teeth. "And I only continued because that's the fucking reason I started this project in the first place. I had to, okay?"
"No, you didn't."
She went for the shoulder, and had his back frozen into a painful crescent arch. It was worse than in his memories.
"Don't. You. Dare. Do you want me to give up on it, because of you?"
His fingers curled, all brittle joints. "NO…!" he groaned. "No, no, no, STOP."
She pinched harder. "Why do you want this so badly, anyways? I told you before, and I'll tell you again and again that you won't really be getting your brother back, okay? Just a genetic copy."
"I DON'T CARE, I JUST WANT HIM BACK…!" Suigetsu said, from the back of his throat.
Karin shoved. "Why?"
"BECAUSE WE WERE THE ONLY ONES LEFT!"
Her grip lessened a feather's amount. "What do you mean…?"
"Back… when we were kids… they killed everyone… and we were the only ones left… with him back, I at least have… a clan…!"
She let go of him. Suigetsu lunged forward, to try and get some sort of retaliation, but he was too exhausted and disoriented, and ended up falling to the floor, barely able to brace for impact with his arms.
But Karin, to his surprise, joined him there, crouching to his level. "Having a clan is that important to you…?" Her voice was curiously soft.
"When there's only two of you left, you kinda… have to take what you can get," Suigetsu replied, with a crackling bitterness. "I don't want the Hozuki clan to fucking… die out with me."
Karin didn't say anything as he regained his bearings a little, though she spoke right as his anger was beginning to gather again as well.
"Why didn't you just… settle down with someone and have a kid, if you're concerned about… your clan dying out? That's what everyone else seems to do, okay…"
The strange shame that began to condensate within him made his words come slowly. He sat against the wall, limbs uselessly splayed out.
(She didn't even mention the now-compulsory repopulation program running in Mist. Even the men that entered into those programs rarely returned intact, and Suigetsu had left the country for a reason. And she figured, rightly, that that was one of those reasons, because so many other people had left because of it.)
(Her clientele had increased severely in recent years.)
"…it wasn't like I couldn't settle down with someone, even if you'd fuckin' let me," he replied.
Which was partially a lie. Though Suigetsu couldn't exactly say he was a man whose sexual experiences had ever been terribly meaningful, and his relationships even less so.
"I'm just not sure if… if I had kids that they'd turn out right, okay?" he continued. "Like they'd be able to… turn to water, like I do. Be real Hozukis. That's all. If I had Mangetsu back… well, I'd have a sure thing…"
The shame collected in his face and made it feel hot.
Karin was now sitting across from him in the hallway, a thoughtful look on his face. "Why didn't you tell me this?"
"Well first off, you never even asked," he replied. "Secondly, I didn't figure it was… worth talking about."
"I think it's worth talking about, okay," she said.
…when did she suddenly get so nice?
Whatever kindness left her voice shortly afterward, however, replaced with her usual, no-nonsense tone.
"Listen, here's something I can do for you. Let me draw some of your blood, I'll do gene analysis on it, see if your clan's traits would be passed onto a biological child of yours. Because that's a hell of a lot easier for the both of us than making a clone of your brother, okay?"
"What, you can do that?"
She sighed. "Of course I can do that. Ugh, seriously, why didn't you tell me this sooner…?" She stood up, and quickly. "Come on, we're going to my lab, let's get this over with, okay?"
Suigetsu had previously been breathing quickly on account of his lost temper, the expulsion of months, years of frustration.
But now his breath was quickened from excitement, though he wasn't quite sure if he had any reason to really be excited.
Karin was very swift in taking his blood, a few vials worth. "Give me a week, and I'll have your results, okay?" she said.
"Just a week?"
"Just a week. I promise."
He sighed, shaking his head, almost in disbelief. "And what if this doesn't work out, huh?"
"Then I promise, if cloning your brother is the only way to keep your clan alive, then I'll throw everything into it, okay?" she said. "I made my Uchiha, and I don't need any more. Suigetsu, I'm honestly sorry it's taken me so long. You've got every right to be angry."
If his temper had already cooled by then it was frozen at that. "…you don't need to apologize, all right? I don't… think I have any right to criticize how hard you work or whatever, since I'm pretty clueless in that department."
Her mouth had slightly opened, at that. "Well I won't apologize if you won't," she said, managing to twist her lips into a smile. "One week. We'll decide what to do after that, okay?"
"Sounds… fine," he said. "I'll be back."
He ran into Ooda in the hallway, returning from the part time job he'd managed to acquire in the wake of Yuki's birth, but Suigetsu couldn't manage anything but a stammered "Uh, hi there," before leaving.
Words failed him, otherwise.