Chapter 13: Walking into fire… slowly

"Four hours and fifty minutes…" I mumbled in English. "Subject is dead. The suspected cause; lack of oxygen. The experiment shows a difference of ten minutes is enough for the victim to suffocate. Need to prolong time victim can be exposed in order to make this useful." I finished writing the note and closed the journal with a click while staring at the limp rodent in front of me.

Its black pearl-eyes stared back at me, wide and hollow.

They did not make me feel in any particular way. The guilt had long since passed, and now I only felt a slight sense of disappointment at the results my experiment yielded, and a bit more annoyance at the prospect of having to find new specimens. It was after all, only an animal, and not one I had learned to project a conscience and personality into by way of upbringing. It that had been a cat in front of me, I would be bawling my eyes out now.

I can only wonder if I will one day look down on a human corpse and only feel a slight academic curiosity.

The thought bring both dread and hope to me. If I cannot kill, I will never survive, and that dilemma promises a lot of future anguish. I could not ignore what being a ninja entailed, but perhaps walking the path of an assassin one step of the time would make it easier in the end.

I sighed and looked down on the pages in my hands.

According to my journal this was specimen number thirty-four which had expired due to faulty Fūinjutsu work. I had gotten the idea from the fake one I had made to pull off the joke on Kakashi. Not that he really had paid it any attention, and would mostly have entirely ignored it if I had not muttered out loud what I was writing. This one would likely get same lacking response, but I had decided anyway to use English in my writings.

It would take them a bit of time to break the 'code' they would see the language as, if they ever tried.

I flipped through the pages and stopped at 'chakra control', which numbered many hours failed work at climbing vertical surfaces and some success in the last few tries. The exact way to manipulate the chakra in my feet was now burned into memory and I had concluded nothing more could be learned after hanging from the ceiling for a full night like some overgrown bat. Everything indicated I was ready for the next step; water walking.

The lake before me was perfect for that purpose.

I pulled my t-shirt down and checked the pile of my belongings lay perfectly before sealing away the dead rodent's body away and putting the storage seal on top of it. Standing only in underpants and t-shirt at the edge of the lake made me thankful for the warm weather which would ensure I dried off quickly when I eventually abandoned the pursuit and went back for dinner.

Closing my eyes, I tried to calm myself and only focus of the warmth of chakra in my feet. I stood still for a moment, before taking a step forward, letting my foot hover just above the water for a moment, while some part of my brain started questioning my actions.

This felt slightly stupid.

I moved my foot back to solid ground and glared down at the wet depths, more irritated with myself than anything. All the excessive required was shaping the chakra the right way to float on the water. It didn't matter what body part was in contact with the water, and thus a hand should do the same as a foot, sparing me from even getting wet.

With an annoyed growl I sat down and slammed my hand at the water surface, wondering if my time in this universe was lowering my intelligence.

"Probably why the living storage seal is not further along." I grumbled, slamming my hand at the surface again with a slight difference in the formed chakra pathways, since it had passed through last time. "Why the dorm rips instead of protects, and why I can't make a damn camouflage."

I felt like screaming, but resorted to snarling at my own red-headed reflection.

Time was running out.

The massacre was coming and I had still not decided on anything specific. Half-formed plans lingered at the back of my mind, scribbled in my journal and showed on several of the papers spread across my apartment. At my next birthday I would turn the physical age of seven and that meant I had to decide, or the matter would be taken completely out of my hands.

Was it worth changing everything just to save some users of the Sharingan?

Human lives, I reminded myself. I would be saving human lives. Whether more would live or die if I acted was unknown. Utilitarianism stated "it is the greatest happiness of the greatest number that is the measure of right and wrong", but I simply did not know enough to predict the outcome of interfering. Also discussing ethics were dangerous, since there were so many branches, and a justified action could be made wrong if another method of thinking was used.

It was like running in circles, and the last couple of years dissections of the problem had been as productive as a hamster in its wheel.

Worthless, not to mention meaningless.

I needed someone else's input on the dilemma, someone native only to this world and who would not think me crazy or suspicious in asking pointed question and setting up farfetched hypothetical situations. Introspection had proved a lost course, and I could not stay on a sinking ship.

My eyes looked up from my reflection and across the pool of water, and the sight made me almost believe in some omniscient being capable of listening to prayers. Two small figures lay on far to the right on the other side of the lake, watching the skies above with a relaxed attitude I had not been able to assume for the last month. Their colorings and visible clan insignias made something jump in my memories, and I smiled faintly.

Shikamaru Nara, the fate of this universe now depends on you.

That sentence is cringe-worthy in so many ways I already feel doomed.

·

They both looked up when I appeared in front of them

Disturbing their cloud-watching with my problems was one of the milder things I had done, so adding a creep effect to my performance seemed only right. "You're Shikamaru Nara." It was not a question but a simple statement. I would not have approached if I had not been sure. "And you're of the Akimichi clan, Chō…ji Akimichi, right?" My memories of him were dim, but the name seemed to fit the spirals on his cheeks.

Technically he was not suffering from obesity, if I remembered correctly, and this was only a clan technique. But damn, it was sad to think he would have to live his whole life in an entirely different weight-class from his peers and be bullied for it.

Perhaps I should pay their class at the academy a visit.

Beside, we were both spiral people. Have to protect your own and all.

"I have a question for you Nara-kun."

I received a slight narrowing of eyes from the supposed genius. Good reaction. "Who are you?"

"Naruto Uzumaki." I gave a slight inclination as greeting. "One to two years above you at the academy. Nice to meet you."

Shikamaru echoed me, while Chōji sat in complete confusion for a moment before saying the same.

"So my question…" The expressionless gaze he was sending me made my lips quiver in an effort not to grin. He was such a cutie, spiky mess for a hair and everything. It made me want to squeeze his cheeks and never let go. "To understand my dilemma I must first present a hypothetical situation. I know you possess high intelligence so I have no doubt you would comprehend the problem I would be presenting… but whether you care to help me or not is yet unknown."

He shrugged his shoulders. "If it has nothing to do with reality, why use the energy?"

"Oh, I have never said anything about whether is related or unrelated to our current reality and the next foreseeable future." I could not resist grinning, feeling a predator on the hunt. "Since the answer I seek is linked to information, which would require quite the willing suspension of disbelief for anyone to properly set themselves in my stead, I'll instead try to go for the metaphors."

His eyebrows lifted, while Chōji's chips stayed surprisingly untouched.

I coughed before starting. "You find yourself standing before the decision of inaction or action and every nuance in between. You know precisely the outcome by not reacting, and therefore the cost of human lives and happiness, but you also know exactly how to handle future events in a way so lives would be saved later. The decision to act holds by contrast many unknowns. You don't know if more will be saved that way or if all will be lost in the end, because you simply lack the knowledge to plan for anything down that path. Your choice is between possible saving lives now, or doing so in the future. What would you choose?"

"Is this homework?" Chōji asked horrified. "Tell me it's not future homework!"

I grimaced before trying to come with a proper explanation to presenting them such a horrible situation. "Don't worry, it's n…"

"You don't have a forehead protector." Shikamaru mumbled, making me lose focus. We stared silently at each for a moment, before I realized he was not going to say anything else. It made me slightly annoyed because it made it harder to guess if he was suspecting me of using Henge, which I actually was, and didn't trust me, or he had just decided to ignore me.

"Hard situations rarely wait for you to age." I tried.

The boy genius nodded before closing his eye with a look of resignation. "If you know something is going to happen and say nothing, then is it not partly your fault too? It you can't decide then it's better to tell an adult and let them deal with the consequences than ask me. Don't bo…"

"… borther me." I said in unison with him, my smile slowly fading. "Any form of action would be better than being passive." I had already known that, so many praised people of my former world had said similar words, but the acceptance of the words meaning did nothing to remove my fear or insecurities.

I took a deep intake of breath in a futile effort to calm myself. "Thank you, Nara-kun. I know what I must do now."

·

An unknown fire took root in my in the weeks after. Every single limp of my body was tingling with anticipation, making it hard to sit still and even harder to stay unnoticed in class. I was absent-minded and replied in only short sentences, but even our current teacher called on my more time than the last year in a single month.

It was in a way exiting, thrilling even, to plan for an evet which could very likely kill me.

I had the means to do something about the massacre, and made the choice I needed I regard of whose fate to change of whose to stay clear off. It was all in motion, and I only needed to properly set it up and execute the plan in a way which made my response and knowledge believable.

No one had forcefully removed my Henge; I was safely incognito from the villagers as a redhead, while still wandering around occasionally in another Henge looking like me without dye and patches on my cheeks. There had been no bright mind among the villagers who had connected any dots, and I would have to replicate the results with a cast of intelligent ninjas now.

It was a challenge worth every minute spent bowed over heaps of papers and trying to perfect the techniques my plan depended on.

I needed to be invisible, to avoid the power of dōjutsu.

And I was succeeding.

Maniacally laughter seemed very appropriate if not for the fact I was currently in the middle of a class.

·

The first test in the intended environment for the technique was for lack of better words, exhausting. My paranoia was slightly to blame, and it had not gotten better with the knowledge that the sighting of one wrong experiment could incriminate me later on. My coming and goings had been rather irregular for years, which helped me vanish without rousing suspicion coupled with the fact I had been trying and perhaps sometimes been successful at escaping my watchers.

There is no way if I can ever be sure, and since I don't know the mechanics of the crystal ball in the Hokage's offices, there was a chance I could be found even if I dodged every watchful gaze directed my way.

You can never be too paranoid

Executing the technique inside my bathroom after a bath, insuring the probability of someone looking was as low as it could be, was the best I could do. After that I only had to make my way through the open door, an open window and start making my way through the city in miniature form.

I was currently a squirrel, a squishy form with no way of defending myself if attacked. The almost invisible band of paper covered in seals around my neck served as a stabilizer, which would insure my mind was not lost in the process of transforming my own chakra-network to that of a rodent, and I had no idea what would happen if it was destroyed.

Calling this risky and stupid was an understatement.

In other news, I had finally gained some insight into the workings of summoning and how summoned creatures differed from natural. Pakkun would've been proud I was sure, if I had had some way of telling him without exposing myself and my plan.

No matter, if everything went according to plan and I did not die nor lose my mind, I would have the opportunity to tell the pug and Kakashi later, when the first act of this play had finished.

Until then, I saw no other option than stalking Sasuke in order to make sure the massacre didn't happen while I was preoccupied with something else, since I had no idea about the date Itachi would slaughter his clan. It was a waste of time I saw no way of avoiding, but at least it would only be for some hours every day. There was still plenty of time to set everything up, if somebody did not see through my disguise and decided the fake squirrel was better off dead than alive.

I hoped the future broody bastard had a bit of heart to appreciate the trouble I went through to insure he was not the 'last Uchiha'.