hello again! i wrote a bit more!

thank you to everyone who read and followed while i was away! it's so crazy that there are people here reading and i'm super honored that yall are.

i am still learning formatting unfortunately, so sorry for any differences in between chapters

also! unrelated! but if you have a ps4 or switch and want something to play i highly suggest 13 sentinels: aegis rim. i personally have never been a huge fan of mecha or sci fi anything but the story and characters of this game are amazing enough that i really enjoyed it. technically it came out in 2020 but they recently made a switch version a while ago. i guess i'm a little late on the train but i regret nothing!

hope you enjoy! and enjoy the end of summer :)

Chapter 3 - The Usual Way Home

It took more than a year, after I first heard mention of ninja, for me to make a step towards my objective. It happened midday, out at the park my mother frequently brought me to, while the lazy breeze and soothing noise lulled me to sleep.

A shrill voice above me rang out. "Get out of my spot, weird kid!"

I slowly looked up at the boy who had spoken, blinking. He crossed his arms and frowned down at me.

I decided I recognized him. I ran into him most weeks at this playground. He was scruffy-looking, his wild dark hair hair held back by a sweatband. He could have been eight or nine years old, maybe.

He usually monopolized the calmest part of the park—the shady tree with the low boughs, perfect for climbing. I heard him boasting from the top of the tree every now and then. But today, I had gotten to the tree before him. There was a slight wind so the air under the tree was cool and refreshing. If I became too cold, I knew I could summon a slight amount of that "chakra" into my hands to warm up. I could almost forget that the village was at war, on a day like this.

Now that the kid had showed up with his friends, it was loud again. I glanced back at the other section of the park.

"See!" He spoke up again, gesturing wildly to the two that had followed him over. "She doesn't say anything, see? It's so weird!"

One of his friends shook his head, then spoke in a much calmer tone. "Just yell at her, she'll run away crying and we can get the tree back."

I had forgotten he was talking to me. Surely, they had better things to do than yell at toddlers.

I sat up, back against the tree.

"I'm not weird," I said, picking through the words slowly to make sure they were correct. "You're weird."

The boy stared at me for a second, brows drawn together and mouth open slightly.

Then, with a huff, he turned his nose up and proceeded to jump over me, straight up into the tree, some five metres. "Well guess what, weird kid, it's my tree now!"

My attention was drawn up to him and I took a second to piece together how his jump was possible. It shouldn't have been, so I turned my head back down to his two friends. They snickered to themselves for some reason or another. I waved a small hand to gather their attention. This was my chance to learn more about the supernatural things that ninja could do.

"Ninja?" I asked them.

"Hell yeah!" the boy shouted, still up in the tree. Was that a curse word, maybe? I wondered, based on the context. His friends puffed up too, sharing his zeal. He had apparently moved on quickly from my insult. "We're all in the Academy!"

I had heard about the Academy a few times since I discovered chakra in the spring. Some of the other kids who frequented the park chatted about going there and learning to be a ninja. My current objective. These might be students, too, then, already in training to be ninja. The jump he had made was definitely using chakra. I considered the difficulty that heating up my hands had given me, compared to his easy leap. He must have been practicing that for years.

"Tenma, Hagiri and I are graduating in two years!" one of the friends piped up. "Isn't that cool or what?"

I hoped that they would keep talking about the Academy, so I would better know what to expect out of it. "Yeah! Cool!" I said, attempting to sound loud and excited. My voice was too quiet to be particularly convincing, but it appeared to encourage the group anyway. Theatrically, the two friends jumped up to join the first in the tree. I decided clapping was the expected response. One of the trio bowed.

"I'm gonna fight to defend Konoha!" the headband kid yelled. "The enemy nin don't stand a chance once I hit the battlefield!"

"Yeah, right." His friend punched his shoulder somewhat hard. "I bet you'd get scared and run away. Remember last week?"

"Would not! You take that back!" I watched as he responded by tackling his friend and knocking them both out of the tree. Neither of them seemed injured when they hit the ground, though. They scuffled for a little while, the third kid just laughing at them and not helping either. I guessed that they had forgotten about me being a weird, tree-stealing kid. I walked closer to him and tried to catch his attention. "Academy?" I asked.

He puffed up his chest slightly. "Yeah," he said, "I've been training since I was four, 'cause my parents were ninja too! They were like, 'You could be a great ninja if you want, Katsura.' So I asked them if I could go to the Academy and I'm a third year now!"

I nodded, sorting out the new information, and turned my eyes back to the fight.

Their fighting wasn't advanced, but I watched anyway, seeing the beginnings of what could be actual martial arts. At least, they were a step above the other scrabbling playground brawls I had seen.

My attention drifted momentarily as I spotted a vaguely familiar face out of the corner of my eye. It was another dark-haired kid, but this one was my age, staring at the other boys with a frown. The recognition came slowly. I remembered him and his stern father from last spring, and the feeling of shadowing them back to my home. I didn't spot his father anywhere on the outskirts of the park, though, where the other parents were gathered, chatting. He wasn't alone on a separate side like my mother was, either. The kid—Jun, I thought—looked different somehow, without his father standing next to him. I didn't have the words to place why exactly.

I didn't immediately call out to him, but the kid standing next to me, Katsura, did, and pulled him over closer to the fight, gesturing at his friends.

"See this? I bet you wanna be a ninja too, right?"

Jun glanced at me, then faced the fight with a little curl to his lip. He didn't appear particularly amazed, although I wasn't sure.

"What, you don't?" Katsura's eyes caught on the white and red design on the back of Jun's shirt. His smile faded.

Before he could say anything, a stay elbow caught him in the gut. The brawl had meandered back over in their direction. Katsura yelled "Hey!," and threw himself back at them, whatever had caught his attention forgotten.

I turned my head back to Jun, but he turned around to walk out of the park already. The design on his shirt stared back at me as he faded into the comings-and-goings of the street next to us. I vaguely recognized it, then, from the entrance to the neighborhood shrine we avoided.

Mother approached me, then. "Nagisa, were they bothering you?" she asked, throwing a look at the still-scuffling boys.

I shook my head. "They ninja," I said, attempting to portray earnesty. Was it a bend in the eyebrows, a tightness in the forehead?

"You truly are interested in this, are you not?" she sighed.

I noticed more fine lines on her own forehead than I remembered there being. It might have been the light. She wore a loose light blue dress. That morning, she had remarked it was perfect for early summer, adjusting its flowing fabric in the mirror. I watched her from my seat by the door. Satisfied with her appearance, she had helped me into my shoes and held my hand as we walked outside.

"Ninja!" I repeated. "Yeah, cool!" A little wave of the arms, a grin that felt unnatural. Hopefully, this might convince her to send me to the Academy, or plant the idea.

She was more cautious now. It had been a long time, but I still hadn't been forgiven for getting myself lost, that day when the policeman and Jun found me. I most likely had seemed like a well-behaved child before then—the kind of child that would never run off without a word. And then I had, for some reason. So it must have seemed strange to her, but even I couldn't fathom why that caution had lingered more than a year on.

Yes, it was there again—the almost unnoticeable tension around her eyes. Captivating, in a way, warping the fine lines on her face into something else.

She kept talking about ninja, describing the Academy to me. She seemed unusually talkative. It could have been that she was making up for silence of the other parents that shunned her. I, personally, was accustomed to them now. The stares, sometimes that harsh yelling, all of it. It was part of life. I didn't think about it. I let my mother's voice wash over me instead, as she answered my question.

"Ninja", she continued, and I couldn't tell what her tone of voice was, but her orange eyes captured the light and my full attention. "They can use chakra, although using chakra does not make you a ninja. Chakra is a tool for us craftsmen, too." It made sense. Ninja protected and administrated the village. Ninja took money in exchange for missions. Everything I learned only cemented my decision to become one. If they controlled the government, then as a ninja, I would have more extensive access to important information.

I filed the facts away in my mind, and considered my next objectives. It was a familiar cycle that brought to mind days tapping away at a keyboard. Spreadsheets and numbers. Background research, experimental design, data collection, review, publication. Pages and pages of tedious math.

I didn't remember the walk home from the park afterwards, too engulfed in my own thoughts. My small hand holding on to Mother's felt odd, as if it was someone else's.

.

.

.

After a while, I noticed that Mother and Father had befriended that policeman and Jun. The two of them became semi-regular visitors to my family's store on odd weekends. It was easy to tell whenever they arrived—Uchiha Chikao was a man of habit, knocking loudly in the same two-tap pattern each time, Jun in tow, hiding in his shadow as my parents slid the door open. They would then either chat in the back over tea, or Father would help Chikao with his latest weapons order. Mother had a sharp sense of humor that meshed with Chikao's as they traded gossip, and Father had the upbeat energy to lighten both of their more serious demeanors.

So, Jun and I were often left in the back together.

Jun liked starting arguments with me. Still, I had no real reason to argue back, so he would resort to pacing around the room touching everything in sight, stalking around like a zoo animal behind glass. We did our own things. He volunteered information about himself occasionally, almost as if it was startled out of him in his limited language. I did answer offhand if he happened to ask me things and I knew the words. His birthday was the 30th of April. Neither of us had any siblings. I was going to the academy in a few years. He was too. He liked dogs.

Today, I stared at the door to the shop for a while, counting the scratches that stretched across it, and trying to overhear anything I could from the hushed voices on the other side. Especially Chikao, who I had decided was a career ninja based on his frequent weapons purchases. Behind me, I heard a series of thumps. Jun likely had clambered up on top of a table to stare out of the window.

I wandered slightly closer to the door. Chikao's voice was fainter than my parents', so he must have been facing the front of the store. He was perhaps leaning on the counter, arms crossed in his usual manner.

"You are... well respected in this area, I suppose. Even with your origins. From my experience, it won't be long until you receive regular merchant clearance."

"You think so? It's been ages, you know. Years, actually. So we still can't expand, or have a certain number of hires, join the guild, you know. I talked to Tanaka-san, that old weasel, and he seemed to like me enough, but we've all heard how much he likes holding things over people, right? Hangs on to that tiny bit of power he has however he can. So I doubt he'd approve us unless we suck up to him for a few months. Which. I'd really prefer not to."

A sigh. "I'll see who I can talk to."

"You know some people?"

"My wife does. I'm not much into the civilian side of things, but she and my father-in-law formerly worked in that sector."

"Thanks, man. I do get that nothing happens overnight, but still. It'd be a huge help."

"Yes, truly," Mother added.

"Consider it a thanks for your quality craftsmanship." Chikao responded. Then, in a tighter voice, "And... don't mention it. Really."

Father laughed. "Don't worry, I won't tell anyone you're secretly not an ass."

"You- that's not-"

"Yeah, yeah, I get it."

"Ugh."

The bright summer sun gradually climbed down to the horizon, shifting the colors in the room around me to softer tones and cooling the air. Chikao eventually said his goodbyes, picked up a frowning Jun from the table, and headed back to his home. After, Mother closed the store and came to check on me. She took her hairpin out, her hair falling to her shoulders, and sat down next to me.

"Nagisa, you have been working on your chakra, right?"

I nodded and showed her my heated hands. She took one in her own. unflinching at the temperature, and hummed as she inspected it.

"Well done," she said. "I have something for you."

From her side, she pulled out something dark and reflective. I had learned the word for them just a few weeks ago. Kunai—a commonly used weapon. Vaguely, I considered if she was really going to trust a child with a dangerous object.

"I want you to remember how it feels, if you want to be a ninja. Your father and I may make them, but ninjas are the only ones who use them..." She breathed in slowly. "They like ninjas a lot, here in Konoha." Another pause, this one longer. "But either way, do not forget our family business, do you understand?"

Mother handed me the kunai. It was sharp, heavy. Nothing like the kitchen knives from a life ago.

A past life, I had decided to call it.

A dream. My imagination.

A woman with shoulder-length brown curls and pale skin, holding a hand out to me. Flowers.

My name was Kan Nagisa, but that night, my nightmares whispered otherwise.

.

.

.

That night, the moon was bright in the deep indigo-grey sky. I was dreaming again.

I hadn't been fully aware in a dream for a long time. The nightmares that followed me in this life had always faded quickly away in the mornings.

An old memory washed over me briefly, then—learning to lucid dream in another lifetime. Counting my fingers and looking at wall clocks.

I stood up and examining the surroundings. I felt like there were strings all around me, some unsteady sort of thread wrapped up and tangled in the air.

It was cold. I was sitting on a hill full of pale wildflowers. They had closed their blooms, maybe because it was night. I scanned the horizon, but couldn't see anything past low-hanging fog banks. The air smelled metallic and I didn't seem to have enough layers on.

Nothing was changing. I sat down, deciding to wait out the dream, and stretched my back while gazing forward.

There was no wind, and the quiet was deep.

"You're safe here."

I jolted—the voice had been right in my ear. When I turned, there was nobody.

My heart rate calmed when I failed to see anything. The voice had been unexpected, but dreams were strange like that.

The next sound I heard was one I recognized. My alarm clock—the dream would be ending.

The voice followed me into the white space of awakening, intimate like a thin hand on my shoulder.

"Astrid, don't worry—I'll find you."