Chapter 3: Toddler Troubles

...

Mikoto loved dressing me up. While Sasuke got away with the standard Uchiha shorts and wide-collared shirts, Mikoto delighted in purchasing cute clothes for me to wear. I might not have minded as much if shinobi clothing wasn't notoriously ugly.

Ninja clothing was strange because it came with a lot of requirements. In general, it had to be durable enough to withstand constant combat and training. It had to be light enough that a shinobi wouldn't overheat due to extended strenuous exercise. It couldn't include any bulky features that could be grabbed during grappling. It couldn't restrict movement. And on top of it all, a shinobi's best concealment technique was to look like a civilian, so it couldn't look ostensibly like ninja clothing while still meeting all of the ninja criteria.

Because of this, most clothing in Konoha was tailor made. There weren't any big box stores selling mass-produced items, so clothing tended to be whatever the tailor thought was fashionable at the time. It was also dreadfully expensive since pretty much everything was a custom order, and people tended to buy in bulk since it was easier to have ten identical outfits than to go shopping every three weeks after getting your shorts burned off in training.

One of my distant relatives, an older woman named Fumiko, was the clan seamstress. She'd been a kunoichi and a police officer once, but she'd lost her leg during the third shinobi war which ended both of those careers rather abruptly. Among ninja, she was considered lucky because she had a clan to support her. There weren't really many social systems set in place in Konoha. There was no welfare, disability, or social security. Clanless ninja that were unable to continue working often faced serious hardship. The village tried to find them work, but it wasn't always possible.

Despite this being her third-choice career, Fumiko took to fashion design with a passion. She had an entire wall plastered with sketches and designs for outfits, which made me a little sad because a solid 90% of her shop consisted of the standard Uchiha wide-necked shirts. She was thrilled by Mikoto's requests just for the chance to do something a little different. She even made a few suggestions on popular styles, most of which I found a little strange.

Ninja fashion tended toward quirks of ninja culture like having mesh undershirts that offered a bit of extra protection without the disadvantage of bulky layers. Another example of that was the tendency to wear bandages as a fashion statement. It was often a necessity borne from constant minor injuries during missions and training, as taijutsu and close-range specialists wore them more often than mid or long ranged fighters.

I'd felt a stab of fear when we received our new clothes, and Itachi had come downstairs with both his arms wrapped in bandages from hand to elbow. But when he saw my expression he only laughed softly, unraveling the bandages to reveal his pale, unmarred skin.

"I just need some extra padding now that I've started camping on certain missions," he explained. "So don't worry about me, okay?"

I nodded, a little abashed that I'd jumped to such a silly conclusion. Itachi's team had been upgraded to regular C-rank missions, and he was gone for days at a time doing basic bodyguard and escort missions for low-risk clients. But it wasn't like he would face anything that could actually hurt him.

He was Itachi.

"Oh, is that a new outfit, Kiyo-hime?"

I blinked and looked up to see a smiling boy standing in the doorway. I squinted at him, but I couldn't feel his presence at all.

"You're sneaking!" I accused, pointing at him.

Shisui gave me a Cheshire grin and didn't deny it. At some point he'd noticed that I was a sensor and he'd made it his mission to sneak up on me whenever he dropped by. It was just one of the many ways he teased me, like how he always called me 'Kiyo-hime' which translated to 'Princess Kiyo' because I "acted like a cute little princess". I wasn't sure whether or not to be offended by that, but his easy smile made it difficult to stay mad at him for long.

"And yes, Kaa-chan got us all new clothes," I added.

I did a little twirl to show off my new outfit, a long pale blue karate top with an embroidered dark blue obi belt and white leggings. He responded with appropriate sounds of admiration.

"Very pretty," he said before turning his attention to Itachi. "Ready?"

Itachi nodded, and Sasuke immediately perked up.

"Hey, hey, I want to train too!" he said, nearly tripping in his hurry to put on his shoes.

"You're too young for this training," said Itachi, smiling and poking Sasuke's forehead. "Sorry, Sasuke. Next time."

Sasuke puffed out his cheeks, a sure sign of an incoming tantrum.

"Aw, c'mon, Itachi," said Shisui with a wink. He crouched down to Sasuke's level. "Man, older brothers are the worst, aren't they, Sasuke?" Sasuke looked at him suspiciously, half in agreement and half not wanting to insult Itachi. "But you know why he doesn't want you to come along, right? It's because after I teach him some super-cool ninja stuff, he wants to come home and teach you!"

Sasuke's face lit up and he turned to Itachi.

"Really, you're gonna teach us?" he demanded.

Shisui really was a smooth operator despite not having any siblings of his own to practice on. Itachi looked uncertain.

"Well…" Itachi said. Shisui was snickering behind Sasuke's back. "Sure. I'll take you camping when I get back."

Itachi gave a meaningful look to Shisui which promised retribution, and the two of them vanished in a burst of body flicker.

When Itachi returned a week later, he actually decided to make good on that promise. Sasuke was practically vibrating at the thought of going out into the wilds for survival training, but I was less enthused. My ideal camping trip involved a hotel with a nice view, but shinobi were rarely afforded that level of comfort and luxury. At least the weather was on our side with the sun coming out warm and bright on the morning when we left. Itachi led us through the clan grounds and across the many training fields. The land became wilder as we went until we found ourselves in a deep forest.

As we walked, Itachi pointed out the different types of trees and plants, naming them and listing how they could be used for various things. When I had to stop and rest, he would break off twigs to show us the shape of the leaves and various berries. Sasuke bounced around trees and bushes excitedly while I held Itachi's hand and scanned the ground carefully for things like snakes and really big bugs. I wasn't expecting anything as dangerous as the Forest of Death, but wildlife in this world tended to be larger and more dangerous than I was accustomed to.

We eventually arrived at a small clearing on an incline above a stream. Itachi demonstrated how to pitch a tent, and we practiced starting fires. He showed us the different ways of stacking firewood to make the fire hotter or smokeless or long-lasting and drilled us on basic safety before going down to the stream to teach us how to fish.

He also taught us about making snares for small prey and how to set them in places where they were likely to be sprung. He even quizzed us on edible mushrooms and berries, and we spent most of the afternoon amassing a small feast for dinner. Our snares turned up nothing by nightfall, but Itachi didn't seem overly bothered. We had more than enough fish and foraged plants for dinner.

"Is this how you get food on missions?" I asked as Itachi checked the fish on the fire. I was mentally reviewing the large amount of information he'd managed to cram into one day. It was a good thing children absorbed information like little sponges, because I never would have been able to remember it all otherwise.

"Not often," he admitted. "Most C-rank missions are short enough that we eat ration bars and regular meals instead. Wealthy clients sometimes provide food too. But a good ninja can survive in any location."

"Did Shisui-nii-san teach you?" I asked. Itachi hadn't attended the Academy for very long, so obviously he must have learned it somewhere. Fugaku and Mikoto seemed too busy for regular camping trips, and while Shisui had said that he was training Itachi, I suspected that their training was a bit more advanced than basic camping. If they were going camping, it would probably involve giant man-eating creatures and liberal use of deadly weapons. "Will he come camping with us sometime?"

"He's very busy," said Itachi. "But maybe one day."

"You're busy too," Sasuke groused. "You're always away on missions. You should come home more. You must like your teammates better than us."

"Never," said Itachi. "They're…" He stopped. "I'd much rather be with you and Kiyo-chan."

This was enough to appease Sasuke, but I squinted at Itachi's hesitation.

"Don't you like them?" I asked. Itachi had always been kind and affectionate towards me and Sasuke, but maybe he didn't get along with his team as easily.

"They're fine," he said in a perfectly neutral tone.

"Yeah, and when we grow up to be ninja, the three of us can be on a team together!" said Sasuke eagerly.

It didn't really work like that. It was highly unusual for siblings to be on the same team. Missions were inherently risky, and if something went wrong, the village leaders didn't want to wipe out multiple members of a family at once.

And, well, for us there was another reason it would never be possible.

"Maybe," said Itachi, handing over a bowl of fish and berries. "Eat up."

After dinner, we huddled together by the fire. It was a warm night, so it wasn't strictly required, but I was just as happy for the extra light and the dubious protection it provided. And if I crawled into Itachi's bedroll after hearing something moving in the trees, he didn't comment, only wrapping an arm around me until I drifted off to sleep.

The next morning we checked the snares again and found a pair of wild rabbits. Itachi showed us how to skin and cook them, which I tried to watch without turning green. Itachi gave the second one to Sasuke to practice on and said that maybe I could try next time. Sasuke cheerfully offered to let me share in his grisly work, but I shook my head vehemently and said that I could wait until next time.

The rabbits tasted delicious.

After lunch, we headed home in high spirits, only stopping occasionally to allow me to catch my breath. But as we passed through the main market on the way to the clan grounds, a shop keeper glanced down at me with a sour expression.

"Uchiha brats," he grumbled, his eyes going from me to Sasuke to Itachi. I wondered if we looked like a gang of hoodlums, which was rather impressive considering our combined ages couldn't purchase a cigarette. A nearby woman shushed him.

"They're only children," she said. "They had nothing to do with—"

"Still Uchiha," grunted the man, his eyes narrowed in disgust. A pair of men beside him looked up, their expressions equally unfriendly. "They're all the same. Traitors. Cowards who hid from the Kyuubi."

"What?" I asked, but Itachi took my hand and pulled me away.

"Let's go, Kiyo-chan," he said quietly. He'd gone stiff and wary. Sasuke, who hadn't heard the quiet exchange, looked back at us in puzzlement. "Don't listen. How about a race home?"

Sasuke's face lit up at the challenge, which was answer enough.

Itachi swung me up on his back and 'raced' Sasuke, keeping just ahead of his younger brother. He remained tense until we passed through the gate into the clan grounds and didn't stop until we were home.

He sent Sasuke and me to get cleaned up and unpacked while he went to talk to Mikoto. I didn't hear much more after that, but Mikoto warned us not to go wandering through the village by ourselves. This seemed like a common-sense thing to tell a pair of three year olds, but I wondered if the man's comment had anything to do with it, if anti-Uchiha sentiments were becoming more common, and therefore more dangerous.

Something else to worry about.

On days when the weather turned foul and Mikoto kept us inside, I liked to help her cook traditional Japanese dishes. There was something pleasantly serene about standing on a stool in a warm kitchen with the rain falling outside as I made onigiri under Mikoto's watchful eye.

In those moments, I felt truly at peace, like our fate was some distant nightmare rather than an inevitable reality.

This was also about the time Mikoto sat us down to learn chakra aspect of hand signs. We'd already learned how to make the physical shapes with our fingers through the games she'd taught us as babies, but there was more to it than that. Hand signs were the basis for just about all ninjutsu and genjutsu. They involved building up chakra in our centers and bringing it to our hands, specifically our palms and fingers, and then weaving the chakra together in a specific way.

Technically hand signs were not required for chakra techniques, but weaving chakra without them was orders of magnitude more difficult, and the hand signs themselves acted a bit like mnemonic devices, decreasing the casting time for a jutsu from minutes to seconds. Of course, that was for skilled practitioners.

Sasuke and I fumbled our way through the most basic hand signs with difficulty, and the more complicated ones were next to impossible. It was staggering to realize that jounin were able to run through a dozen hand seals and the associated chakra manipulation in seconds when it took me a minute to do just one properly.

But it all came down to practice.

Always practice.

Well, there were worse ways to spend a rainy afternoon.

The downside of these peaceful days were the equally terrifying stormy nights.

I wasn't afraid of thunder. I'd never been afraid of thunder. I had no reason to be afraid of thunder. It was an electrical discharge in the sky. It wasn't dangerous. I was perfectly safe within the house.

So why did every single rumble send a needle of terror through my heart?

I lay awake, wide-eyed and fearful, dreading the next boom. Sasuke slept beside me, completely oblivious to the noise. I should be asleep too. There was no reason to—

At another thunderous crash I let out a cry of fear. I clasped my hands over my mouth, worried that I'd woken Sasuke, but he was still deeply asleep. I stayed there, frozen and trembling for a long minute until the door slid open and Itachi slipped inside. He met my terrified gaze and gave me a reassuring smile.

"Don't be afraid, Kiyo-chan," he whispered. "It's just thunder. Your big brother's here to protect you."

This was so embarrassing. And what was he supposed to do against noise? There was nothing—

Another deafening boom made me curl into a ball and whimper.

Itachi crawled into my bed and held me in his arms, rubbing my back soothingly. I buried my face into his night shirt. There was nothing he could do, but still…his quiet reassurance made things a little bit easier. I still flinched with each rumble, but I didn't call out again. And when the storm began to wane in the early hours of the morning, I even fell into a light doze with Itachi still holding me close.

We trained and played and played and trained. Sometimes it was difficult to tell where one ended and the other began. Itachi was gone more often than not, and whenever Sasuke demanded more ninja training, nine times out of ten, Itachi responded with a forehead poke and an apologetic promise of some nebulous 'next time'. Itachi tried to make time for us, he really did. But he had his own training to do on top of his missions, one of which he brought up at dinner one night.

"Guarding the Fire Daimyo?" Fugaku asked with a hint of surprise.

"It's a symbolic position," said Itachi. "Because my genin team performed the best this year."

"Obviously, the Twelve Guardian Ninja are his actual guards," said Fugaku. "But still, it is quite an honor. As expected of my son. Continue to represent the Uchiha clan to the best of your abilities. I'm sure that your team's track record was largely due to your contributions."

"Ah," said Itachi, not quite agreeing but not denying it either.

He picked at his food and left it at that.

Four days later, Itachi returned home with the Sharingan. He was only 8. Fugaku praised Itachi for his progress at such a young age, and Itachi smiled, thanking his father for the approval. When Fugaku turned away, Itachi escaped and sat down on the veranda to stare blankly at the sky. I followed, not knowing what to say to him, how anything I could offer would make things better, but I had to try. I tucked my legs beneath me, and wiggled under his arm until he was half-hugging me.

"Onii-chan, what's wrong?" I asked. Sasuke crawled into Itachi's lap, smiling and happy to have his big brother home again.

"It's nothing," said Itachi, though his eyes were oddly bright. He smiled and patted my hair. I met his gaze levelly.

"Please tell me," I said, and Itachi's breath caught in his throat, the brightness in his eyes beading over his lashes. He let out a small sound, like a wounded animal followed by a short gasp as he tried to keep from crying.

It wasn't working.

"Please," I said, holding him tighter.

"I…I lost my…teammate today," he whispered, words catching as he failed to hold it together. I was reminded sharply that despite his natural stoicism, he was still very much a child.

I held him tighter.

"I'm sorry," I said. I buried my face into his chest. He didn't have the normal soft plumpness of a civilian child. He was already lean with hard muscle from intense physical conditioning and had a collection of small scars from training mishaps and people trying to kill him. It was difficult sometimes to see him as a child. Vulnerability was death to a shinobi. "If you hadn't come home, I'd be really sad too."

"He was…he gave his life to protect me," he gasped. "…and I couldn't…"

Itachi held Sasuke and me, and he wept for the friend he had lost, for the child that was dead before his eyes. He might not have gotten along very well with his teammates, but clearly this boy had meant something to him in the end.

"I wasn't…strong enough," he said, still attempting to mute his sobs, fearful perhaps of what would happen if Mikoto or Fugaku heard. His grip tensed around us, becoming almost painfully tight. Sasuke was staring up at Itachi in alarm, but I only patted Sasuke's hair absently to reassure him. "I thought I was strong, but I couldn't…I couldn't do anything."

"You survived," I said. "I'm glad you came home. If I was with you, and I'd died, I'd still be glad that you were safe…. And I think he'd be glad you made it home too."

But Itachi shook his head.

"I couldn't…save him," he said, but his sobs had quieted further. His eyes were Sharingan red with a set of twin tomoe. "These eyes...One day you'll have them too."

Not me, no. But Sasuke…

"Nii-san…" whispered Sasuke, his eyes also filled with tears, though I couldn't tell if they were sympathy tears or if he was frightened by Itachi's sudden show of emotion.

"Onii-chan will get stronger," I said. Because he would. Itachi would grow strong enough that no one would ever touch him. He would use that strength to keep Sasuke safe. "Then you can save everyone."

That was always the solution in this world: get stronger than the people who were trying to hurt you, an eternal arms race of power.

"Yeah," he said, sniffing quietly and wiping his eyes. The tears were gone now, the wet tracks down his cheeks and his reddened eyes the only evidence that they'd been there at all. "If I'm strong, it will never happen again."

That was a fool's promise. But he said it with such certainty that I could almost have believed him. I held him until Shisui arrived to take Itachi away for training. Shisui gave us all a friendly wave, but his eyes lingered on Itachi, likely taking note of the redness that couldn't be dispelled so easily.

He made no comment.