6 - Chamomile カモミール
when time rewinds to
fade out the forgotten; life
waits undyingly
"Shisui? Shisui, are you there?" There's a girl, her black hair coiling into strands and twisting around her fingers. She sounds frantic, frenzied, overwrought, her laboured sighs blaring out at him like screams.
He's not himself. His eyes are blurred into inky dots, lines crossing over from memory to memory. Splinters of lost time shape themselves into fragments of pieces he can't recall. Who's calling to him? What was he doing?
The hours before are smudged into echoes of faint recollections, an evening of fresh, dewy skies which he will never remember. Soft, chubby hands clench into fists, his blunted nails desperately trying to stab through skin. The marks fade away into embers of red and white.
The girl blanches, her white face trembling with a foreign emotion - anger, disappointment? "S-shisui-kun! What were you doing!?" He would think otherwise if he didn't hear the choked sob which she tries so hard to stifle. A hiccup, and he's burrowing into her arms like a rabbit, clutching her tight as if he never wants to let go. And he doesn't.
"I-I," but he can't say anything because his heart is pounding wildly and she's holding him close, hugging him, tears streaking freely across her face. With some surprise, he notices that he's crying too. "I d-don't know. Who are you? Please-" Shisui pauses as he realises she's just as much in the dark as he is.
His teeth chatter as a gust of wind sweeps into the room, the sombre lamplights outside flickering on and off. Like beacons, he thinks. Guiding shinobi through paths forged and founded by Uchiha thousands of years ago.
Shisui shakes his head. Now he just sounds like his father in a history lesson.
"You - you don't remember my name? Who I am?" His silence is enough of a response for her, a downcast look flitting away from her face, the brief tinges of shock in her eyes. The bells from the square clang, reminding them of night's shroud of twilight.
Shisui leans back, head banging on the hard oak cabinets fixed to the walls. He whimpers gently, and suddenly all the non-existent pain is rushing at him, consuming him, devouring him in its flames of agony.
Groaning, he begins to flex out his fingers to dissipate the cold, but there's a stabbing sensation shooting through his palm. He howls, her hand clasped in his, but it does nothing to mitigate the torment he feels.
For the next few minutes, Shisui lolls in and out of oblivion, darkness engulfing him each and every time, responding to nature's call.
"Oh - I'd better get a blanket," he registers her slight murmur, and now the bathroom swirls into the comforting confines of his bedroom, warm and quiet and peaceful and-
There's a sweet sound coming from her mouth - a song luring him to sleep. A lullaby. Shisui has no time to protest, only managing to grab a lock of her hair and tug on it before he descends into the depths of tranquility.
He wakes up hours later, at nighttime, in his futon, the girl by his side with a glass of water. After tilting it to his lips, he notices that his hands are bandaged neatly, any traces of wounds forgotten. The blood soaks through, but it barely shows if it's seen at a distance.
She's kneeling down on the zabuton cushion curling a hand through his hair. The smell of biscuits wafts from the open door into the room, and his mouth waters with the promise of food. He hasn't eaten in hours.
"W-where'd you learn to do that?" He struggles to maintain his coherency, stuttering along to craft a single sentence. Maybe she's been doing it for Haru too? After all, who else would bandage up his father's wounds so late in the night, when the Konoha Hospital is jam-packed with patients from all types of foolish accidents and mischief?
She shrugs her head, a little embarrassed. "No-one else would do it for otou-san, so I did." So she's his sister, Shisui thinks. Aneki. And then the shards of his memory start to combine, intertwining the events of the days before in his mind. Pieces are missing from his cracked mirror, the reflection he so desperately wants to see.
But he knows enough.
"I don't - I don't really think I'd do that, aneki," he attempts, licking his cracked lips. Somehow, his sister knows, reaching for the glass of water before he can even stretch out his hand, the cooling liquid satiating his parched throat as he gulps it down.
"I don't think you knew," she explains in calming tones, pacifiying his urge to retaliate against the voices shrieking in the wild. "You've never felt pain; how could a child like you know?"
Shisui doesn't seem insulted, because it's true. He's not sure what he was expecting when the knife slashed down, when it cut through flesh and bone. The blood was red, his innocence disappeared, pain piercing every inch of his hands. Nothing less than he'd ever experience as a shinobi.
"I can't tell otou-san," she mumbles. "You understand that - right? I'd be in more trouble than you'd ever realise, so you'll just have to deal with it for now, maybe hide it under long sleeves. If he asks, I'll say you have a cold."
She seems to be reassuring herself more than him, he notices, his hands grasping hers in a fluid motion. Shisui starts to apologise, although it's more out of courtesy than sincerity. "I'm sorry for what I put you through, aniki. I'm so-"
And then Hisa cuts him off. "I'm sorry too. I should have been taking care of you better. I shouldn't have left you alone all the time by yourself." Her heart is hammering with fear, mind desperately trying to whir into action, but she can't think properly, can't even move.
Shisui wants to shake his head, to say no, this is all my fault, but he just can't find the words. "I was angry," he says quietly, waiting for her reaction. It never comes. "I was angry with you. And then about okaa-san-"
"What did he tell you?" She demands, tapping her fingers lightly on his bedside table. "He wasn't supposed to tell you anything, especially now. And at your age..." Her eyes rove over him distrustfully, sizing him up and down as an innocent, protected little boy.
"Just, you know-" he responds trying to piece together the memories from the day before, "Her...death."
She nods.
"Why can't you ever play with me?" He cries, panting from the exertion of raising his voice. "You never do - you always break you promise! Why, aneki?"
"Look, I'm tired," she defers. "Otou-san is placing a lot of work on me, as well as the Academy."
"But-"
"And knives are never the best way to go about things," she interrupts in reproval. "Certainly not okaa-san's kitchen knife." Hisa groans distastefully. "I'll have to buy a new one now. It'll be from your allowance, since you're the one who ruined it."
"Was it - was it my fault?" He asks, his voice lower now. "I'm making you sad." He has a tendency to say wrong things at the wrong time, Shisui thinks as he internally scolds himself for his inconsiderate words.
"Kami, no!" And her face crumples, body wracked with sobs as she buries her face in her hands. She's lying - Shisui can feel it somehow, he's swelling up with curiosity at those unspoken words. Hisa stumbles over her next sentence, laced with rivulets of tears."Don't ever think that - you can't - you didn't know - you're just a child!"
Seeing her futile efforts to persuade herself, Shisui doesn't know what to say, so he looks down and averts his eyes from the crying. "I can't-" Hisa begins, causing him to look up, features rippling inquisitively. "I just couldn't - I couldn't see someone else die."
Shisui nods. "Why didn't you leave me?" To die. "You could have." He wonders now, what it would have been like to feel death's cold embrace, to be in the hands of that binding infinity which would make sure he'd never see the light of day again. He shudders, lungs inhaling and exhaling rapidly to remember how to breathe.
"I'd never leave you," Hisa says, but they're both imagining the slight moment of pause when she contemplated his death. When, perhaps, he could have died if she hadn't wrenched the knife out of his hands.
"It's okay, aneki," he starts, suggesting he's already forgiven her. Pressing the teacup to his mouth, he drinks the herbal brew down in one gulp. It's so bitter that he tries to spit it out, and would succeed if Hisa isn't currently holding the cup in place. He doesn't understand why his sister has such an infatuation with tea at all.
"Oh, I just heap a few tablespoons of sugar into it," she gives an awkward laugh at his repulsed expression. His mouth opens wide - did she just say tablespoons? - then closes it once he notices her staring. "Too unhealthy, I know."
She examines his bandaged wrists, pinching the soft flesh near the knife marks and making him wince in pain. "I'll check that for you in a few hours, though I have no expertise with knife wounds. You brought this on yourelf, remember, and I'd rather otou-san didn't find out."
"Okay," he nods again, though he doesn't know what he's agreeing to. "Anything else?"
"Come down to lunch when you're ready," Hisa closes the door.
"Wait!" He exclaims after her. A beat passes, her dark eyes watching him, alert. "Are you upset with me?"
"I don't know, otouto," she says, simply. "I don't know."
She lingers for a while, her eyes roving over him, then she gives a start.
"What is it?"
"Shisui, you need to tell me!" Hisa pleads. "Do you have it or not? Tell me, now!"
"What?" He's confused, trying to pull away as she holds him roughly in place.
"Just tell me...do you have the sharingan yet - the eyes which I have? I need to know - tell me!" He remembers those eyes swirling him into the depths of sleep, those eyes which haunt him in his empty, unforgotten dreams.
"Those red ones? I don't think so, aneki," he placates, trying to get her to calm down from her excitement.
"Must have been a trick of the light then..." Hisa trails off, peering at his face.
"Huh?"
"Nevermind."
The once-bare training posts are full of full of dents and scratches, but even that's not enough to satisfy Haru.
"The Clan Heir is supposed to set an example for the rest of the clan," he scolds her. Her eyes turn somewhere else - hands fiddling with the studded pin coiling her hair into a bun. Her hair is something she always has to put up, especially since Mariko made her grow it out from young. She wouldn't like to cut it anyway, as a memory that her mother's spirit still remains.
"Not for long," she corrects. "And I can't do much better, anyway." However much she tries, this isn't like ninjutsu. Taijutsu can be improved by chakra control, but it's not the basis of the technique. And Hisa is probably weaker than anyone in Konoha, with slim arms, tiny legs, and horrible vision without the Sharingan.
"You can, though with that mindset, you won't get anywhere," he admonishes her. "Practice makes perfect." Haru's relentless at this, resolute that she'll somehow get better if she puts more effort in to it.
"Not in my book," she mumbles, though reluctantly starts the kicks, hits and punches from their normal routine. A kunai misses the target completely, courtesy of her weak arm strength. It's only after an hour when the answer stares right at him in the face.
"You really aren't getting anywhere," he realises. "Try something else." The next kunai thuds into the centre of the target, almost ironically at his words. The training grounds are deserted at this time, when most shinobi are out on missions and the like.
Hisa's already tired, and this will prove to further her exhaustion. "Of course nothing's happening! I told you, I'm bad at this." She scoffs, lying back on the mossy floor and panting through the heavy summer heat beating down.
His eyes narrow, almost consdescendingly. "Then get better." Haru pulls her up to her feet as she struggles to breathe.
She ignores his words of contempt, instead focusing on throwing her shuriken at a tree, though only half embed themselves in the trunk.
"Use chakra to enhance your strength." Haru suggests. "Like this." A few seconds build up, and then there's a smash as his fist goes right through the wood, Hisa glaring at him at the loss of her target post. Show-off.
"I guess I could try," she says, bringing her fan out from where it is tied in a sash at her waist. Concentrating the chakra to her wrists, she raises the uchiwa, bringing it down with a crash. Rocks fly out create a gaping void in the middle of the grounds, Hisa stepping back instinctively to avoid getting trapped in the cracks of stray stones and pebbles.
She grins, pleased with herself - finally! - but Haru's shaking his head and sighing. "Not good enough," he says. "Perhaps strength-focused techniques are not for you, though we'll have to hone your taijutsu skills in a different area. Maybe you can use the Sharingan to help you respond to the opponent's movements."
The two tomoes swirl into her eyes at his indirect order. "So, wha-!?" Her eyes flash red as he holds the kunai milimetres away from her neck, almost piercing the bare skin beneath her collar.
"To respond, you must predict," Haru says dryly, his hand firmly gripping the kunai. She resists the urge to tilt her head backwards, trying to keep her body straight so that she doesn't feel the sharp knife tasting her skin.
"I get it," she sighs, waiting for him to relax his hold. "No need to rub it in."
The next attack is a little easier, somehow. He strikes through with the kunai, a little slower to match her speed, and she's not fully entrapped in a vulnerable position like the last time. The most damage cause is the strings of the haori which are loosened up by the friction of the knife against her clothes.
"Good," he praises, though the remark is grudgingly given. Hisa manages to dodge the next shuriken thrown, the tips glinting in the sunlight. Of course, as a renowned jōnin, he's not even displaying half his skills with weaponry, since his opponent is a three (almost four, she claims) year old girl.
One thing she can't do, Haru notices, is fight back against his attacks. At the speed they're at, she can barely hope to avoid them, and it's peculiar to see how just manages to evade his strikes by the skin of her teeth.
Hisa's sharingan certainly does wonder for her, though. By the end of their training session, she's able to dodge most of his attacks and even respond to a few. Her progress is something controlled wholly by the sharingan, though, and that's something he needs to change.
When they walk back on the crossroads, the streets are much quieter, indigo setting in to a heathery violet. The compound once full of crowds in now stripped to the bone, their houses only twinkling lights in the distance.
"Look," Hisa says, once she's absolutely sure that they're alone. "I want to graduate with my class in the Academy. You should have told me before you'd agreed, you know? Otherwise I'll just go up and rescind it."
"I understand your attachment to your friends, but the clan always comes first," Haru reproves her. "It will be of benefit to the clan and Konoha if you graduate early. And you can't appeal, or you will lose all support of the Uchiha clan. Why, Fugaku-san may even force me to throw you out!"
Hisa grits her teeth at his standard, rehearsed response. "I don't care! I don't want to just be of benefit to our clan, I want to actually do something for myself for once!" The outburst is so loud that she looks around again to see if anyone is there. "Please, let me stay with the rest of my friends!"
He might be a little moved by her pleading, but he still won't budge. "You have a duty to your clan, Hisana."
"And who did I learn that from?" She cries out, remembering the many years ago when her mother uttered the exact same words. "Look where that got her!"
His thin fingers press on her arms tightly, forcing her to walk forward faster. "I will not repeat myself again, Hisana. You will do as you are told to." Hisa fights not to wince in pain as his his nails dig into her skin. She has to remind herself that he's not trying to murder her, just trying to find the best for her. Deep breaths. In...and...out. Again.
He suddenly pauses, turning around as she jumps at the loss of contact.
"Hey! Nice to see you, oji-san!" Someone's behind them. It's a spiky-haired boy perhaps a few years older than her, orange goggles covering his goofy face. She'd think he's an Uchiha, but he simply seems too...idiotic to be one. Maybe she's just being too cruel.
While she recovers from the pain, she listens to their interaction intently, her eyes politely turned downward.
"Ah. Obito-kun, how are your missions going? I heard you got promoted to chūnin recently." So he is an Uchiha, based on the degree of familiarity which Haru speaks with.
"Yeah," Obito scratches his head. "I've definitely surpassed Bakashi now - my training's going great! I'll be Hokage in no time!" There seems to be a wistful aura around him as he looks at Haru's sharingan.
"You'll be getting more missions now, I'll expect."
"I've kinda noticed that, sensei is sending us on higher ranks now."
"How is your team doing? I heard Kakashi is a favourite to be promoted to jōnin soon." Haru reveals with a small frown. Hisa looks up with interest.
Obito scowls. "He's still the same rule-abiding jerk as ever. I can beat him easily though, anytime!"
"Where are you going now?" Haru asks. "Do you want to come and eat dinner at our home?" He looks at Hisa, as if she should be doing the cooking and not him. It's the first time Obito notices her too, but he doesn't greet her in his rushed state. "You must be tired from all the training you're doing, aren't you?"
Hisa is too polite to mention her fatigue from training all day.
"Oh - sorry - I can't, shit, I have a mission now. Bakashi is going to kill me for being late! I was helping an old lady with her shopping, and - ah, sorry, oji-san!" He hurries off, presumably not to get killed by his teammate.
Helping an old lady? Hisa thinks. Maybe she undermined his personality after all. She certainly wouldn't be so kind-hearted to do such an act when fixated on a mission.
"He still doesn't have his sharingan yet," Haru remarks, looking at the silhouette running through the shadows. "He's lucky he's still innocent of the way the world works."
"Who are his parents?" They're probably more lenient that most, especially if their son can keep a happy smile on through any adversity.
"Obito-kun is an orphan. He lives with his grandmother as one of the distant branch families."
"Oh, well I guess that makes his dream of Hokage even more special, then. He doesn't have to worry about death or anything." Hisa has never met such a pure-hearted person who exudes laughter and positivity from every step. Even her naïve little brother is someone flawed inside out by the death of her mother, a death which she will blame him for and continue to blame him for all of eternity.
"But you," Haru pauses, "You are different from the rest of Uchiha. You will uphold our legacy and our values - you will be the greatest shinobi which ever lived."
As a flower's bud begins to slowly unfurl, Hisa sighs and looks down at the gravel below, which suddenly seems very fascinating. The life which is chosen for her is the path which she must follow, the expectations sewed into her in the botched, unruly stitches of a child.
"General to 6-i," Hisa comments, moving her piece one square ahead on the wooden tiles. The board is blemished only by thin black lines running down vertically and horizontally.
Her opponent, Shikaku Nara, is a silent, well-thought man, perhaps his only flaw which ruins the canvas is his perpetual laziness. There's no background to how she knows him, just a series of introductions and recommendations from long before.
He sweeps his bishop diagonally into an anticipated space. "Bishop to 5-e." Hisa doesn't let any expressions show on her face, instead concentrating on the flow of the game.
"How's school, Hisa-san?"
"It's going well, thank you," she exchanges politely, a series of pleasantries which she has no will to continue. "I hear you're the best at shogi, so I wanted to see how you play. I hope you don't mind."
"The honour is mine." They resume the game, his pieces playing right into her hands. Or so she presumes.
A rook, this time. It glides up the path, capturing one of his generals in return. For now, all is under her control. "Your clan has a history with shogi?" Hisa mentions, recalling the history books in the Uchiha Library. "They say you're the best in the nation." The crickets chirp in the distance as dusk dawns upon them all, covering daylight in a blanket of moonlight.
Shikaku coughs. "My father was a good one in his time - I could never beat him until the years leading up to his death, and even then, I'm convinced he was going easy on me."
"I'm sorry for your loss," she utters delicately, taking a sip of the teacup next to her. The vines outside the engawa twist all the way up the Nara main house, a musky scent of incense permeating the air.
Another pawn is captured, placed, played. Hisa's eyes never move off the board at his smooth, intriguing movements, observing every strategy as it is in raw form.
"I'm sorry to ask," she apologises politely, "But it would be easier to follow the game with my sharingan. Perhaps-"
He cuts her off with a nod, nudging his general to defend his king. At the motion of approval, she instantly activates her sharingan, her dark eyes once again swirling into its familiar crimson hue.
"It's surprising you didn't ask for a handicap," Shikaku suggests, spiky hair flaring in all directions while he focuses on the pieces spread in front of him. "I would have acquiesced to do so - it's quite common nowadays."
"Is it too much to ask for no holds barred? I simply want an interesting game, perhaps something to take my mind off...other things," she informs him lightly. "You would understand, wouldn't you, having a sibling yourself?"
"Where did you hear that from?" he takes another piece of hers, breaking through her once-impenetrable defenses.
"Ah - well - there were rumours," she falters, taking her gaze off the board for a second. The willow tree outside shakes unsteadily, drooping even lower, crooked branches stealing the light and shrouding the compound in darkness.
"Rumours?" Shikaku chortles, causing her eyes to momentarily flicker to his face at his loud display. "Checkmate, I believe."
Surveying the board for one final time, she bows her head with a sigh. "That was a rather long game, wasn't it? I hope to play you again."
"It was a good game," he agrees, skimming his nails over the pieces and piling them together. The dregs of her tea shape into a blood-moon of glowing white and violent red.
"I'd better go back now, mm?" Hisa hums, glancing at the twinkling stars which light up her path to tbe compound. It's not too far, maybe a few miles away, she finds herself thinking. She can get there in a few minutes, but it would be easier to just teleport. A pity she hasn't learned that jutsu yet, maybe she'll keep it on her list.
"Wait-" Shikaku stops her, before she can step out. "I was quite pleased. After genin, perhaps, we could find you an internship at the intelligence division. If you'd want. It would depend on what your guardian would say, of course."
"A job offer?" Hisa asks curiously. That's quite unusual, after only one game of shogi.
"No, only a recommendation," he counters. "An idea for after the Academy." He doesn't seem perturbed by her young age either.
"It does seen rather handy to have a backup," Hisa muses with a hand on ber chin, the other looped around the rim of her empty teacup. "I wouldn't say I'm particularly wonderful at anything else, anyway."
"I've heard that your genjutsu is formidable," he acknowledges, "But, as my friend would say, it is food for thought."
"Ah - perhaps," she says, eyes never leaving the white moonlight glowing faintly above. "If otou-san would spare a thought on it."
Edit - 17/06/23: Updated chapters 2-5 with added description.
Hopefully I'll be able to post in late July/start of August, as I'm going on holiday. Have a nice summer!
lovehearts,
m.b.