AN at bottom

Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto

Warnings: Death, injuries, people freaking out, angst, pieces of fluff, you get the drill.

Chap 14 Paths (sort of) Diverge

Turns out it really was only the thirteen of us, nine kids and four adults, the rest having stayed behind and went down fighting, or were tracked down while trying to reach one of the safepoints that the Yuki were stationed at. If Scar had lived, there would've been fourteen.

He did not.

I may harbour a bit of a grudge towards our rescue party for that because if Kaguya Katsuki had came in the fight even that bit earlier, then Scar could've been with the rest of us (grieving). However, I really shouldn't. Because they risked their necks for us, and who knows what circumstances prevented Katsuki-san from immediately jumping into the fray?

Honestly, we really owe the Kiri caravan a lot this time, and a hell lot to Hisao-san and his partners (may they all rest in peace). Apparently, he wasn't just a medic-merchant-multitasker person, but one of the best information gatherers in the clan. His partners, all the tiny threadsnakes named after the musical scale, were somehow capable of reverse summoning themselves back to his hair at any given time in addition to their other skill sets. Add in that he's a merchant of ninja and civilian wares alike, gossip was plentiful.

Sadly, his last message via snake-on-eagle was intercepted before it even left Suna, as no one recalled receiving any messages during the Last Day (us kids aren't inventive, whoops, and the adults can be worse).

The clan had already begun evacuating slowly, with each leaving adult taking two kids about with them, as 'children are the light of the next generation' and 'the old guard needed a replacing anyway'.

When they choose the adults for escort duty, they were obviously not chosen for child-comforting skills.

Who the hell tells toddler-aged brats that 'the old guard needed a replacing anyway'? Or perhaps it was more for the benefit of the snakes?

(Probably the latter.)

But… it made sense in a twisted fashion. Almost all the surviving adults are chakra sensors, maybe not with as much detail as mine, but with incredibly large ranges or senses so keen that the rest of the animal kingdom can go wallow in their corner of pity. Add to that, only two kids and an adult with good enough chakra control wouldn't alert any possible Suna sensor nin stationed around our compound when they sneaked away, a child's generally being so small that it would be covered by the thick, home feeling chakra emitted by our summons. As to whether there were any sensor nin or not, well, there probably was.

I tried to ignore the fact that there used to be more than just nine children in our clan, and how there were much more Kinme not trained to fight in full-scale ninja warfare. Evidently, my ignoring thoughts didn't work, as can be seen from my brain running over the facts again and again and again.

Why they waited until the day that we had left Suna, I will never know. Perhaps they wanted all the Kinme in a single goddamn basket ripe for picking (They didn't have mind-readers that I know of, but T&I works just fine)? Or perhaps they wanted to use us to track down our safe houses?

Too bad, none of us are soft or fragile enough to be compared with eggs, and if the battle that I caught a glimpse of was any indication, Suna had dropped the basket of grenades over in a field of ice. Exploding ice is never good for those nearby, especially the one that had mistaken the contents of the basket.

All this and more was explained over a grim meal of plain rice and fried desert rat with the thirteen of us crowded into the center of the old mess hall, its seal having been passed to us by a messenger snake from the possession of our now deceased clan leader. Those that understood looked away when our new clan head broke down crying.

It felt too empty, with only the few of us where there used to be a hundred, the walls too far away from our backs and the air too still from lack of movement.

(And they're all dead dead dead and there's nothing I can do except perhaps pester Tobirama for Edo Tensei.

Actually, that's a good idea…

Brain, kindly shut up. Please.)

Of the four remaining adults, one could barely count as such.

Our new clan leader seemed rather distraught, an emotion that I can fully sympathize with right now. Her grandmother is dead, and so are her parents, all having stayed behind to vanquish the Suna invaders, a task that I would consider mostly completed as the last messenger had informed us that out of the near two hundred enemy nin, only three escaped unscathed due to being far-range puppeteers, and only seven injured. The rest, deader than kami-damned doornails. The snakes that had remained on site had also gathered enough information on the dead enemies, Suna nin and missing-nin alike, that we could track down their associates and wrangle answers out of them. As in answers to why they thought it acceptable to wreck genocide on an entire clan. Or for revenge. Who knows? I personally know that forevermore, I shall shun puppet users and strive to be the bane of their existence whenever possible, Sasori, Chiyo, and Kankuro be damned.

Of course, we were not left without casualties as well, as the only Kinme's still alive were all seated with me in our cavernous mess hall. Today was the third day after the attack, and Scar and I were the last to arrive three days ago.

No one else had appeared. Apparently even those that had been on missions or absent were hunted down, there's no way that they wouldn't return otherwise.

The three days had passed with the hazy recollection of events common after a particularly traumatic event, and up till today, no one had really ventured into the mess hall for anything longer beyond a snack. It might be because the Snake clan were cleaning up the battlefields by reverse-summoning, then somewhat-normal summoning, my clanmates into the mess hall via glass egg capsules.

Actually, they might've, but I wouldn't know considering I was basically stuck in a fuuton for the entire first day back. That was… mildly aggravating. Who knew running for so long would be detrimental on a six-year old's legs?

(Thankfully, someone had decided to compulsively hide food everywhere in the base for everyone else to find and eat. Whoever they are, they're a kami send.)

It was strange living at a mockery of home after the Last Day. After Mako-san and Katsuki-san had delivered Scar and I to the rest of the clan along with our partners, one of the adults had, according to Hikaru, 'plopped you kids off with us before stealing

Dōsukēru and –' shit. I forgot his name again '– because the Suna bastards had dropped pellets specifically targeting the chakra systems of non-humans in our water supply and they needed an uncontaminated specimen.' After a bit of prompting and a hell lot of whining, I had then found out that the compound in the water supply was not discovered because it had no adverse effects. At least, not unless it came into contact with some specific gases.

The only non-humans living with us are some of the experimental animals, and the snakes that virtually harbour half our souls.

Was this how Sugiryuu had originally died? From a poison that not even my clan detected?

There's some twisted sense of irony, right there. The fact that most of us are immune to quite a selection of poisons even more so.

Thankfully Dōsukēru got back to me a couple hours after I woke up, even if she was missing a few scales along her back and the faint scent of blood that wafted out of her mouth made me want to rip something apart.

At least her sacrifice (I don't care she was willing, she was hurt while away from me) wasn't in vain, as we hadn't consumed the contaminated water supply but the little bit of gas that was inhaled around our brief last glimpse of our compound was enough to stick around her bloodstream. The few gas-infected samples that she provided along with the pellet-water-supply-poison shit that the water provided was enough for the adults to put their heads together and create an antidote.

(It's this genius that scared away almost everyone else)

The Kiri caravan were nice in a way in that they occasionally popped down below to where the remnants of my clan rested in a miniaturized, bastardized version of our original compound to ensure that we were eating and getting up and didn't die in our sleep.

I wonder what the standardized pay for stealing the remaining fragments of a clan away from a genocide is.

"–Nee-chan, nee-chan!" an incessant tugging on my sleeve broke me out of my thoughts and I stopped mechanically stuffing my face with overcooked desert rat. I imagine it tastes like overcooked chicken. As long as it's edible though, I don't really care. Dōsukēru didn't care either, but I was pampering her by stripping meat off the bones for her to eat so her opinion is moot. Normally she eats like any other snake, by consuming live/barely dead prey whole, but with most of the snakes in the infirmary-like section of our– our– bunker-esques hideout due to poison, I felt like she needed a bit of pampering.

(And I a little self-assurance that she's alive)

"Yes, Orochi? Don't forget to drink your cactus juice." When in Rome, do as the toga-loving romans do. Of course, messing with people is always a good way to take some attention off of other...things.

An eyebrow under the little mop of black hair twitched, before my little brother furiously shook his head, "hime-sama-chan wanted to know what we want to do." I could tell that Sugiryuu was doing the mental reptilian equivalent of a facepalm from Orochi's title for our young clan head.

But...oh.

We're already looking at the future? But now? When the past wasn't even close to being settled yet?

I temporarily focused back on my chakra sensing (balled away and suppressed for the majority of three days because grief was contagious damnit) and could barely hold back the sigh when the bits of emotions in the chakra of my clanmates threatened to overwhelm me. The adults were fine, but most children had close to no control over what they leaked into the ying half of their life energies.

Trying to block out the feedback was always difficult, but distance and practice over the past few days had helped considerably. In such close quarters though, I'm honestly surprised that it took me conscious effort to remove the mental block instead of having it shattered like an extremely stressed dam.

"Suijami-san, once the wills are read, is there anywhere in particular that you are interested in going?" I… do not understand why they would ask me, a six year old, that, but whatever. I have known for quite a while on what I want to do next, a decision that would've been revealed soon anyways even without our fifteen-year-old clan leader's prompting.

Giving off an air of thinking by scrunching my brows and running a hand along Dōsukēru's scales, I looked up and answered (with fake confidence and fire, no doubt), "Konoha."

What was the point of asking us if they didn't take any of our decisions into account?

From a logical perspective, asking a roomful of recently orphaned kids of the last of a clan what they plan to do with the rest of their lives is probably a bad idea, but at least give us some sense of being in control of our paths? Please?

At least the group with the authority (three guesses which four, the first two don't count) let us try to argue our point. The kids a bit older than I were slammed down for their insistence on going back to beat the stuffing out of the remaining Suna nin "while they're soft and squishy and weak from losing around two hundred of their ninja over the course of a single day." Their words, not mine.

As tempting as the thought is, there's only about six combat-ready Kinme humans right now, not to mention most of our partners were in various stages of recovering from poison and thus unfit for strenuous activity such as combat. Besides, if they were soft, squishy, and weak, why the hell would they have been able to commit genocide with an expectation for success?

Because they weren't. Suna, stripped down to the bare bones, was still a major ninja village with ANBU, Shukaku, a functioning Kazekage, and a military force numbering around/over ten thousand.

It made sense, however, that the questions for the future were asked before the opening of the wills of our clan members.

The mess hall at the end of day three was completely filled with glass eggs of various sizes, and the messenger snake had left after declaring that there were no more bodies that could be recovered. We ignored his hiccup and how his scales seemed particularly dull, hush gossip informed me that his nestmates, nestlings, and partner had all perished.

It's a bit of a tragedy that the corpses of my clanmates our partners are all encased in a glass covering. On one hand, we get them back, which is a lot better than what some of the other clans can get. On the other hand, glass means that we can pretty much see exactly how and why they died, and if the particular clansmen was very (un)lucky, most of the pieces are there too. I don't know how the younger ones will deal with this trauma when even the older ones will have trouble wiping some of these images from their mind's eye.

It's also telling that I didn't know what to think considering half of them are alone in their glass eggs, but I could barely suppress an irrational flare of anger when I saw kaa-chan's final resting place, without Manda. Not anger at Manda, but for him. He was never the most even-tempered of the lot, but now he's going to be so unbalanced I don't know if we can ever get back our uncle figure.

I sat vigil the entire third night, health and safety be damned, it's not like any of the other kids slept anyways. We were a bit too distraught, and a night of nightmares was not something the adults needed.

On the morning of the fourth day, a Kaguya came down to our grieving (extremely sleep-deprived) lair and brought us a basket of dried meat, preserved/pickled vegetables, and a packet of fruits, not to mention an offering of strong tea.

The meagre amount barely being enough to feed the lot of us, but we made do once we realized that I still had some random cooking ingredients in some of my seals. After some experiments with the cooking products, however, barely a fourth of it was still edible. Despite my tendency from Before of constantly nearly burning the kitchen down (I blame technology that I no longer have), nobody seemed to think that I should be allowed to add that much sugar to flour with chocolate and other stuff.

Chocolate chip cookies are supposed to be comfort food, dammit.

Unfortunately, the Kaguya also brought us news that they'll be leaving the area in a bit over two days, as it would cast suspicion on them if they stuck around Suna outside of their usual schedule right after the Kinme clan was "Exterminated for unethical experimentation and backstabbing clients."

That type of bullshit is exactly the reason why our clan never stayed in one village for too long. Stay too short and be accused of being spies, stay too long and be accused of sleeper agents? Village bullshit politics are not needed for a free, roaming, science-orientated, nerd-filled clan.

So we might be a bit cold and emotionally stunted when concerning outsiders, so what? Uzumaki Kenta dealt just fine, as did all the others that choose to stay with us via marriage, adoption, or just flocking towards us fellow nerds.

Whatever, what's done is done, but hell will freeze before I spare Suna nin mercy.

Now with a deadline, it sort of gave us a bit more purpose. Rather systematically, our clan leader magicked from somewhere a list of wills for all of our deceased classmates. It took us the entire afternoon to read through the legacy of our clan's deceased, and with the looming suggestion of our eventual splitting up, the remnants was divided amongst us.

As anticipated, some of the wills sounded rather rehearsed and dry, probably due to them being cynical while still in the living and constantly re-writing the details of what to do in case of permanent sleep. Being a ninja does not do wonders for one's lifespan, much less when your neighbor might accidentally blow something up.

But most, most were rather lighthearted. I think those were the ones that didn't completely immerse themselves as ninjas and chose to spend some of time alive doing activities that didn't have a guillotine hanging over their necks. Of course, some experiments weren't the safest especially with our habit of trying it ourselves first, but, details.

They probably knew that if they died, it would've been due to some massive event that could likely have traumatized the remaining Kinme.

Going down that vein of thought probably wasn't what the authors of the wills intended, as they were trying to cheer us up even in a place that they can't return from, but…

They shouldn't have needed to do so if this goddamn world believed in peace more.

At least it occasionally cracked open some small watery smiles and broken laughter amidst everyone's fogged up vision. No one is ever truly immune to grief.

The only will that was explicitly addressed to Orochi and I was kaa-chan's, which can basically be summed up as "don't die, survive, claw your way to the top because I believe in you, and we'll be watching you live with no regrets from the Pure World." There was no question as to who the 'we' denoted, and there was a little note folded in that listed a bunch of names that we could collect favours from. Unfortunately, most of them began with 'Kinme', and the rest were probably all scattered clan names with a few Uzumaki's thrown in. There were also some unsubtle hints of sticking around Uzushio, Konoha or otherwise allied countries, but I already know where I need to go.

When tou-chan's possessions that were temporarily looked over by kaa-chan ended up in my hands, I could only stare blankly as the heart-hole that I thought healed opened again. When Kaa-chan's black box came to rest within the white-knuckled grip of Orochi and her (too large) blade slung over a shoulder, neither of us commented. We both knew that it was because everything between us was meant to be shared, besides, I'm quite sure that Orochi would be able to do more with tou-chan's research anyways, or will once he's old enough. But… it was all the better that Orochi kept kaa-chan's blade, as I don't need a sharp object to tear open a new heart-wound.

Hikaru didn't have any more close relatives to pass anything on, but due to the multitude of the dead, he still inherited quite a bit when all of the previous possible receivers were dead.

All of us inherited a lot, actually, six or seven black boxes on average actually. But that's on average. In reality, Orochi and I had nine passed down to us altogether, and Hikaru got six.

Even then, what a time to come in handy, tiny black boxes and their binders of storage seals, just like the ashes of clan members that we don't get to completely keep.

(Half is sprinkled into a special, ceremonial urn in the snake's realm, even that of the non-pure-blooded Kinme's unless specified. Half kept with the living, for burial, upkeep, whatever the living desires and the dead wishes.)

But… none of us know what to do with so many material belongings. Even if most of the Kinme's like hoarding miscellaneous items for random usage, it doesn't mean that the rest of us have a desire to keep them. That probably meant that tonight we'll be spending much too long on sorting through the inheritance of dead clan members.

And how painful is that? Knowing that they aren't around to defend their last possessions?

It didn't stop any of us from opening the boxes though, nor did it prevent us from flipping open the binders and quickly going through what is in each seal by the captions underneath. As a general consensus, the journals and research notes were (mostly) all removed and placed onto a couple temporary shelves (also removed from selected seals), for later transportation to the snake's realm. The librarian there will sort the notes better than we ever could, and summoning a list of the books was legitimately two puffs of chakra away. There was a lot of journals and research notes and over half was so disorganized I couldn't even grasp how the original authors functioned. I made special note of where tou-chan and kaa-chan's research work was, so as to perhaps snag them away before being sent off with a snake for sealing. The Snake Sage will be gaining a lot more scale-tattoo-seal things in very short order.

There was a tug on my sleeve. "Nee-chan, what's a bin-go book?"

"It's a book with bounties and information detailing missing-nin and strong ninjas of different places." Then I blinked. And did a double take. Didn't kaa-chan stop taking bounty missions after Orochi was hatched?

"Pass me that, please?" Golden eyes flicked to me for a second before he grudgingly passed it into my waiting hand, I ignored how the adorable little tyke tried to discreetly rub the underside of Dōsukēru's jaw when he sidled up to me with the action. I also ignored his slightly stumbling shift because there was no snake perched on his left shoulder.

Hikaru leaned over my shoulder as well when I flipped open the most recent copy of Suna's bingo book, distracted from the task of sorting through some of the (now his) stuff.

I flipped open to the back cover (for some reason read left to right instead of the way I was expecting), and fumbled. Crammed between the last pages was a tiny sheet of paper inscribed with panicked, barely legible writing. Kaa-chan's writing.

That's when it hit me. Half of the remaining couple that had created my existence and brought me to this world, was gone.

The one that saw me through the thick and thin of a childhood in a war-cultured world died in battle.

The mother and father that had changed my diapers and fed me, cleaned me, clothed me, taught me I was safe, were gone.

The one last human that has known me since my birth well enough to identify my tells, habits, and everything in between was gonegonegone –

Dead. Just like over seventy percent of all the people I've actually knew in this new life.

The worst thing? I already have the loss of an entire world, not to mention having everything I knew ripped away once. Whether this makes it easier or worse can only be told by time, but the children, the children.

They're the only ones really left that matters.

Fine, the adults are around, but what are the odds that adult sensor-nin aren't just killed on a mission "accidentally" when they choose to settle down in a village? Children are much easier to mold than adults, mentally-wise, not to mention it could reduce possible attachments of the children to the remaining adults whom most definitely have biased opinions towards different subjects. Subjects from a logical and scientific point of view that most ninja villages might not agree on.

And if the paper scrawled with urgent writing proved anything correct, then Suna had virtually set up a bounty for anyone that is seen close to snakes. As in, fifty thousand ryo for the head's of a Kinme and their snake, and seventy-five thousand if delivered alive and capable of coherent thought. It was the shaky writing that scared me the most, as it declared living children under the age of five (very impressionable and liable to develop Stockholm syndrome or whatever), have a bounty of ninety-thousand ryo.

And this was the bounty book of Suna, the village that in the future known to have a crappy economy and not a whole lot of clans. Hell, it wasn't even Kumo, who had/will have a reputation as a village that tries to 'grow' bloodlines via kidnapping kids from Konoha, a village that has never lost any wars.

Maybe this is what caused the overkill number of ninjas sent to 'exterminate' us? Capturing is much harder than killing, after all. That can be exemplified quite well by how there's only thirteen of us left.

I fear what could have possibly elicited such a response from Suna.

(I also felt a wrong sense of pride that none of my clansmen chose live-capture over death-freedom)

But… this could definitely work in my favour. If Suna was desperate enough to offer up such a high amount of bounties for my clansmen, dead or alive, then there must be conflict brewing somewhere. As one of the last clans that virtually refused to become tethered to any individual village, it is sorta evident why Suna didn't want us roaming around too much, especially with all the time we spend in the desert.

I tried to quash down the feelings of injustice that I felt because Suna didn't trust a ninja clan to keep secrets. The feeling was not quashed. It grew like a stubborn dandelion (I swear those things could even live on Mars given the chance) because dammit, if we didn't know how to keep secrets, how the seven hells would a science-orientated ninja clan be able to survive this long?

Annnnd, off my brain goes. The point is, the more Suna tries to desperately capture/kill my clan, the more the other villages will be interested, and a potential clan genocide when there's people from all over the bloody Elemental Nation considers the Kinme as kin and family, or even blatantly living with us, well.

Suna's rep isn't going to be going up in anyone's books.

It might've worked if they managed to actually capture/kill all of us, but nope. They failed, and we'll make sure it's a permanent type of fail. Our clan leader ordered us, tears and glass and iron in her will, that as long as we live, as long as any Kinme of this generation lives, not a single one of our clan will choose to willingly reside in Suna.

When everybody from the youngest to the oldest all bowed down to her (the youngest stumbling and red-eyed), it felt more like a vow and considering Kishimoto somehow declaring that Orochimaru actually did become immortal, well. This generation may last for quite a while.

Annnnd, that's off tangent again. What I'm getting at is that the situation works in my favour to get into Konoha. Tobirama is known as a nerd within the science/experimentation/logic circles of gossip (and a terror to everyone else who's in on the ninja gossip grapevine), meaning that he'll probably be more accepting of children, especially when they are orphans of an intellectual-based clan. Perhaps not in that order. The summoning contract may be a plus too, despite it probably never leaving my clan.

Unless Anko. But she's Anko.

I think I might need some reins for my mind, especially with the odd looks I'm targeted with via concerned brother and cousin.

"Is nee-chan ok?"

I ruffled Orochi's short, somewhat spiky hair.

"Yup, I think I found a way to get into Konoha without anyone dying."

Turns out, Hikaru and Ume wasn't all that agreeable when it came to what we're supposed to do later. The both of them were rather dead set on going to Uzushio with some of the other Kinme, which admittedly is a good plan, but I was also rather insistent on heading to Konoha.

Decisions, decisions and too much tension resulted in us giving each other a cold shoulder.

At least Orochi said that he'll just follow me wherever, albeit with a lot more clinging and whispering and random glances out of the corner of his eyes. I think he was trying to be discreet?

He wasn't. Perhaps with time he'll grow to be one of the strongest shinobi to walk this bloodied earth, but for now he's just my little brother, partner to a snake summon named Sugiryuu, newly orphaned of our one remaining parent, and a tad concerned over whether or not his sibling has gone off the deep end.

I crunched on a piece of jerky (aka dried mystery meat) as I searched for more arguments I could add for going to Konoha with Orochi in tow. So far, it mainly consisted of: Tobirama is Hokage, they're allied with Uzushio, they're a large country, Konoha has a lot of clans (very exuberant founders a la Hashirama and too much charisma), the Inuzuka and Hatake clans resides there where working with summon/nin-companions are common and not looked down upon, uhhh, almost everyone there has the potential to be a nerd, and what else? Umm, They could get into conflicts with Suna, the land is big and there's a lot of variation in climate in case certain experiments required stuff, there's a friggin forest of death with so much potential, and they are all friendly treehuggers.

Whatever. I'm only supposed to be six years old, so these arguments should be enough.

I rehearsed Orochi on what he should say in case asked as well, so what if it seemed manipulative? If a timestream ever existed, it would probably be trying to get Orochi to Konoha anyway, not like I ever cared about time after all, it's but a figment of our imagination. Or rather, it's a phenomena thingy that co-exists with space, until one gets into astrophysics. Then distance is measured in time.

...Whatever, screw physics. We have chakra and seals. Actually, this world has Uzumaki, if that isn't a great big middle finger to the existence of physics, I don't know what is.

Annnnd I shouldn't be spacing out in the middle of a clan meeting, should I?

"Suijami, for all that is still gold, speak your arguments of why you want to go to Konoha before we decide to split up." Whoops, methinks I pissed off my clan leader. At least being pissy means she isn't too busy being sad?

Ha, a Kinme's multitasking should never be underestimated.

"Uhh, I wanna go to Konoha because– because–" dammit brain, work already– "The Hokage is Senju Tobirama who likes science and stuff and not Hashirama that doesn't understand– understand– for science!" I… just ended up screeching our unsaid clan motto, didn't I? That was not part of the plan.

Oh well.

"And um, they are very good with clans, and they're friends with the Uzumaki, and– and– oww Dōsukēru what was that for?" I pouted a bit at my blue-scaled partner that had whacked me upside the head with her tail, despite it being expected.

She ignored me, but continued where I left off in my not-so decent explanation. I blame kaa-chan, a tendency to mimic, and the so-called reality that six-year olds should not be able to formulate too many logical reasonings.

"What Suijami is trying to say," cue pointed glare from Dōsukēru, "is that Tobirama will accept us into the village because of our clan's reputed love, respect, and altogether prowess in science. Also that despite being orphans, we can survive well because the Great Shinobi War ended not very recently so that there are lots of orphans who have probably struck out a living or found a home, hence plenty of spots in perhaps even clan orphanages, and Konoha is the Great Village that is most accepting of clans. Not to mention they are allied with Uzushio and Takumi village, who they would risk alie– alienating if they maltreated the children of other allies." She's had my respect since the day I considered her pretty much part of what makes us, us, but damn, she just earned it all over again. Even if our arguments are sort-of based on the fly, it's the thought that counts.

"And why should Orochimaru go to Konoha with you? He's young, without a defined personality to make decisions off of, and recently orphaned." I bristled at the accusations and– Sheesh. We did not need that reminder. At all. Thanks for bringing up the dead parents. Who are both dead. "Never mind that both of you are too young to hold any real power, you would not be able to sustain yourselves on clan inheritance alone even if we discounted the politicians and other characters that make villages political venus-flytraps."

That's a pretty good point. Dangit.

"But if we show enough po– potential, then they wouldn't want to touch us too much, right? And Orochi and I are a pa –package deal because if Hikaru goes to Uzushio, then we'd be our only blood left!" I argued back, stuttering just enough over the big words to not cause too much suspicion, and perhaps with a touch of incoherency that wasn't all that feigned.

Suddenly the clan leader sighed and rubbed the bridge of her nose, eyes squinted at us so only a thin slit of gold bisected by a sliver of black could be seen.

"You… are really set on going to Konoha?"

"Yup!" I agreed cheerily, or as cheerily as possible under the conditions allowed.

"Fair enough, we'll ask the Yuki if they can drop the few of you off at one of Konoha's outposts after everyone finds a route."

Why the hell is she relenting so easily?

"Thank you Hime-sama!"

With that, I bounced out of the meeting room to all the other children who've decided on where to go, or rather, where they were allowed to go.

Ie: Uzushio, Takumi village, Hidden (insert village name that's not Suna here), and Konoha. Surprisingly, Orochi and I will be the only ones going to the village of tree lovers as most of the others have decided to stick to Uzushio or Takumi. It makes sense, but not what I would do if my "future knowledge" holds correct. In the bits and pieces that I can still recall, Takumi fell into poverty due to some reason or another, and Uzushio… sort of died. Sort of.

Shit. I'm going to have to warn them somehow, right?

Orochi was pretty much 'interviewed' right after me, and he came out pretty soon with a smug looking Sugiryuu perched on a shoulder like a scaly, no-limbed parrot.

Speaking of the snakes, there's good and bad news. On the upside, almost all of them made it, meaning there are currently fifteen summoning snakes in our world at the moment (the two youngest, the only two younger than Orochi and Sugiryuu, didn't survive, and a few clansmen had more than a single snake hatch with them). On the downside, they now have somewhat compromised chakra systems, and will have to consume live prey with a legit chakra system on a more regular basis to keep their own networks intact. I do not understand how the ever loving heck the adults came to such a conclusion, but it makes a bit more sense than no side-effects at all. Unfortunately. Even the snakes that had departed for the summonings realm had to receive a dose of the antidote, Manda apparently included.

On the almost completely unrelated side, we will be getting the rest of our sealing tattoos early. They include to some extent the summoning tattoos that will connect us to Manda (Orochi and I agreed to share his 'contract' to lessen the drain on us, and so Manda can be stabilized quicker), the other random ass storage seals that act as red herrings or convenient storage space, a few random knick-knacks that could be used to simplify life or be sold at decent prices, and etc. Not to mention, each of us were handed a booklet on clan traditions (in case of clan genocide the paranoid ones had said) that will be going into a seal over the left collarbone.

Well, looks like the Kinme clan was rightly paranoid.

The snakes also got two more storage seals, one located in the back of their throats, and one on the roof of their mouths. Snakes shed, so those were probably the optimal positions.

The tattooing of the kids and their partners not heading off with the adults took most of the fourth night as the adults and Hime-sama had spent the daytime on interrogating the children on future plans. It worked out pretty well, as we were sedated in the duration and so actually received a nearly full-night's sleep.

Everyone participating as a tattoo-seal-artist however, ended up chugging down too much coffee in the morning to prepare for the departure at noon.

So with patches of aching, scratchy skin, the entity of the remaining Kinme's and our remaining summons watched as we burned down the mess hall, or clan hall as it really is.

The inferno consumed everything, the tables, chairs, podium, and all the seals that generations of Kinme and random others added to. But above all, it gave our deceased a viking funeral. From previous, unneeded experience, I know that the 'glass' is particularly flammable, and that nothing will be left accept unidentifiable ashes.

To perform this act, we had all went back above ground, which was freezing because it was still bloody winter, and ended up with penguin clusters of Kinme children surrounded by adults, watching the blaze eat everything. The mess hall was sealed and resealed aboveground so it wasn't six feet under, and for the first time most of us could ever recall, we saw the actual, outer walls of the hall.

Somehow, it was steel.

(Somehow, it was almost everything that I have grown to know and love)

Somehow, it still burned.

I blame physics and chakra. Which don't really mix. So, uhhh, never mind.

The penguin huddle was rapidly dispersed into smaller clusters after the fire consumed everything, mainly due to the repulsion forces wielded by snot and tears.

Like I said, the adults that survived aren't very good with kids, but they are somehow good at picking bone ash out of everything-else ash.

Nor are they good at goodbyes, I thought drily, and all that much amused with an unamused face plastered on.

Our Oro-dubbed "Hime-sama-chan" was flitting about us all anxiously, softly asking the soon to depart children whether or not we'll be ok "almost alone in the world, without parents or the rest of the clan." She was fidgeting enough that her partner ended up whapping her upside the head nearly every fifth step.

The answer though, is quite obviously a resounding no, but perhaps this was just her way to try to keep us all together. By guilt-tripping children.

Silly leader, it's not like we won't ever meet again.

(Pure land, afterlife, whatever comes after, those meetings count, right?)

The other adults, who I've finally temporarily remembered the names of, stood around awkwardly and fussed over the children gathered around their legs while a few Yuki sat in the background. They were resting up, preparing to take us all on the Yuki Waterways to wherever we need to find ourselves. If they get lost in that maze of mirrors that they set up, I would be pissed, especially since only four of the kids, including Orochi and I, were going to split off from the main groups. But then again, when the main groups only have around four and five people each, they can't be considered big either, can they?

When Hime-sama fidgeted her way to me, I tried not to feel bad about leaving. It was something we had to do, or it better be.

"Suijami-chan, Dōsukēru-chan, take care ok? Orochimaru-kun and Sugiryuu-kun will need someone to teach them how to be part of who we are, and you two will be the only ones that can do so." Her eyes were slightly red-rimmed, showing through as a light tinted brown through her ordinarily green clan markings. The bags under her eyes were also unhealed by the miracle known as coffee. She leaned down and gave the four of us a group hug, nose buried in my hair, then Orochi's, inhaling our scents for probably the last time in a long long while.

"I will take care of nee-chan too! Hime-sama-chan! And Sugiryuu will take care of Dōsukēru-nee! We– we can–" oh gods, "we'll take care of each other because, like, we are family and– and" the waterworks are coming "snakes of a scale slither synchro– chronal!" Kudos to him for saying the words tight, and kudos again for showing me that emotion is actually a thing these days other than guilt.

I scrunched my nose at the familiar sour tang and leaned my forehead onto our clan leader's shoulder, Dōsukēru squawking a bit when the close proximity was almost enough to squash her. There was no real heat behind her incoherent warbling.

All too suddenly, it was time to leave, and Hikaru still hasn't broken the tense silence that had stretched between us when I declared our (my) intent to go and fraternize with tree-huggers.

With a mental age literally years above his, I should probably be the one to apologize and not leave on a sour note, but… I've never been good with responsibility, or communication, and my farewells are on par with awkward adult penguin huddles.

So… the hell am I supposed to do to mend this bridge?

Or actually, seeing as Orochi was dragging me over to the lonely silhouette of Hikaru, I don't need to do anything at all.

"Nee-chan, be nice to Hikaru-nii." What.

My little brother is a little, manipulative, arse in disguise. I'm onto him now.

Or, at least I will be once Dōsukēru stops snickering and Hikaru stops giving the betrayed puppy-eyed look.

It looks more like a frosted glare, but I know there's a kicked puppy look somewhere below.

Uhhh, the hell do I do?

"Dōsukēru-nee, can you get nee-chan to not be mad at Hikaru-nee anymore?"

I blinked owlishly, then blinked again, taken back. "You thought I was angry at Hikaru?"

Ignoring the subject of our little chat, my little Orochi nodded viciously, just barely hiding a pout, "yes! Because nee-chan wasn't smiling when Hikaru-nee was around and nee-chan's always smiling!"

Our clan just died. Did he honestly expect me to be smiling?

"Like now! You look pi–pis–" I slapped a hand over Orochi's mouth, gently.

"Whoever taught my little brother how to swear is going to die a very gruesome death," I reached over to snag Hikaru's sleeve, "and you're going to help me."

Apparently taking my hand away from Orochi's face was a bad idea because he proceeded to cheerfully complete the sentence. "Nee-chan looks pissed!"

"Who needs to die?" questioned Hikaru, grim as he can be. The plume coloured snake coiled around his waist gave a flick of her tongue in agreement. No one is allowed to teach Orochi how to swear, or at least not until he's old enough to kill those that hears him do so.

The next ten minutes were the funnest in the last week of my life, as the three of us "interrogated" numerous clansmen of whether they did or did not use "bad words" around an innocent looking Orochi that I held up. I think it bemused a lot of the present company, but parting on a semi-confused and amused terms will always be better than a depressed one.

As Orochi's only a bit older than three, I got to pick him up. Getting to shove him into people's faces however, is a plus side and prime blackmail material that will be around forever.

Hikaru standing to the side and scowling what he probably imagines to be an intimidating scowl made me want to ruffle his hair, if only I wasn't lugging around an Orochi the entire time. One can never have too many hands. Or can they?

Then time was up much to the regret of us all, and a buff-looking Yuki (now I've seen everything) crouched down in front of us.

"Did you teach my brother how to swear?" I accused while holding Orochi up to the Yuki's face, Hikaru crossing his arms in a mocking attempt of being a bodyguard somewhere behind me. I could hear Dōsukēru inside my yukata despairing about the idiot trio and Sugiryuu's muffled agreements to her mumblings.

The Yuki just chuckled, then straightened up whilst holding me when I was still holding my cargo.

Is this going to become a thing?

"I didn't, but but perhaps it's time to split up and hunt down whoever that did so, don't you think so, little hatchlings?" His voice was smooth, like cool water over rounded rocks in a summer. The words however, felt like anything but.

I looked down, and noticed the reddening of my remaining family's eyes.

"It's time to leave?" I questioned the presence holding me up.

A nod later, and I was sitting on his shoulders while Orochi was cradled in the crook of the Yuki's left arm. Hikaru stepped back, holding back red-rimmed eyes that we can all see, and I winced inwardly.

Ume wound her way around my little cousin's waist before lifting her plum-coloured head to gently nudge against Hikaru's forehead, and Sugiryuu poked his head out of Orochi's yukata.

"See you around, Ume-san," hissed the youngest snake of our lot, "we might be able to visit."

It suddenly dawned on me that because of the close relations between Uzushio and Konoha, it's actually plausible for us to visit the rest of my clan, and vice versa.

I raised a hand to wave at Hikaru from way atop the shoulders of the Yuki, the other perhaps gripping a bit too tightly on his bandanna-like head accessory. Whoops.

Then a few more hasty waved farewells was all I could do before the Yuki started jumped down into one of the tunnels leading away and an incoherent jumble of holycrapI'mfalling mixed with toofasttoofastgravitysucks was all that stayed in my mind. For a somewhat logical reason, I believe that all the other thoughts were sucked out via gravity. For a definitely non-logical reason, I believe that if we fell any longer we would impact the mantle and die. This I deem illogical because we would be dead from heat long before actually hitting the mantle (air friction/resistance and etc), and not the actual logical reasonings that would make this illogical, which was that random Yukis, aka the clan of ice-users, wouldn't jump into the mantle and expect to survive.

If I'm just making excuses for my screeching my head off, well.

Falling at terminal velocity and then being bounced back up sideways at negative terminal velocity tends to do that to people.

(I wonder at the last impression that will be left imprinted on the minds of my clansmen, two kids screaming like banshees disappearing down a hole can't be normal.

Then again, screw normal.)

AN: *wails incoherently* Imma so sorry I didn't update, except life and time apparently all hate me. Plus, my mom's gonna murder me cuz its (very) past my 'curfew' so I'll try to keep this brief (which failed miserably, lol).

Things that happened over the last two months: wisdom teeth removal, two economics and three math tests, two economic IAs (that the teacher screwed us over with), uni application and scholarship application that I may have screwed up due to timing, and other Bad Things (TM) etc.

Things that didn't happen: Me breaking writer's block, plugging out the rest of the chapter, putting out this chapter after only about 4000 words, ending my procrastinating period of procrastination, etc

On a completely unrelated note, I got dragged into the Fire Emblem fandom via Fire Emblem Heroes?

On a related note, holy shit this chapter wouldn't end, and if you guys find errors, please tell me somehow because I didn't really get to read through, and it isn't beta-ed. It might be a while before the next update again (imma so sorry) because IB exams are the first two weeks of May andPhysics is gonna murder us all)

OMG thank you everyone who read, followed, favourited, and reviewed this story! It now has over 300 followers and 200 favourites! (Someone else enjoys reading my baby~!)

Anyways, thank you all for reading, following, favouriting, and reviewing, every one of them brings a tear to my eye, and you guys are awesome!

Happy all the belated holidays that I forgot the name of!

Please leave a review on the way out, they are love and motivation~

~Cadriona Morningwing

Uploaded: April 12, 2017