Question

Water morphing into shape, she dropped her hands to her sides. To think that a week ago she had been so frustrated she thought it impossible. Her perfect water clone maintained its shape, mirrored her smile, and even stood atop the choppy water with as much ease as her.

Having the full beginner set of signs had done wonders. However, the less she used, the more effort it took. Using it twice at two of three seals exhausted her. Reigning consciousness after a nap in a puddle reaffirmed that. One was impossible. Her eyes narrowed. The reason…

Nowhere near practical use, though. A bit more and-

"Would you look at that?"

Renri almost jumped, her clone whipping around while she tried to swallow her heart. Despite the unfamiliar, too enthusiastic, shout, her clone reported no danger. Just confusion. She glanced over her shoulder while allowing her clone to sink back into the water. No way would her concentration hold out through a conversation with-

With Itachi.

Her words caught. A foot almost slipped below the water.

"Good afternoon," Itachi greeted, as unfazed as ever. She hoped he didn't consider startled her standard greeting. He really needed to stop sneaking up on her- alternatively, she really needed to pay more mind to her surroundings.

Especially since he wasn't alone.

An older boy waved at her, sheepish look on his face. Short hair messily fell over his headband in places, leaf symbol peeking out. His clothes, and some of his features, were similar enough to Itachi's that she assumed him a relative. "Sorry about that, didn't think we'd startle you." Itachi mouthed 'we?' with a small, very ignored, glare. "That was good, though! You caught onto that quick."

"My cousin," Itachi helpfully introduced, "Shisui."

Ah. She had heard that name before, but the more she stared, the more familiar he looked. She had seen him before. Somewhere. Distantly, maybe? Still, she didn't appreciate that he seemed to know when she started training. Would Itachi bother to mention her? Because she didn't think so.

"Thank you," she said, vaguely aiming it at both of them while reconsidering her priorities. She had a few too many stalkers. She hated when he was right. "It's been a lot easier to learn with the additional seals," she added with a slight smile towards Itachi. Then she clammed up. She could barely carry on a conversation with Itachi, she stood no chance with his cousin in tow.

"Sure nice of you to share that with her, Itachi." Shisui stepped forward, proudly declaring, "I'm Itachi's teacher. Taught him everything he knows."

"Please stop," Itachi quietly deadpanned.

She almost bit her lip, smile creeping onto her face at the two. The time of day, the slightly singed collars and smudges of dirt on skin and clothes, they must have been training together. She didn't know Itachi could be annoyed, but Shisui seemed to be the expert. She also didn't know Itachi could look so simultaneously… relaxed.

"But I'm a great teacher," Shisui defended. "You had the water clone down after seeing my fantastic demonstration once."

Renri let a small giggle slip. Maybe he wasn't so scary. "Should I thank you too, then?"

Shisui nodded with a broad smile while Itachi gave her a look that said 'how dare you encourage this.'

A moment passing, Renri walked towards the riverbank to join them instead of standing out on the water. She could handle a conversation. Probably. The teasing dying off, Shisui took a more serious tone as he watched her approach. "We can't all be a natural like Itachi." Yet he noticeably omitted himself from the statement. She knew because Itachi shot a look at him for it. "You're pretty good. Must be at the top of your class?"

"No." She pulled at her sleeve, more focused on her feet sinking into the mud as she hopped off the water. For someone that less than a month ago had been sabotaging her scores, the failure for one skill to improve at all frustrated her. The silence prompted her to mumble, "Dead last in taijutsu."

"Why?" Itachi asked, her glancing at him in time to see his brows pinched slightly. "You're good with throwing weapons. That requires some strength." He looked from her to Shisui, waiting for one of them to explain.

"You use a small chakra charge, right?"

Her head tilted to the side. Shisui gave a flicker of a knowing smile. For further targets, she had to use a bit of charka to increase the force to both clear the distance and ensure it would stay in the target. It wasn't practical to waste chakra on increasing her physical strength to make it average. Especially not in taijutsu-only sparring matches. The whole point of taijutsu was chakra conservation.

She pulled at her sleeve again. Bruises had barely turned green before she had earned another deep, painful one in class. A particularly hard kick to the arm had about knocked her down. The follow up would have broken something, but she cheated, snuck in a substitution since it wasn't expected. She had to apologize to teacher for the ninjutsu in a taijutsu match, but he let it go easily enough. He only reminded her he was about to step in.

"How did you know?"

"Did you use the sharingan to see that?"

Their questions asked at the same time, Shisui looked between her and Itachi.

Sharingan? The Uchiha kekkei genkai? It wasn't something that immediately manifested? She didn't know a lot about it, given, like most, the clan smartly kept its secrets far from outsiders. It'd be rude to ask. May expedite her demise if she dared. And, if she really wanted to know, she could ask Orochimaru. He liked kekkei genkai.

"No," Shisui said with a slight laugh, looking to Itachi. "You could use it for that, but I didn't. I could tell because," he gestured to the river, "of how easily she was walking on that choppy water. To do that, she must have good chakra control. With that, you can increase physical strength. It was just a safe guess based on some observation. You can learn a lot about someone just from how they carry themselves."

Jealously panged at how Itachi stared up at Shisui, hanging onto every word. Her heart clenched at thinking of her brothers, thought swiftly kicked aside. Another replaced. She… she probably had cousins somewhere. Would they be as nice? Would they have helped her train?

"Medical ninja can do that, so don't piss them off." Shisui's expression twisted from a smile to something grim, whatever memory apparently scarring. "Seriously. Don't. I've heard horror stories."

Renri wanted to hide when Itachi's gaze returned to her. "You exploded a practice fish," he said, confirming that she really hated rumors. Even when true. But it wasn't on purpose! And he didn't need to say it with a blank face like she commonly did stuff like that!

Shisui held back a laugh but it then came out as a soft snort. He quietly apologized.

"Unrelated issue," she muttered, not trusting herself to ramble a coherent defense. Her face felt like it was burning. Curiosity was the issue. According to Orochimaru, at least. Her first attempt, he had told her that she had lost her concentration, too distracted with feeling the structures revealed by running her chakra into them, accidentally flooding the delicate network to the point it just… came apart. He liked to call her chakra volatile. Quirk of his lips, slightly narrowed eyes, she always took it as a compliment.

"Are you interested in genjutsu?" Itachi asked, jumping to the chakra control adjacent subject.

As she nodded, Shisui's tone shifted, "Itachi," a light warning, "you shouldn't use your classmate as a guinea pig to train-"

"I don't mind." If she got hurt, she got hurt, just like practicing anything else. Genjutsu sort of required a secondary party to practice properly. Being the secondary party would at least offer her some experience more than reading alone.

Shisui's brows pinched together as he gave her a look she didn't quite understand. She had said something strange, obviously.

Itachi shot Shisui another mildly-annoyed scowl before looking back to Renri with… With an expression nearly mirroring Shisui's. What had she said wrong? "That's not what I meant," Itachi needlessly clarified.

Oh. Oh! She should have taken more offence at being a guinea pig instead of thoughtlessly agreeing. Life already forfeit, poked, prodded, and stabbed, vials of blood drawn, she had forgotten that most probably hadn't accepted themselves as a lab rat. A retired lab rat that's temperament was apparently amusing enough to keep alive as a pet.

She forgot that people could care even if it was just her.

"I have a few books about the basics," Itachi continued, instantly flustering her. Had he seen Takuma-sensei, with her in tow, speaking with the librarian the other day? "Do you want to study with me?"

"Fantastic idea!" Shisui smiled, shoving Itachi a step forward. "You definitely need to hang out with some kids your own age. Can't have you sounding like a textbook." He'd be disappointed; she also got teased for that. Shisui's tone faded with his smile, replaced by something more thoughtful. "And, well, I'm not always here and your father's been busy lately."

A meaningful look passed between the two, meaning unreadable to her.

But slowly turning gears finally clicked into place.

She remembered where.

Chaos, screams piercing, howls shaking the air, a massive creature towered over the village as it rampaged. She had been stumbling through the rubble of unfamiliar streets as everything burned around her. This time, she had been alone. But then, suddenly, she wasn't. A boy blurring by, skidding and whipping around, windswept hair and glowing eyes above a tall collar, that half-second pause as he stared had lasted an eternity. His voice followed him with the wind as he vanished from sight.

"That way is safe."

She'd listened. She found another group of villagers evacuating while under the guard of Uchiha police. She had survived the Kyuubi's rampage only to be taken into custody.

Had that been him? The age matched up, but the details of a mostly obscured face only glimpsed for a second… His eyes certainly didn't match.

Demon eyes, her classmates sometimes taunted Izumi behind her back, afraid to face her.

"Even you can only do so much on your own," Shisui added before turning his attention to Renri. She accidentally froze, choked on her words. She needed to ask. He mistook wide-eyed admiration for shyness. "Sorry for pawning this bucket of fun off on you. Gotta enjoy my last evening of decent food, hot water, and an actual bed before shoving off at the crack of dawn tomorrow."

He vanished.

Renri blinked a few times. How had he done that? Not a puff of smoke, whirl of leaves, or even a dust cloud left behind, he just… Could he teleport or something? He had barely moved aside from a single wave. He left no trace. No sign he had ever been there. That… Had that been the reason she'd heard his name before? It seemed like a brag-worthy skill.

"I hadn't meant today," Itachi muttered, looking the direction of home, singed collar and mud and all.

Her voice returned before he could vanish as well. "Tomorrow after class, then?" Staring, perhaps glaring, at the water, "I need to keep practicing this." The point of the lesson… She would finish out the day, rest, and show her progress.

"Need to?

She opened and closed her mouth. "Yes," she eventually decided. "Need to."

She didn't want to disappoint.

Knuckles rapping lightly on the door, she waited for permission before even daring to reach for the handle. No blinding fluorescent light escaping under the door, she shifted her weight. Not in the middle of something delicate, at least, but likely busy none-the-less. Always busy. Not usually here, though. Not anymore. Straining to hear, no soft click of glass against glass. The expectant pause dragging a dare, she shifted to her other foot. Not asking again. Not losing nerve.

Finally, he said enter.

Door shoved open, held open to cast the hall in dim light, she squinted. Back to her but within sight, writing or reviewing notes.

"Orochimaru-sama."

"Renri."

Crack! Water clone bursting to coat the floor, she sucked in a breath, eyes forward. The door slammed shut with another ringing bang greatly exaggerated by her spiked heart rate. Swallowing harshly, moving only her eyes to the side, she saw a kunai stabbed into the wall beside her head. Would have been a direct hit to the clone. No wonder it became a messy puddle to clean.

Pouting, she pulled the kunai from the wall before re-opening the door, trudging through the puddle. "Did you know that one was the clone?" Her pout definitely escaped into her tone.

"Of course," he said, because of course he did. She returned the kunai to his waiting hand. He never gave her a second glance, returning to whatever he had been doing.

Under her breath, just to be spiteful, "I don't know if I believe you." She wasn't maimed. Should be proof enough. His quiet scoff told her to drop it or he'd reconsider.

Weaving the signs again, she managed to redo the clone using the water puddle. She had it go over to the sink and hop above it before she dismissed it in a semi-controlled manner. Clean glassware spotted with very contaminated water, she'd have to rewash them now. Not that any of what she had done had pulled his attention from his work.

She set to work on cleaning her mess regardless, quietly dragging over a stool so she could properly reach the counter, tying back her sleeves so they weren't in the way. She wasn't here to annoy him. Especially since he seemed in a decent mood.

"You caught onto that quicker than expected." Comment ambiguous, had he meant the technique or the trick or both? She at least found comfort in the complete lack of surprise in his tone.

"You gave me one of three seals," she mumbled, looking over her shoulder while trying to keep the sour expression from her face. Still writing. She scrubbed at the glass a little harder than necessary. Stupid thin little vials were the worst, but at least they were essentially already clean. Having to break out the gloves, deal with rinsing out blood and who-knows-what was never her favorite task.

"Oh?" Again, lacking surprise, but curious. Just not enough to look at her. "It doesn't seem like that kept you from learning it."

She let out a little huff through her nose. Drying the last vial, she answered, "The library still won't let me have anything above D-rank difficulty." Not unless she got Takuma-sensei to physically appear before the librarian to express his permission, and Takuma-sensei seemed reluctant. For now.

She wouldn't be sneaking in to take the information like Orochimaru had wanted.

Silence, she dropped off the stool to return it to where she found it. She stopped mid-reach, his attention finally hers. But the narrow of gold eyes wasn't chastising so much as pitying. A brief pause, his eyes shifted away, returning to his work.

"You will only waste your precious time playing by these rules." A warning, she stared at the harshly yellowed bruise on her arm. Another day or so, and it'd fade completely, time pressing forward. "Renri, your greatest flaw is how passive you are."

She hummed under her breath.

Fiddling with the ties, her sleeves draped back over her arms. Instead of returning the stool to its place, she set it in front of a row of specimen jars. Quietly studying them, stalling, she tapped lightly at the glass. She liked when she could tell what something was, these lumps of flesh rather… gross.

"What are they?" she eventually asked. Organs, probably, but she couldn't tell what from or what was wrong with them. Just that something was wrong. The splotches of color, uneven textures, rigid over squishy, some sliced in pieces… gross. Probably unhealthy. The more she looked, the more wrong they looked.

"A vexing case," he sighed, genuine, "from an experiment so close to reaching its fruition." Perhaps part of the reason he had decided to stick around the village was this. Maybe he was going to have Anko help with it, too.

Her eyes flickered to him. He usually elaborated more than that, indulging her morbid curiosity until he found some detail that made her squeamish- if he could. Odd… but still something he literally left sitting out in the open for anyone to see.

"I am busy," he lightly reminded as she began to overstay her welcome. "Had you only come to show off the clone?"

She fought frowning. His words, his tone now bordering disinterested despite earlier praise for the accomplishment… She didn't like how easy it was for him to poke and prod her to get her to do what he wanted- and that, currently, was asking her question without needlessly stalling.

She spun around on the stool, swinging her legs when the excitement demanded movement. "I'm going to start learning genjutsu. Uchiha Itachi asked me to study with him." Hand stopping for a moment, she tilted her head to the side. No idea what to make of it, especially as he returned to writing the next second. "He gave me the full set of seals for the water clone," she added, too pleased with herself. She made a friend and didn't have to break any rules. So, there. Quieter, still with a smile while fiddling with the ends of her hair, "I'm jealous of him."

Severely so. Perhaps she would be as bitter as some of their classmates if she wasn't so passive. Instead, she found herself envious and endeared, at the crossroad between, yet not indifferent. He was interesting. And nice.

"He is quite the genius, even among the Uchiha."

An odd mix, she couldn't pick anything certain out of the comment. Something positive. Approval, maybe? Always more than what was said, context and subtext…

She gave up. Too many pieces missing, and Orochimaru said a lot of weird things. Probably best not to ask. Knowledge is powerful, he had warned her a few times, and she wasn't yet strong enough.

So, she finally asked her question.

"Could you teach me about juinjutsu?"