"There's still a part that lives inside
My heart that hopes to be
By your side until you reach the end,
No matter what I am by then,
I'll always be your friend."
-His Theme, Lizz Robinett
Matsu leaned down, head between his knees, and closed his eyes.
The gnawing ache in his stomach was an old friend. The kind that pulled up a chair when told to go away, that always popped up just as he started to relax.
Sometimes it brought along dizziness and exhaustion and they threw a party in his head.
"It's her," Enyo said.
Matsu lifted his head.
His half-brother stood in front of the only window in the room. Cracks crept up the glass.
"Remem—Rem—I told you when she saved me. I came back dirty and lost your knife?" Enyo asked.
"Remember," Matsu said absently, forcing his eyes open. It took a second for the dots to connect.
Another to remember why the Wolf of the Rain would look for him.
Why he hid here when anything of value had already been taken. Why he ignored that the front door was folded in half and how he could see rotted wires in the ceiling if he looked up.
Matsu shot forward, snagged the back of Enyo's shirt, and pulled him down.
He wanted to look out, to see her for himself, but knew he wouldn't be able to. There was a permanently fuzzy dot at the center of his vision. It made picking out people from the third floor nearly impossible. He'd be lucky if he could point out any non-moving objects.
Matsu couldn't cover Enyo's mouth fast enough to stifle his yelp, and his eyes shot to the door. His heartbeat was too loud and he wished it would be quiet so he could think.
Enyo wiggled his head free. "What was that for—" he stopped, annoyance melting away as his brother searched his face. "What's goin' on?"
"We need to hide," Matsu said, swaying as he used the wall to stand.
It was supposed to be different with the Akatsuki in charge.
Somewhere down the line, he'd come to rely on them. They brought him fish and he stopped scavenging for half-eaten trash, stopped setting up traps that almost never worked. He knew better, but he let himself depend on them to survive.
After Shido Valley he'd had to relearn how to trade and barter and lie, because the Akatsuki stopped helping them. He re-remembered what it felt like balancing on the line of starvation (finding enough to keep Enyo strong and himself alive).
It was harder than the first time.
So many thought they gave up and gave up on them, too.
He might've done so himself if he hadn't seen how hard Enyo cried for Kota. Or if he never saw the clouds part (too fast to be anything but ninjutsu) and watched the sun appear. Enyo had thrown his fist up and cheered until he lost his voice.
He remembered the others that stood, finding sudden strength in weak bodies. The way mouths had fallen open and eyes widened as the rain stopped. He'd never forget the silence, the shock in the air, and then the roar, because the Akatsuki's victory was theirs too.
It was the closest Matsu ever felt to loyal to this place. But maybe he'd been wrong to believe in them again. Nothing really changed after that.
Matsu took a step away from the wall, towards the back of the room, and crumpled.
Enyo hovered in front of him as he managed to sit up, elbows bruised and breathing hard.
There was no running from a ninja. All he could do was hide and he couldn't even do that.
"Hide from her?" Enyo asked in disbelief, eyes wide.
Matsu watched Enyo's eyes drift to the door. He watched confusion flit across his face, then a frown, narrow-eyed anger and finally, blank acceptance.
It reminded Matsu of his early days on the streets when their clothes were stolen, when he trusted the word of a butcher (if he helped to keep the crowd back, he'd be fed) only to be burned. How Enyo was there for every betrayal until Matsu became the liar, the cheat.
Enyo was only nine, but he was used to being hurt.
Matsu propped himself up against the wall and felt an ache in his chest that had nothing to do with hunger or fear or how weak he was. "Run, Enyo. She won't chase you."
Enyo looked at him and Matsu thought that most of the time, his brother acted his age.
He still had trouble with his words because Matsu chose survival over grammar lessons. He liked to collect rocks. He cried when Matsu gutted a fish in front of him.
And yet, rarely, Enyo had a look like this. It reminded Matsu that while he'd been tossed down into the gutter of the village, he'd known a life before the war and before their mother died.
Enyo was raised in the gutter. It was all he knew.
Matsu looked at his brother and knew he didn't really know what he was capable of.
His brother shook his head once and didn't speak.
Matsu reached out, faltered, and managed to flick his cheek.
Enyo flinched back, the look in his eyes vanishing. He rubbed his cheek and frowned.
"You're too good for me, you know that?" Matsu said.
Enyo looked away. "Why's she want you?"
Matsu dropped his hand. "Because..." Because I'm a bastard.
He always thought his brother resembled their mother more than he ever did. He had her chestnut skin.
Enyo leaned close. "Somethin' you're hidin' from me?"
Matsu tilted his head back. What would you think if you knew I was related to someone so hated?
"Do you think I look like anyone you've seen, Enyo?" he asked.
It's because he didn't give a damn about me that we ended up this way.
Enyo's brows furrowed. "Me? Your eyes look like rocks, like mine. Who else?"
Matsu laughed so hard his stomach hurt.
The door cracked as someone leapt through the space between the bent part and the ceiling and the Wolf of the Rain landed soundlessly in the room.
Matsu's breath caught.
She faced them, looking at him, then at Enyo. Her stare lingered on him. "You're with...?"
She was... different, from the last time they met.
Her scarf made her stand out back then, but now it was absent. Her flower crown was gone, too. Hair loose instead of braided. Purple eyes when they used to be black.
Her smile was bittersweet. "Of course you are."
Matsu shifted between her and Enyo, ignoring his brother furiously wiping his eyes with his shirt. "I won't resist," he said quickly. "But Enyo hasn't done anything. Let him go."
She lifted her right hand and it was like she didn't hear him.
Matsu braced, readying himself to shove Enyo away from whatever jutsu she threw at him, but it never came. He caught her staring at the twine looped a few times around her wrist, swore he imagined her shaky, slow exhale.
The twine was worn, fibers unraveling, but wait, was that—
Enyo threw a knife. Matsu didn't notice until she jerked suddenly to the side and the point thudded into the wall behind her.
Strands of cut hair floated down.
Matsu inhaled. He twisted and caught Enyo's wrist as he started to pull another out from under his shirt.
"You don't use those on ninja," he whisper-hissed.
Enyo struggled and tried to push past him. "I wish we didn' meet ever," he shouted. "I hate you!"
Matsu tensed, expecting retribution when he glanced back, but she wasn't looking at them.
She held the cut ends between her fingers. "When did it get so long?" she mused.
"Enyo, for once, listen to me," Matsu said. "You have to live—"
The door groaned, scraping against the floor as it was pushed open, and Matsu went still.
A red head squeezed through the narrow space, taller and older than he remembered. He and the paper girl used to bring them fish most often.
The Wolf of the Rain turned to him and they stared at each other.
Matsu shoved a hand over Enyo's mouth and didn't make a sound. It took all the strength he had to keep his brother pinned.
He thought the red head came to stop her, but instead he looked away first and only sat. His expression told Matsu he wouldn't interfere.
Matsu should've known better. He should've known he could only rely on himself. How many more times would it take for him to learn that?
The Wolf of the Rain turned back to Matsu, stared at him with those empty eyes of hers, and then left the room.
Enyo stopped fighting him and Matsu felt relieved, bewildered, confused—
"Why?" he blurted out. He instantly wished he could take it back.
The red head glanced at him. "I don't know," he said, then stood and followed her out.
.
.
.
Sitting at the edge of a roof, legs over the side, I rubbed cut strands between my fingers.
I didn't pay much attention to my hair after Konan died.
She'd fix my braid when it came loose, force me to sit so she could finger-comb through tangles, scrub out dirt with water and determination.
If she were here, she'd chastise me for having split ends, for letting it get so dry and brittle. She'd tell me I should've taken better care of it and that I was lucky, because she always wanted long hair.
It still stung, like a half-healed cut under scalding water.
The tap of Naga's sandals behind me was barely audible. He sat next to me, crossed his legs, and looked down at a pile of rubble. The top two floors of what used to be a tower jutted out the top. The road sparkled with old glass and four civilians crouched in the shade beneath a rusted, metal overhang.
I stared up at the sun, half-hidden behind a cloud, and thought of the mission to Kusagakure. I wondered why I ever thought fixing Amegakure would be as simple as killing Hanzo.
I dropped my hand. "It took you a long time to find me."
"I knew where you were," he said vaguely.
I glanced at him, but he didn't say why he didn't come sooner or why he didn't send Namekuji. He looked further out, at the sea around the village.
"You told them to call me that. The 'Wolf of the Rain,'" I said.
Naga's smile was small. "I didn't tell them."
"You started it," I accused.
"It spread faster than I thought it would," he admitted. "But you've always been a wolf."
Was I?
Maybe when Kota was still alive, maybe when I used to bite.
But after Shido Valley I became something else. Something with longer claws and sharper teeth. Something that didn't have fur so much as armor, just under my skin.
A monster that couldn't kill a little boy and his brother because of a necklace.
Maybe it fit, after all.
"I stayed away because I almost did what you did and it terrified me," he said in a breathless rush. "Yahiko—when he told me someone tried to kill you—" his fists clenched. "He stopped me. But right before he did, it was like I was someone else. Someone who could kill. Someone who would if it protected you."
He dropped his head in his hands. "It's not the first time. It happened with Usagi. Guilt tore me up inside after, but in the moment, when I saw what she'd done to you—I didn't hesitate. I know all the pressure points in the body. I know how hard to hit the cervical nerve to make someone pass out. Why didn't I try something nonlethal?" he asked, breathing hard. "It happened with Minato, too. It was like I became someone else. If Yahiko wasn't there—if Minato was weaker—I would've killed him, Oka."
I watched him bend down, head against his knees. He shuddered. "Not-Madara. The shinobi we fought. How many people did we hurt? I saw people that were still alive, but I didn't help them. Why didn't I?" he asked himself. His voice wobbled. "I became a medic-nin to help as many people as I could, even if it was hard. Why did I let them die?"
I felt like I was six again. It was the last time I heard him cry like this. His whole body shook as he sobbed and I thought, You didn't cry this hard for Konan.
And I remembered that, even now, he never found a place to plant the lilies for her and Kota and Osamu. I watched a big, white cloud cover the sun and wondered if he ever mourned for them.
He cried in Shikkotsu, but not after that. Not when we found Kota and Osamu. Not when Yahiko almost died to the triplets' poison. Not when Hanzo was finally, finally dead.
I listened to him gasp, trying, failing to catch his breath. A long time ago, he told me that the only way to live with the bad things I felt was to push them down and ignore them.
Later, he told me that was bad because it only made how he felt worse. But he never really stopped following his own advice, had he?
Maybe it was easier back then to only feel grief on a surface level. Maybe if Naga had mourned then it would've broken him, too.
Even while he trained me, while he helped Yahiko look for hideouts, he was holding himself together like a house made of glass and tape. He thought he had to be strong, I knew, so Yahiko could be weak.
I heard his fear of himself through his tears, but mostly I heard glass breaking, tape snapping, crystals shattering into thousands of tiny pieces next to me.
"Nothing is wrong with you," I said.
Have you ever let yourself be angry, Naga?
He didn't hear me, but I thought of the men who threatened to cut off his hand, so long ago. The shinobi who killed our faceless parents. Why he had to steal at all.
Because it was unfair. Because it was so, so unfair.
But what I couldn't remember was Naga ever expressing his anger. He was sad when Tsunade left, but not angry. Not really. He was worried for me, even after a wild paper bomb permanently scarred him.
He was hurt the most by a fight we weren't in, but he was never angry. Even when it hurt to move the left side of his body, even if, no matter how much he healed himself, the scars would never completely go away.
Only in battle did he let that anger slip out. Then he locked it back up and pretended it didn't exist.
"It's not someone else," I said, lying back on the rooftop. "It's you."
"I'm not—that isn't me," he said with more force than he meant to, I think.
"'It's okay to be angry,'" I recited. "You said that to me once, but it was about being sad. You're like the geysers in Yugakure, Naga. You hold everything down inside until you explode."
Naga jerked up, staring at me, tears on his face, hard denial in his eyes. "I'm not angry," he said raggedly. "I never was angry and there's nothing—there's nothing that will make me angry enough to be like that."
Liar.
I looked back at him. "You're right. You don't get angry, Naga. You hate."
He drew back.
"I hate so much I could drown the village in it. We killed Hanzo and I still hate him. I don't know what to do with it, sometimes," I admitted. "But I still let myself feel it. You hate more than I do, Naga. You remember more than me."
His eyes widened. His shoulders hunched and he turned away from me.
If he were born somewhere else, they'd use his kindness. They'd take advantage of him until he broke, and then he'd turn out worse than me.
I mused that if our parents had their way and Naga was a civilian, he'd be dead by now. As a shinobi, they turned him into a human-sized paper bomb, just waiting to detonate.
"I didn't notice before," I said. I believed you when you said you wouldn't, anymore. "And I'm sorry. You've been angry for so long, Naga."
"I'm not—" he broke off, looking suddenly exhausted. "That's not who I want to be," he said quietly.
I stared at a kunai-shaped cloud. "It'll happen again," I told him. "It'll happen over and over and over until one day, when you explode, it'll be with blood instead of tears."
What kind of monster could my brother be if he didn't reign himself in so tightly?
He flinched. "No, it won't," he said, harsher than I ever heard him. "It won't."
"It will," I said back. Naga hated more, but he didn't know it like I did.
Hate was there with me in that alley, just before Yahiko threw his rock. It sat in a cave with me after Naga, Konan, and Yahiko left me behind to steal food. It laughed when I loved Chibi and laughed harder when he was dead.
It loomed over me when Konan died and clapped when I killed the shinobi at Antei outpost, only slightly smaller than I was.
Hate was my second-oldest friend.
Naga would hate a little more, be able to contain it a little less each time he cracked. Then, eventually, he wouldn't be able to contain it at all.
He looked at me and maybe he knew it too because he sagged. "I don't know how to hate," he said.
"Think of something bad that happened," I suggested, tilting my head his way.
Naga was silent. "I don't know if you remember the picture book I used to read to you about the princess from across the sea. I thought about it a lot while you were gone. I'm not sure why."
"If it wasn't for Mama and Papa, you wouldn't be holding back so much hate in the first place," I said.
Naga frowned. His eyes drifted away from mine. "I think it might've been a journal, not a book," he said idly. "The only way to know would be if we had history books from each country. And time to read them."
He didn't want to be angry.
"If Tsunade stayed, Konan would still be alive," I said.
Naga faltered.
It was how I felt, but it stung a little, too. I looked back at the sky instead of facing his hurt because he'd only keep holding himself back if I stopped.
"If—If we could find a map from back then—"
"It wasn't fair to you," I cut him off. "You had to stop Yahiko from going too far ever since Konan died. It should've been Mamoru-sensei, or Joji, or Etsudo. It never should've been you or me. But it was."
You taught Maho, too, even as you hid your grief in the dark space you put your hate.
"Maybe they—"
"They didn't," Naga hissed. His voice shook.
I didn't look at him. "Maybe if any of the adults stayed or stepped up, things would've ended differently."
I didn't blame Mamoru-sensei, Joji, or Etsudo for believing Yahiko or following him. I thought of Mamoru-sensei, who'd just lost his arm, his friends, and his village when we found him. Etsudo, who spent days and days on the couch, not moving.
How could Joji have led the Akatsuki when civilians didn't know shinobi code?
But it was easy for me not to blame them. Naga, Konan, and Yahiko had to be the adults. They gave out fish and earned the trust of civilians. They became relied on, looked up to.
The only thing I did was find Kota and catch fish.
I glanced at him. His head was down, fingers digging in his hair. He fought to control his breathing.
"If you knew this was what being a medic-nin was like, would you have done it?"
Naga took a breath, leaned forward, and screamed as loud as he could. It was a war cry, a shout of rage, a howl of despair, all wrapped up in one broken note. It was a drop of the hate my brother had carried around for years.
He screamed until his voice broke, and then he screamed more.
.
.
.
I heard the civilians before I saw them.
They stood in front of our hideout in a half-circle around Yahiko. Mamoru-sensei stood to his right, hand in his pocket, lazily scanning the crowd.
Looking for shinobi. Or Root.
"How long do you expect us to live like this?" a man asked, raising his voice to be heard over the others. "Where is the change you promised—"
Yahiko's gaze moved up, away from them and to the sky.
"Whatever you have, please share it," a woman interrupted him. "My husband—he's wasting away—"
I counted fourteen of them. Sleeves had been ripped off and wrapped around feet to protect them from the sand and heat. Some of the wraps were too thin to cover their entire foot, and I knew if I looked, the exposed skin would be burned.
Even with chakra as a barrier between my feet and the sand it was uncomfortably warm.
"All that big talk about being different than Hanzo, but now we're worse off than we were—"
Next to me, at the back of the group, Naga frowned. He'd healed his damaged vocal cords, but his throat was still too sore to talk. Maybe if it wasn't he'd intervene.
"My family—they're gone. I'm the only one left. Please, I don't want to die like they did—"
"I'm working on it," Yahiko said. He looked like he hadn't slept in days and I remembered what he told me about Emon and stress.
How did it make him feel to be reminded of the promises he didn't make anymore? To see dirty, old clothes and gaunt faces and keep the mission to Kusagakure a secret?
Mamoru-sensei didn't see Root, but what if they were just good at hiding?
What would Konohagakure do if they knew about the deal Yahiko made? If they knew Kusagakure had little to no shinobi and fields and fields of rice they didn't need?
If Konohagakure killed Shinnai, Kanae, and stole our rice, all the civilians and shinobi forced to retire would die.
And then how would I make Konan's dream come true?
A woman at the back of the crowd noticed us and fear flashed across her face. I wondered if she knew about Antei already.
"We've all been eating rats and bugs while you've been well fed—"
Yahiko didn't look down.
"Help him," Naga signed.
A quarter of the crowd had noticed us.
I hummed. Help him how?
If it were me standing on the top step of our hideout, I wouldn't tell them either.
Maybe they'd think I didn't trust them, maybe they'd think I was just like Hanzo, but it would hard enough for Shinnai and Kanae without painting targets on them.
Hate me if you want, but I'd feed you all.
"We don't have an exact time frame, but there'll be a grain delivery coming in from Kusagakure soon," Mamoru-sensei said, making the decision for Yahiko.
He had the attention of the crowd in an instant.
Yahiko turned and disappeared down the steps without a word.
I followed him, the civilians murmuring to each other in stunned silence. I heard someone question why Yahiko hadn't told them. Another asked why it was a secret, why the news wasn't spread to give everyone a little more hope.
Yahiko leaned against the wall next to the dim lantern, head tilted back, eyes closed.
Naga soundlessly followed me down.
"Everything I wanted, right?" Yahiko asked. His fingers curled.
"I shouldn't have left," Naga rasped, then winced.
I didn't know how to help him. I couldn't talk Chiefs and Kage into doing what I wanted.
I could help sort messages, but only ones written with words I knew. Words that stuck from what Naga taught me and what I remembered from his textbook.
And even then, Yahiko or Naga looked over them first. What could I do to make Yahiko less tired?
"Tell me how to help you," I said, because I didn't have an answer.
Yahiko glanced at me, then at the wall. "I should get back to work."
"You can't," Naga signed. "Because I'm taking over as Amekage."
Yahiko slowly shook his head. "I'm going to think of a title, and it won't be that," he said, flat when he meant for lighthearted.
"Mamoru-sensei should do it," I said.
He crossed his arms. "He won't. He's been different since the bastard died. Might have to do with a local wolf who told him that the dead wouldn't want to see him, but who knows?"
"You make it sound like I brought it up."
"It won't be permanent," Naga signed. "I'm trying to be better about taking on too much. But you can't do this alone."
Yahiko considered this. "I don't think you can 'take turns' being a Kage."
"Why not? We don't have to follow the rules of other countries," Naga protested with complicated hand motions.
Yahiko tapped his chin. "Did you know Rain Country has a Daimyo?"
Naga blinked, hands lowering.
"I thought it was just a Fire Country thing, but no. Apparently almost every country with a shinobi village is ruled by a Daimyo."
"Distraction," I said.
"The Daimyo has no say in what we do," Naga signed, attempting to regain control of the conversation.
"Well," Yahiko said. "Kind of. He's supposed to."
"Supposed to?" I asked.
"Usually, the Daimyo is the economic leader of a country. Controls how much a village is funded and how many missions they get and stuff. But our Daimyo doesn't have that much power," Yahiko explained. "There's not many places to collect money from in Rain Country. Only Amegakure as far as I know. The bastard paid a monthly 'tithe' and our Daimyo didn't look too closely here. It was suspended when it became too dangerous to send someone to collect it. He doesn't know the bastard's dead."
"You're stepping down from being Amekage," Naga signed.
"Taiyōkage," Yahiko corrected. "And only the Daimyo in the biggest countries can name Kage."
"Who cares what they think?"
Yahiko looked at the ceiling. "You say that until I have their attention for calling myself that."
"You keep letting him distract you," I told Naga.
Naga frowned. "You don't want me to be Taiyōkage?"
Yahiko dropped his hand and shook his head. "You're my best friend, but we see things differently. I don't want to give mixed signals to potential allies."
Naga raised his hands, lowered them, then raised them again. "We're not that different."
Yahiko stared away from him and didn't respond.
I shrugged. "Either Amegakure has no leader, or you let Naga try."
Yahiko blinked at me. "Why does that sound suspiciously like a threat?"
I smiled, "Because it is."
He blinked again. "What if I pick neither?"
My smile widened, all teeth. "Are you sure?"
Yahiko shot Naga a concerned look. "Make her stop doing that."
"Can't hear you," Naga signed. He made no attempt to cover his ears.
Yahiko slowly shook his head, eyes on the ceiling. "Betrayed by my own flesh and blood."
"Talking isn't working, so I'll just make you," I decided.
Yahiko's eyebrows furrowed. After as second he sighed loudly and slid down against the wall. "If I lose potential allies over this, I'll be angry at both of you. For at least a week."
"Don't make the same mistake the Salamander did," Mamoru-sensei said. He stood halfway down the stairs, the hatch above him closed. "Keeping secrets from civilians will only isolate you from them. You need them. If you lose them, they'll only stand behind someone else."
Another 'Akatsuki', another group that thought change was easy.
Mamoru-sensei had had a front row seat to watch the tide of civilians turn against Hanzo.
Except I wasn't Hanzo. I wouldn't go down easy.
Yahiko's humor vanished. "Don't compare me to that bastard."
I'd still keep Shinnai and Kanae and Kusagakure a secret, because there'd be no one to stand up to us if everyone died of hunger or fled.
"We won't," Naga signed.
Mamoru didn't respond to either of them. He only stepped down and walked past us.
A/N: A shadow of who Nagato could've been (was) if things went a little more left.
Taiyōkage - Sun Shadow
Bonus points for anyone who knows what a tithe is.