Kyoko didn't remember it being this hard to learn doton before. Granted, she had already been a chunin and nine years old by the time she started trying, but it hadn't been this hard and it hadn't hurt sat slumped in front of all the crumbled dirt that had refused to form properly and massaged her aching palms.

"Spar?"

She jerked, looking up and twisting. Kakashi always had been able to sneak up on her. "You're back," she said needlessly.

He nodded, gaze roving over the disturbed earth around her and the redness to her hands. "Just a few minutes ago. Spar?"

She blinked at him and then shifted around to face him better, dropping her hands to her knees. "No. I can fix up that leg, though."

His eyes narrowed. "How can you tell?"

"I can always tell," she said instead of pointing out that he normally wore shorts instead of pants taped around his ankles. She retrieved her medical scroll from a kunai pouch. "Well?"

He huffed and stepped closer before sitting down in front of her. After a moment, he cocked his head and pressed a hand against the ground. One doton jutsu later, the dirt was smooth again.

She wrinkled her nose. "Show off."

He looked pleased as he started peeling the tape around his right ankle. Once his pant leg was free, he rolled it up to expose his bandaged and braced knee.

"What did you do?" she asked, putting a hand over his knee and starting a diagnostic jutsu.

"Messed up," he said between gritted teeth.

She glanced up at him.

"Thought I could make a jump to follow someone getting away. Missed it. We lost him."

"Ah." She started pulling together the muscles in his knee, stitching where they'd torn from the strain. He hissed, and she took a moment to try to soothe warm chakra through the joint. "I'm patching you back together," she explained. "You'll still have to go easy on it for a couple days."

"You're better at this than Rin," he remarked.

Her fingers flinched around his knee. She swallowed. "Rin is going to be better than me."

He tilted his head just a touch. "You think so?"

"I know so."

"Huh." He leaned back on his hands and watched as she continued to work. After a minute, he said, "Doton?"

"I'm trying," she mumbled, finishing her chakra treatment. She then moved to re-bracing his knee. "It's not my strong suit, apparently."

"Are you trying to start with a wall?" he asked. When she looked up at him, he looked doubtful. Instead of waiting for her to respond, he continued, "You should be starting smaller." As she packed her supplies away, he sat up and started taping down his pant leg again. "I can show you."

She looked at him for a moment and then nodded, laying back on the ground and tucking her hands behind her head. "Sure," she said, staring up at the clouds. "But not today. You just got back from a mission."

He snorted. "I'm fine."

She hummed in response. She'd heard that from Kakashi a lot after missions; telling him to rest was muscle memory.

"Alright. Fine." He hit the ground loudly as he flopped onto his back. "When we train tomorrow, I'll show you. And make sure you aren't messing up your tanto stances again."

"I appreciate it," she murmured. "We're meeting here?"

"We always meet here."

"I know." She moved one hand to pull up the grass at her hip. "I guess I'm just wondering why you never train at your house. You have a training ground there."

"Yeah, I do."

He didn't say anything else. She ended up pulling up a whole pile of grass. A cloud above them looked like one of Shisui's crows.

"There you are!"

At the sound of Rin's voice, Kyoko sat up in alarm. She turned to find her brother's teammate and her brother himself jogging towards them from the edge of the training ground. Obito's eyes widened and then narrowed. "Kyoko? What are you doing here?"

She held her breath, fingers curling and uncurling. "Training," she said honestly. "Or I was. Earlier."

"Here?" Obito accused. He shot a look at Kakashi. "Whyhere?"

Rin looked nervously between her teammates. Fluttering her hands at them, she said. "We're all going to dinner with sensei. You ran off before we'd decided, Kakashi-kun."

"Oh." Kakashi pushed himself to his feet, dusting off his pants. "Okay. Sorry."

Rin nodded and bit her lip, looking towards Kyoko. "Do you want to come with us?"

Kyoko stole another glance at her brother. He looked upset, but he still looked a bit hopeful. "Thank you. I will." She moved to walk at her brother's side.

They were almost home when Obito finally brought it up, interrupting her telling him about her lessons with Kushina.

"So why were you training in Bakashi's training ground?"

She pressed her lips together and stared straight ahead, unable to look at him when he was upset with her. "I was training."

"In Bakashi's training ground," he repeated.

"It's a public training ground."

"Yeah. That Bakashi trains in."

"His name is Kakashi."

Obito sucked in a breath loudly. "Yeah? And?" he asked, voice rising.

"And sometime we train together." She wanted so desperately to be able to look at him. Her shoulders were drawing tight.

"Why?" he demanded.

"Because I want to. And he can help me with things like my tanto."

Obito stopped walking. "I can help you with things."

She stared at his feet. "I know."

"Why don't you ask me to train with you instead? I can help!"

"But I don't want to train with you. I want to train with Kakashi."

The moment the words were out of her mouth, she wanted to swallowed them back up. She wanted to take back the snap to them. She wanted to be able to look her brother in the eye and apologize. She wondered what his expression was. Probably hurt. Definitely hurt.

"Why would you—"

"I made tea."

Kyoko jerked her stare up at her father's voice. He was standing a just a bit away, halfway between them and the house's engawa. His brow was creased as he looked from Obito to her and back again.

Obito turned from him to frown at Kyoko, mouth opening again.

"I'm glad you're home, Obito. How was your mission?"

Obito hunched his shoulders and shuffled for the house. "Good," he muttered. "I don't want tea."

"I think it will help you," Kagami said, dropping a hand on Obito's head as his son passed him and running his fingers briefly through his hair. "You too, Kyoko. And maybe you can both explain what's going on."

"Nothing's going on," Kyoko said, stepping slowly to join them.

"It sounds like something's going on," Kagami countered. "Let's go inside. Shisui's waiting."

At that, Obito perked up a bit and sped up ahead of them. He threw the door open and disappeared inside.

Kyoko lingered, and Kagami slowed to meet her there. She took a breath and looked up. "I didn't want him to know that I train with Kakashi."

"Ah."

"I didn't mean it, you know. That I don't want to train with him. I just . . . don't want to stop training with Kakashi."

"I see. Maybe you should try explaining that to him."

"He won't see the difference."

He frowned. "I think you aren't giving your brother enough credit. He'll never understand if you don't give him the opportunity to."

Shisui appeared at the front door. "Kyoko!" he yelled. "Why're you so slow?"

She couldn't help a smile. "I'm coming!" She started walking again.

Kagami closed the door behind them once they were inside. "Obito," he called. "Go ahead and pour a cup for each of us."

"Shisui already did," Obito said. He had his chair tilted onto its back legs. His cup sat untouched on the table, but he had an onigiri in his hands.

"I see you found the food Shisui made."

"You made this, Shisui?" Obito asked around a mouthful. "You're gettin' good."

"Itadakimasu, Shisui," Kyoko said, taking the seat next to him and picking up her cup.

Shisui shouldered her roughly, grinning. "I unlocked my chakra today!"

She straightened. "Did you?" she asked, activating her sharingan—one tomoe, just one—to look at his chakra system. It was alight, more similar to the bustling brightness she was used to from him despite lacking the depth of his future reserves.

"Yep! Obasan said I'm a natural. Look!" He pressed his hand to one of the small, empty plates. His chakra kept the dish there as he lifted his hand up and shook it. "I'll be tree-walking tomorrow!"

"Soon," Kagami corrected. "I don't know about tomorrow."

"Kyoko hates me," Obito announced to the table.

"Obito," Kagami said reproachfully. "You know that's not true. Don't start this conversation by saying that."

Kyoko wished that Obito had stabbed her instead. It would have hurt less. "I don't hate you," she whispered. Her eyes hurt, and she almost felt like she needed to check that she hadn't slipped into her mangekyo. "I love you." He knew that, right? He'd known that last time, right?

Obito slumped low in his seat and crossed his arms. "You don't hate me," he agreed. "You don't like me," he said instead.

Shisui looked confused. "That's stupid," he contributed.

"Obito, why don't you explain what happened," Kagami interrupted. "Without assuming how Kyoko feels."

Obito wrinkled his nose. Then he sat up. "Yeah. Fine. Kyo-chan's been meeting with Bakashi behind my back because she thinks he's smarter and better and—"

"Without assuming what Kyoko is thinking, either."

"I'm not assuming!" Obito protested. "She said it!"

"That's not what I said," she protested. "And I didn't mean what I said, either."

"Then why'd you say it, huh?"

"Obito, please keep going," Kagami urged. "I still don't understand what happened."

Obito huffed a loud breath. "Kyoko's been training with Kakashi, and they didn't tell me."

Kagami waited for a moment. When Obito didn't continue, he said, "Which part is the issue: Kyoko training with your teammate or the fact that you didn't know?"

"Yes. Both. It—" Obito looked to the side, jaw squared. "Training with him's dumb."

"It's not," Kyoko defended.

"Kyoko, one moment." Kagami reached a hand towards her, resting it on the table between them, but didn't look away from Obito. "Obito, have you ever asked Kyoko about training together?"

"I didn't know they were!"

"I mean you. You and your sister training together. Did you ever ask her about that?"

"No."

"I'm sure she would like to."

"She doesn't." Obito's face screwed up. "Shesaidshe doesn't."

Kagami looked to her. "Kyoko," he prompted softly.

She took a breath and straightened, forcing herself to look her brother in the eye for the first time in over an hour. "Of course I want to train with you. But I don't want to give up training with Kakashi to do it."

His expression twisted further, and to her horror she realized his eyes were glassy. "Why? 'Cause you think he's so much better than me? He's dumb and arrogant and mean and—"

"Obito." Kagami sighed. "Kyoko, Shisui. Could you give us a moment?"

Kyoko hesitated even as Shisui stood and started piling onigiri on his plate to take with him. When her father nodded to her, she stood and left her tea behind as she retreated to her room. Once inside, she sat down against the closed door.

It was a technique Yuugao had taught her. People with rougher chakra control—like Gai or Asuma or even Kakashi, in this case—couldn't use it. Not that Kakashi really needed to; he'd always had hearing like a dog.

Kyoko pressed a small bit of chakra into her ears and leaned her head back against the door, closing her eyes to focus.

"—understand. I do," Kagami was saying. "But there's a line between disliking your teammate and hating him. Do you hate Hatake Kakashi?"

She could hear shuffling.

"Do you?"

"No."

"And do you hate Kyoko?"

"No! That's—"

"Okay. Then let's talk about why Kyoko might feel more comfortable seeking Kakashi out for training than asking you."

"She thinks I'm dumb."

"She doesn't. I know she doesn't. But I also know that the only person to have ever graduated earlier and faster than Kakashi is your sister. The only person to come close to her graduation score was your sensei, and even he didn't get the perfect score she did. No Uchiha in history has unlocked their sharingan quite as early as she has."

"I get it," Obito muttered. "Kyo-chan's a genius. I know that."

"Hmm. Don't you think that might be a little lonely?"

There was a pause before, "What?"

"Don't you think that might feel lonely? Being the only one like that? The only one her age doing these things. The only one ever, for some of them."

"I dunno. I . . . guess so."

"I would imagine that your teammate can probably understand more than anyone else. You've said he's a genius, too. Just like Kyoko."

"He'snotlike Kyoko. Bakashi's a jerk about it."

"Maybe. But how many people could understand him before Kyoko asked him to start training together?"

There was a long stretch of silence, and she wished she could see Obito's eyes.

"Kakashi's not taking Kyoko away, Obito-kun. You're not losing your sister. We're not losing anyone else." A chair scraped against the ground for just a moment. When Kagami spoke again, his voice was softer, and she had to focus more chakra to still hear him. "—okay. I know."

Obito made some sort of sound. It wasn't quite a word, but it wasn't quite a sob either.

"Sometimes it's easy to forget that Kyoko's still yourlittlesister, isn't it? You need to help me take care of her, right? She has a lot going on. You and I both know, I think, that something happened she isn't tell us about. I knowI'mworried. But . . . I think a friend is one of the things she needs most. Theotherthing she needs most is for her big brother to be there for her."

A sniffle. "Okay," Obito whispered. "Sorry."

"I don't need you to apologize for anything. I know it's a lot. But I love you."

"Love you," Obito said back, though it was muffled. "I love Kyoko, too."

Kyoko's ears hurt from the chakra strain of listening.

Her eyes hurt, too.