Chương 16: Disciple and Sword - 2

Time passed without announcing itself. By midmorning Shisui had migrated to a branch above the clearing, lying on his back with his head propped on one arm, eating something small and round that might have been a fruit. He was talking—half-sentences, nothing requiring an answer—while below him Shin threw shuriken until the sweat soaked through his shirt. The sun was overhead when a small object sailed down from the tree and knocked Shin's shuriken out of the air mid-flight. Shin turned. Shisui was sitting up now.

He pointed at the sun.

"You're throwing sideways," he said.

"Your wrist is giving out." Shin looked at his arm. Didn't argue. His legs found a patch of ground and folded under him, and he sat there with his hands braced behind him, breathing. Shisui dropped from the branch, landed without a sound, and crouched down in front of him.

"Come on." He extended a hand.

"Up." Shin took it. Stood. And then warmth flooded through him—not sunlight, something directed—spreading from Shisui's palm into his hand and up through his arm, moving through his chest and shoulders and the burn in his wrists. The sweat on his skin evaporated. He watched it happen, a thin curl of steam rising from his forearms.

"... What was that?"

"New application I've been developing." Shisui looked pleased with himself.

"Fire chakra. Controlled diffusion." He let go.

"Useful, right?"

"... Can I learn it?"

"Depends on your nature affinity. I run fire and wind, and fire chakra tends to be on the intense side." He pulled back.

"You'd need to get tested first. I'd guess you have water—your father's water jutsu was considered exceptional." Shin went still.

"You knew my father."

"Knew of him." Shisui scratched his chin.

"He didn't know me. I'm a generation younger." He saw the question forming and answered it first.

"Don't ask me to tell you about him—I don't have much to tell. We never spoke. By the time I made jonin, Tsukasa Takami had already stepped back from active service." Shin closed his mouth.

"You're young," Shisui said. His voice had gone quieter.

"You'll learn what you need to learn." He reached over and ruffled Shin's hair.

"Come on. I owe you lunch." Shin pushed his hand away.

"Don't touch my hair."

"Ha—" Shisui grinned.

"—haha. Okay. Okay, let's go." Konoha's market district.

"What do you want to eat?" Shisui walked with his arms folded behind his head, unhurried, letting Shin lead without quite letting him lead.

"What do you want?" Shin said, scanning the stalls as they passed.

"It's my treat. I'm asking you."

"I'll eat anything. Pick what you like."

"Generous of you." Shisui tilted his head, thinking. Then: "There's a dango shop around that corner. Let's go." Shin looked at him.

"... Dango is lunch?"

"Dango is absolutely lunch. You said you'd eat anything."

"I didn't expect—" Shin paused.

"Won't it be too sweet?"

"Uchiha like sweet things." Shisui said it like a fact.

"You didn't know?"

"Sasuke told everyone on the first day of school that he hated sweet things." Shisui stopped walking for a moment. Then he covered his mouth, shaking silently. Shin stared.

"... What."

"Nothing." Shisui composed himself with visible effort.

"Forget I said anything. Dango it is—come on." He caught Shin's elbow and steered him forward before any further objections could be lodged. The dango shop was small and unhurried, the kind of place that felt like it had been there longer than the village. Shisui pushed through the curtain and called out to the owner before they'd even found seats.

"Six skewers of the sweet bean. —You?" He glanced at Shin.

"Something less sweet. Or savory."

"Six more sweet bean," Shisui told the owner. Shin opened his mouth.

"Try it first," Shisui said.

"That's not what I—""I'm not letting you not try it. You're a child, you should eat sweet things." He settled into a seat with the easy authority of someone who frequented this place.

"Sit down." Find this and other great novels on the author's preferred platform. Support original creators! Shin sat. Four plates arrived. He looked at them. Across the shop, another customer—young, short-haired, a woman—sat behind a mountain of empty plates, working through another stack without apparent urgency.

"... There are others like you," Shin said. Shisui glanced over and smiled at his food.

"Why do you like sweet things so much?" Shin asked.

"Why would anyone prefer bitter?" Shisui picked up a skewer. Shin didn't have an answer to that. Shisui's smile softened slightly—something happening behind it that didn't quite surface.

"You're still young," he said.

"You'll understand eventually. There are days when something sweet is the best thing in the world." Shin said nothing. He'd read about Shisui. Not much, but enough. Shisui of the Body Flicker was a name that had come up in conversations about the Third Shinobi War—the kind of war that left people with specific ideas about sweetness and what it meant. Shin's previous life had been comfortable. Inheritance and insulation and nothing to want for. He didn't have a reference point. He picked up a skewer.

He ate two of them. The rest disappeared into Shisui at a pace that suggested he hadn't eaten since yesterday.

"That was good." Shisui sat back and pressed a hand to his stomach with deep satisfaction. Shin looked at the mostly-empty plates.

"You said you were taking me to lunch."

"I did take you to lunch. You ate."

"Two skewers."

"And they were very nice skewers." Shisui waved this away.

"If you're still hungry we'll go somewhere else."

"I'm not hungry."

"You trained all morning. You're hungry." He was already standing.

"Come on."

"This sake is excellent." Shisui was half-reclined in his seat, turning a cup in his fingers. In front of Shin: a small plate of snacks he had no appetite for. Around them: an izakaya, midday and quiet.

"You brought me to a bar."

"I brought you to a restaurant that serves excellent sake." Shisui closed his eyes, savoring.

"The food here is also good. You should eat."

"You wanted to drink."

"I wanted good sake and lunch. These are compatible desires." He cracked one eye open.

"You're not going to drink, obviously."

"I wasn't planning to."

"Good." Shin looked at the sake cup. Looked at Shisui. Looked away.

"You have something this afternoon," he said.

"Drinking won't affect that?"

"You're underestimating my capacity."

"I didn't say I was worried." Shisui smiled, genuine and a little delighted.

"I know." He set the cup down. Let the silence settle—the comfortable kind, nothing requiring filling.

"Hey." His voice came out quieter.

"Shin Takami."

"What." Shisui looked at the sake cup without picking it up. His expression had gone somewhere slightly elsewhere—not sad, exactly. Somewhere with distance in it.

"Do you have something you're aiming for?"

"A goal?"

"A dream." He looked up. His eyes curved into a question.

"What do you want?" Shin didn't answer immediately.

"Why are you asking?"

"You're more or less my student," Shisui said.

"Humor me." A beat.

"... You could say," Shin said, slow, "that I want to keep living like this. Quietly. Without anything breaking." The words sounded ordinary. He meant them completely. Shisui went still. Then he laughed—soft, short, something wrapped in it that wasn't quite sadness.

"That's a good thing to want." He reached over and rested his palm on Shin's head for just a moment before Shin could stop him.

"All right." He pulled back.

"We're done here." He stood. Shrugged on his coat. Looked down at Shin with something that didn't announce itself.

"My good disciple." The waterfall in the forest north of Konoha was loud enough to feel in your chest. Itachi stood at the edge of the spray, watching the young man in front of him.

"You've been drinking," he said. Shisui shook his head, the ghost of a smile on his face.

"I'm fine." A pause.

"You went to see Shin Takami," Itachi said. Not a question.

"... Ah." Shisui blinked, as if that surprised him.

"I'm not the only one who knows now." Itachi exhaled slowly.

"Your situation is sensitive enough as it is. He's the top student at the Academy. Being seen with you could cause problems for him." Silence stretched between them.

"It's fine," Shisui said quietly, eyes drifting to the waterfall.

"I won't be sensitive much longer."

"..."

"Soon I'll change all of this." The wind picked up without warning. The trees around them shuddered, branches bending, leaves tearing loose and spiraling into the current of white noise. Itachi went still.

"... Shisui." He couldn't stop himself.

"Do you think we'll actually succeed?" Shisui turned to face him. In the dim light, the eyes that met his were the deep red of old blood — and within them, those cold, slow-blooming flowers were already open.

"Of course we will," Shisui said. The Academy classroom smelled like chalk dust and someone's lunch.

"Clone Jutsu," Iruka said from the front of the room, "is the technique of using chakra to produce a perfect duplicate of yourself. The goal is misdirection — the clone looks identical, and to an opponent with no sensory abilities, it's nearly impossible to tell apart from the original." At the back of the class, Naruto was asleep. Next to him, Kiba was also asleep.

Two rows forward, Shikamaru had propped his head against the wall and achieved a state somewhere between conscious and unconscious that only he seemed capable of sustaining. Choji, who had been eating, was at least technically present. Iruka continued.

"A well-executed Clone Jutsu has almost no weaknesses. Against an opponent who can't sense chakra fluctuations, it holds up under nearly any scrutiny. By the same token, when you're facing one — take your time. Watch the movement, the weapons, the way it speaks. The differences are always there."

"Huu—" A long, slow exhale from Naruto's direction.

"—huu—" Iruka's marker stopped moving.

"Naruto Uzumaki. Kiba Inuzuka. Shikamaru Nara." His voice had gone very quiet.

"Get out." He turned his head.

"Choji Akimichi. No eating in class. You too." The explosion that followed rattled the windows. Kiba stood up with the expression of someone who had been asleep in a warm place and couldn't quite locate the problem yet. His body, however, had apparently done this enough times to know where the door was. He walked toward it on autopilot. Shin watched him go. Beside him, Shino said nothing. Naruto, Shikamaru, and Choji filed out after Kiba. Iruka turned back to the board and tapped it once, sharply.

"Moving on." Outside, the four of them leaned against the wall of the building. The afternoon sun was warm in the way that only early autumn managed — not heavy, just present. A breeze drifted through and Kiba tilted his face into it, eyes squinting shut, letting it move over him. He stretched, made a sound, and yawned wide enough that Akamaru, tucked against his chest, stirred and yawned in response. Kiba blinked himself back into awareness. Looked left, looked right.

Choji was working through something from his bag. Shikamaru had resumed his previous arrangement against the wall — arms behind his head, face aimed at the sky, probably asleep already. Naruto was sitting on the ground, leaning against the wall, mouth open, drooling. Kiba glanced through the window. In the seat beside his own, Shino was quietly taking notes. Neat lines, steady hand. He shifted his gaze — and found Shin already looking at him.

Shin sat sideways to the window, one elbow on the desk, chin resting on his hand. His hair was pulled back, black and smooth against his shoulder. He looked relaxed. He was smiling — easy and open, that particular kind of smile that didn't ask for anything. He tilted his head toward the desk in front of Kiba's seat. Kiba looked. His notebook. Open. Already half-filled with notes in Shin's handwriting — clean, even, covering everything Iruka had said.

The sun was coming through at an angle, lighting the side of Shin's face, and the smile hadn't moved. Kiba looked away. He shook his head once, gave the back of his own skull a flat pat, and turned to face forward — away from the window, away from the classroom, away from whatever that was. The warm afternoon. The distant sound of cicadas. Iruka's voice carrying faintly through the glass. Kiba reached over and smacked Naruto on the head.

"Hnn—" Naruto surfaced, eyes bleary, momentarily confused about which dimension he was in.

"—what, wha—""Let's go," Kiba said. Shikamaru opened one eye.

"Where."

"Ditch."

"..." A long pause.

"Sure."