What's Hidden In the Dark
Hiruzen Sarutobi, Sandaime Hokage, Konohagakure's longest-living Kage, felt practically ancient as he walked into Uchiha Kiyomi's room. As the person who had to make decisions and sacrifices for the safety of the village as a whole instead of a single group or individual, he had seen and committed countless acts of brutality, manipulation, and political sabotage/intrigue.
The Will of Fire must survive for future generations.
On this matter, he and Danzō agreed although their ways of ensuring that loyalty happened to be wildly different.
As he sank down into the uncomfortable plastic chair in front of her bed, the Kami no Shinobi took in her wary countenance, pushing away the sadness that he had absolutely no right to feel. He recalled how hopeful she'd been at the start of her shinobi career, eager to make a difference in the war efforts, to follow in her mother's footsteps and become a 'pretty and fierce lady'.
'But after that mission, Hitomi couldn't bring herself to care for her daughter.' Sarutobi's fingers tingled and itched, the cravings for his pipe intense.
Uchiha Hitomi had been a member of the ANBU-Yu, one of the very best, but while her skills left her as an amazing liar and seductress, there hadn't been a maternal bone in her body even though she couldn't, wouldn't, absolutely refused, to abort her baby, Kiyomi; regardless of the fact that none of her clansmen would have judged her if she had.
Kiyomi had instead grown up on the outskirts of the clan, given the clan name as the bare minimum of courtesy only, and that was mainly due to the fact that she had activated the Sharingan at four years old. Hitomi had squirreled away a little house for her daughter to live in, perhaps naively, assuming that she was being generous instead of recognizing the gesture as patronizing and insulting.
To the old Hokage's knowledge, the house sat empty even now.
"Sandaime-sama." Kiyomi's hesitant voice spoke up and drew the wizened man from his musings. "It's alright. I know what...what Itachi…" here, her breathing hitched, unnoticed by most people that wouldn't pick up on the subtle nuances in her tone, even though her face remained calm and carefully blank. "You don't have to coddle me, sir."
'This is untrue. I owe a debt that I can never repay. But perhaps now. Perhaps now...' "The shock of the attack forced your body into labor two months before you were ready. My ANBU reported that you were already heavily bleeding when you were found." Sarutobi noted that her fingers clutched tightly at the fabric of the hospital sheets, knuckles turning white with the strain.
"...Against all odds, the baby managed to live."
"W-What?" Kiyomi's voice revealed her shock.
"Mm. It's true." Sarutobi nodded, trying not to smile, not yet. He believed that she would be happy, a contrast to her matriarch, but for the moment, he held the emotion at bay. "I'm not your doctor, but I have seen many miracles in my lifetime. If she can survive in the upcoming weeks, things will never be easy for her, but you're up for the challenge, yes?"
"I, I thought…" A ragged sob rattled through Kiyomi's body, shaking her shoulders. Tears fell steadily down her cheeks but she didn't seem angry. "I have a daughter. It's not...just me...and Sasuke-kun. I have a…"
Sarutobi witnessed a rare sight that day: Uchiha Kiyomi smiling with tears of pure joy and relief.
Once the youth managed to get control of herself, the man with the epithet of "The Professor" had to deliver some bittersweet news. Or so he tried anyway but Kiyomi startled him by saying that she couldn't trust Sasuke with the news of her child, not yet, and especially not about the baby's father. Kiyomi pledged that she would watch out for the boy, train, and feed him, but she wasn't his mother and didn't intend to try to step up for that role.
"Mikoto-sama is...she was the epitome of what every female Uchiha strived to be. A great woman like that, I couldn't possibly fill her shoes." There was something wistful about her voice that he didn't want to examine too closely. "Can I go in and see him now if he's well enough?"
Kiyomi's personal doctor and Iryō-nin, Takahashi Manabe, murmured an affirmative. "He wasn't responsive to much else but the news that he wasn't alone as he thought…"
"It's a relief." she completed the train of thought for him. "Living alone in the compound with his ghosts…" Shaking her head and visibly pulling herself together, Kiyomi squared her shoulders, hand on Sasuke's room door before she pushed it open and walked inside.
"Hokage-sama. We will be telling her about the risks, right?" Manabe queries in the quietest tone he could.
There are many things stacked against Uchiha Sasuke and Kiyomi, the dangers inside and out of the village. He has no illusions that the two need to be monitored, at least for a while, to test their loyalty to Konoha. Although she hadn't spoken about it yet he also didn't doubt that she would be coming out of retirement in order to get stronger.
If he wasn't careful, the girl would shatter.
'But if she learned of the truth of her clan's massacre, or her child was taken from her, she would break anyway.'
"Of course. Kiyomi-kun deserves to be prepared for anything." He formed a grandfatherly smile. "Let's give them some privacy and talk somewhere quieter."
If the two of them happened to be walking towards the baby ward where a certain infant could be found, then civilians might just look at it as coincidence, trained shinobi and kunoichi whom were in the know (less than a mere handful) knew different.
"I've never seen you around the clan compound," Sasuke stated, glancing out the corner of his eyes as the older girl peeled an apple quickly and efficiently. "And I saw many of the clan members coming and going."
"You saw members of the Konoha Police Force and a few cousins that were direct kin to Mikoto and Fugaku-sama, maybe even a couple shopkeepers." Kiyomi refuted, pretending not to notice when Sasuke flinched at the mention of his recently deceased parents.
"I didn't know my father, but I do know that he wasn't an Uchiha, even though I got my looks from my mother, because of this, I am permitted the name but it wasn't something given to me freely, and even being considered as technically an Uchiha, I still had to work twice as hard to receive the slightest recognition."
That was the first time Sasuke had heard anything negative about his family. He was a bit thrown off-kilter with the revelation. "I see."
"No, you don't." Kiyomi calmly popped an apple slice into her mouth. "It isn't a bad thing. You were sheltered from the reality of how the world works. Now you don't have that luxury is all."
Sasuke didn't say anything and Kiyomi took that as permission to continue talking.
"It will be hard, living with the weight of Ita…"Breaking off as she noticed his shoulders beginning to tense, obviously about to devolve this conversation into a shouting match. "His actions have made you the sole heir to the family, and although you're young now, you won't be a child forever. People will try to use you as a pawn in their games, secure more power for their families and themselves. If you let them, the Uchiha name will be either assimilated into another big or no-name clan or worse, fall into disgrace permanently."
"And you? Who are you loyal to?"
Kiyomi popped another slice of fruit in her mouth. "To the village, to Hokage-sama." He could have lied about the death of her child, like the woman from the dream (nightmare) but he hadn't. Still, what angle was he going for was a little unclear to her. "If you do something worth procuring my loyalty, then I will stand by you until the day that I cease to be."
"I'll get your loyalty."
He said the words with such grim certainty, an underlying hint of steel in his voice that had Kiyomi glancing at him with interest. Privately, deep in her heart, she secretly thought that he almost sounded a little bit like his brother.
'Being siblings, of course, some traits would be passed onto the younger brother.'
"Well, I'm interested in seeing what you might try."