Chapter 2
It was an unspoken game between them.
Satsuki played her role, and Itachi let her.
She knew the moment she stepped into the Academy that every breath she took, every word she spoke, every movement she made was under scrutiny. The Hokage watched. The council watched. The clan heads observed her from a distance, some with wary eyes, others with quiet calculation.
She was the last Uchiha, after all.
(Or rather, the last innocent one.)
There was no way to escape it, so she embraced it. She wore the mask well, head held high, expression composed, every inch the perfect kunoichi-in-training. She was exceptional in the classroom, brilliant in her practicals, charming when necessary, respectful when expected. She became everything the village wanted her to be.
An open book written in invisible ink.
They saw what she allowed them to see, and nothing more. If they wanted a prodigy, she would be one. If they wanted the shining hope of the Uchiha, the perfect heir, the village’s darling, hell, she will be that too.
She never fought the attention. Instead, she absorbed it, turned it into armor. Because as long as they believed she was exactly what they wanted her to be, they would never suspect what she truly was.
A girl with a mission.
Itachi never spoke of it.
Never called out her carefully crafted mask, never reprimanded her for the deception. He let her play the part, let her manipulate their perception of her however she pleased.
But he watched.
...And if interfere is needed, then the fucking village better run.
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Time passed, and Satsuki grew.
Her classmates adored her, her teachers praised her, and the village whispered of her potential.
She excelled at taijutsu, breezed through genjutsu, and her ninjutsu was leagues ahead of the rest. The sons and daughters of Konoha’s greatest clans gravitated toward her, some out of admiration, others out of interest.
Even Naruto Uzumaki, Konoha’s loudest, most troublesome orphan, stubbornly clung to her orbit. (It was irritating, but tolerable. He was a distraction, but a harmless one.)
But she never loses track of what is truly important as her mind worked tirelessly. She combed through old scrolls, studied village records, pieced together inconsistencies in the official reports. She memorized every Uchiha name listed in the village archives, traced the timelines, analyzed the patterns.
Nothing made sense.
How could an entire clan, one of the most powerful in history, be completely wiped out with no known enemy? How could there be no evidence? No leads? No suspects?
She was missing something.
But what?
What doesn’t fit beside the man who, no matter how she turned the puzzle, never quite fit.
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One evening, after another long day of training, Satsuki came home to find Itachi seated at the dining table, a tea set arranged neatly before him.
She hesitated only for a moment before stepping forward, lowering herself onto the cushion across from him.
A quiet hum of approval left his lips as he poured her a cup, the steam curling between them like a veil.
"Your mind is troubled," he said, his voice soft, unreadable.
Satsuki wrapped her hands around the porcelain, studying him from beneath her lashes.
"...I have questions," she admitted.
Itachi met her gaze, dark eyes steady. "I know."
She inhaled slowly, choosing her words with care. "Why do you think they never found the culprit?"
It was a test. A thread pulled at the edge of the web.
Itachi’s fingers remained loose around his cup, his expression betraying nothing. "Perhaps because they were too afraid of what they might find."
Satsuki’s grip tightened.
He is doing it again. Being vague. Deflective. Careful.
He knew something. He always does.
But if there was one thing Satsuki had learned over the years, it was that pushing too hard, too fast, would get her nowhere.
So she didn’t press.
Instead, she lifted her cup, took a slow sip, and gave him a smile.
"That’s a rather poetic way of saying the village is full of cowards, Nii-san."
A breath of amusement left him. "Perhaps."