Chapter 26
Itachi is an oddball to Ayaka-she can never really understand the boy. Too… apathetic. No, not that. Passive.
He’s just… going along with the motion.
Something’s wrong.
Ayaka can see the tension in shoulders too young for burdens, the tiredness in his brows.
But of course. There’s so much expectations on him. Prodigy, clan heir, and Uchiha, famous for producing genius. A genius in geniuses.
The blankness in his eyes, the droopiness at the corner of his gaze-it both terrifies and excites her.
That boy is a monster in the making under the pressure-and yet here he is, functioning under everything.
Ayaka is terrified for the day that bomb explodes and also very excited for the potential violent tendencies she can guess at in him.
Ayaka makes friends with Itachi, because she sees Ann casting glances at the boy every now and then. It’s a discreet thing, meant to look friendly, but the questioning quality in it is too much for her to even pretend she thinks it is that. Of course, Itachi hasn’t caught on-Ayaka made sure to draw both of them into conversation whenever Ann starts looking at those two in an interested way, hide the glances as mere conversational tool.
Ann is careful not to meet any of their gaze head on.
Ayaka has no such precautions.
Itachi is the quiet sort, Ayaka comes to learn. Burdened by expectations the way Clara was, with eyes that look upon her like she was a saint, like she was all things good. With family that both adored and detested him. With a mind too fast, eyes too sharp, heart too soft not to understand what they are and where they stand.
Ayaka wants to punch someone for it. A child shouldn’t have such weight on their shoulders.
Ayaka understands, because this isn’t her world.
There’s more at play here, and she so wants to learn.
“The Uchiha is… powerful.” and people fear the powerful. Their mother does not finish her words, but Ayaka can read between lines.
“But their power comes at great cost. You’d do well to be cautious around them, child.” It would be as close a warning as their mother would ever get to giving Ayaka.
Spider doesn’t speak of the Uchiha with a wary tone the way their mother did, no. She speaks airily, like the words are born to be whispered, like the sounds never meant to be utter for their enticement.
“Those blessed by Amaterasu are fire-wreathed and sun-blessed.” Ayaka can never quite understand why Spider insists on speaking in riddles. Can never quite figure out why people around her like to tiptoe over issues and talk in circles. “To be near them is to dance with flame at your fingertips.”
Ayaka can’t see her eyes. There’s nothing to be read from her mouth or chin. She doesn’t move as she speaks.
“It is beautiful, yes. But also infinitesimally warm and quick to burn. One must be prepared to face such wonderful creations.” The water at the tip of her fingers burns, as if it were, by some miracles of chakra, fuels for fire. Ayaka marvels at the flickering water-turn-burning-flame.
“Are you?”
Ayaka doesn’t quite understand the question.
“I like being their friend.” She answers honestly, trying to mimic the burning. How does it work? Her sensing fails her in this instant, from how complicated the pattern in Spider’s chakra is. There’s no copying it when she cannot even see the completed mesh. “They are fun.”
Spider only hums as she lets the water disperse and return to her scrolls. Paperwork. How she hates it, especially as Clara. The amount she had to deal with as a doctor…
“Then, I suppose all I can do is congratulate you.” There’s no pity or anything strange in her tone, in the way Spider’s voice doesn’t waver. The same calm speech she always does with that slightly childish voice of a not yet grown girl. But there’s something Ayaka doesn’t quite see.
Ann files it away for a rainy day to ask.
Itachi is fun to be around, in a different way than Shisui. Shisui is loud, accommodating and easy, with the right amount of danger that Ayaka finds intriguing enough to keep coming back. He’s quiet, with too straight a priority and too many rules in his head, but a mischief stripe so subtle it is hard to notice. He’s silent on his feet, with eyes that scream of age, but still so naive, in the emotional sense. Ayaka, despite being a fuckup in that regard also, is comparably better.
She wonders if it’s her world that had too high standards or this world that has too low a bar. Then decisively lands in the latter, because mental health only got some attention in the last few year of her old live.
Also, Itachi can be an absolute troll if he so wants, and Ayaka revels in the chaos that the cousins can cause.
“Did you just… You’re supposed to be on my side, Itachi-kun!” Shisui squawks from his place, half drenched from the river water. Dramatic hand flailings and all.
Ayaka crackles, one of the culprits in this. Itachi smiles, the tightness between his brows fading in his bemusement. He was the one to enact the plan to trip Shisui into the water, after all.
The boy starts to play dirty and uses that chakra-filled flicker-y jutsu near her whenever a game of tags goes on for too long. It’s not like she can actually touch him, the asshat.
Ayaka glances at Itachi, noting the cat-like satisfaction air wrapped around the boy, and offers him a high five in between heaves of breath. He looks at her hand in confusion, and Ayaka definitely didn’t feel soft. Nope, not at all.
“Betrayed! By my own cousin, nonetheless!” Shisui shrieks, yet makes no move to get out of the shallow stream they’ve managed to knock him into. “How may I recover from this treachery!”
“You were just complaining about the heat, Shisui-kun. I just wanted to help.” Itachi informs him primely, and Ayaka dissolves into breathless giggles as she spies the hint of impishness in the boy’s words.
Ayaka reaches out for Itachi’s hand, hovering for a moment if he wants to pull away, then taking it and high fiving him, as she snickers at the still flailing Shisui. Drama-prone, excitable Uchiha.
Spider is about the only Furoushiku worker the twins know. They weren’t introduced to any others, were not given tasks to do. Ann only ever has to train, and not actually work.
It makes her wonder. Curious.
Not enough to ask whenever Spider cancels one of their lessons without prior notice and reappears with such a tired air around the next.
No one in Furoushiku with actual masks starts a conversation with them, and Ayaka is silently thankful.
She can’t understand the blankness of the mask, even if many allow their eyes to be seen. Even what is shown seems like a mask.
Spider is honest in that she never hides her intention behind a smile, for all that she keeps her secret. It feels vulnerable, the sort of strange, distant, almost affection the girl affords them.
Ayaka doesn’t complain when Spider brushes her fingers down their mask in an absentminded move as they walk toward the Omoya, warding away the irritating feeling of strange chakra, leaving it pleasantly quiet.
She likes the girl-likes the way she would give a small, almost unnoticeable smile at her good work, the way the aura she possesses changes with her mood, the way she ever so carefully demonstrates what they are learning.
She wouldn’t mind putting her under her territory also.
The weather grows chilly, as autumn comes and edges into winter. Ayaka makes sure to put her twin into something warmer.
There’s something strange about Mikoto’s chakra. It’s… growing? nursing?
Ayaka can’t quite put her fingers on what’s going on. Her chakra focuses around her abdomen, swirling protectively.
They don’t go out of the park that day, despite Shisui’s insistence.
Mikoto notices the odd glances-from both Ayaka and Ann- because of course she does. She has been through a war, been the mother of a prodigy, the lady of Uchiha. Her sensitivity to eyesights are ridiculously high.
But the girls’ gazes aren’t hostile.
It’s hard to decipher Ann’s-the young girl is rather closed off, even with her sister close by, ever the mystery. She has asked around, but nothing suspicious comes up-orphan, recently adopted, not in school. But the ordinary background does nothing to stop her from wondering.
The girl is a genius-in the way she acts, the way she talks, the way she learns. There is clearly more at play, but Mikoto doesn’t dig deeper. She has been warded off, Mikoto can tell. The informants are afraid.
Of whom, of what, Mikoto doesn’t ask. Yet. She won’t push more than they are willing, more than she can pay for with money. No one likes owning favors, and Mikoto is no exception. Not even small ones.
Ayaka, on the other hands, is much easier to glimpse. Her gaze is full of curiousity, a hint of concern, and a sort of confusion Mikoto has seen on her face before when she doesn’t understand something the two boys explain to her.
To be honest, Mikoto has always been curious about the two of them. They are too smart, too quick-eyed to have been simple orphans. Even if orphans in Konoha are smarter than most, they are more. Well-educated, perceptive, observant. They know things, understand the world better than even her child sometimes.
What has gotten Ayaka concerned for her, Mikoto wonders?
“You have been staring at me for an awfully long time, child. Is there something wrong?” Mikoto-san asks, and Ayaka hesitates.
Anka warns them not to speak out their chakra sensing, warns them not to make a spectacle of themselves.
But they can trust Mikoto, right?
Ayaka’s instinct has never warned against Mikoto, has never pushed her away.
And Ayaka, for all her rationality, has always trusted her own instinct more than her human thoughts.
“There’s…” Ayaka hesitates, because she doesn’t quite know how to word it, doesn’t know how to tell it in full. But Mikoto is looking at her expectantly, “something weird with your chakra. It’s wrapping… protectively? around your stomach.”
“My… chakra?” Mikoto sounds surprised. Well, Ayaka has never shown signs of being able to sense chakra, not in front of Mikoto or any Uchiha, anyway.
Except for Anka, but she doesn’t count.
“Uh-huh. Your chakra. It’s running weirdly.” Ayaka nods, confirming. She watches Mikoto’s expressions and chakra carefully.
There’s no twitching, no flexing of her chakra. Nothing concerning, nothing that stands out.
And perhaps that is the most concerning fact of all.
“Like it’s forming something.” And Ayaka can feel Itachi’s and Shisui’s eyes on her, watching like a hawk.
One slip up, and there is no doubt she’ll disappear from the dark alleys today, or some days after.
“It seems I must congratulate you then, Mikoto-san.” Ann cuts in, smiling prettily.
“Congratulate, Ann-chan?” Mikoto asks, as if confused.
“Yes, congratulate.” Ann says back, tilting her head in a way that’s questioning Mikoto’s reaction. “Ah, pardon me then. Did you not know?”
“Know what?” Itachi asks, leaning closer, with Shisui right on his tail. “Yeah, Ann! You’re making no sense!”
Ann blinks up at Mikoto, almost asking for permission, but Mikoto just looks at her, not understanding the gesture.
“You are having a baby, Mikoto-san. Congratulations.” Ann says at last, a soundless sigh escaping her at all the attention.
“Oh, so that’s what it was!” Ayaka claps her hands together, turning to Mikoto with a wide smile, “Congratulations, Mikoto-san!”
“I’m… having a baby?” She sounds baffled, like she wasn’t expecting such a thing. Which, silly, couldn’t be.
Mikoto is an awesome lady, no way she can miss the way her chakra shifts and moves. She’s just joking around, right?
…Right?
“Oh shit, did I accidentally break the news a little too soon?” Ayaka whispers, feeling faintly the same way Mikoto must be feeling with how pale she suddenly looks.