It would definitely look wrong if a pregnant woman would just suddenly pause walking to turn around before whizzing past everyone just to get back into the main branch"s household. But it"s Kaiya we"re talking about. She picked up the chakra signals of her own son abnormally off after a gust of wind went through the streets, and she just has to get back as soon as possible.Following her son"s scent that was also near a familiar one, she ended back up in front of the Uchiha household. She gently shoved Itachi out of her way and followed after Shisui into the house"s guest room.
What greeted her is absolutely terrifying for a mother like her; her son"s Nara and Hatake-styled clothing is covered with flowing blood that came from his mouth. Orion was shaking violently, skin cold to the touch. Even Shisui was as pale when he had laid the child down onto the bed.
"What the h.e.l.l happened?" Kaiya asked as she a.s.sessed her son for any type of injuries, but there were none.
"I-I don"t know… I took him for a walk then he just…—" Shisui wiped the cold sweat from Orion"s forehead, "He just started coughing out blood…!"
Kaiya had a quick glimpse on Shisui"s state. She knows that the Uchiha child doesn"t like to lie. In fact, he"s even covered with her child"s blood too. She cleared her throat, "For now, get some fresh set of clothes for my dear Orion, okay? You should get changed as well. I"ll take care of things here." She smiled gently at the Uchiha, "Thank you for thinking fast, Shisui-kun."
"As you wish, Kaiysan." The Uchiha bowed, turning around and b.u.mping into Itachi who had just entered the room. Shisui blinked at him before looking back at Kaiya, "It"s my duty to protect the Silver Arrow"s child."
"While you"re at it, please contact Shikakuro…" Kaiya"s smile faltered as she turned back to her son, her fringe covering her eyes. "… Do it immediately, please?"
"Of course." Shisui saluted by placing his right hand onto his left chest before disappearing completely in a quick puff of thick smoke.
Itachi read the situation and proceeded to go out to at least serve the silver-haired lady in a room with a gla.s.s of water.
Back into complete focus, Kaiya ran through a set of seals with a quite release of her chakra that flowed over to her son"s body, a.s.sessing every body part of her son—inside and outside. She narrowed her already worried eyes, releasing her seal as she proceeded to manipulate her chakra towards her son.
It wasn"t any physical injury that could be seen outside, but something more… deeper and one"s eyes simply cannot see. Well, Hyūga"s can, actually, but that"s beside the point.
No, her son didn"t exhaust his chakra reserves. In fact, Orion"s chakra reserves overflowed and went over the limits—which worsen his condition even more. Basing from the given signs—struggle in breathing and Orion"s extremities (tips of fingers, lips, etc.) turning purple due to deoxygenating, Kaiya understood that her son had been struggling even before the "chakra overload" occurred.
Since chakra"s main point is within the chambers of the heart, the chakra overload overworked Orion"s already weak heart and it imitated something like a heart attack, before the overflowing chakra coursed through his body inside out, attacking the child"s vital organs first.
It"s a rather scary thing, but Kaiya has an idea how to work over this in order to save her son"s life. It could last long depending how much excessive chakra went into Orion"s system, but as long as he will live, the Hatake-Nara will definitely do it.
She just needs a vessel in order to contain the excess chakra…
She gritted her teeth as she retracted her hands back to herself, eyeing her son that had already curled himself into a ball in order to keep himself warm.
Kaiya would do anything just to keep her one and only son safe.
Absolutely anything.
Her eyes slowly trailed down to her belly.
She instantly whirled around when the door slid open.
"ORION—…!"
__________
"Hey—he"s waking up!" Shisui pointed out as the young Orion fluttered his eyes open, only to curl himself back into a ball while clutching his chest with his small hands.
He was crying.
"A~h…! I feel like I"m ripping apart…!" The child thought to himself, biting his lower lip.
"Orion!" Kaiya panicked, eyes meeting her son"s, pausing for a bit.
"It hurts, kasan—" Orion coughed, blood dripping from his mouth, dying the white sheets with the crimson colour. Both of his eyes were flashing between the colours of gradient brown to golden yellow as his tears flowed down his pained face. It seemed like it was ticking, for some unruly reason.
Kaiya immediately went to calm down her son, but when she touched her son"s skin, he was burning hot. "Aiya? I"ve extracted most of the chakra but why—"
Shikakuro pulled away his wife before hovering his hand over his son"s eyes, releasing a burst of chakra that would make the young child tired. The said action made Orion fall asleep. It was enough to keep the pain away, for now at least. He hopes that the small thing helped his child.
"He was conscious of the pain. This is all I can do for now." Kuro said, disappointed with himself.
His heart ached when he saw his son"s eyes crying for help—crying for someone to ease his pain. It"s been three days since Orion"s like this, and it"s rather scary to know that you might lose your beloved son when he"s not monitored properly.
No one wants to lose their beloved child.
Again.
"Has Tsunade-sama responded with our request?" Kuro asked.
One will know that the situation is serious when the husband of a great medical ninja is calling for another. It"s just that Kaiya can"t handle the situation herself—she"s pregnant, for crying out loud! If she could, she would"ve done everything herself, but there"s a living being inside her that will also take damage if she takes another drastic measure.
The Hokage had already said he"s help them and their child, and he"s doing everything he can to get in touch with the Senju. But the time"s ticking and Orion is seriously wasting away every second that pa.s.ses.
"Unfortunately… no, sir." A jounin appeared inside the room, revealing herself to be Tsutsuji Hyūga. "s.h.i.t…" Kuro started to bite his thumb"s nail after hearing the answer.
Everyone in the room fell silent. Shikakuro, Kaiya, Shisui… even Tsutsuji—everyone one of them. Their eyes all gazed over the helpless child lying down on the bed that was stained with his own blood.
__________
It was so cold that I woke up, only to regret doing so. Every inch of my body is in excruciating pain, and it"s not very pleasant. This is definitely worse than getting impaled by an iron pole because… right now, I feel like I"m ripping apart! It hurts!
I"d rather die! Seriously!
Tears just rolled down my face because I really can"t take it.
It may be because of this small body, and its small pain tolerance, but s.h.i.t—it f.u.c.king hurts.
I met kasan"s eyes when I clutched my chest, and she looked absolutely scared. "It hurts, kasan—" I couldn"t even complete my words when I started coughing. Surprise, surprise, the metallic taste of blood greeted me again as I stained the white sheets of whoever"s bed I"m curled up on.
My heart is throbbing like I had consumed twenty energy drinks in one go—
I was too focused onto trying to ease the pain coming from my chest that I didn"t notice tou-san. He hovered his hands over my eyes and in an instant, I felt drowsy. Well, falling asleep is better than feeling this incredible pain coming from my chest so, I just let myself fall unconscious.
I think I fell asleep… but when I opened my eyes, it"s blindingly white. The place brings me a sense of familiarity, like I"ve been here before. All the white s.p.a.ce is blinding me but I still looked around, only to find the s.p.a.ce empty, like a newly bought canvas—yet to be filled with great worlds.
Am I dead?
Man, I"m too young to die—literally. My physical body is like, not even five years old.
I let out a sigh.
I didn"t even get to meet my younger sister in the ninja world. Now I"m wondering how she"d look like.
Would she take the Hatake"s beauty, or the Nara"s piercing, laidback and calculating appearance? Would she take the Hatake"s laziness, or the Nara"s? Maybe both?
It sucks that I won"t get to see her.
Just as I was about to release another sigh, something knocked all of the air out of my lungs, sending me skidding away for a few feet. "What the f—" I breathed, catching up to my breath.
"I didn"t know that you"re such an idiot, Idiot." I heard a voice that made me stop.
I slowly looked back, meeting a familiar golden gaze—wait, what?
WHA—
Why—
Why does he look like—
…
Why does he look like me?
"It"s funny how you"re panicking inside but your expression tells otherwise." He chuckled before sitting down and making a couch appear out of nowhere to catch him.
He"s my complete mirror image—minus his golden pair of eyes.
"Oh, and yes. You"re me… but I"m not you." He said in a rather calm tone.
"Okay, that doesn"t make sense in my head." I started biting my thumb"s nail, "Afterlife is very confusing." Another cold hit knocked me to the side. "What the h.e.l.l man?"
"Stop saying you"re dead. You"re not dead, Idiot-kun." He blinked, "Wait, no. "-kun" sounds disgusting. Forget I ever used that."
"I agree." I nodded after picking myself back up to my feet. "But—what do you mean I"m not dead? I have this nagging memory that I"ve been in here before… right after… I… died…" I stopped at my words upon the realisation. "Yes! After I died I… I ended up… here." I placed my finger against my chin, "Though I don"t know what exactly happened…"
"Oh, yeah." The other "not me" nodded. "I think you were just materialising into the world when you first stepped onto this world."
I blinked at him.
"By materialising, I mean that it was when your scattered soul is recollecting itself to form a new… "you". When you first entered this world, you feel like you were hovering, yeah?" I nodded at his question. "What I still don"t understand is when you were able to—anyways, never mind that. To put it simply, you were reincarnating by that time. Oh, and you"re still alive, you naïve mentally 32-year old child." He casually gave me an angry glance.
And the glance was quite playful.
Too playful for me to be comfortable with.
"Well, you are dying, but you"re still not dead, okay?" He sighed, folding his arms together.
"W-Wait—what?" I took a step closer to him.
"Well, it"s not like it matters. They"re not gonna let you die anyways so, let"s make use of this time, okay?" He waved off his hands, preventing me to ask him any further questions.
Man. That version of… "me" is quite the b.a.s.t.a.r.d, isn"t he?
"I can hear your thoughts, Idiot." He said in a casual tone, like he"s used to it.
I sighed. I still have a lot of questions to ask the "me" in front of me.
"Well, your questions will be answered in the near future. Now"s just not the time." He gave his golden gaze to me. "For now, since you"re here now and I have nothing to do—plus I"m bored, I"m going to teach you a bit on uh… how to use your eyes properly. Well, they"re mine but you have them too so yeah."
"Pardon?"
"When you activate your eyes, or accidentally awaken them, you"re just flinging around your powers carelessly, affecting people you do not wish to affect with them." He flared up his golden eyes, "I believe your left eye has the power… to make people see."
Make people see? "So… it"s basically like… a genjutsu or something?"
He blinked, pausing for a moment, "Actually… yes? Well, it"s far more superior than that puny thing." I raised a brow at his statement. "Let"s see… your left eye can pretty much reach into the depths of your target"s mind and replay their deepest fear, inflicting the same damage that has been done that particular time. Heck, you could even make up scenarios and play them into their mind. "What would happen if this happens?" Bam, you can play whatever scenario you"d think of into their brains."
"Basically a genjutsu."
"Wha—no! I told you it"s far more superior!" I smiled when he snapped.
"Oh? Really?"
He then stopped, realising what I"m doing to him. "You know what? Think whatever you want. I"m not gonna help you anymore."
"Hm… petty…" I looked away, puffing my cheeks.
We honestly look like siblings fighting over something.
He released a long sigh before snapping his fingers, making the once white s.p.a.ce change into a green forest. ""Ya better start figuring out how to activate your eyes, you t.u.r.d."
I gasp, covering my mouth, "It"s like you"re saying you"re a t.u.r.d too!"
He gave a warning look.
"Okay, I"ll stop. Whatever." I raised my hand in a surrendering manner, smiling at him. "So? What are we doing again?"
"I"m gonna train you until you"re hanging close to death itself."
With his simple words, I already know that I"m going to be at h.e.l.l"s doorstep once again.
Me and my stupid mouth.
s.h.i.t.