"We'll take over," Kakashi stated as he and Itachi stood in front of them.
She signaled some of her subordinates to make a move.
They placed their hands on the ground.
"Earth-style: rock collapse!"
The hill they were standing on shook and large pieces of rocks began breaking and falling.
"Earth-style: mud wall!" Kakashi made a giant wall that blocked off all the rocks.
"You two, get out of here!" Guy told the chunin, and they began running.
"Rumour has it, you'd kill a comrade for the sake of the mission," Itachi stated.
"I'd never let a friend get killed.
That's why I was entrusted with this Sharingan.
You go too." Kakashi told Guy.
"Like I'd ever turn my back on a mission!" Guy said and got ready to fight.
"Get on with it!" She commanded her shinobi.
"Earth-style: rock collapse!"
Boom!
More rocks fell towards them.
"Wood style: Forest destruction!"
A Giant thick tree grew from the ground and covered them while blocking the rocks.
"Wood style? But that's…"
"Eight inner gates: fifth gate of closing, open!"
A green aura surrounded Guy as he jumped out of the forest and headed toward them.
"All that with just taijutsu?" Itachi wondered.
"Admire him later." Kakashi entered lightning chakra mode.
"Ya!" Guy kicked two of them and threw a shuriken at another one.
"Purple lightning stream!" Kakashi charged up purple lightning, and it shocked five of them.
"Water style: Water bullet jutsu!"
Ryuu shot multiple giant water bullets that dampened the area, adding electricity and shocking them.
"Fire style: Phoenix flower jutsu!" Itachi shot multiple small fireballs at them.
"Retreat!" she ordered the remaining ones, and they started running, only two of them survived.
Whoosh… Whoosh… Whoosh…
Ryuu, Itachi, and Kakashi stood in front of them.
Itachi threw multiple shurikens, and they hit them in their stomach and heads, leaving the leader alone.
Purple lightning charged into Ryuu and Kakashi's hands.
"Purple lightning: lightning transmission!"
They ran across each other, lightning connected to them like a cable…
In a second, her body was split in half.
Itachi widened his eyes.
'They have such great teamwork.
They don't even have to speak to do a combination jutsu.' Itachi thought to himself as he admired their teamwork.
When they went back to Guy, they found him knocking out one last shinobi.
"Huh?" Kakashi gave the scroll to Guy.
"Your mission is complete now.
Return to the village."
"Argh!" someone yelled as Itachi drove his Katana through his neck.
"Hey! What are you doing?!"
"This is our mission," Kakashi said.
"Even if that's true, stop this Kakashi!"
"Hey, only an idiot calls someone by their real name on an Anbu mission."
"Wuaargh!" another person yelled as he got stabbed by Ryuu.
"Rest assured, captain.
We have neutralized the enemy." Itachi reassured him.
Guy's eyes widened seeing them all standing there, over the corpses and wearing their masks.
He couldn't recognize them.
Could these be the same people he went to class with?
Ryuu took them all back to the village.
Guy went with his team to give a debrief of the mission as Ryuu and Kakashi spoke with Itachi on a rooftop.
"Kakashi and I will report back to Danzo, your part of the mission is over."
"Captain Kakashi, the Sharingan you possess, wasn't yours, to begin with."
"No."
"Do you ever feel the doubt, using the power that wasn't yours, to begin with? You aren't an Uchiha captain.
And yet, you possess the Sharingan.
You will the power the Uchiha do, so tell me, whose side you're on."
"I've never thought about it that way.
This Sharingan was… entrusted to me by a friend."
"Obito Uchiha?" Kakashi nodded.
"Did Ryuu tell you?"
"No, it's just that there aren't many one-eyed Uchihas with Sharingan."
"Fair point…
Obito made me vow to never forget what's important."
"A friend?" Itachi guessed.
"Yes, to never let a comrade get killed."
Kakashi stated before leaving with Ryuu.
"Later, Itachi." Ryuu waved him off.
----------------------------------------
As they gave Danzo their mission report, Guy gave the scroll and the debrief to Sakumo.
"Hokage-sama, I get why you told me that the Anbu wasn't suited for me."
"I understand."
"But that's not all! Because I don't believe that Kakashi is suited for the Anbu either!"
"Is that so?" Sakumo heard Guy's complaints about Kakashi in the Anbu.
"Maybe, in the future, Kakashi will be dismissed from the Anbu.
But until then, he and Ryuu will stay, being the captains."
----------------------------------------
After changing out of uniform, Ryuu went to pick up Naruto from the academy.
"Big brother!" Naruto yelled and jumped on Ryuu, excited after a day at the academy.
"Come on Naruto, let's walk together." He nodded excitedly.
"You're already done with your mission?"
"Yes, it was a very short mission.
How was your day at the academy?"
"It was awesome! I beat Sasuke in hand-to-hand combat!"
"Really? You can tell me all about it at Ichiraku."
"Alright!"
Ryuu took Naruto to Ichiraku Ramen, they ended up eating so much Ramen they could barely walk back home.
Later that night, Ryuu snuck out of bed and headed to the Uchiha compounds.
There was a meeting taking place in Naka shrine, Fugaku was addressing Itachi joining the Anbu, and him being the fourth Uchiha to do so.
"Well, then, let's begin." Fugaku stood up from his seat in the front row and turned toward everyone gathered in the hall.
"They have officially decided that my son, Itachi, will join the Anbu black ops.
He has already carried out missions as a member." A quiet cheer echoed through the shrine.
"Now we have another pipeline connecting our clan with the center of the village."
"Itachi," Fugaku called his son's name.
Without a sound, Itachi got to his feet and waited for his father to speak again.
"You have joined the Anbu. Have you noticed anything?" The question was much too vague, confusing Itachi.
The villagers were prejudiced against the clan and did not think well of them.
That was likely the answer Fugaku was hoping for.
And in fact, his comrades in the Anbu had not celebrated Itachi joining them apart from Ryuu and Obito; there were even some who made a show of their displeasure.
But he couldn't say without reservations that this was simply because he was a member of the Uchiha clan.
At eleven years of age, Itachi's youth was another source of irritation.
"It is a fact that the people of the village are wary of the Uchiha clan, and do not think well of us," Itachi began.
"It is!" Once Itachi offered the answer his father was seeking, a voice called out from the seats.
"But," Itachi continued, giving his voice extra weight as if to push back the hasty hooting.
"That said, I don't feel any active hatred, no persecution of the clan.
Especially for their captain's Ryuu Uchiha and Obito Uchiha.
At best, I believe their feelings are the sort of worries and jealousies that anyone has."
As Fugaku listened with arms crossed, only his right eyebrow twitched upward.
"This worry and jealousy you mention can come together and be twisted into a bigger emotion."
As if to agree with Fugaku, the clan began to chatter and make a commotion.
To push through the voices of the crowd, Itachi concentrated his strength in the bottom of his belly, and spat out,
"If you add on backward predictions like that, anything can be reduced to a negative phenomenon!"
As if to stand in the way of Fugaku, silently glaring at him, a single man stood up.
Yashiro.
"Hey, Itachi!" he called, his narrow eyes gleaming murderously.
'Not him again.' Ryuu facepalmed hearing Yashiro's voice again.
Shisui saw his sensei's reaction and lightly chuckled.
Silently, Itachi turned to Fugaku's confidant.
"You're siding with the village here, aren't you?
You and Ryuu-sama.
Whose ally are you anyway, the village's, or the clans? We all know Ryuu-sama has his reasons for his judgment and now maybe your judgment's dull after joining the Anbu, getting a little full of yourself?"
"It's better not to force things into a framework with words," Itachi murmured.
"What?" Yashiro called back.
"Enemy? Ally?"
Itachi's eyes shone a faint crimson.
"If you differentiate between things with the tool of words, you lose sight of the true situation.
You're forced to step into places you shouldn't."
"I don't have time for this incomprehensible back and forth.
Whose ally are you, Itachi Uchiha?!"
Yashiro's angry roar returned the main shrine to silence.
"Yashiro, sit down." Ryuu stepped in. He sounded bored of this, who wouldn't be bored of hearing Yashiro's voice?
"What do you want?"
"Didn't you hear me?
You're questioning Itachi as if he isn't a part of the clan.
Don't you see the emblem on his back? Stop acting like a child and sit down.
You're older than most of us for fuck sake."
Yashiro grit his teeth before sitting down.
Even he had enough brain cells to know when to back down.
The meeting ended, and Ryuu called out to Obito before leaving.
"Hey." Obito looked back.
"You wanna go for a walk?" Obito nodded.
Ryuu and Obito headed in another direction, while the other Uchiha went the other way.
"You got a sec?" Shisui called out to Itachi.
Itachi was walking home a little behind Fugaku.
Fugaku looked back, curious at Itachi's sudden stop, and saw his son's good friend there.
"What's wrong, Shisui?"
"I wanted to talk with your son for a minute." Fugaku looked at Shisui and Itachi before saying,
"Don't be too late," and walked off into the night by himself.