"Hey, I've come to visit you again." I'm standing before the graves of Uchiha Haruki and Uchiha Aoi. I have some towels and cleaning supplies on me, but it seems like their graves are well cared for. The clan pays some guy to clean it once every week, I think.
"It's been what, a year? Anniversaries are supposed to be for days worth celebrating, but this is just too melancholic and gloomy." I reach out to touch the pictures of my parents on the tombstone, and continue, "I don't think I was late this time, since there has been a decline in missions for me once I got a job in the hospital. It's not very fun to be there almost every day, but I manage."
As always, no one gives a reply. I have to say, it's such a depressing place. The tombs are all packed up in one dense area, and every name there probably means some poor sap died before even turning twenty. I'm kind of numb to all this stuff, because ninja.
Working at the hospital plus Konohagakure's amazing shrinks and brainwashing techniques also equals very unfazed motherfuckers, so yea. Still leaves a sour taste in my mouth.
I decide to not dwell on my thoughts any longer. I bring out a bottle of wine and pour some into the two cups in front of my parents' photos. "You guys never like drinking much, but I kind of took a liking to cheap alcohol, sorry about that. I'll grow out of it soon, but before that, I'll enjoy them while I can."
I take a sip of said cheap alcohol and then pour the rest of it on both the tombstones. "I've been taking care of myself though, don't worry about me. I promise won't drink myself into an early grave. I'd like to see you both again, but I'm not that eager, so you guys would have to wait, huh? I hope you don't mind waiting for another decade or so. Your daughter would ideally like to live until at least thirty years old, after everything important has happened and I can ideally rest in peace."
My parents weren't perfect, but they were kind enough to me and treated me well. I routinely visit them from time to time, bringing wine and some food and leaving it on their graves or sharing the food with them. Some people might think of it as a waste, but it's a habit from my past life. Like how some people leave flowers, my kind of people give food to the deceased to feel connected with them. Sometimes they even let younger kids eat some of the food after praying, like a symbolism of the circle of life, the food intended to feed the elderly now used to nourish the next generation and all that. It's all very poetic and used to make a basic bitch like me tear up, but now I just do it to honor the traditions of my birthplace.
It helps me feel connected to my past life, and while I did change a lot from the person I was before, it's still a part of me, and it helps ground me when I'm feeling nostalgic for things out of my reach.
"I'm doing alright, I got a little bit lonely after you guys went and got yourself labeled missing and presumed dead, but I've made some good friends and got myself some mentors that care about me, so you guys can rest easy. Still, it would have been nice to have you guys present when I made Chunin. But I suppose that's too much to ask, luck was never a strong aspect of the Uchiha. Like, look at all the graves out here." I spread my arms, and let out a sigh. "You know what I mean? I could drone on and on about the casualty rates, but that's just sad."
"I've been trying my best and honing my skills, but everytime people ask about how I'm doing it's pretty much always about my eyes." I huff. "Don't get me wrong! I'm grateful for the eyes you gave me. It's useful in a fight, for sure, but it's a bit of a curse too, forcing me to remember everything I see while my sharingan's activated. Seriously, it isn't very good for my mental health." I take a sip from the wine bottle and shrug. "I mean, I guess it's just service PTSD dialed up to twelve, so I really should have seen that coming."
"I have some plans to fix this, but there's nothing concrete yet. And in the end, I need to live through the big event for me to actually have some impact on this world. But if I do, I'll change the world for the better. It's a promise, hmm?"
I stand up and dust the dirt off my pants. "Welp, it's been good catching up, but I've got to go. My shift starts at nine in the morning, so I'll see you next year or so. Goodbye, father, mother. I'll leave the bottle here just in case you want to drink the rest." I turn on my sharingan and glance at their pictures, before walking away to bin the empty beer and wine bottles.
Talking to dead people, just fucking comical, isn't it?
Well, I guess it's just the right amount of crazy that comes with the job.
…
This place really is too depressing for my liking.
I leave the cemetery and start to make my way to the hospital. It's roughly an eight minute walk there from my current position, so I should be on time by the time I arrive.
Of course, I have to be followed the moment I leave the compound, and from the chakra signatures, my stalkers don't seem very weak. I try to shake them off, but more and more of them start to appear. It's so annoying, man. I'm not in the mood for a fight to the death right now, read the room!
Guess I have to stand my ground in a random forest right in the middle of Konohagakure. The stalkers seem to be experienced, tailing me through all that. Must be pretty familiar to the layout of the village if they didn't lose my trail.
They're also casting a subtle Genjutsu that tells people nothing suspicious is currently happening. There's definitely not a young girl getting jumped, wink wink. I'm in range of the Genjutsu, and I can barely detect it.
As I said, very experienced.
Is there any chance I can get the jump on some of them? I'm not normally too much of a stealth guy, but I still got the basics of it down. One of my stalkers might be a good sensor though-
I see someone wearing a creepy mask on my right, and I dodge instinctively when he thrusts a spear at me. Well, I guess the stealth option's out the window now.
"Great Fireball Jutsu!" I jump away from multiple thrown kunais while forming the needed hand seals, bringing two fingers up to my mouth and blowing the great gouts of flame to force back multiple ROOT agents.
I do all that, just for all of them to evade my jutsu effortlessly. Those creepy masked sons of bitches, I swear.
Huh, I never did manage to get any decent ninja with that jutsu, and I normally just use it to give me some space or to buy time. Fire jutsus are kind of overrated in terms of combat, not going to lie.
After the smoke fades, I see a blank ANBU mask right in front of me, with the guy wearing it trying to stab me through the stomach. I barely dodge the attack, but an agent slashes me in the back with a tanto when I was focusing on the one in front of me just now.
I ignore the pain, and back away from both of them. Oh dear, the rest of the goon squad's coming this way, not good.
When in doubt, body flicker away. This tactic never failed me once, and it's not going to anytime soon.
Run away, Smokey!
After some running and jutsu spam, there's finally some distance between me and the agents. I take stock of my surroundings and my injuries, and it's not a pretty picture.
I was targeted by eight ROOT agents and just dispatched one of them, so seven's still on my ass. Luckily for me, the slash to my back is relatively shallow, so my spine is still intact. Small mercies.
Still hurts a lot though, I'll never laugh at people showing up at the hospital moaning about slash and stab wounds again.
Well, nah. I'll still laugh at them since I'm a prick like that, but I probably should focus on the life-threatening fight happening right in front of me right now.
"Lightning Beam Jutsu!" I breathe out, hearing my heart racing and blood pumping through my head. God, I haven't been in a fight for quite a while, I'm kind of rusty. My hands once again form familiar seals, and the lightning beam impales a ROOT agent through the chest and scrapes another.
That's good, that's one less agent to worry about.
What's bad though is I can feel my chakra reserves decrease by a lot. I'm definitely not doing that again today. It's just way too taxing on my reserves.
I'm thinking too much in a fight like this, and a ROOT agent takes this opportunity to throw some shuriken and injures me when two of them hit my right foot. I start engaging the rest of the agents while feeling the metal in my foot dig even deeper, what a fucking pain.
Whatever, I'm a big girl now. I won't let the bastards know how much pain I'm in. Fake it till you make it, or die trying.
"Rising Storm Jutsu!" I yell out and put my hands on the ground, pushing electricity through the dirt as bolts of lightning begin to rise from the ground in a rhythmic fashion covering my front, back, and side. Take that, you emotionless wankers!
Multiple ROOT agents are shocked silly and I slap a couple explosion seals on one of them, kick them into the arms of another, and both of them go down because of the resulting large, beautiful explosion. Three down, four to go, and I even casted a Genjutsu while they were regrouping. Hell, I might get through this after all!
Of course this is the moment when someone kicks me against a tree and pushes a fucking sword through my lungs, pinning me in place while I struggle to free myself. Typical.
Of course, I'm not dead yet. This is why I love Genjutsu so much.
"Any chance we could talk this out, like civilized people?" I ask, and the agents remain silent. You're raised to be a ROOT agent, and your ability to banter is damaged irreversibly. "At least say something, don't leave me hanging, yeah?"
An agent stabs me in the heart with a kunai, and we just kind of stay there staring at each other. "You…" Huh, so they are aiming to kill, good to know. "Oh, fuck off."
Another agent grabs a tanto and stabs me in the neck. To be fair, I probably deserved that one for the horrible joke about hanging and shit, but the world is an unfair place, so I won't be punished for that.
I disable the Genjutsu I casted, leaving the tanto and kunai stuck in the tree and all agents confused. I can hear the question marks all the way over here. One second they're stabbing a girl in the heart and the neck, and the next she's gone, I would be confused too if I'm one of them.
I'm not, though, so I get to point and laugh.
I observe them from the treetops. No one ever pays attention to what's happening above them, absolutely no one, so I'm safe for at least a bit.
I wince when I pull out the shurikens in my leg. Man, they really roughed me up. At least I can use the Mystic Palm Jutsu to patch myself up, so it's not all bad.
Not even one minute passed when one of the agents decides to look up and sees me sitting there, treating my leg, can't even catch a break in this damn place.
You know what, my patience is dwindling so I'm just going to wing it. I haven't mastered this technique yet, but now or never, I suppose.
I mold my chakra into small, sharp blades covering my hands, and said, "Chakra Scalpel."
This technique needs a great amount of concentration, so almost no Medic-nin can use it in the middle of a fight to the death. I take great satisfaction in hearing some gasps from the supposed emotionless agents as they tense up. Not so emotionless and fearless after all, hmm?
"Time to end this farce, this has dragged on long enough. I'm fucking late for my shift, and I ain't getting my pay docked just because some stupid blank mask wearing agents tried to kill me." I jump down from the tree and rush the rest of them. They react too slowly, and by the time they started getting into a defensive formation, I already cut the leg tendons of the closest agent to me. He stumbles and falls to the ground, while two agents grab kunais and tantos to try and injure me while one of them seems to be preparing a jutsu. I deal with both agents quickly by disabling their chakra pathways and pinning them to the ground by stabbing them with their own weapons. Pretty brutal, but you reap what you sow, eh?
Still a bit too late, sadly. I turn back, facing the only remaining ROOT agent, but he already finished his hand signs.
"Wind Dragon Jutsu!" He yells, and a literal dragon forms from the wind. I'm just staring straight at a traditional Chinese dragon that is at least ten feet long, has a red mane and the rest of his body borders light blue. It would be breathtaking if it isn't going to be up close and personal with me in about two seconds.
Alright, I can work under pressure, no problem. I quickly form the hand seals needed and just pray that it's sturdy enough to block whatever that is.
"Mud Slide Jutsu!" A thick wall of mud and earth rises up, blocking the wind jutsu from fatally injuring me. Still, the dragon's too strong for the wall to completely tank, and I get to experience the wonders of taking a fucking wind dragon to the face. Now they've done it.
I quickly body flicker to the lone agent's side, sweeps his legs from under him and knocks him out. I take the blank masks, leave the unconscious agents on the ground, tie up all the agents and tree-jumps all the way back to the hospital.
Some civilians and ninjas just stare at me, and maybe it's because of my condition and my blood-soaked clothes, but still. Have some manners!
"What the fuck happened to you?" The Chunin at the desk asks me, concern seeping into his voice as he picks me up and starts running to one of the hospital rooms.
How should I respond to that question, I wonder. Hey, not much, just fought a secret organization and took some kind of mythical animal jutsu to the face. How about you?
I have a job to do, I didn't sass him and just hand him the masks the ROOT agents wore. "Give these to the third. He can put two and two together."
He runs quicker, and I feel a flash of pain. He just hit my ribs with his shoulders, that amount of pain isn't normal.
The ROOT agents must have bruised my ribs when I wasn't looking. Or it could be the dragon.
Yea, it's probably the dragon. How is that jutsu fair?
"Ow ow ow ow ow. You better watch it! Don't carry me like a sack of potatoes! You're making my ribs hurt!" He's not even slowing down. Come on, I don't deserve this, I really don't.
"Oh I'm sorry, I'll let you walk all the way to the bed then! Be glad I even took the time to carry you, don't make me leave you on the ground!" He says.
Is he giving me sass? After I refrained from doing the same to him? No one here is allowed to give me sass.
"You would never! You guys love me too much, plus I do most of the work here anyways. If I bleed out here, it's your loss!" I grumble half-heartedly and flip him off. Except I can't really do that, because I can't feel my arms.
I should be more angry or scared of the events that are unfolding right now, but I feel fine. I don't know if that's good or bad. I'm too exhausted to think without the adrenaline keeping me awake. I'm just going to sleep for a while.
I feel so damn tired, someone wake me up when all this shit is over, alright?
"Hey!" He's shouting now. So damn loud, why is he so loud? "Did you hit your head? Being unconscious with head injuries is dangerous! You stay awake now, Akari!"
"I'm pretty sure my head hasn't been hit too hard, I'll be fine! I'm a Medic-nin, ya know?" I joke tiredly, finally drifting off to sleep. I don't want to deal with this bullshit anymore.
I hear the Chunin swear loudly. Yep, it's your problem now, you can deal with it, sorry not sorry. At least I'm not dead yet, stay positive, am I right?
Oh yea, I also get to skip work, how nice.