Hana Uchiha's Story

"... Wh..where are you taking me, nii-san?" Came the weak and barely audible voice of a girl. Riding under the cover of night within a carriage, Toru and his twin sister Hana were traveling to the outer boarder of the Land of Fire, but only Toru knew fully where they were going. Not even the carriage driver was given any further instruction but to 'follow that path' or 'make a turn here'. Toru sat with his back against the side of the carriage, his face barely visible under the black cloak that was typically reserved for members of the ANBU. The man gently stroked his sister's cheek. Hana laid with her head resting on a pillow beside Toru, wrapped tightly in blankets. She was startlingly pale, though the rays of moonlight did little to illuminate the shade as it was roughly the same, and darkness of the carriage made it impossible to notice. Hana was visibly shivering even though Toru did his best to keep the carriage warm.

"Don't worry, Hana. Just rest." He told her softly. Hana's condition had gotten much worse since they left the village several hours ago, and it had him worried. As Hana drifted off to sleep, Toru weaved a series of handseals and held his hand over her chest. A soft green glow formed around his palms, sending a calming wave of healing chakra through her body. After about a minute, the glow faded, and Toru sighed, leaning his head against the wall of the carriage as he thought his plan over. By his estimates, they would have to travel in the carriage for about forty more minutes before arriving at the hut. With a sense of dread weighing him down physically, and mental fatigue slowly taking over, he closed his eyes, drifting off to sleep.

By the time Toru came to, the carriage had already stopped, and the driver had already disappeared into the small building Toru called 'the hut'. It was a small, circular house made from stone and what appeared to be clay. From the outside, it appeared to be at least a century old, with nature waging a war against man's own creation, and apparently winning. Vines crept up along the stone, tangling and intertwining before wrapping tightly around the roof. From a small chimney at one side of the hut, smoke spouted out before being carried off in the breeze. Toru smiled, carefully shifting himself around Hana before leaving the carriage to get a closer look. "This.. is the place." He muttered quietly to himself. He took one deep breath in, savoring the natural, unpolluted air. It was rare that Toru ever left the village on a 'vacation'. Even though this trip was far from one, Toru wanted to take in every last second of it, but what came next shattered all his hopes of relaxing.

Hana laid in a small pool of what appeared to be fresh blood, with most of it coming from the corner of her eyes and mouth. The sight of it made Toru's heart skip a beat, and in a frenzy of panic, he called for help. Toru rushed into the carriage, gently but quickly picking his sister up in both hands before exiting, her blood staining his hands and making them slightly slippery. From the hut, the driver came out, dressed in a black cloak similar in design to Toru's. When he caught a glimpse of what the panic was about, he too turned pale. He rushed to towards Toru, unsure of what to do. Moments later, an old lady exited from the hut as well. She, like the house, had to be at least a century old, with silver white hair tied in a neat bun and a wooden staff two inches longer than she was. The remained calm, a stony expression on her face as she shuffled to one side, as if she were permitting the others to enter. "There is no need to panic, my child. Your sister will be fine." The woman said. She spoke much slower than any normal person, which only furthered the hypothesis of her age, but there was a wise, almost sage-like quality to her voice that made it hard for anyone to not listen to what she was saying.

Toru, unable to shake the sense of fear from his system, rushed towards the hut as fast as he could. When he entered, the smell of boiling herbs and burning incense assaulted his senses, mainly irritating his eyes and causing them to water. The door closed behind him, and the sound of a cane hitting against a solid surface could be.

"Place her down over there." The old woman commanded, pointing to a small bed that seemed to have been prepared for the occasion.

"Sensei.. you say she'll be alright, but she's even more pale now.. I.. I don't know what to do.." Toru said, a sense of urgency in his voice as he spoke. He could feel tears forming in his eyes, and he wasn't sure whether it was from the incense or from his situation. "You.. you have to save her.. please.." He added, this time in a whisper as he collapsed on his knees.

The woman simply looked at him, unmoved by the emotion. Without so much as a second word, she walked across the room to Hana's bedside and placed a hand on the girl's forehead. After several seconds, the woman pulled a stool from under the bed, placed the staff against the wall and got to work. "You are aware of what you must do, correct?" She asked him as she worked on stopping the bleeding.

Toru nodded, rising from his knees as he composed himself. "I am her older brother.. it is my obligation to keep her safe and healthy.." He told her, his voice steady now as he regained his composure. His research had led him to one final conclusion - the transfer of his own eyes. By sacrificing his eyes to his sister, he hoped that she would regain her vision, and hopefully recover from whatever illness had stricken her.

The old woman nodded. "Very well then. Come, my child. When the bleeding stops, I will do my work." She said to him.

About a minute passed when color finally started to return to Hana's face. Hana opened her eyes, almost jumping when she saw the old woman staring back at her. "Toru? Where did you take me? What are we doing here? Who is this?" She demanded, a look of anger on her face. "I told you not to meddle in my affairs! Just leave me alone!" She shouted bitterly at him before coughing.

"Hana, this is for your own good. I don't want you to suffer anymore, just be still." Toru reasoned, his eyes focused steadily on her, ready to react if she decided to make a break for it. Knowing his sister, anything could happen, but from the look on her face, he could tell that she knew what he was planning.

Hana's face was drained of color once again, but this time in horror. "No.. No! I won't let you do it!" She nearly screamed. Hana jumped from the bed, sprinting towards the door, only to be grabbed by her brother. "Let me go Toru! I don't want your eyes.. mine are perfectly fine! Get away from me!" She said, struggling to break free. Her lack of physical strength and his skill in taijutsu made it all the harder, but she was determined.

"I'm your brother, Hana. I'm here to protect you, but this is the only way I can. Just calm do-"

"Toru! Let me go!" She interrupted, her eyes turning a familiar shade of red as a ring formed around six tomoe arranged in one big circle - Hana's Mangekyou Sharingan. But even despite rarely activating her Mangekyou, let alone using any of its techniques, her vision was blurred to such an extent that he was barely visible. Toru responded immediately, his eyes forming what appeared to be a black sun.

"..Amaterasu!" Hana shouted, her voice cracking slightly as she shouted. Her right eye began to bleed. The black flames of Amaterasu, directed at her brother's shoulders, failed to stick as they immediately dispersed once they were created. It seemed that Toru reacted immediately, extinguishing the flames once they had been generated. Before Hana could react, Toru grabbed hold of Hana's shoulders, swinging her forward to face him. Their eyes met, and Hana was caught in her brother's Tsukuyomi.

"I'm sorry, Hana..." Toru whispered in her ear before taking a small pill from a wooden box and placing it in Hana's mouth. By the time Hana broke free from her brother's technique, the pill had taken effect and she fell to the floor, unconscious. Picking his sister up, Toru wiped the blood from her face before placing her back down on the bed. "Sensei..?"

The woman nodded, pointing to a table that was cleared, it seemed, during the brawl between Toru and Hana.

Four hours later, the windows of the hut were opened, and a steady breeze flowed through the hut. Any scent of blood had been masked by the herbs, while any bacteria in the air had been purified by the incense. On two, clean beds, Toru and Hana laid, wrapped in their own blankets with their eyes heavily bandaged. The woman sat on a rocking chair, staff in hand as she used it to rock herself back and forth.

Two weeks passed. By then, Toru had recovered, though now severely weakened, he felt an immense pressure lifted from his shoulders. He wore a blindfold now, black in color and wrapped around his eyes. He had resolved to stay with his old sensei, but waited for Hana to awake in order to tell her his decision. When Hana finally awoke, Toru slowly removed her bandages.

Hana drew back from him for a moment, the light hitting her sensitive eyes caused acute pain, but over time, the blur in her vision faded, and clear images of the world unfolded before her. At the sight of her brother, Hana broke down, crying with her head pressed against his chest. "I hate you.." She sobbed, an immense pain in her tone as she spoke. It wasn't true. Hana loved her brother dearly, but hated the choice and sacrifice he made in order to restore her vision and, quite possibly, save her life. It wasn't worth it in her opinion. He was the stronger one of the two, he deserved her eyes. Hana felt Toru's arms wrap around her small frame, drawing her in closer. For what seemed like eternity, Hana wept.

"You'll do fine without me, Hana. Trust me. Konoha needs you, and I need you to go back to Konoha." Toru had reassured her. The sun had risen to its peak, and Hana was left alone in the carriage, carefully thinking about her brother's words. The separation terrified her, and the idea of leaving her brother alone in the woods made her want to jump out of the carriage and run back to him. But he wasn't alone. He had his sensei. Tears began to form once again, though this time Hana angrily wiped them away on her sleeve. She was in immense pain, mostly as a side-effect of the illness and the eye transplant. By the time Hana arrived at the village gates, she had barely enough strength to walk, nearly collapsing had several jounin not been there to catch her.

Hana was rushed through the streets of Konoha, being taken to a place that she had become familiar with in her short lifetime - the Konoha Hospital.

Hana awoke in her normal hospital room, hooked up to several strange devices. It seemed that one of the devices contained some sort of clear liquid, and when she tried to move, the liquid dripped down a tube and into her arm, which caused her head to spin. Hana cursed, closing her eyes as she let out a sigh of annoyance. "Hello? I'm awake now, you can get me off of this thing.." She said aloud, hoping that a nurse would be around to hear her, but nothing, not even the reply of a patient who might've been in the same room as her. Growing impatient, Hana called out again. "Hello? I'm not dead, so you can let me go now.."

When she lifted her head, she saw a nurse wheeling some sort of metal cart in. "Hello Miss. Hana, I hope you had a good rest, the Jounin that brought you in reported that you had collapsed from exhaustion. None of them knew where you had come from, but they assumed that the Hokage sent you on some mission. We wanted to contact someone to discharge you from the hospital, but none of your listed contacts responded to our messages." The nurse told her as she started to unhook the various dangling pouches and remove the needles in Hana's arm.

"How long was I in here for?" Hana asked, curious now. Judging from what the nurse had said to her, and the various apparatuses that were hooked up around her, it would seem like she was in the hospital for at least a day. Memories of her brother flashed in her mind, and a pang of guilt caused her to fall back into her bed. She could barely feel it when the nurse removed the needles.

"Two days, miss. But I can see that you have recovered quite dramatically since you were brought here. I'm not a doctor, but I can assure you, working yourself to the bone is anything but healthy. You really need to rest for at least eight hours a day." She said before removing the last needle and placing them all on the cart. The nurse knelt down, picking up a tray from the bottom of the cart and placing it at Hana's bedside. "There's a light snack, some water and medicine for you. Eat the food first, then take the medicine. Afterwards, wait here for ten minutes. The pills will help clear the drugs that were administered from your blood. Afterwards, you are permitted to leave." The nurse told her before pushing the cart out of Hana's room.

Hana sighed, following the woman's instructions. By the fifth minute, she couldn't wait any longer. Jumping to her feet, Hana headed out of her room, signing out at the front desk before walking into the streets of Konoha.

As Hana turned a corner, she could see a group of young shinobi gathered in front of the ramen shop. Unsure of what was going on, all she could see was that one of the boys had gotten uncomfortably close to another, and that boy was backing away now. The Jounin didn't want to disturb the boys, but knew that if things got violent, she would have to step in. Stepping out from the shadows, Hana made herself known to them. The girl looked like she had just gotten out of the hospital, so pretty much the exact same as how she appeared any other day. Her long black hair in a messy tangle that fell over her shoulders and framed her face. The darkness of her hair brought out the paleness of her complexion, which enhanced her coal-colored irises. She walked slowly, a note book in hand to seem as if she was preoccupied with something else as she slowly walked towards the group.

Keiske's eyes narrowed as he looked into his " I suggest you keep this to yourself for now, or I'm afraid you'll be making your life a lot more complicated than it needs to be, trust me " i was clear what he said was the truth as the sharingan appeared to only be at it's first stage of development so it probably couldn't follow movements extraordinarily like a fully or half developed one but easier than a normal eyes would. " you make sure you keep this to yourself as well Navi, tell absolutely no one " he said turning his head back towards her. it wasn't ideal to trust crucial secrets to someone so young but she already knew about it and nothing was going to change that. As he turned to speak to Navi he noticed another dark haired shinobi approaching them now and she looked like she'd been through hell in the last few hours, he turned towards her making sure to stand between her and Sakamo, looking back at him and gave him a look to tell him to deactivate the sharingan so the other shinobi wouldn't notice.

the veins around his eyes became more prominent with the strain of activating his byakugan, looking at the woman he could see her chakra flow was a bit disturbed so either she just awoke from a genjutsu or sedation under the care of a hospital, which would explain her looks. His body was tense and ready to strike in defense of the younger shinobi behind him but he relaxed after deactivating his byakugan to see the face of the woman who approached, it was the Jonin Hana Uchiha ironically, he heard about her recent hospitalization following the tragic murder of her mother which they still had no suspects for. He should've been feeling sympathy but it only gave him a reason to be weary, the last thing this village needed was another Uchiha out for revenge.

" ah, it's you Hana Sensei, shouldn't you still be in the hospital? I heard you weren't faring very well after the..incident " He said, deciding not to mention what it was exactly though the implications were enough

Sakumo Hatake

Taking a hint, Sakumo quickly deactivated his Sharingan. Frowning, he bent around Keiske to see a young woman (though most definatly older than any of the other three) approaching them. What had Keiske called her? Hana-sensei? Unsure of whether or not to speak up, Sakumo simple sidestepped a little, then moved forward so that he was no too far away from Keiske, and yet at the same time not too close. From this viewpoint, he was able to get a good look at the woman. She had dark black hair, a small kind of button nose, and full lips. Sakumo thought she was pretty though his natural inclination towards respecting those much older than him caused him to only think of her as pretty. Curious as to why she had been hospitalized he perked up listening.

Navi Uzamaki

Navi jaws clenched. She despised when people told her what to do.

"Of course I won't-!" she had been about to say that Sakumo probably trusted her more than anyone else, but was cut short as Keiske rushed past her and Sakumo pointedly shielding the silver haired genin from a dark figure. Upon closer inspection, Navi found herself, or rather their small group, face to face with a dark haired woman that Keiske referred to as "Hana".

"Ah, it's you Hana Sensei, shouldn't you still be in the hospital? I heard you weren't faring very well after the..incident." she heard Keiske say.

With little consideration for her or the others well-being Navi spoke up, "Yeah isn't it a little late for you to be roaming around?"

"Don't mention it. I was passing by on my usual stroll after a night of training when I met these two, what they were doing I don't know" He noticed the way she tensed up when he mentioned what happened, though she appeared to hide it particularly well he would be sure to not bring it up around her again. He glanced back at Sakumo and to his relief the sharingan was gone, he wondered what time it was now as they had been standing out there for quite some time.

" now that I think about it you two should be heading home and to bed, Navi especially, we wouldn't want you falling asleep in the academy " her natural reaction would be to resist most likely, she had a real problem with authority and even more so with him but she would no doubt see the logic in his words, even if she didn't listen to him Sakumo would probably convince her to head home. His father was probably wondering what was taking him this long to arrive back home, Keiske rarely deviated from his schedule at night so it probably caused a little worry, the old man will no doubt be awake still awaiting his arrival.

Walking through the streets of the Hidden Leaf, Jimaru finally made his way to the hospital. Upon inquiring about Hana with the head nurse, he learned that she had already left the hospital. Well, he supposed he should have expected that. Leave it to an Uchiha to push themselves like that. Still, now he had to track her down. The Leaf Village was quite large, so Jimaru spent a good portion of the afternoon moving around the village. After a long search, he finally found her talking to a group of genin and chuunin. He stood where she could see him and waited for her to finish talking to them before conversing with her. Jimaru hoped she was doing alright and wished her a speedy recovery. A shinobi with the eternal mangekyo sharingan would be an invaluable weapon in the coming conflict.

"To bed?" Navi said, her face contorting into the shape of frustration and anger. "Did you have no freedom when you were a kid? I mean, I'm almost thirteen, and Sakumo is thirteen! We've--" Sakumo quickly clamped his hand over the girl's mouth before she could reveal further secrets about their nighttime adventures. Clogged toilets, overstuffed with toilet paper, or toilet papered houses or rooms, wrapped like Christmas presents in the soft fragile paper. The Hokage rock, vandalized with various unholy words, and disgusting and demeaning drawings. Key's missing, doors locked, food gone, magazines gone, you name it and they'd at least done some of it. Navi had a bucket list of pranks to do that they still had to pull and they had little time left. They were Genin. After missions started, and they eventually grew up, there would be much less fun than before. Or so they thought.

Bowing quickly, and pulling Navi by the hair so she did the same, Sakumo said "Good night, Keiske-san....Hana-sensei." Then straightening up and grabbing Navi by her arm, he pulled the resilient blond away. Eventually they hopped up onto one of the houses, from there on moving from house to house.

"Are we really going to sleep?" Navi asked. Any earlier hard feelings between them had disappeared. Typical of children.

"Nah." Sakumo said, shrugging indifferently. She snickered at that. The two had boundless energy, and had gone well into 6 o'clock in the morning without sleeping. Kakashi had, countless times, scolded them about it. But, against the elder's advice, Naruto had been quite the bringer of mischief.

Let them go ahead, he would say placidly, How much longer do they have to be kids?

Since then, both fathers had taken to ignoring their kid's periodical disappearances at night. Or at least Naruto did. Sakumo would still have to check on Kakashi every now and then. The man was much older than his previous student.

"Maybe we could go to my house and do something." he suggested, silver hair glinting in the shine of the moon.

Hana sighed, shaking her head with a soft chuckle as the kids dispersed. She desperately wished to be a kid again, without all the responsibilities that an adult had. But as she thought about her childhood, memories of her brother replayed , and a sense of emptiness returned in her heart. She felt guilty for what she had done, even though it technically wasn't her fault. She assumed that her new sharingan was a secret to most villagers, save the Hokage and his assistant. Toru would have needed clearance from the Hokage to carry out his plans anyways. When she saw Jimaru, Hana waved. "Hey! Jimaru! It's been like.. forever since I've seen you!" She exclaimed, genuinely excited to see him. "How have you been?" She asked.

As Hana faced him after leaving the group of low-ranked ninja a smile lit up her features. "Hey! Jimaru! It's been like.. forever since I've seen you! How have you been?" He gave his best approximation of a similar smile. It was an awkward attempt, the smile was physically present, but there was no emotion behind it. A problem for many ANBU was adjusting to normal human interaction. He could grasp what actions some of the less-complex social norms dictated, however the exact reasons for the actions, the why of the situations were beyond him. After a few seconds Jimaru gave up the smile. "It really has been awhile hasn't it? I am glad to see you are doing well."

Jimaru never could understand why Hana was as nice to him as she was. Sure they had worked together to investigate the murder of Hana's mother and the disappearance of her brother, but the Hokage had ordered him to do that. He supposed it could be some sort of psychological reaction to the extreme stress that she had been under back in those days. But then this sort of thing was never his specialty anyway. "It took me awhile to track you done, you were scheduled to remain in the hospital for awhile longer, but I guess I should have expected you to not stay cooped up for long. I suppose we should catch up or something, but shouldn't you really be resting right now?"


"Hokage, did you come to practice too? I've been working really hard! I'm going to work hard to become strong so I can make everyone in our village happy. Then everyone will want to smile, won't they?" Shuro gave a sigh, "I wish I had the time to train regularly, but unfortunately I hardly have time to do anything it seems like. Make sure you practice hard now while you have the chance." He peered off into the distance, a grin on his face as Kiko said the last part. "Yes, I am sure they will. I am sure you will grow into a fine, worthy kunoichi, and everyone in the village will be able to smile knowing you will be around to protect them!"

"It took me awhile to track you done, you were scheduled to remain in the hospital for awhile longer, but I guess I should have expected you to not stay cooped up for long. I suppose we should catch up or something, but shouldn't you really be resting right now?"

Hana shrugged, looking down at her hands for a moment, then back up at Jimaru. "I feel fine, and the nurses let me leave, so I'm assuming that I'm not in any life-threatening danger for now. Besides, the nurses must be pretty used to my sudden disappearances nowadays. If they haven't sent a search party looking for me, then I don't really need to go back." She said to him. It wasn't that she didn't like the hospital, it was just the fact that Hana had spent so much of her life in one, and lost so many years laying in bed getting 'treatment' for something no doctors had a cure for.

"But you said you were tracking me down? Was there something you wanted to talk about?" Han asked. It was rare for someone to be looking for her. Most often, it would be a member of the ANBU or the Hokage himself looking for her brother, and when they were unable to find him, then they would look for Hana, but only to ask if she had any idea of his whereabouts.

"But you said you were tracking me down? Was there something you wanted to talk about?" "Well," Jimaru thought for a moment. "Lord Hokage wanted me to check on you and see how you were doing. You have been through a very trying ordeal, he, or rather we, want to make sure you are doing alright. And not just physically. I am sure what you have been through was painfully in more than just a physical respect." Before Hana had a chance to reply, something caught Jimaru's eye.

Jimaru's eyes took on an intense, focused look. There was no mistaking it, the woman walking their way was Vita Shi. Though he had never personally encountered her, Jimaru knew her face well from her prominent profile in the Bingo Book. This was not good...why was she here, and now of all times? Whatever the reason, he would not allow a foreign shinobi, especially one as dangerous as Vita to just strut into the village and run about as she pleased. Not turning away from Vita he said, "Hana I hope you really are feeling ok, we are about to have some real trouble on our hands. Back me up."

Stepping in front of Vita, a few yards in front of her still, Jimaru made eye contact with her. "Vita Shi. State your business here. You know you are not welcome in this village so unless you have some truly significant reason for being here you need to leave now or risk an incident between the Leaf and Cloud villages. I will not ask you again." Jimaru brought his arms up in front of him in a fighting stance, one arm already slid out of his shirt, ready as he could be if, when this got violent/



Shuro nodded to Rie. "I don't doubt you were. I just like to get out of the office every once and awhile to see how the young shinobi of the village are doing. It will be up to you all to defend the village and keep it's people safe one day, I just want to make sure you are doing everything you can to be ready for that duty, that honor." It was really too bad that Rie was the jinchuriki, he reflected to himself, gazing off into the distance. He would have much preferred the child of one of his ANBU to be the jinchuriki, someone who would have been more readily molded into an ideal shinobi than this samurai outcast. Well the decision had not been left to him, that time, so he would just have to do the best with what he had. It was just too bad she wasn't as fond of the village, or him, as Kiko.

An ANBU member down the road caught his attention. "Well, sorry but duty calls." He bid farewell and moved quickly met the ANBU a ways down the road. The man whispered to Shuro the nature of the unwelcome visitor. "Hmm, what is she doing showing herself here?" Looking at the ANBU he said, clear the area of civilians, I don't know that she want's a confrontation, but I don't want to risk villagers getting hurt. "Yes sir!" The ANBU replied before setting out to do his task. Shuro then teleported to a taller building overlooking the main entrance and observed the scene taking place. The villagers seemed to have a sense of something bad going on and were making haste to get out of the area.