11

Chapter 11: maybe i'm not all that you thoughtNotes:

Sorry for the wait while I had my exams. Enjoy some baby Itachi as a treat :)

Chapter Text

Of course Raijin is aware, on some theoretical level, that the Uchiha are still around. He did rescue and drag one across the elemental nations after all. Moreover, he has found himself completely incapable of ignoring the police force as they patrol the village purely because he's just not used to seeing them around. 

He can vaguely remember the clan members being around in his earliest memories, with their high collars, severe expressions and the scent of disapproval wafting off of them in reaction to his first pranks. But he'd barely been seven by the time they'd been wiped out and the police force was never really reinstated after that so Raijin has done most of his growing up in their absence. He's more used to ANBU taking care of the things the police force is in charge of. To see them out and about now just rings as markedly strange in his head.

Kurama agrees, wrinkling his nose at the 'clan of the cursed eyes' as he'd called them. 'Why are there so many of them?' he demands. 

'Shouldn't you remember them from your time with mum?' Raijin asks back. 

Huffing, the Kyuubi turns away pointedly. 'I didn't care to see through her eyes on most days.'

So they're both in roughly the same boat with regards to their disbelief at seeing the Uchiha clan still around and 'thriving'. It might not be obvious to anyone who isn't looking for it, but Raijin can see the way the Uchiha already hold themselves apart from the village. In turn, the villagers treat them with either a distant sort of respect or with outright hesitance. 

Raijin doesn't really know what to do about Danzou just yet, but he has a feeling that even with that old coot out of the picture, the village's problem with the Uchiha will only be delayed and not solved. To the civilians who tend to be wary of shinobi anyway, the only remaining founding clan is one to be kept at a distance on principle. And that doesn't even cover how most shinobi tend to resent the Uchiha because despite their number and the advantage of the sharingan, most Uchiha shinobi tend to only serve in Konoha's forces for a mandated five years before the police force ultimately absorbs them.

So that's another thing he'll have to figure out how to solve. He doubts he can talk or fight his way out of this one too. It's probably going to require a lot of delicate political manoeuvring. Raijin sighs and shakes his head. It's going to take him a while to build up to that point. First, he just has to keep them all alive. 

It's oddly nice to see them around. All these people who look and dress like Sasuke, the uchiwa fan on their clothes blinking in and out of sight as they meander through the village they still call home. 

And then Raijin realises that not only is Sasuke's clan still alive, his immediate family is too—including one Uchiha Itachi, who is all of four-years-old right now. The blond takes one look at the child who doesn't even reach his hip and nearly has a heart attack right on the spot. 

It's all he can do to not drop the bag of fruits he has just purchased to bring back to his hotel room along with his newly acquired stash of cup ramen. Itachi either doesn't notice or doesn't care about the grown man having a crisis next to him. The boy is very clearly on a mission as he seriously asks to buy a sweet melon just like he has been instructed to by his mother. 

Even at four-years-old, Itachi is unfailingly well-mannered. Paired with his big doe eyes and chubby cheeks, Raijin only barely holds back from cooing over the child while simultaneously having a breakdown because no one told him Itachi had been such a precious baby before his stint as an international terrorist what the fuck.

Itachi is already carrying a bag of other vegetables and fruits but he looks determined to lug the melon around too. While he's this young, he doesn't yet have control over his expressions and his face visibly screws up in concentration as he tries to work out the maths behind how he's going to transport all his purchases back to the Uchiha compound which is at least a fifteen minutes walk away by adult standards. 

Really, it's a no brainer to Raijin. He doesn't even actually think before swooping in to grab the melon before it can roll right out of Itachi's bag. 

'Do you ever think?' Kurama snarks. Raijin charitably ignores him. 

"You look like you could use a little help there," he says to Itachi instead, offering an easy smile and keeping his body language open. "Can I help you take these back to your mum?"

Itachi blinks at him, hesitation passing over his face. "Thank you for the offer, shinobi-san," he says solemnly, "but I wouldn't want to trouble you."

Sage, who raised this kid? All the polite genes must have gone straight to Itachi because Raijin remembers Sasuke having been kind of a brat even before the trauma ruined his personality.

"Are you sure?" Raijin asks, crouching down so he's at eye level with Itachi. "Because I'm new to the village and still trying to learn my way around. If I walked with you, I'd get to revise the village layout without having to worry about getting lost, so really, you'd be doing me a favour if you said yes."

Itachi doesn't look very convinced by Raijin's logic but he also seems to realise that he's going to have a hard time somehow making it home by himself with all his luggage in tow. With clear reluctance, he nods once, his hands twisting into the material of his canvas bag. 

The nervous habit immediately reminds Raijin of a younger Hinata, and he has to blink and comprehend that Uchiha Itachi ever shared some similarity with the painfully shy Hyuuga heiress at some point in time. Raijin wonders when exactly Itachi lost these more childish parts of himself. 

"Great!" he says instead of lingering on that particular thought for now. "Would you like to hold the melon or the bag?"

Gripping his bag tightly, stubborn determination settles over Itachi's face as he says, "You can hold the melon, shinobi-san."

"If you're sure." Raijin shrugs. He knows pushing any more won't do him much good. "Ah, my name is Raijin, by the way."

"It's nice to meet you, Raijin-san," Itachi says dutifully. "I am Uchiha Itachi."

"How old are you, Itachi-kun?"

"Four-years-old," Itachi informs. 

Raijin hums, shooting the boy a smile. "And you're already running errands for your mum, huh? You must be very responsible."

Itachi doesn't say anything to that, only ducking his head. It's not like Raijin hadn't meant it as a compliment, but he also knows exactly what that sense of responsibility is going to do to Itachi before the boy even hits his teens. 

It isn't unusual to see toddlers run errands for their parents. The errands aren't usually that important anyways since the whole point is to instil a sense of independence and responsibility in the child at an early age. Two things that Itachi could probably use less of in his life, honestly. 

Raijin has been running all of his errands by himself for as long as he can remember, and while he definitely had a harder time than most kids what with the whole village hating him for no reason and all, it's still a difficult thing for a kid to handle by themselves. Even at this age, what Itachi probably needs to learn instead of any more self-reliance is how to ask for help when he needs it.

"Do you go to school, Itachi-kun?" he asks conversationally, because what do genius shinobi do as toddlers anyway?

Itachi shakes his head, puffing his cheeks out and then immediately thinking better of it. "I train with Father and the other children of the clan," he says. "I am still too young for the Academy."

He'd join at six, if Raijin remembers correctly, and then graduate within months of that. 

"Do you like training?" 

"I am grateful I get to learn my clan's techniques," Itachi offers.

It's not really an answer, and certainly not a response you'd expect from someone so young. Raijin can't help the urge to gently reach out with his chakra and brush it against Itachi's in hopes to transfer some comfort. When Itachi startles at the contact, he pretends not to notice. 

"That's a smart response," Raijin notes, his smile turning a bit wry. "Bet you're a better student than I ever was. I only went to school to be as disruptive as possible."

Itachi blinks, openly bewildered, and Raijin laughs. 

"I don't learn like everyone else does," he explains, "and my teachers didn't understand or like that. So, I figured, if they keep trying to ignore me, I should just make it harder for them to do that and have some fun while I'm at it. Being a public menace made complete sense in my head."

Lips twitching, Itachi bites the inside of his cheek. "You don't learn like everyone else?" he asks, glancing up at the blond. 

Raijin wrinkles his nose. "The whole classroom thing really isn't for me," he explains. "I can't sit still for that long and I have a hard time with theory and textbooks and stuff. My master was the one to figure out that I need to actually get my hands on things and do them to get it. He simplified stuff until I understood, and eventually, I learned to do the same for myself."

"Oh," Itachi says, nodding thoughtfully. "I see. I thought everyone just learned the same."

"A lot of people do." Raijin shrugs. "I just thought I was stupid for the longest time. But everyone's brains work differently and you just need to find what works best for you."

Itachi hums. "That makes sense."

"Right?" Grinning, Raijin nods. "You'd think more people would agree."

"They don't?"

Nose wrinkling, Raijin offers Itachi a tight-lipped smile. "You'll find that a lot of people don't like things that are different, Itachi-kun. They don't like seeing things that don't fit in with the rest. I think it scares them."

Itachi's face takes on a thoughtful note. "Because it means change?"

Raijin makes a vague noise of agreement. "And because they don't understand." While he doesn't say anything, brief disgruntlement passes over Itachi's face. Raijin chuckles and grins at the boy. "I don't really get it either," he admits cheerfully. "They should just mind their business if they don't understand why something is different. Wasting all their energy just to hate something on principle is stupid and will probably only give them an ulcer or something." He shudders. "Ulcers suck," he adds gravely for Itachi's benefit. He's lucky Kurama likes him enough to get rid of all that nasty stuff for him so he doesn't have to deal with it anymore, but he still remembers them from back when he was a kid, before Kurama gave actually gave a shit.

The boy blinks. "I see."

It's terribly endearing. Raijin can't help getting carried away with his rambling when he has such a willing and attentive audience. He's probably leaking happy chakra everywhere too, but he has a hard enough time controlling that even when he isn't being faced with unfairly cute children who look at him wide, fixated eyes and nod along solemnly to everything that comes out of his mouth. 

Admittedly, Raijin was never really a fan of Itachi. Like, he gets that the guy was in a tough place, especially as an eleven-year-old. Sage knows just what sort of questionable decisions Raijin would have made if he'd had half Itachi's baggage as a preteen. So, he gets it—the guy didn't have it easy and he made his choice for Sasuke's sake when he wasn't thinking straight. That said, Raijin never quite managed to get over just how colossally Itachi fucked Sasuke over for years. Surely there were other ways that didn't involve torturing seven-year-olds. Surely.

So, yeah, he has his hang ups about his best friend's older brother and he probably won't be getting over them any time soon either, but man, he can definitely get behind the idea of Itachi staying four-years-old forever. 

He kind of wants to wrap the kid up in a soft blanket, put him in his pocket and whisk them off into the sunset to live happily ever after. 

'Stealing that child is exactly what you need right now,' Kurama drawls sarcastically in response to his line of thought. 'Bet the old man in the hat will just love that.'

'I'm not actually going to kidnap him,' Raijin insists. 'I'm just…thinking about it.'

Kurama snorts. 'Must be breeding season.'

Raijin sends his friend an impression of suitable horror at such a crass remark. He doesn't want kids! He just wants to keep this baby Itachi safe. There's a difference. 

The fox makes his incredulity clear in the impression he sends Raijin. Raijin ignores it.

"Oh." He blinks when they come to a stop, having arrived at their destination while he hadn't quite been paying attention. "We're already here, huh?" He turns to consider the guards at the gates of the compound who blink at the stranger accompanying their clan heir. The young one on the left looks easier to bully into helping Itachi. Raijin nods decisively. He has found his target. 

At his side, Itachi shifts and peers up at Raijin, his gaze hesitant and shy. "You can come in if you'd like," he offers, voice soft. 

He says it like it might be for Raijin's benefit but it's clear to anyone observing that there's something hopeful hiding just underneath. 

Raijin brightens. "You think so? Won't your mum mind?"

Itachi shakes his head. "I ought to repay you for your kindness. Mother will approve."

"Lead the way then, Itachi-kun."

It's a surreal thing to walk through the Uchiha compound for the very first time. In his time, it had been closed off as a veritable ghost town. They couldn't do anything to the place without Sasuke—the de facto clan head's approval, and he'd either been too young or too much of a criminal for them to start any official projects that might demolish or repurpose what had once housed a founding clan. 

Right now, however, it is very much functional and filled to the brim with noise and activity. It's essentially a mini-village inside with stores and stalls dotting the first couple of blocks before giving way to more administrative and residential looking buildings. Raijin practically breaks his neck trying to take it all in. 

To be fair, people stare right back at him so he thinks they're even. These people really must not be used to visitors. 

"How many Uchiha even are there?" he mutters, still not used to just how many of them are around. 

"Just over two hundred and fifty," Itachi answers promptly. 

Raijin whistles. "Damn. You must be one of the largest clans."

"Second largest," Itachi confirms, something like pride in the curve of his smile. "Right after the Akimichi. The Inuzuka are pretty close though."

In less than a decade, they'd go from over two hundred to one unless Raijin manages to do something about it. Which he will. He's physically incapable of minding his own business and he's too stubborn to not have things go his way, but damn, he's definitely feeling the pressure now that he has actually seen the Uchiha with his own eyes. He's going to have to make a list or something soon for all the tasks he has to accomplish before he can actually consider his work done and fuck off to take a much deserved vacation. 

The day Danzo dies, Raijin decides he's going to go on a ramen tour around the Continent. Maybe he can become a really niche food critic. 

"Is this your house?" Raijin asks when they approach the biggest house in the compound. He blinks at the sloping roofs and almost oppressively traditional design. "It's…impressive," he remarks diplomatically. Not really his style but definitely aesthetically pleasing. 

Itachi bobs his head, leading the way to the front door with hurried steps now that they're almost to his destination. 

As soon as they enter, a voice calls out from further inside the house. 

"Itachi, is that you?"

"I'm home," Itachi calls back softly, carefully toeing his sandals off so as to not damage his cargo. 

Raijin is about to follow the boy's example himself when he freezes, caught off guard by the woman who rounds the corner to the genkan, a smile on her face that is only barely marred by surprise to find a stranger with Itachi. 

Well, it's clear just who the children take after. Uchiha Mikoto is obviously the one to give her sons their pale skin and delicate features.

To Raijin, it's a lot like looking at a ghost. At twenty-years-old, Sasuke had looked a lot like his late mother. Raijin wonders if his friend had known—had remembered his mother's face every time he looked in a mirror. 

"Mother, this is Raijin-san," Itachi introduces, cutting through Raijin's stupor. "He has been kind enough to assist me with the shopping."

Mikoto's eyebrows rise ever so slightly as she turns back to the blond. Her eyes are sharp and analytical even as she expertly dons the persona of a perfect wife and host, smiling politely at her guest. "How nice of you, Raijin-san. Thank you."

Raijin waves the pleasantries away, forcing his face into a smile. He can't exactly keep gaping at Sasuke's mom. Or worse, cry at her because he suddenly really really misses the duckbutt-haired bastard. 

"Not at all, Uchiha-sama," he assures, only just remembering his manners. "It wasn't any trouble." 

He isn't really sure how he's going to manage reintegrating the Uchiha into Konoha, but it's almost definitely a good idea for them to have a good impression of him regardless of what he plans on doing. Whether he stong-arms them into it or chooses to gently prod them onto the right path, he's sure he'll have an easier time of it if he manages to get the clan to consider him a friend. 

Exercising his minimal training in etiquette (courtesy of Tsunade) is a small price to pay in the name of peace and all. 

Itachi turns to peer up at him. "Would you like to stay for some tea?"

Mikoto glances at her son but doesn't reprimand him for extending the offer. If anything, there is a gleam of interest in her eyes when she turns to look expectantly at the man who has apparently managed to make enough of an impression on Itachi for her son to proactively extend an offer like this instead of letting her handle social pleasantries as he usually would. He is staking a claim here; this is his guest.

Raijin considers it. He knows it's probably a good idea to get some dialogue started with the Uchiha clan head's wife and maybe install himself as a friendly adult presence in Itachi's life, but as he turns back to Mikoto, he also knows it might just turn out to be more than he can handle right now. 

It's one thing to escort Itachi home with the resolve to better his life in some way, if only for Sasuke's sake. It's another to have Sasuke's eyes stare up at him from Mikoto's face in the house where she died. Raijin had been mentally prepared for one and he isn't for the other. At least not yet. 

He needs to take time away and collect himself before he can come back with some sort of plan to put into action. He might be good at improvisation but he also knows by now to not test his luck in such a way. 

'Good call, kit,' Kuaram rumbles quietly in his mind. 'Just go home. You've done enough.'

Raijin swallows. He offers the two Uchiha a smile that he probably can't hide is fake. "Maybe next time, Itachi-kun," he says apologetically. "I already have plans for today." He doesn't, but he's sure Obito will be happy to see him again nonetheless.

Itachi's shoulders droop ever so slightly. "Oh. Okay."

Mikoto drops a hand on her son's shoulder. "Next time, then," she says lightly. "We'll have to repay your kindness after all, Raijin-san."

Instinctively, Raijin knows she isn't the kind of person he can let his guard down around. For whatever reason, Uchiha Mikoto is watching him and it probably isn't a good thing for someone with as many secrets as Raijin. 

He tries not to twitch under her gaze. "Sure, Uchiha-sama. It'd be my pleasure." Turning to Itachi, he presses the sweet melon into the boy's hands and offers a more genuine grin. "I'll see you around, Itachi-kun." He winks just to see Itachi smile back cautiously. 

And then he hauls ass like the house is on fire behind him because today is absolutely not the day for him to have a breakdown about missing his friends from a future he is never going to get back. Eventually, Raijin thinks the emotions will catch up to him and he'll have to sit and have his meltdown because he can't outrun reality anymore. For now, though, he's going to run away from his problems like any good little shinobi.

He's still a student of Hatake Kakashi, after all. He learned emotional constipation from the best. 

"Namikaze Minato's brother was here earlier today," Mikoto brings up conversationally over dinner. "He helped Itachi with an errand."

Fugaku lifts an eyebrow. "Is that so?" Of course he'd heard that Namikaze Minato has a long-lost brother who he was recently discovered by coincidence. Who hasn't? It has been a favourite topic of gossip and conversation for how dramatic the whole thing sounds—like a play or fairytale of some sort. "What did you think of him?"

Mikoto hums around a mouthful of rice. "Itachi would have more to tell you than me."

The couple turns to their only son who blinks back at them, caught a bit off guard. 

"Did you learn anything useful, Itachi?" Fugaku asks. 

Itachi swallows, thinking carefully back to everything Raijin had said. The man talked a lot, so it isn't exactly easy. "He has a lot of chakra," Itachi offers. He hasn't learned sensing yet but Raijin had had so much chakra that Itachi hadn't needed to actually look to know. 

Mikoto smiles in encouragement, nodding. "A ninjutsu type for sure," she offers. "Probably wind-natured."

"Just like Minato," Fugaku notes. 

"He knows sealing," Itachi pipes up. "He talked about it."

The Uchiha patriarch looks interested at that. "Just like Minato indeed," he murmurs in thought.

"He could be one to watch," Mikoto comments idly. 

"Especially if the Hokage gives Namikaze a seat on the council," Fugaku agrees, sipping his tea. "It wouldn't have been possible with just Minato, but if there's two of them…" He shakes his head, turning to smile at his son. "Well done on your observations, Itachi."

Itachi smiles back at his father, ducking his head and paying attention to his dinner. He doesn't mention any of the other things he learned today about Raijin, but he thinks it's okay just this once. His father probably doesn't want to know about Raijin's frog wallet and his pink-haired kunoichi friend even if Itachi had liked hearing about those things. He doesn't mention anything about Raijin liking ramen or about his trip to an onsen in Land of Tea. He also doesn't say anything about the man's chakra feeling like the sun when it had brushed against Itachi, warmer than anything he had ever felt before and full of the feeling of safety, comfort and playful affection.

Just this once, he thinks it's okay to keep these things to himself.