When mid-March arrived, she found out that Kisame's birthday was on the 18th—a day he didn't want to celebrate—and Jiraiya told her something that discouraged her quite a bit.
"You're afraid we can't open the secret chamber."
"What? Why?"
"Have you seen this sequence?" he asked, pointing to a series of kanji. "It looks like some kind of time seal, like a countdown."
"You mean the chamber is programmed to open by itself?" she asked, quite surprised. "But why? When?"
"To be honest, I have no idea," scratched his head the pervert.
The matter of the Uzumaki secret chamber was, after that, set aside. Jiraiya didn't want to spend more time thinking about how to enter a chamber that, supposedly, would open by itself when the time came. However, the mystery had sparked discussions among the others, who wondered what could be inside to warrant such barriers.
"All this just gives me a headache," Naruto sighed. "Why so much mystery? They could've left a note explaining what's going on with that chamber!"
Sasuke and Kisame snorted a sarcastic laugh upon hearing him. It was clear that no clan would ever make it easy for others to try to take possession of their belongings. Still, it was curious to realize that perhaps the chamber hadn't been sealed during the destruction of Uzushiogakure, but before. That would explain why so many interesting scrolls were taken from among the ruins that weren't stored in the chamber believed to hold the true secrets of their clan's fuinjutsu. The idiots who tried to wipe out the clan hadn't even bothered to search the ruins to take the Uzumaki knowledge, thinking they'd destroyed everything.
With one less worry so to speak she refocused on training, just like everyone else. The only one who seemed to disappear more often was Jiraiya. Everyone knew he must be trying to find out something about that infinite genjutsu they planned to use to enslave humanity. After all, alongside training, that was the most important thing.
Her brothers and she were so busy training that days flew by in the blink of an eye. Until April arrived, and Jiraiya was able to discover more about Akatsuki.
"Apparently, the bijuus Akatsuki still doesn't have are the 1, 6, 8, and 9 tails."
"How do you know?"
"Well, Gaara is obvious since he's still alive and protected by his village. You're here, and as far as we know, the jinchuriki of the 8 tails is still alive in Kumo, closely watched by the Raikage. As for the jinchuriki of the Six Tails… Apparently, he hasn't let his guard down and has escaped Akatsuki a couple of times. Right now, he's missing after the last attack."
Seina sighed with relief realizing Utakata had heeded her warning. She didn't want to think what would have happened if he hadn't known Akatsuki was after him.
"That's good news," Itachi acknowledged, with a voice much less monotone than before. "That means they've only recovered half of the bijuus. Naruto and Seina are out of danger for a while."
"Do you think they'll go for the others first?"
"That was the plan."
"Then Gaara is in danger!" Naruto exclaimed realizing.
"His council already knows Akatsuki is after him," Jiraiya calmed him. "Besides, like I said, he's well protected in Suna. After all, he's the Kazekage candidate."
"What!?" Naruto shouted, extremely surprised.
Suddenly, she remembered she hadn't told her brother what she discovered in Kakashi's last letter. She stifled a laugh realizing Naruto was pouting like a little kid because his friend had beaten him to it when he hadn't even wanted to be Kazekage. She half-listened as Naruto bombarded Jiraiya with questions about Gaara while Sasuke and she exchanged amused glances.
That afternoon, Itachi took another step in his unofficial therapy. Finally, after many weeks, they talked about his conflicted feelings about Shisui.
"Why don't you keep talking about Shisui? When was the first time you two talked about what was happening in your clan?"
"It was a few months after I was promoted to chunin and started attending meetings. As I told you before, we knew each other from before, but I wasn't aware of what was going on in secret until much later. From what I know, he was recruited to help the cause much earlier than I was. Obviously because he was older and had a higher rank. And because he was also a prodigy in many fields."
"Was he the one who approached you to talk about what was going on?"
"He approached me, but not to talk. He was ordered to watch me since, apparently, I didn't seem too convinced by the clan's plans, and they noticed before I could hide it. He accepted the orders, but no one in my family knew that Shisui actually sympathized more with me than with the rebels."
"So, Shisui told you he agreed with you?"
"No. He just kept acting like my friend while behind my back he somehow contacted Danzo. He didn't tell me how he got to him until the day he lost one of his eyes at Danzo's hands and committed suicide, giving me his other eye."
Seina blinked. Too much important information in very few words. For starters, Itachi implied with "acting" and "behind my back" that he felt as if Shisui had betrayed him, in one way or another. On the other hand, Shisui hadn't trusted Itachi with much information, perhaps to protect him, so Itachi had gaps about what happened in between. Finally, it seemed Itachi also didn't know Shisui had been a Danzo ninja until the day of his death, the day he lost both eyes. Damn. She'd have to take it slow.
"Let's go step by step… Do you think Shisui, back then, betrayed you? That he wasn't your friend?"
"… Part of me does believe it, but… another part of me knows that maybe he did it to protect me. If he had betrayed me, my clan would have found out early that I didn't share their ideals, and they would have… punished me somehow," Itachi admitted aloud, with his usual crushing logic.
"Do you think Shisui knew you were reporting to the Third and the counsellors?"
"Probably. I talked to him a couple of times about betraying the clan to avoid a possible war in Konoha, so logically, he should have deduced that we would need the help of the village's high command."
"Do you think he knew you were also being recruited by Danzo?"
"Maybe. He didn't talk to me about Danzo, but Danzo was a counsellor to the Third, so he knew what was happening inside the Uchiha clan. If he tried to recruit Shisui, maybe Shisui thought he also tried to recruit me."
"Hmm… On the other hand, why do you think Danzo ripped one of Shisui's eyes out?"
"Shisui had a very particular mangekyo sharingan. Instead of having Tsukuyomi, he had a much more powerful genjutsu called Kotoamatsukami. With this genjutsu, you can control people so subtly that they don't even realize they are under an illusion. It can even implant false experiences to make the victim believe they still have free will, when they don't."
"The genjutsu he used on you, isn't it?"
"… Yes."
There was a silence when Seina asked the key question. Itachi seemed neutral. She knew he must have been thinking about it for a long time. Maybe a part of him had already accepted that he was a victim of Shisui. Maybe another part of Itachi had understood that, even if it pissed him off, he couldn't change the past. Before she could ask another question, Itachi continued.
"Now, with what I know, I think Shisui tried to use this genjutsu on the Uchiha clan rebels, but Danzo stole his eye before he could change the clan's will because he wanted them to rebel."
"What makes you think that?" she asked, somewhat surprised.
"Because someone stole the eyes from all my family members, and they could only be stolen if they were all dead," said Itachi, with a dangerously cold voice, "and there's only one person, in this whole story, who urged me to kill them in exchange for Sasuke's life."
"Danzo."
"Danzo. I thought I was manipulating him, agreeing to kill my clan in exchange for Sasuke, but now I know it was the opposite. I fell into his trap, just as he wanted. His plan was always to keep Sasuke alive to keep me in check, that I would kill the Uchiha clan to steal their eyes, and at the same time force me to leave the village so I couldn't realize his true plans. Had I been in Konoha, sooner or later I would have found out everything. With his plan, he could keep me away using Sasuke to prevent me from returning to Konoha and learning the truth. At the same time, I became his scapegoat in front of everyone. Even if Konoha's high command had noticed those eyes were missing… Danzo could always have blamed me too."
"And how do you think this plan affected Shisui?"
"After thinking it over carefully… I've realized that Shisui was also a victim of Danzo. If I'm right, and everything makes me believe that I am, the facts point to Shisui trying to subdue the clan peacefully. It was a desperate gamble that I'll never know if it would have worked. Surely, by that time, Shisui was either working for or reporting to the council or, at least, to Danzo what was happening and what he planned to do. Otherwise, if he hadn't told them about the abilities of his mangekyo sharingan, Danzo wouldn't have known that such a genjutsu existed in the first place."
"You mean that he wouldn't have known because only someone with the mangekyo sharingan and the Uchiha stone tablet knows what jutsus exist," she thought aloud, realizing it was a solid deduction. "Do you think that, knowing what Shisui planned to do, Danzo realized that his plan to steal the eyes wouldn't be possible and that's why he attacked him without hesitation?"
"Exactly. Shisui was too naive. It was clear he didn't think Danzo wanted the destruction of the clan. It was his overconfidence in the council that triggered his death. As soon as Danzo stole one eye before he could use the genjutsu, Shisui knew he couldn't keep the other eye. For one, a Hokage's advisor had attacked him directly, which was a death sentence because Danzo wouldn't leave him alive to tell the Third Hokage what had happened. On the other hand, he knew that even if he committed suicide, Danzo would try to take his other eye, stealing it just like he did with my family's eyes. And finally, Shisui probably figured that using the genjutsu with his remaining eye was useless, considering that Danzo, with the stolen eye, could undo it in an instant."
"So Shisui had no choice but to give you his eye to protect it, and to use his suicide as a way for you to evolve your sharingan into the mangekyo sharingan."
"Yes, but before giving it to me, he used the genjutsu on me."
"Why do you think he did that?" she asked, finally getting to the tricky topic.
"Because, in case Danzo got the eye by attacking me as well, he would have already spent the genjutsu. Kotoamatsukami can only be used once every ten years, according to the stone tablet. It was a good idea to deny Danzo his eye for at least a decade. That gave Konoha and the clan time."
"Can't you think of any other reason?" she asked, imagining what Shisui might have been thinking. Itachi raised an eyebrow, looking her in the eyes. "You yourself said that Shisui caused his own death and accelerated your clan's destruction due to his overconfidence, right?"
"Yes."
"Don't you think that Shisui, who trusted the council and the Third Hokage, and who violently discovered that Danzo, whom he probably worked for and who had no good intentions towards him, lost all trust in people and in his own decisions in one blow? From what you've told me, Shisui was someone confident in his own abilities, but surely, he realized he wasn't as good at judging others as he thought, don't you think?"
Itachi blinked and looked back at the ceiling, pondering what she had just asked him. He seemed to be realizing something he had never thought about before.
"What's worse, if you've been able to deduce all this about Danzo, perhaps Shisui did too, and it happened precisely the day he lost all the trust he had placed in the leadership. The same day someone he had hoped in stole his eye. Possibly, besides feeling betrayed, he felt guilty and stupid for trusting the worst person of all. And to top it off, he knew that person intended to kill him to bury his secrets with Shisui's and, at the same time, take his remaining eye. Do you think that on the day of his suicide, the same day Shisui understood all this, he felt he could trust anyone else, like you, when he had already been wrong before?"
"…No."
"I want you to close your eyes," she asked, seeing him obey. "I want you to think you are Shisui moments before Danzo tears out his eye. How much he trusted the council, trusted Danzo. The shock and betrayal he felt when Danzo tore out his eye before he could try to save his clan. Think about how he felt when he realized that Danzo, in whom he had trusted by revealing a secret from the stone tablet, not only didn't want to save his clan but wanted them dead, maybe to take their eyes like his. Think about how he felt when he realized he didn't know who to trust. How much he risked going to you moments after being betrayed because he wanted to believe in you, how he exposed his heart again by placing his last hopes in you, giving you his eye. If you were Shisui right at that moment…, why would you use kotoamatsukami on your friend before dying?"
Itachi was silent, eyes closed, for almost 20 minutes. She knew he was thinking deeply about the scenario she had presented. After all, Itachi wasn't a coward. Even though it hurt to think about it, he knew he had to because he wanted to understand what happened and couldn't ask Shisui what exactly occurred. Seina had thought that Shisui manipulated Itachi, even if to protect him, but now she wasn't so sure. She was beginning to think it was exactly the opposite. Shisui had fervently wished to trust Itachi, but they had betrayed him so deeply that he couldn't make another mistake. Not with such a powerful eye as his. Especially knowing how many lives depended on it.
"He would have used the genjutsu to deny it to Danzo for ten years and to make sure I protected Konoha. A part of Shisui, at that moment, couldn't trust me after the betrayal he suffered in less than 24 hours," said Itachi, "just before he had to kill himself for the good of everyone."
Seina didn't know if he had just understood why, so she continued sharing her thoughts with Itachi to help him reach the epiphany she herself had less than an hour ago.
"Shisui knew your greatest wish was to avoid war by protecting Konoha and, as much as possible, the clan, right?"
"Yes."
"So, would it be possible that Shisui put you under genjutsu with the order to 'protect Konoha' so he could trust you and die peacefully knowing you would protect the village, and at the same time to avoid manipulating you since he knew that 'protecting Konoha' had always been your own desire?"
Itachi opened his eyes suddenly when he understood what she was trying to convey. His tormented and stunned expression was the most emotional she had seen on him since she met him in person.
"You think Shisui believed that ordering me to 'protect Konoha' wouldn't have much effect on me because it was something I already intended to do. That way, if he was right, the genjutsu would neutralize itself or wouldn't affect my decisions. The only benefit would have been to spend the genjutsu of his remaining eye so Danzo couldn't use it."
"Don't you think it's possible?"
"Yes. It's very possible."
"It's true we won't know if the decisions you made afterward were yours, since you were under the genjutsu, and possibly Shisui didn't think in such a short time what would happen to the genjutsu or how it would affect your actions when Danzo deceived and manipulated you, but do you think Shisui did what he did out of malice? That he didn't care about you? Or did he simply make a mistake in a desperate moment?"
Itachi didn't answer. They ended the session there. The next days, he took time to rest from their talk. He was probably thinking about what they had discussed because he was quieter than usual. Sasuke and Kisame knew that sometimes he needed space to process what came up in therapy sessions, so they pretended nothing unusual was happening. Not all sessions were "real." Some days they just talked about trivial things.
Therapy was usually weekly or biweekly, but Itachi didn't know that. Seina was taking advantage of daily talks to reintroduce Itachi to society and help him mature emotionally without him knowing, not just to treat his traumas. That's why she didn't mind not talking to him for a few days as they usually did, because their next real therapy session was in a week.
Sasuke—and Naruto—were the only ones who knew of her secret plans, so they helped her bring up topics and interacted with Itachi as much as possible so that, little by little, he stopped being an emotional block and became a normal person. The funny thing was everyone knew it was working. Even Itachi himself.
In the following days, Itachi seemed lighter. Whatever he had internalized did him good. One day, after their daily one-on-one training, Itachi sat on the log next to her. He glanced at her with a relieved expression.
"I was going crazy, but now I've processed a lot. I can't change the past, but at least I'm sure Shisui never wished me harm. He didn't betray the clan or manipulate me more than necessary. He could have countless times before his death. He did what he did because he saw no way out, no other choice. He made mistakes, like me, but even on the brink of death, he wanted what was best for me. And now I know," he looked at the horizon more serene than ever, "thank you, Seina. You're a good person. I'm glad my brother has you as his best friend and as a sister."
"You're welcome. I'm glad he's my brother too," she smiled.
Then she looked at Itachi, who was giving her a tiny smile back. She couldn't help it. She had to hug him. He froze for a second, but then he hugged her very gently, as if he didn't know what to do with the hug. Seina squeezed him tightly, but without overwhelming him, so he would know she was there.
"I know you did and have done everything you could for Sasuke. Even when your parents couldn't think about their children," she whispered in his ear. "I know you've suffered and paid the price for many years, but you are not alone anymore. You have Sasuke, Naruto, Kisame, and you have me. Others would have collapsed, but you have stayed standing and now you try to be a better person because your brother needs you and because you are a good person, so I'm proud of you."
Itachi trembled in her arms. He hugged her tightly, burying his head in her neck like Sasuke did every time he needed comfort. He was so much like his brother and, at the same time, so different that it made her smile. She noticed how he gripped her shirt with his fists while trying not to sob into her neck, but after so many years alone, sad, hated, feeling guilty… he couldn't hold it any longer because he was no longer the emotional wreck he had been almost a year ago. She held him for a long time, stroking his black hair as he silently cried into her neck like a little child.
He didn't say anything as he let it out, crying over traumas from almost a decade ago. Sasuke watched them with a smile. He dragged Naruto to the tent while Kisame walked behind them at a slow pace, watching Itachi in her arms with a neutral expression. Jiraiya, as usual, wasn't there with them. A while later, she realized with genuine astonishment that Itachi had fallen asleep in her arms. She didn't dare wake him up after all, so she just conjured an extra-large lounge chair out of the log they were sitting on and stayed there the rest of the night. Kurama, stretched out beside her, looked at her with playful, innocent eyes before settling down to sleep.
She woke up the next morning feeling Itachi shift on top of her torso. He didn't say anything about his crying or sleeping on her, so Seina let it go. However, something had changed. She felt that somehow she had connected with Itachi in a way that had not been possible before. She was right.
She noticed it right away. Instead of waiting for others to come to him to interact, he started initiating conversations or training sessions himself with Naruto or Kisame. Instead of sometimes having breakfast alone before the others woke up, he started waiting for everyone so they could eat together. Instead of staying on the side-lines during game nights, he started participating—without anyone having to drag him along! Day by day, Itachi was starting to live rather than just watch others live from afar.
"I don't know what the hell you guys are talking about, but it's working," Kisame said quite surprised one morning while training on the beach. "I thought I'd never see Itachi without that stick up his ass."
"I'm an expert at pulling sticks out of asses," she replied with a smile, "and so is Naruto."
"I can see that…" Kisame laughed.
She kept training with her adamantine chains and Kurama, who could summon a sort of chakra armour while connected by their usual chain. They had to repair the training area several times because Itachi's Susanoo was equally gigantic. With Itachi's help, Sasuke began practicing mangekyo sharingan jutsus, starting with Amaterasu, but soon Itachi had to teach him new things since Sasuke was becoming a prodigy with genjutsu.
Many times they were seen "fighting" standing face to face while Naruto, Kisame, and she made bets on who would win. It was interesting and boring to watch. While the Uchihas mentally beat each other up, Kisame and she trained kenjutsu with their special swords, and Naruto trained—or tried—with the Kurama-yang.
When May arrived, Jiraiya, after returning from one of his many trips, sat down with them.
"I've been handling a few matters the last weeks. That's why you haven't seen much of me, but now I have a long stretch with no pending work," he told them. "So, seeing that Kisame is training with Seina and Itachi with Sasuke, I'd like to train with you, Naruto, on something new. Something only you can do with the toad summons."
"Really!? What?"
"Sage Mode."
"Awesome! When do we start?"
"Not so fast!" Jiraiya rolled his eyes. "To train in Sage Mode we'll need to go to Mount Myoboku."
"What!? And what about Seina and the teme?"
"Didn't you hear me say they're already getting special training?"
"How long will you be gone?" she interrupted, seeing that was the real question.
"We'll try a couple of weeks, to start. The training depends on the person's chakra control, so I imagine we might need to stay longer. We'll see. Besides, I'd like to take advantage of being alone to push your training with Kurama a bit," he said to Naruto. "There we'll have help from the summons if something happens, and we won't destroy Uzushiogakure again if you lose control."
Naruto seemed both excited and reluctant about being away so long with the pervert, leaving them alone. Seina nudged him.
"It's only a couple of weeks, Naru. It's not the end of the world."
Seina exchanged a look with the pervert. She knew why he wanted to go with Naruto to Mount Myoboku. There, with no one but them and their giant summons, her brother could try again to use much more Kurama chakra without fear of losing control over his partial transformation like the first time. Until now, Naruto had been using Kurama's chakra to surround himself with a layer of demonic chakra, but he didn't dare take the next step without Jiraiya and with them around. If Naruto didn't overcome that fear of failure and hurting them, he would never progress.
That's how Naruto left for that remote place, and how Sasuke and she stayed behind, accompanied by their respective S-rank criminal masters.