The stone memorial rose like a dark monolith at the edge of the training fields, half-swallowed by shadow and mist. The sky was gray, not with storm this time, but with that cold kind of overcast that made the world feel muffled, suspended. A soft breeze moved through the trees, stirring the leaves with cautious fingers.

  Rei stood at the top of the hill, hands in her pockets, eyes narrowed as she studied the names carved into the black stone. So many letters, so many dead. Some she knew. Some she had only heard of in whispers. Others were strangers, but that didn’t make the weight of them feel any less real.

  She hadn’t come to mourn. She didn’t do that. Not the way people expected. This place wasn’t for closure. It was a tally, a ledger, a scar left out in the open.

  She moved closer, her boots silent on the damp grass.

  Then she saw him.

  Itachi was already there, standing a few paces from the stone, his back straight, hands folded behind him. He wasn’t in uniform. His clothes were simple, dark, civilian. His hair stirred slightly in the breeze. He didn’t turn when she approached. He didn’t need to.

  Rei stopped at his side. Not close. Not far. Just enough that they were both reflected faintly in the polished surface of the stone.

  They didn’t speak.

  Silence settled over them like a familiar cloak. It wasn’t comfortable, not exactly. But it wasn’t foreign either. It lived in the space between their names, between the lives they had walked through and survived.

  She glanced at him once, out of the corner of her eye.

  He was looking at a specific name. Her eyes followed.

  Kozue Uchiha.

  She remembered the mission report. Kozue had been one of the last to die during the purge. Defended the civilians until her chakra gave out. No one had been there to recover her body. Only Itachi knew where it had fallen.

  “She taught me how to disarm a sword without breaking the wrist,” Rei said. Her voice was quiet, as if speaking louder might shatter something between them.

  Itachi gave a small nod. “She taught me how to breathe underwater.”

  That was all.

  Another gust of wind passed. A crow called from deeper in the woods. Neither of them moved.

  When Rei finally turned to leave, she didn’t say goodbye. Neither did he.

  They didn’t need to.

  The forest path twisted through damp ravines and rising ridges, hemmed in by thick underbrush and gnarled roots. The morning fog hadn’t lifted, and the sun was a pale smear above the trees. Silence pressed in, broken only by the soft footfalls of the three shinobi moving in formation.

  Rei took point. Her senses were sharp, shoulders relaxed but ready. Behind her, Hyuuga Nao moved with textbook precision, scanning the woods with his Byakugan. Itachi, quiet as breath, brought up the rear. He said little, but nothing escaped him.

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  Their assignment was simple: escort a minor diplomat from Konoha to a neutral border province where talks were being held with a landlocked daimyo. Political nonsense, wrapped in ceremonial robes. The kind of job most Chūnin handled with little trouble. But the diplomat had insisted on an ANBU-level guard. Paranoia, the mission file said. Or maybe something deeper.

  Rei didn’t trust him. The man’s smile was too polite, his movements too careful, like someone playing civilian.

  They were halfway to the drop point when the first shuriken cut through the fog.

  Rei spun, deflecting one blade with the flat of her wrist guard. Another grazed her shoulder, but she moved through it like wind across a river stone. The diplomat screamed and dropped low, covering his head.

  “Five,” Nao muttered, Byakugan active. “Surrounding.”

  Itachi’s voice was even. “Rei, center line. Nao, guard the target.”

  Steel hissed from the trees. A masked shinobi lunged for Rei, katana drawn. She met him head-on, no hesitation.

  Her palm snapped forward, catching his wrist mid-strike. The crunch of bone echoed through the clearing. She pivoted, drove her elbow into his temple, and dropped him without a word. Another came from her blind side, but she ducked under the arc of his blade and struck low, sweeping his leg and planting a boot into his gut as he hit the ground.

  Nao shouted. Two more attackers were flanking from the east.

  Itachi moved then, fast and silent. His blade flashed once, clean. One shinobi dropped without a sound. The other tried to flee. He didn’t make it.

  Rei took a step back, chest heaving. Blood dotted her sleeve. Her knuckles were raw again.

  Itachi’s eyes found her through the mist. His Sharingan wasn’t active, but he studied her like he had just seen something new.

  “You’ve been holding back,” he said.

  She didn’t answer. Not with words. Just wiped her hands clean on her thigh wraps and looked past him toward the diplomat, who was shaking and muttering thanks to no one in particular.

  “Mission’s not over,” she said.

  She wThe village streets were slick with last night’s rain, reflecting torchlight and shadow in uneven ripples. Rei walked with her hands in her pockets, head down, footsteps soft on the stone. The mission had ended hours ago, the debrief was done, and she’d left without waiting for praise or follow-up. There was nothing left to say.

  But someone had waited for her anyway.

  He was leaning against the alley wall behind the training hall. Kaito. Broad-shouldered, familiar, handsome in that way people expected a shinobi to be—confident, clean-cut, scar just right on his jawline. He wasn’t in uniform. He never was when he came looking for her.

  She stopped a few paces away, not out of surprise, but impatience.

  “I heard you were back,” he said.

  “You’ve got ears, then,” she replied, deadpan.

  Kaito frowned, pushing off the wall. “You could have told me.”

  Rei shrugged. “Could’ve. Didn’t.”

  He stepped closer. “We’re not strangers, Rei.”

  She met his gaze. “We’re not anything.”

  That made him flinch, just a little. Enough.

  Kaito ran a hand through his hair. “You really have to do this every time? Pretend like I don’t matter just because you're angry, or tired, or whatever it is you're doing now?”

  Rei tilted her head. “I’m not pretending. You just don’t matter here.”

  He stared at her, jaw clenched. “That’s bullshit. You only talk like this when something’s wrong. When you’re scared.”

  “Scared?” She laughed, a sharp, brittle sound. “If I wanted comfort, I’d buy a blanket. You’re just a complication I keep forgetting to cut loose.”

  Silence.

  The kind that hurt more than shouting.

  Kaito’s voice dropped. “So that’s it? After everything?”

  Rei didn’t answer. She turned, walked past him, down the alley, into the night.

  She didn’t look back.

  Behind her, his voice came one last time, barely audible over the wind.

  “You keep pushing people away, Rei. One day, there won’t be anyone left to push.”

  She didn’t stop.

  She never did.

  She walked past them both, back into formation, fog curling around her like smoke.