The next day, Itachi woke up looking tired. He didn't seem much better than the day before, but her spell told a completely different story. The poison had completely cleared, his eyes were no longer inflamed, he'd regained much of his vision, and his lungs were in much better condition. Not to mention, the tuberculosis seemed to be retreating thanks to the specialized antibiotics, her magic, and the iryo ninjutsu she had applied.
"How are you feeling?"
"...Better and worse."
"Yeah. That's normal after everything I did to you in just a few hours yesterday," she smiled, realizing he was there with them. "Here. Eat something. You need your strength."
She handed him a varied breakfast with toast, cold cuts, fruit, and some soup. Itachi took the food without complaint, though he gave it a glance out of habit. He ate all of it. He even drank the tea and juice. She gave him more antibiotics and gave him another full check-up.
"You've improved a lot. At this rate, you should be fully recovered in about two or three weeks."
"Just in time for Sasuke's birthday," said a voice from the doorway. It was Naruto. "Itachi."
"Naruto… Thank you for taking care of my brother," Itachi replied, looking at them both.
"He's my brother."
"I wouldn't go that far, but the teme is family."
"Dobe," Sasuke smacked him on the head, appearing out of nowhere. "You think I can't hear you with that shouty voice of yours?"
"Hey! I don't have a shouty voice!" Naruto shouted.
Seina snorted a laugh, ignoring their argument. Itachi watched them with a very faint smile before turning to look at her, raising an eyebrow. She rolled her eyes in exasperation. She made the tray and dishes vanish, which made Itachi visibly surprised — well, "visibly" in the sense that he blinked a couple of times, his eyes a millimetre wider than usual.
"How do you do that?"
"It's part of my kekkei genkai."
"..."
Itachi seemed to consider her words in silence, but didn't ask further.
"By the way… speaking of the mangekyo sharingan. Did you know we came up with a few strategies to activate Sasuke's?"
"Did they work?"
Itachi looked at his brother, who walked into the infirmary and leaned against another bed with his arms crossed.
"We never actually tested them. Seina found something strange connected to the sharingan. A curse."
"A curse?" Itachi frowned, looking directly at her. "What do you mean?"
"I have no idea what it is, who placed it, or when. We thought it best not to activate the mangekyo sharingan until we knew more, but Kakashi didn't know anything about it either, nor who to ask."
"How did you find out?"
"By entering Sasuke's mind and comparing the information I gathered when I healed Kakashi to what I saw in Sasuke's sharingan."
She explained her thoughts when she analysed both cases — how she saw nothing in Kakashi's mangekyo, and how the curse might either not be present or be hiding from her, etc.
"We wanted to ask if you've read the Uchiha stone tablet and seen anything related to that," Sasuke said, pulling out the wooden replica from his pouch. "This one doesn't say anything important."
"No. Of course not. That's just a replica made by someone who read the original tablet with the sharingan. But there's more information if you read it with the mangekyo."
"Seriously?" Sasuke asked.
Seina and Naruto were quite surprised. It hadn't occurred to them that different eyes might reveal different secrets when reading the tablet.
"Yes."
"And what does it say?"
"It doesn't say, exactly, that there's a curse on the mangekyo sharingan, but… it does talk about its weakness. Maybe that's the curse Seina mentioned," Itachi frowned.
"What weakness?"
"The more you use the mangekyo sharingan, the more the eyes lose their light."
"...Blindness? Is that why you lost so much vision?"
"Exactly. That's why I said your healing is only temporary."
"And the tablet doesn't say why or how to fight that curse?" Sasuke asked.
"It does. But I'm not willing to save my eyes that way."
"What way?" Naruto asked curiously.
"The mangekyo sharingan is only the second stage of the sharingan. There's a third stage where, supposedly, the eyes never lose their light — but it requires an unthinkable sacrifice," Itachi explained seriously. "The user has to transplant the mangekyo sharingan from another person. Specifically… from a brother, sister, or very close relative. That's the only way to reach the eternal mangekyo sharingan."
A slightly sombre silence settled in the room. Itachi seemed very set on not tearing out his brother's eyes, and Sasuke looked a little shaken by what he'd just heard. Naruto, meanwhile, seemed a bit disgusted by all the talk of eye transplants. Despite being a ninja, he always had a weak stomach when it came to medical procedures. Seina, however, just blinked in exasperation.
"What a load of bullshit," she muttered without thinking. All eyes turned to her. "What? It's true!"
"Why do you say that?"
"Isn't it obvious?" she asked rhetorically with a bored expression. "All you have to do is switch eyes and problem solved."
Kisame, who had arrived later to the infirmary and had been eavesdropping from the doorway, burst out laughing at that. He stepped into the room clutching his ribs and crying with laughter.
"A twelve-year-old girl just made you look like an idiot, Itachi!"
"Hey! I'm almost fourteen!"
He laughed again when he saw she wasn't afraid to put him in his place. Itachi, meanwhile, had a blank expression as he pondered what had just been said. Sasuke just shook his head, accepting his own lack of creativity.
"Then, could you swap our eyes?" Sasuke asked.
"Easily, but first we need to activate them."
"Sounds perfect."
"Great!"
Should she try it now? She shrugged. She sent a pulse of magic to her earring, molded chakra, and trapped him in a genjutsu. It was the special genjutsu, wrapped in magic, she had prepared just for this. She hoped it would work, but she wasn't entirely confident. Then, something strange happened.
"He's crying blood, Seina-nee!"
"I can see that, yeah."
Sasuke's eyes turned red and then morphed into a new shape they had never seen before. Itachi, leaning in his direction, blinked with a slightly stunned expression as he saw his brother awaken his mangekyo sharingan with a damn genjutsu. Once he realized what was happening, he looked at her with a poker face.
"What? Not my fault the Uchiha lack imagination," she said, making Kisame laugh at Itachi again.
She released the genjutsu. Sasuke blinked instantly.
"SEINA! Wha–...!?" he shouted, coming back to his senses, but then felt the blood on his face. He touched it in surprise. "Did it work?"
"Congratulations, teme!"
Seina let out another snort of laughter. Then, Jiraiya arrived.
"Oh, perfect. We're all gathered," he said with sarcasm. "Why don't you all come down later for a chat? A looong chat."
He gave them all a stern look and walked away. Sasuke, and Itachi too, were still a bit stunned by what had just happened. Seina didn't understand why, since it was obvious that the activation of the new sharingan was logically due to a chemical reaction in the brain in response to a negative stimulus. Something that could easily be mimicked with a genjutsu.
"Are all Konoha ninjas this crazy or is it just you guys?" Kisame asked with an amused smile.
"...Define crazy."
Kisame chuckled at that, shaking his head.
"How are you, Itachi?"
"Better. Seina is a good iryo-nin," Itachi praised her in a neutral tone.
"I'd like you not to use the sharingan—any kind of sharingan," she said, pointing at his nose with a finger, "until your vision is fully healed. After that, we'll swap your eyes to avoid further blindness."
Itachi gave a tiny chuckle that she heard thanks to her spying spell, but he nodded in agreement.
"Can I get up? We should go talk to Jiraiya-sama."
They all went down to the dining room, where Jiraiya was sitting, writing something on a scroll. When he saw them, he put it down and gave them his full attention.
"Great. Why don't you start by telling me what the hell you were thinking?" he asked her and her brothers. "How could you bring two criminals to the place where you sleep?"
"Itachi is innocent."
"And the other one?"
"Itachi's earned my loyalty, so..." Kisame shrugged nonchalantly.
"That's it? What will you do if Itachi returns, and is accepted, into Konoha?"
"I'll think about it."
"We could send a letter to Tsunade-sama. After all, she's the Hokage."
"That's not—! …Wait a minute… You're absolutely right! Let her handle it, that's what she's paid for," Jiraiya suddenly smiled, making a 180-degree turn. Naruto let out a snort of laughter. "What do you plan to do now?"
"He's sta– They're staying," Sasuke said before his brother could open his mouth. He even crossed his arms. "As we all know, Itachi is innocent."
"Why doesn't Itachi speak for himself?"
"...I'd like to stay with my brother and his team, if possible."
"And Akatsuki?"
"I've left them. Even if I can't stay here, I won't go back to them," Itachi looked at his friend Kisame, who nodded. "I don't share their ideals. Otherwise, I'd have to kidnap Seina and Naruto, and that's not something Sasuke would allow."
"That's it?" Jiraiya repeated. Itachi nodded calmly. "Well... I suppose we'll see if that's true. I'll keep an eye on you. I'm not sure I like you having access to this shop."
"Don't worry," she cut in. "It's full of barriers, so if they try anything, they'll activate."
"And what do those barriers of yours do?" Kisame asked, standing next to the doorway.
"Depends on how serious the offense is..." she smiled maliciously.
After that, the conversation turned into an interrogation. Jiraiya bombarded both Akatsuki with questions, jotting down all the information they had—which was a lot—on a scroll to send to Konoha.
Apparently, Akatsuki was made up of several members: someone called Pain, who was the leader, his right-hand Konan, someone named Hidan paired with Kakuzu, Sasori and Tobi, Kisame, and Itachi himself. According to Itachi, they were formed in Amegakure, from what he could gather, and he wasn't sure Pain was the true leader. As soon as Jiraiya heard the names, he seemed to pale, stopping his writing, before regaining composure as if nothing had happened. Itachi acted like he didn't notice and kept talking.
Their goal until about a year and a few months ago had been to serve as a mercenary military organization, outside the authority of the ninja nations, but they had since changed their purpose. He didn't know why, but they wanted the bijuus sealed in the different jinchurikis. According to him, as of today, four jinchurikis had already died, as far as Kisame and he knew.
"You don't have a single clue why they're going after the jinchurikis now?" Jiraiya asked as his final question.
"Now?" she said with a disbelieving huff. "I get the feeling that was the goal from the start."
"Why do you say that?"
"Don't you remember the masked man who attacked our mother? I'm sure it's that guy, Tobi."
"Masked man?" Itachi asked, frowning. "Tell me about him."
"I can do something better."
She raised a hand, focusing on what she wanted to happen, and proceeded to show them Kurama's memory projected as a floating cloud in the air. Everyone witnessed the attack and saw their father fighting the masked man, and how he managed to rescue them from a possible kidnapping and murder. Itachi frowned throughout the entire memory.
"Tobi claims to be Madara, but in this memory… He seems young. For a long time, I believed he was Madara simply because everyone else, except Sasuke, was dead, but now it seems like I'm missing something," he admitted. "Another reason I thought Tobi was Madara is because of his abilities with the mangekyo sharingan."
"Abilities?"
"The space-time jutsu he's using in the Kyubi's memory is called Kamui. It's described in the Uchiha stone tablet. Not all eyes possess it. I, for instance, can't use it, but I can use other techniques. I thought it was Madara because no one in our clan could use it while alive."
"That is interesting, certainly..." Jiraiya thought aloud, frowning.
"What if he was someone recruited by Danzo that Itachi didn't kill?" she asked out loud. "Danzo has several recruits from each clan, right? Is it possible someone else survived without Itachi knowing?"
"It's a rather far-fetched possibility, but not impossible. Especially after learning what Danzo did with the Uchiha corpses."
"...What did Danzo do to the Uchiha corpses?" Itachi asked in a sinister, monotone voice, staring at Jiraiya.
"...None of the buried bodies had eyes."
Itachi's eyes evolved the instant he understood that their dead relatives' eyes had been ripped out. He needed a few minutes to calm himself and push back his murderous instincts. In the end, he blinked and his black eyes returned.
"It's not just that," said Naruto. "He also stole the corpse of Hashirama Senju. I don't know how you could follow orders from someone like that."
"I... I didn't know."
"We know," she said with compassion in her voice, noticing how truly he meant it. "That's why we're doing everything we can to bring you back and get rid of that decrepit old man."
Kisame stifled a laugh upon hearing it. Itachi seemed fairly stunned by what he was hearing, but he always composed himself with admirable speed. It was as if nothing affected him for more than a couple of seconds, and he never really seemed surprised or shaken. Was Itachi truly capable of feeling things, or was he just emotionally numb like she imagined?
"Is that why you're here? Away from Konoha?" asked the exile from Kiri.
"Yes and no. Last month in the village, he tried to attack us right in the middle of Konoha."
"And he tried to kidnap me several times. Sasuke too."
Itachi frowned as he listened to the dangers they had faced in Konoha, where they were supposed to be safe. He asked the pervert what they were doing about Danzo and frowned even more when he realized they had been trying to deal with him for over a year in the least violent way possible.
"That won't work. Danzo is slippery. The only way to end Root is to kill Danzo and then clean up what's left," Itachi deduced coldly. "No matter how much relevant information you think you have on him, he'll always be hiding something worse."
"That's what Tsunade is afraid of," admitted Jiraiya, "but it's too risky to attack him head-on within the village itself. She's hoping that with Team 7 outside Konoha, she can act more freely without fearing for the villagers' safety."
"Sounds like a big problem you let grow out of control," Kisame commented with a smug grin.
"You're not wrong."
"Until he's dead, Root won't disappear."
Itachi's words gave her a bad feeling. Why did she have the feeling that she'd return to Konoha and still be alive? Maybe Tsunade-sama was going about it the wrong way. She, Shikaku, and Commander Ryu. Instead of starting with his lackeys, maybe they should go straight for Danzo.
A few days later, Itachi was still recovering quickly thanks to her care. Both he and Kisame were reluctantly accepted by Jiraiya and, to a lesser degree, Naruto. Especially Kisame, who was a total stranger—and from Kiri, no less. Seina didn't know what would happen when they returned to Konoha, but there was still time before that moment came, so she decided to forget about it before the stress gave her grey hairs.
"You have to stay alert," Jiraiya told them, out of Itachi and Kisame's earshot. "At any moment, one of them could turn on us. Especially Kisame."
"We'll be careful."
"Good. I just wanted to warn you. Even if Itachi seems innocent and Kisame is playing along for now, I need to keep working. More than ever, I have to verify the information Itachi gave me."
Jiraiya's strangely serious expression made them all nod without teasing. None of them were going to put themselves in danger, not even for Itachi. Not even Sasuke. Jiraiya left the next day, glancing back every so often as if he didn't want to leave them alone with two S-rank criminals.
"So what do you do all day by yourselves?" Kisame asked curiously once Jiraiya disappeared.
"Train."
"That's it?"
"What else do you want us to do? A slumber party?" she mocked, rolling her eyes.
"Aren't you ashamed that your kunoichi has more balls than the two of you combined?" Kisame asked her brothers. Then he looked at her with a toothy grin. "The last person who talked to me like that lost their head."
"Did they go crazy?" she asked with exaggerated astonishment, putting a hand on her chest. "You're amazing."
Kisame chuckled, and so did Itachi, though more quietly. They left the shop to start training. Seina made her usual clones to learn a new ninjutsu as quickly as possible, Sasuke kept trying to add fire to his chidori, and Naruto finally managed to launch the rasenshuriken without hurting himself.
"I did it!" Naruto howled, inspecting his hand. "Did you see that?"
"I knew you could do it, Naru. Congrats."
"Thanks, nee-chan."
"Hn."
Naruto rolled his eyes at Sasuke's reply and tried the technique again to make sure it worked perfectly. Meanwhile… She had made up her mind to try giving Kurama that body. She still wondered why she had waited so long to get to know him. Maybe a small part of her was afraid of losing him or messing something up, but… She was Kurama's jinchuriki. They were destined to fight together, and she wasn't a coward.
Seina sat cross-legged in the grass to begin her new phase with Kurama. The idea was to open the seal to 99% so Kurama could fully emerge into the outside world. Thanks to Jiraiya's modification, she had been able to use 70% of Kurama's power, but she couldn't give him shape. Not until everything—except a small portion left tied to the seal—was released.
"Ready?"
"You have no idea."
She molded her chakra, opening the gates nearly all the way for the first time in her life. It felt like something escaped from her, a gigantic energy burst out of her and, in doing so, left her feeling somewhat empty. If it weren't for the fact that she could feel Kurama's chakra still linked to the new seal on her back and the faint thread tying him to the seal on her stomach… she would've thought he was fully free. She opened her eyes with her heart pounding.
She looked up, then higher, and higher… Until she saw Kurama's eyes. He was so enormous she had to lie flat on the ground to avoid hurting her neck and still be able to look at him. Kurama had to be a little smaller than a third of Katsuyu—around 120 or 130 meters tall. She was thankful for placing those magical barriers very, very far away.
"Squirt," he said in a deep voice, leaning down a little to look at her.
"At this size, I must look like a rabbit to you."
"More like a very, very small bunny. I like that comparison."
Kurama let out a laugh that echoed across the clearing. She heard the others had stopped training, but she didn't turn to look at them. Kurama offered her a hand, so she jumped onto it, letting him lift her to eye level. His dark red fur looked like dried blood, while his eyes glowed pure red.
"At last, we meet face to face in the real world."
"I missed you," she smiled, even though it didn't make any sense.
"I missed you too," he replied, watching her with a pleased expression. "Let's go. We've got a lot to do."