Chapter 2: Arc 1: Chapter 1

Chapter 1

 

I grieved in silence over my dying social prospects. The inability to lie to someone—even tiny white lies; I didn't initially think they were so big for general interaction. There were so many tiny lies we shared with people. They eased friction.

Little lies were a social lubricant. And I no longer had that.

It was… difficult. Trying. Exhausting, really. To put on a friendly face for someone when you know beyond the shadow of a doubt that they prayed for your figurative downfall as they simultaneously wished you well.

Behind the smiles was indifference. Behind the smiles was disdain. Irritation.

That is how my morning went, empty platitudes from the girls I typically hung around. Their smiles didn't match what I—they felt.

It was a lot okay?

And it didn't take long for me to get to the point where I'd wished they'd just stop bothering in the first place. I'd heard so many variations of the same thing. I know. You only like me because of my family name. I can't not know anymore.

Is this how Shikamaru felt? Is this why he slept so much? No… I'm sure he was just lazy. Surely.

I was broken out of my musing—not brooding, absolutely not— by the lazy one himself. Shikamaru sat quietly beside me—a rare occurrence for sure, but not an unwelcome one. He looked at… no. He regarded me silently, thoughts jumping from point to point with very little correlation between each one.

"You're not in your usual seat," he said, while his mind raced between thoughts. Physical malady, Hijutsu backlash? Emotional bleed-over?

I groaned as he continued over-thinking. Inexplicable jump in behaviour. Depression? Worrisome. And of course he went off on the wrong tangent.

I think.

"Do you mind?" I'm not sure exactly what I was asking to be honest. Did he mind me sitting here? Did he mind not thinking so damned loud?

"Troublesome," and of course, my question was completely disregarded with the simplest answer he could give.

Chouji took a seat to my left, "Hey Ino, you okay?"

I didn't have to be an empath to know how worried he was, so I sat up and pat him on the shoulder, "I'm fine Chouji, thanks for asking."

He returned my smile, and took my words at face value as he always did, and his mind immediately went on to other things. Namely, food. Specifically recipe ideas.

Iruka Sensei walked into the class, and quieted one set of voices before starting his lesson on Jutsu theory. I could barely pay attention though, as Shikamaru mentally fussed over me constantly. It was both annoying and sweet. Mostly annoying, though.

I tried to distract myself by looking around at the rest of the class. Most were too far to hear, as they'd devolved to muted whispers with just a bit of distance, but I could still feel their emotions if I focused on them.

Sasuke, of course, was brooding. His anger was muted, likely due to the distance, but mostly focused on the lesson.

Sakura, surprisingly, didn't fawn over Sasuke during lessons, as she paid rapt attention to Iruka Sensei's every word in a pure show of focus and interest.

Huh.

Shino was also focused on the lesson, and I felt the buzz of thousands of simple minds as they surrounded him. Burrowed into him.

Gross.

Naruto slept, but as I looked at him I felt… the undercurrent of something. Like there was something right underneath the surface. So, being the curious cat I am, I tried to focus on him, to pry it loose. To look underneath the underneath and all that.

The good news? It didn't take long, or much effort at all for me to find it. Delving into the connection and drawing it forth was comically easy.

The bad news? I'd never felt so much malice and hate in my life, it was an all encompassing, pervasive need to rip and tear and kill and destroy. That feeling made Sasuke feel like a toddler throwing a tantrum.

My body frosted over, warred with the need to run, but too shocked to the core to do anything but internally scream. I wanted to run, to shriek and scream indignities and hide behind whatever I could.

In all my years, I'd never felt so small. So helpless.

So of course, in all my infinite wisdom, I delved deeper.

I shuddered as more and more of the emotions bled into me—the all pervasive need to maim and rend flesh— and I could feel my heart and lungs as they laboured to pump the life-giving essence into my body, so I'd be ready to bolt at any moment.

In just one painfully long instant, I felt like I was prey. Like I was being hunted. Like I was one step away from being eaten whole.

I wasn't ready. I peered into the veil, and two deeply crimson eyes stared back at me.

I heard a growl.

I reeled back as I instinctively cut the connection, a soundless shriek dying in my constricted throat.

What the hell…

The only thing that kept me from running was Shikamaru's iron grip on my chair, he was the last bastion between me and gravity's sweet embrace. I'm sure that if he weren't paying an insufferable amount of attention to me, I'd have hit the ground, and immediately dashed through and out the window, dignity be damned.

Right, we're back to sweet, then.

I gave him an appreciative smile, and eventually ground out a withered "Thanks" once my throat relaxed enough to allow for words, but he only looked on in suspicion.

Of course, his thoughts were focused on how troublesome I was being, and how to get me back to normal. But this was my new normal, as far as I could tell.

I couldn't pay too much attention to that though, I drew into myself to allow the tension to bleed through, to allow my brain to realize that no, I was not about to be eaten. Yes I was alive. No, I didn't need to run.

I'm fine. I'm fine. I'm fi — Breathe, Ino.

Honestly… I don't think I'd be able to keep this from Shikamaru for long. He'd figure something out before long. Something either close to the truth, or something irritatingly far, but plausible. I'm not sure which I'd rather, at this point.

I'll mention it to dad I guess. Along with… whatever that was.

I continued looking around—pointedly not looking at the Crimson Death with yellow hair, or even thinking about whatever all of that was.

Kiba… why was Kiba throwing spitballs at Naruto? Oh Kami. He was going to get us all killed.

He was going to piss him off and we'd all die for it.

Naruto woke up, enraged, and of course, my heart decided to stop as everyone laughed.

He lunged at Kiba viciously, who bounced around the room cheering.

He ran past Shino, as Iruka Sensei tried his damndest to calm them down. He threatened Naruto. Oh Kami.

He bound onto my desk, and all I wanted to do was pull him out of the air, legs first, but one look at Naruto had me flinching away.

Distantly, I could feel Shikamaru's shock, but he wasn't focused on them, he was focused on me. That helped ground me as the literal beacon of hate ran right past me.

All my muscles tensed, but he kept running without a care in the world. Laser focused on his prey.

Kiba rammed into Hinata's desk, and rode what little moment he had accrued to bounce up and onto the wall, and shouted with laughter as he launched away while being pelted with stalks of chalk.

As Naruto tried to emulate, I had to focus on anything and everything around him to not get sucked back in. Hinata—whose desk was currently being used as a springboard, was besides herself with anxiety. She looked on with wide eyed panic as the entire class looked her way.

Even after they'd bound away from her—and was subsequently captured by Sensei— she hadn't returned to calm. Those small moments of holding the weight of the class's interest weighed down on her psyche. Like a rabbit in front of a predator.

A room full of predators, even.

She'd eventually calmed down—long after Sensei resumed teaching after disciplining the two trouble makers— but I'd noticed a second thing with my observations.

No one really paid attention to her.

Sure, they looked her way, but she was invisible for the most part.

Unlike Sakura, where people spat insults at her because she looked different, Hinata was ignored. In a corner at the back of the class.

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That small point of similarity, the alienation, drew my attention like a moth to a flame.

It was a different sort of torment, and perhaps it was even all self-inflicted.

I had a front row seat to my own emotional state as I processed it. In a clinical way that I'd never experienced before. I could see my decision process as it unfurled.

Rooting for the little guy was apparently something I found myself frothing at the proverbial mouth to do.

Did I have a hero complex? Or a Sakura complex?

Time passed like this, Shikamaru fussed over his thoughts while pretending to sleep, I worried about what in the world I saw, and Chouji snuck chips into his mouth when Iruka Sensei wasn't looking.

My new normal, I guess.

 

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It's as I stepped onto the training grounds that I felt an onset of anxiety—my own, this time. The gravel under my sandals helped to alleviate it a bit, but it rose all the same.

I hadn't yet sparred since I got these… abilities, and I just knew I wouldn't be able to maintain my focus while also maintaining my fighting ability.

Luckily, Academy spars were pure Taijutsu. Less that can go wrong in general.

It'll be fine. I'll be fine.

My reassurances fell on deaf ears, as I knew it was going to suck; It was going to publicly suck, and there was nothing I could do to escape it.

Unless I could figure out how to throw up blood on demand. That… wasn't what heirs did though, unfortunately. Clan heirs had to suck it up and do better, be better. And I would do that—be better, that is.

Just not today.

Hopefully I get someone easy.

Spar sessions came and went, Iruki Sensei went through pairings with practiced efficiency, in an attempt to get every pair to learn and improve from the sessions. Which is why I was confused as Shikamaru went up against Sasuke.

It's not that Shikamaru didn't have the potential to fight Sasuke, it's not that Sasuke was on a whole level above in comparison. He was better, sure. But the main issue was that… Shikamaru didn't care.

He held on for a bit, matching Sasuke's staggering speed with pre-emptive wit, and honestly made a good showing against the resident Uchiha. But I could tell just from growing up alongside him, the exact moment that he realized he did the bare minimum required, and immediately blows started getting through, before he yielded.

I knew he was lazy, but damn.

Hearing my name snapped me out of my thoughts though, "Yamanaka Ino, Haruno Sakura, you're up."

I grinned; An easy opponent. Saku—Forehead-Girl had never been able to win against me in spars, whether jutsu were allowed or not, it'd never been close.

Lucky.

We both approached the field, and I could feel the pinkette's confidence in spades, as she thought about beating me up to… impress Sasuke.

Right, Ino. Don't judge. Up to yesterday you were the same. Hell, even this morning you held onto a small petal of hope.

Even now it was hard to not look his way during off moments when my focus waned, but every time I did I'd remember his thoughts, the revulsion he'd felt, and I'd immediately look away.

We stood opposite one another, and performed the Seal of Confrontation without prompt, indicating that we were ready.

"Begin!"

I approached rapidly, intent on ending this quickly, and my focus narrowed as I did.

The first clue that things were going horribly wrong was the… afterimage? before-image? There were two Sakuras. Kind of. Sort of. I could clearly tell that one wasn't real, but my brain perceived it all the same, and Sakura trailed after that image, right behind it even.

Huh.

That alone made me… hesitate in the offence I was about to begin. And that small moment allowed her to take the initiative.

Which wouldn't really have been a problem, if not for the second clue, which was that when I reacted to the image, in an attempt to deflect a blow, it went—literally!— right through my guard, and what followed was… Sakura charged into my unguarded front with a formless right hook.

Right in the nose.

Say what you will about Sakura: She was a traitor? Uhuh. Physically slow? Painfully so. Disloyal? Yep. Spent too much time over-thinking during times when she should be acting? Sure. A boy-crazy backstabbing bi— breathe Ino, breathe.

Right, all that said, no one could ever take away from her the fact that she had a mean right hook.

And I just experienced that first hand. It was unpleasant, to say the least.

It hurt like hell, to say more.

I reeled back, following the blow as best I could—which was, barely, or not at all, given the fact that it was completely and utterly unexpected— and Sakura didn't let the moment go, and proceeded to rain blows on me, as I struggled to determine what was real, and what wasn't.

I regressed into a passive state, the pace and control of the fight already slipped completely out of my grasp as if slick with oil, and Sakura burned bright as I deflected ghostly limbs, and overcompensated with far-too-early evasion attempts; And don't get me started on my attempts at counters.

The less said about me getting expertly nailed in the face by the under trained pinkette, the better.

I honestly couldn't tell the attacks apart, and if it weren't for my current everything I'd have assumed it was a new technique she created. It was a cacophony of sheer random chaos.

It was a lot, okay?

At one point I managed to deflect an actual attack, only to flinch at the followup as it hit me—way sooner than was possible, even— only to realize it actually didn't, and then promptly got hit by the actual followup.

Needless to say, I lost. It was not close. I couldn't even land a hit. My basic, fundamental ability to actually not lose to a flailing toddler in a spar was in shambles, because I quite literally saw in double.

Who knew that fighting with my eyes—however fake the sight was— lying to me would make it significantly harder? Not me, that's who.

So not only was my ego bruised, but damn, how did Sakura hit so hard? Those spindly limbs called arms of hers had no muscle at all, and had no right to make me feel like battered and bruised steak.

Was it a Haruno thing? A Sakura thing? Or a civilian thing?

I had no way to know, and as I reeled back my evidently palpable focus— that's an observation, huh. — both obnoxiously cheering Forehead Girls' blended into one. There was one clear moment where the two forehead's blended together, in tandem. It was hilarious, beautifully glorious.

I couldn't enjoy that moment of humour though; She was loud, she was boisterous, and I was ashamed.

We performed the Seal of Reconciliation to each other, and I felt myself getting more and more annoyed by her smug grin. Luckily for me, she decided bragging to Sasuke was more important than bragging to me.

Good thing too, because her face was looking more and more punch-able as she gloated.

I trudged my way back to my seat, between Shikamaru and Chouji, and pointedly ignored their gazes.

Chouji was fine in the silence, but Shikamaru refused to let the sleeping Bijuu lie, "What was that?"

I groaned as my face and shoulders throbbed, relaxing in the soft contrast of the soothing grass as my back pressed down into it.

I didn't give him a response. I couldn't bring myself to.

After all, what was there to say? I couldn't focus? True, but not an excuse. I was being overloaded with mental information that I had no training at all in parsing? Also true, but without context, meaningless. And it's not like I could tell him now, not without running it by dad first, at the very least.

So instead of lying, I stayed silent. I just knew his suspicions were getting more fervent and outlandish. No really, I knew it, I could hear all the theories he came up with and discounted rapidly. It's not 'that time of the month', damnit.

I hit him in the shoulder for that one, which only made him double down on that theory.

Back to the annoying side of the scale he went.

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