Reviews;

xenocanaan: Akira is definitely a little tragic. And that's going to affect her in the future, I think.

SadisticAvocado: I've never read anything with an invisibility kekkei genkai before actually, so I can promise there's no plagiarism there. As for the whole frantic planning thing, I don't know if I've made it very clear before but Akira doesn't have a whole lot of access to her memories. So that kind of discounts that.

JBebe: Yep, you got that right. Poor Kashi has to share his teacher now and he's not happy! You're right about which clan it is, the crazy(literally) illusionists. I don't know about the other clans and their clothes but I imagine that they can make super stretchy stuff, maybe chakra reactant.

KumorikoKumoriko: He's jealous that she's getting Minato's attention and that she's not 'useless' like he can dismiss Obito as being.

534667lc: Thank you!

Nami: Dude, I feel you. That happened to me so much in school I wanted to scream.

amgs: It's pretty small compared to the Hyuuga and the Uchiha and everyone like that but it's big enough and everyone works together. I think I mentioned in the first chapter that there's usually around 130 members, give or take? If not I've said it now!

"O may I join the choir invisible

Of those immortal dead who live again

In minds made better by their presence; live

In pulses stirred to generosity,

In deeds of daring rectitude..."

― George Eliot

In the morning Kakashi and Akira were waiting at the front gates, near the southern end of the village. Akira sat at one end, a cloth pack of sturdy green slung across her shoulders. Brown eyes slid across the dirt, the building roofs, and the sunny hair of her teacher, never staying in one place for long. She was taking everything in, silently finding the shadows. It was an unconscious, ingrained habit that all of her clansmen shared. Find the shadows, find where to hide, to stay out of the way, to survive.

"When," she had asked once, years past, "does survival turn to living."

Without missing a beat her father replied, "When you decide it does."

Five minutes after her arrival, right on time, Obito came tumbling around a corner, his pack slinging hap-hazardously around his shoulders, not at all secured. She heard Minato sigh and pushed away from her hiding space to intercept Kakashi in his clear intent to berate and scold their Uchiha.

"Morning," Akira slid the pack from his shoulders without asking permission, knowing well enough by then that the minute Kakashi's mouth opened Obito would stop listening to her. She was right, Obito didn't even say hello before he was in a verbal fight with Kakashi.

She set the pack on the ground, pulling open the flap and letting everything stumble out of the messy confines. They had been taught how to properly pack in the Academy, but apparently he had failed that particular test. Akira had passed with flying colors. Or, her supposedly abandoned pack had.

The Kageyama heir sat back on her crossed ankles and looked down, puzzled. It was stuff that would be useful, but none of it was even remotely secure.

"Obito," she called, louder than normal. He didn't react. He didn't even look at her.

Akira felt her eyes start to sting. In an attempt to push away the hurt she picked up one of his granola bars and beaned him with it.

He sputtered, spinning with a kunai in hand. It was a good reaction. Slow though. Akira felt her mouth curve crescent-ways in unkind smugness.

"Come here," she requested, gesturing. Now that she had his attention he obeyed, joining her. She felt more than saw Minato lower himself slightly behind her. She paid him little mind. She was used to double checking for Obito, helping him in even simple things.

"You packed it messily. You might want to try being more organized, so you can find things and so nothing falls out the way it was trying to just now. Will you try again?" she never ordered him, just made soft suggestions. Orders and berating were not for Obito, he would balk and argue. They were only for her when no one was listening. When she was invisible and free to rant and rave without fear of retaliation.

Obito looked it over, nodding slowly when she pointed out the flaws and things he could do to improve them. Minato stayed behind them, his shadow cast across her back. It made the girls skin crawl with the knowledge she was being watched.

With her direction and under the watchful eye of their teacher Obito repacked. A wave of Minato's hand dissuaded Kakashi from snipping at him. They were already going to be a bit late with the pick up, from the Kagetsu clan. They were one of the few clans that the Kageyama had a connection with, near lost as it was. A marriage three generations back between the youngest son, Usui and Aoshi Kageyama, her great aunt. She doubted highly they would recognize her name when Minato said it, but it would be interesting to see where their offspring had ended up. Takani, and her daughter Kaoru. Both Kageyama by blood.

"Is this good?" Obito asked, presenting his pack to their teacher. It only occurred then that maybe Akira should have let their teacher do his job and teach. She shifted away, standing and waiting for any possible scolding she might get for taking over. For all she knew Minato wanted them to pack a certain way that only Kakashi, his protégé, knew.

"Yes, that's much better. Thank you Akira," Minato patted her head, only a few inches off center. She breathed a sigh of relief. She missed the funny look the blond gave her as she adjusted the straps on her back pack and turned towards the road.

It would be the first time she had seen anywhere outside the village since Before, and even those memories were few and far between, only appearing when something triggered them. It was frustrating, and she had begun keeping a journal of everything that came back, held in Kageyama invisible ink.

It was a funny thing, that ink, only visible when one of her clan pushed their chakra into it. It was the opposite of just about everything else in her world.

She wasn't sure how it worked, that production was left to her great-grand-aunt Minatsuki, a genius at chemicals. If it were possible for a Kageyama she would have made a wonderful poison mistress during the last war, and the one before that. As it was she had memories she enjoyed sharing of rescuing people during the warring states from over zealous or flat out murderous clans.

Some of her family was great.

Most of her family was amazing.

None of them were acknowledged.

"Let's go!" Obito shouted, making her jump as Akira was pulled out of her thoughts. She looked back at her friend, smiling at his boisterous nature. Kakashi was scowling, but that was nothing new, and Minato looked only a little like he wanted to make sure he could still hear everything well.

Obito's immediate desire to lead was reined in by a simple reminder from Minato that he didn't know where he was going, which was apparently his cue to pout. Akira laughed, a chime that fell through her fingers and made Obito flush in embarrassment.

The troop fell in behind their leader, a line of children so perfect ducklings would have been jealous. Obito enjoyed twisting his head this way and that to see the path way, the trees and the sky, not obscured by the high walls of the village out there. Kakashi kept his eyes straight forwards unless drew them from the path, on alert, always on alert.

A floating group of granola bars brought up the rear. Invisible from excitement and just enough anxiety to set her skin to clear Akira watching was world around her, spinning to stroll backwards more than once. Clouds puffed along in the wide blue sky, trees rustled all along with sides of the path, their familiar shadows cast right through the girl. The dark was always a comfort to her, something that only reinforced her abilities. She had never been afraid of it, she was Kageyama. Darkness was her greatest companion.

It was even in the name, their origin and family all rolled into four syllables.

Kageyama. The Shadow Mountain. That was where they had resided before joining the primordial village of leaves under invitation of Madara Uchiha, a man legendary to their clan as the only person to never lose sight of them. The agreement was negotiated by Akira Kageyama the elder, her great grandmother, name sake, and the leader of the clan at that time. Before then they had haunted a mountain to north and west of the village, in the Irihiko Province. It was one of the smaller peaks that touched near the border that would eventually lead to the country whose name was Iron, and the beginning of the long range of peaks that would lead into its heart. They had been called down from that place, so high and so set aside, called to help found a village that would never know their names.

They went, if only so the harsh winters that had once cut their numbers were eased into the small struggle that Akira had grown to know.

Winter was mild in the southern part of the Land of Fire, though none would argue that the snow damaged crops. This made things difficult for the forcibly-self-reliant Kageyama, and lead to a yearly ritual of jarring, preserving and drying near everything there was, setting things aside and rechecking green houses to be sure of their security and their ability to grow what little food was manageable in the winter.

No one had truly full stomachs, and everything was rationed with care, but no one had starved or frozen since they left the mountain that was still called after their name.

Akira had been predicting something awful happening on the mission, no matter how short it happened to be. Team 7 was known for its bad luck, after all, and she had never heard of a single mission that went the way it was supposed to.

Funny enough this time it did.

Simple and routine the group had walked with a good amount of leisure to the home of the herb sellers, loaded up their already-paid-for cargo, and left again in the smoothest transaction Akira had ever known.

Is this, she wondered, what it's like for everyone else?

Observing the faces of her teammates on the way back she decided that yes, it probably was. How convenient, how nice to be able to simply ask for something and be heard, to be able to offer compensation instead of just leaving it.

It sent and ugly spike of envy into her heart.

She hadn't had time to ask the night before about what Minato had told her. Her parents had been so excited about her going out for the first time they had gone over things to pack and advice that she had ended up not needing.

When she got back though she went to her mothers sitting room, an addition to the house that he father had added so she could have a place of her own.

It was beautiful, with delicately painted walls and the largest window in the entire district. The furniture was soft and stuffed well, a love seat and a rocking chair paired together. Her mother was an amazing shinobi, but she still had an appreciation for beauty and the quiet, feminine parts of life. Akira could learn to share it, if her tastes were a bit more soft pinks rather than the pastel yellows and oranges.

The eight year old hopped onto the couch beside her mother, who was busy reading. It would have been a perfect scene for anyone, if the book hadn't been labelled T&I: For the Advanced and Sadistic.

She waited with patience for her mother to close the book and set it aside, tucking it under the pillow as if to hide her interests and occupation from the girl that was soon to share it.

"You want to talk about something?" she asked. Akira nodded.

Her relationship with her mother was wonderful, as it was with her father. The only thing was that, like all others, she occasionally lost her child. Such was not a case that day, when she held one arm up and let the girl lay down, resting her head on her hip. Slender, calloused fingers ran through her plain hair, tugging out the few tangles that formed.

"Kurama," she said quietly, "That's your dad's clan, isn't it?"

The gentle motions never faltered. "Yes, that's right. I am Kurama. We both are, even if it's not our name."

Akira waited a moment, contemplating how to phrase her question.

At last she asked, "How many kekkei genkai do I have?"

"Who ever told you about mine?" Ryuko asked, looking down at her daughter. Brown eyes slid shut, relaxed.

"Minato-sensei did. He said that the Kurama have one. Do you? Do I?" she wondered. Her voice, when it got soft, was barely a whisper in the wind.

Ryuko had grown accustomed to her quiet clansmen in the past ten years, to her soft husband, so tough and so kind. She heard her daughter, as long as she listened.

"I do, yes. And you do as well, or you wouldn't be as far as you are. So you have two kekkei genkai," she said. "Lucky, aren't you?"

She could see the smile form on her daughters face. "Yes, lucky."

The pair stayed like that until the sun began to dip over the horizon. The only thing that changed was three hours in Akio appeared and joined them, leaving the family close, together, until Akira was asleep and her parents were exchanging soft kisses in the moonlight.

That night Ryuko carried her daughter to their room, and the family of three slept well in each other's arms.