Irony and Chrysanthemums

Summary: Reborn and AU Fanfic: What happens when you die? Is there just an unfaltering sleep? Are you sent somewhere, such as Elysium or Hell? Perhaps your soul is torn apart with only the "good" ones remaining and then being reused and recycled. Let's see how a person, who committed suicide, goes on to live in a life where anything is possible yet the restraints are still the same.

Hello! I'm so thankful that many of you are following me through this journey, I am attempting to rewrite IC again and this time stick to it. The chapters that are rewritten will be noted at the top. I'm attempting to just fix my storyline so it makes more sense. I will also note if there's much changes so the older fans can skip the chapter or not.

Prologue/Chapter 1: Rewritten April X

Changes: Minor grammar/spelling corrections.

Quietus

"A period of inactivity or retirement.

A release of life- can be regarded as something that causes death.

Something that has a calm or soothing effect."

When I killed myself, I only had one phrase in my mind that looped around endlessly as I dropped down stories below to the unforgiving earth below.

Reduce, Reuse, and Recycle.

It's a mantra that is chanted quite a bit through most of the world, as pollution and trash began to build up and resources began to become more scarce due to the rise in population. It's something that almost everyone can be familiar with, as we heard it broadcasted throughout the schools when young and as we grew. There were competitions for it, such as who can help clean up the park, collect the more trash, collect the most recyclables or even making posters to show off artistic ability and attract others' attentions to the cause.

It follows along with the basic day of life, as we all tend to reduce, reuse, or recycle without even noticing. Such as when we donate old belongings, help make compost with food that we no longer will eat, or even the usage of animal parts changed into further use, so nothing goes to waste.

In my opinion, it also follows along with the first law of science as well that states that energy (technically matter, I suppose) cannot be created nor destroy, it just simply changes forms. The heat from the sun isn't gone, it merely changed into energy for the plants to create sugar in order to help produce the chemicals and materials they need to grow.

Despite my lack of faith or religion in my life, I have decided that "reduce, reuse, and recycle" is what happens to souls when a person would die. After all, souls are an energy, and it makes no sense that it just merely goes away without anything being done with it. Having all those souls gather into a single place whether it is Heaven, the Garden of Eden, the Fields of Aaru, Vaikuntha, or many others that are quoted in religion for good souls to go is a waste and made no sense to me. How would that one place be able to hold all that energy? Where would all that energy go? What do the souls do for all eternity?

Due to my disbelief in those places, I have decided that souls were like everything else in this universe and that they merely changed form. They were recycled. I believed that all souls were first reduce in order to break them a part into pieces that you can be able to call up as traits or even "good" and "bad" parts. Whatever being out there, whether it was several gods working upon this process or merely just the universe itself, would then take those "good" parts and patch them together to make a new soul, causing those parts to be reused. Afterwards, the newly created soul from old parts would then be taken and release back into the world into a new vessel where they will live once more. This would be the recycle phase.

Even with my belief, it still raised concerns to me as what would happen to the bad parts, the "bad" souls. Was there a place where they were sent off to in order to be burned and destroyed for some other purpose? Was all forgiven and were they just sent back down to try again? Or, the worse part in my mind, were they just quickly taken and then reduced and reused for some other nefarious plot?

For some reason, the last one seems fits better, as you can easily look back in history with this world and be able to pick out a villain. In every era of the world, there was a "villain" and they were so easy to pick out that many people would be able to decide which one it was without a fault. Maybe the villain was made with more masses of "bad" parts than good while the underlings, those to create minor chaos and add nice drama to the reality show called life for whoever or whatever is in charge, were made with only minor "bad" parts and more good than the "villain" would have.

Regardless of my many concerns, I still like the idea of souls being recycled. In my mind it was just so comforting to me to have that happened.

That's probably why I finally killed myself without a second thought, tipping my body over and letting gravity do the work for me.

I'm not quite certain why that I did it, I suppose it was a mass of things like falling leaves on the ground. A bunch of traumatic events, major and minor, just finally enclosed me to the point where I was tired of moving, of walking, of doing anything. My feet hurt, my heart hurt, and it felt like I was swallowing glass daily every time I woke up from my pseudodeath known as sleep into the living world. No real single event caused it, no single thing or person was at fault, it was just everything.

I wanted an unfaltering sleep, so I did it.

In all hopes, I was wishing for my soul to be unraveled for them to pick the good parts of me out and then scatter the rest.

Regardless if my belief was true or not, I was still expecting nothingness. No more living. No more memories. No more thinking.

I suppose I should explain my ramblings and my anger, (is this anger or something more? Perhaps another bout of depression…) so you can better understand.

As I died, I was expecting anything but the fact my soul would just be reused as whole with no reducing- or would this just be plain up recycling?

I just jumped straight from the breaking down into pieces to being put up into a shop for someone else to buy despite not being clean. Despite my soul being dirty and still intact from before.

Most of my memories are there, despite me not remembering a few things.

But this just meant that I was still dirty, soiled, unconsumable, and a danger to human health. Yet I was still being eaten. Still being served on a platter despite having no rights being there at the dinner party.

It made me angry, frustrated, sad, upset, yet also… nothing. Just a mind numbing emptiness that has followed me from one life to the next. It was a coldness that seeped from my soul into my body, numbing the pain but also increasing it at the same time. It help soothe but it also heightened everything into being too much, just too much, too much, too much, too-…

I just wanted to be happy.

I knew that with nothingness, I would cease to exist, which would be the best thing to happiness I could get.

I wanted to be free.

I think though, that was the problem with my past life. I just didn't feel free at all. I felt trapped, stuck, under so much pressure, being crushed, backed into a corner, packaged away, chained down, locked in a cage- and so many other things that could just explain how utterly hopeless I felt.

It didn't matter if others saw me as "succeeding", I couldn't see that I was "succeeding" and nothing could do it. Nothing could feel right. I did community service, I hung out with peers, I had a great job, I passed school, I had some loved ones but not too many yet I still didn't feel… happy. I still didn't feel the success and warmth. I wasn't emotionally pleased and nothing I did could light up the flame for the will to live.

Yet, given this second chance, shouldn't I try then? Regardless of whatever plan is in place for me, or whoever decided to plop me here, in this world I will know my faults and errors and will be able to react accordingly to make sure that I am free. I don't need to be repressed this time around if I know all the answers to living a basic life. I have information and knowledge from my past life that I can use here.

That's one thing, I think, will allow me to run free here. The fact that I have knowledge from before helps raise the repressed feeling a bit, and instead allows me to look more at the sky than just what's in front of me. Here, I am going to spread my wings and fly as high as I can so that I can touch the stars and grasp them, keeping them so that I may look at them forever.

However, I know that I can also get just as trapped in this world as I did in the last and know that I will just easily fall apart at the seams. I won't lie and say I am mentally stable and whole all of a sudden, I'm not. I'm still fragile and unraveled, ready to pull apart with one single tug.

If that happens though, where I will fall once more, I hope that this time around the fall will be big enough to crack me into so many pieces that they will be FORCED to properly process my soul.

Until then, I suppose I should actually try living.

In that case, the first step in doing so, would be attempting to please my new parents.

Starting with the angel.

The Growth Arc

Chapter One: Revitalizing

"Beautiful."

The word was croaked out and hoarse, sounding different than the meaning of the word should be. It felt like I twisted the word to be the opposite of what I stated.

Yet, it gained Mother's attention as she was startled out of her peacefulness of cooking in the kitchen. Her dark, almond shaped eyes widened before searching the room as if to find where that noise creaked out from. Quickly though, they landed on the source. She twisted her body quickly, her dark purple dress with sleeves to her elbows, swirled around her knees. The wooden spoon in her hand was clenched so tightly, that I could see her knuckles turning white with the pressure upon the utensil.

A flash of worry flickered through me before being over taken quickly by the coldness that was fixated within me. I still hoped though that she wouldn't break the spoon, it would splinter in her grasp and cause her to bleed.

And she doesn't deserve that. She doesn't deserve any type of pain.

"Chi-chan?" Mother asked me, as she began to move towards me slowly as if I would dissipate into smoke if she came near too quick. She looked down at me in surprise and shock, with all her attention on me. Normally this will cause me to look away, yet I dug in my heels and trained my own dark eyes onto her steadily trying to keep focus. I didn't want to get lost in my own mind again, swept away and battered by the waves of emotions like I have for the past 11 months of this new life.

I mainly spent time up there in my mind since the beginning of this life and, once I learned how to, normally walked around the house quietly while staring blankly at the walls until Mother grabbed me to eat or sleep. I was able to take care of my body physically, as I quickly demanded control over my bladder and bowels the moment I could as potty training (which is when I learnt I was now a male in this life much to my mild displeasure at the new parts) was easily the first thing on my list with walking right after.

Due to this, I wasn't used to staring at another person anymore, especially straight in the eyes like her and I was doing. Unwillingly, a warm blush appeared on my face as embarrassment tried to creep in and take its place, battling the numbness that normally mutes the emotions inside of me.

"Beautiful." I croaked out again, not liking the strain on my throat as I made sure it was louder for her to be able to hear. For all I could know, my Mother was probably deaf or hard of hearing. It has been very silent in this somewhat large house of ours with only the two of us since the man has left for a war that was ravaging the land. We used to have quite a few visitors around in the beginning, but as I grew and Mother noticed how strange I was, she began to send them away until none of them bother to visit. Although Mother did speak to me a lot to make sure I got interactions, I did not speak back or made any sounds making me a poor conversational partner which made her attempts to speak to me lessen as time went on.

I am sure that with this very quiet household, my ability to process this language will be stunted until I put forth more of an effort.

Through my quick flights of thoughts, Mother kept her eyes trained on me as they slowly became misty and tearful as her own thoughts seemed to process out. Quickly they spilt over though, trailing down her pale cheek as she gave a startle sob and dropped down onto her knees in order to grab me and bring me close to her. She hugged onto my tiny body tightly, causing the warmth of hers to seep into mine.

It was nice. It felt comforting. It felt like love.

It made me close my eyes and lean into it more as I enjoyed it warming up my colder figure. She cried into my hair, causing it to become damp, but I didn't mind much as a slow curl of pride and happiness began to blossom in my heart with what I have done.

For the past few weeks, I have been deciding on the word to say to this wonderful creature and once I have, I made sure to practice it a lot. Repeating the word over and over while she slept so that I could make sure I was pronouncing it right despite the strain on my voice it caused.

The language of this new life was weird, a mixture of what sounded like Japanese and Korean from my old life but being more predominantly Japanese in sound but the writing being an almost Japanese completely with the words I've seen scratched out around the house.

This caused it to be very hard to learn the new word, only remembering it from when Mother pointed out a flower to me in the garden and saying it, especially since I haven't made any noise despite my fast grasp of the other milestones of a toddler. It wasn't my fault that I didn't want to follow the normal milestones that a child should have, it was restricting and with me able to mentally process what was going around better than a new soul would of- it felt childish and dumb to do so. However, me talking, was the first milestone of what I am truly marking as the beginning of my new life.

This is the beginning of me taking back my freedom, my hope, my love, that I have lost in the life before.

I tried hard to focus once more back on my mother, as I have spent enough time processing what has happened to me in my mind that I feel like it is time to spend more of it in this new reality of mine.

"Beautiful…Mother is." I whispered out a bit brokenly, sure that she could hear me. My hands, oh so tiny and fragile looking compared to what they were before, moved to grasp onto the cream apron that she had tied on her figure. Her long black hair has felled around us, turning into a curtain that tickled my nose and my face.

It made me want to squirm, but I held still and allowed her to hug me and touch me as much as she wanted to- as much as she NEEDED to in order to quell her own pain in her heart. I was a very antisocial child during this time, shying away from a lot of her touch and being unresponsive to the words Mother have spoken to me. This caused her to be concern, worried, and so extremely scared that she consulted with the multiple doctors who visited us to see if I was okay. Much to her relief, and confusion, I was. All of them were baffled.

That just means though, that this first stepping stone down the river of my life was just as important to her as it was for me, so I need to allow her a few moments to just feel happy. She deserves it.

"O-oh… Chi-chan, just…just when did you learn how to talk? W-why didn't y-you say anything sooner!?" She cried out, pain was mixed in with the love and happiness in her voice. It caused my heart to twist and sting a bit, hearing her sound the way she did.

I shrugged in response, not willing nor able to convey myself in words. I felt bad at this action, only for the numbness to appear once more and take the feeling of guilt and muted it before devouring it whole causing me to feel empty once more.

I suppose it would take some time for me to be able to truly live.

Mother moved away from me, a gentle smile on her face which radiated with so much love that I could feel it chasing away the numbness and melting the ice in my soul a bit.

"I want you to know, anything you say will be important to me Chi-chan. Understand?"

Without much thoughts in my actions, my hands moved away to touch and wipe away the tears on her face as she released me yet still stayed down to the ground. I watched as her arms move away, revealing in the pale skin that we both shared before I also moved my own hands away that were now damp.

"S…sh…shorry." I slurred out, frowning a bit at the fact that the word came out with a lisp instead of properly like I imagined.

"It's fine, Chi-chan… How about we go out and celebrate though for today and do something special, ne? We'll go get something to eat instead of just eating in, okay?" She asked me, her dark eyes still looking damp but more eager and lively as I nodded in response at her my hand clutching onto her apron and dress when she stood up with me in her arms.

It's strange a bit, to see dull eyes that used to look around the expansion of the house in boredom, sadness, loneliness, and pain now be flared up with life.

I was very upset with myself for treating this gentle and loving creature so unkindly and given her such pain. Regardless if I wanted this life or not, she was the one who gave me this new vessel that will allow me to live as I wanted to. Yet, I haven't thanked her in any way at all.

She smiled even wider, if possible, feeling pleased by my actions before she put me down on the ground as the tended to the kitchen in order to clean it up and to take whatever it was she was preparing on the stove off of it and into the fridge. I took this chance to go to where I knew the front door was and sat on the ledge to wait for her to put on my shoes.

Now that I am thinking about it, this will be the first time I have ever went outside of the house and its yard with me being able to properly process it. Usually when we go out, I am still trapped in my mind and catatonic, processing what the hell has happened to me with reeling horror, anger, and angst.

My knowledge of this new life of mine, of the outside world, is very limited. I didn't process any stimuli outside of my mind other than the fact Mother used to point at herself and say Mother a lot and then point at a picture of a man and call out "Father" a lot. I suppose to get me to know what he really looked like, although I remember him a bit from before he had left off to war.

Despite me being unresponsive, I still got a hold of the language although not perfectly, enough to be able to process it and understand it a bit. I also knew that my name was something like "Chi-chan", Chi without the honorific on it.

It seemed so girly in my opinion, too feminine for a male to possess as it's more fit for a female child. Yet, who am I to judge really considering my position?

Mother eagerly walked to the front door, sliding on her own shoes first before kneeling down and sliding my shoes on my feet before starting to strap them down. All the straps were a little too complicated for my chubby fingers, although that was a thing on my list to definitely learn very soon. Dexterity with your hands are very important after all and it seems as if shoes in this world don't have any laces but instead buckels and straps which seems very practical.

Mother gently grabbed and lifted me in her arms, carrying me out of the house. My eyes were already watering and stinging from the sunlight that was a lot stronger out here than it was in the house. Feeling more vulnerable than usual, I clung onto Mother's dress tightly and enjoyed the sensation of being carried even though I was able to walk. I suppose Mother didn't want to show off how advance I was at this moment of time which made sense if I somehow went back in time. I could be seen as a witch, or some abnormality, and could be killed for it or used by whatever government rules in this area.

After all, we did the same thing in my old life. Either used people if they were too different from the masses or ostracized them if their abnormalities could not benefit the greater good.

It was cruel, but normally life is.

Mother soon left the fence of our yard and turned onto the path that laid in front of it.

Already it was filled with people who looked similar to us, dark hair, dark eyes, and pale skin that swarmed the road a bit. Many of them waved hello or smiled at us causing Mother to wave hello back or smile in their direction with a pleased expression.

I suppose these people would be family relatives as mine, due to all of the similar features we share, meaning that we must be in a time period where clans existed. This helped ease my anxiety a bit at the era I was now in, as I would have been very unhappy if I was born in a more futuristic setting.

My mind further cemented the fact that I was most likely placed back in the past, as the roofs on the houses in the area held slopes and a strange traditional feeling with an oriental flare to them that was only seen in history of my time. There were many dirt paths and small buildings that appeared to be shops in this district as well that spilled out and mixed with what looks like the rest of the town as there were more different looks of people around us.

I suppose this was a bit of the residential area, or at least near the edge of it from the looks of the tall buildings that seem like they would fit better in my modern day world than here. They were mixed in with the houses, causing a strange mixture of traditional and knew. There were apartment buildings, stores, restaurants, and more that surrounded the bustling road we were now on and it pleased me aesthetically.

During the entire walk, Mother merely talked to me happily when she wasn't humming or acknowledging the new people (who were most likely towns people now since they didn't share features with us) who greeted her.

As pleasant as this sounds, something was bothering me but I couldn't tell what.

Something was itching, scratching away at my brain, something important. I furrowed my eyebrows in thought and frustration as my eyes narrowed and began to search around the area a lot more carefully.

This place looked familiar, kind of like the way you would be able to identify a place by a photograph. Such as the moon, the Eiffel tower, or some other land mark or place that you would only be able to notice because you saw it in photos, in videos, but never in person. It was that odd sensation mixed in with something that was a vague feeling of Déjà vu.

"Oh, Chi-chan, look at that! This is probably the first time you have really seen it!" Mother exclaimed, bouncing me in her arms so I would focus in on her.

I looked to see where she was looking at before moving my head in the direction.

My heart dropped down to my stomach.

I felt nauseated, dizzy, and oh so very hot with a head that was lighting me on fire.

I broke out into a sweat quickly, becoming clammy and moist to the touch as my eyes began to tear up without my permission.

This was a joke, just a joke, maybe we're in some theme park.

It has to be a joke.

It must be.

After all, this was a TV show. Just some random animation produced by a guy with imagination and creativity.

IT WAS A FUCKING TV SHOW.

It's not real, it's not real, it's not real, it'snotreal, it'snotreal, it'snotreal!

I moved my hands to rub roughly at my eyes before looking up again at what was before me.

My whole body began to tremble.

It was four faces, carved into a stone cliff with a lot of precision and accuracy to detail. One that I knew I have seen before, which was why the déjà vu sense was tingling throughout my body.

That was why this place was just oh so fucking familiar.

I wasn't in the past, nor was I in the future or any post-apocalyptic type scenario.

No, I was in a place called Konohakagure, the village of Konoha, the place that was known to be "hidden in the leaves", the place that was crushed, squashed, ripped apart, defeated, and destroyed so many times only to rise from the ashes like the mythological phoenix.

This was hell, this was hades, this was a place that could utterly destroy me.

I swallowed roughly, trying to keep myself from vomiting, listening to Mother half mindedly as my mind whirred quickly, all of the details coming together to form a bigger picture now that all the lights had came on.

The weird shoes, the clan with the people looking at me, the Japanese but slightly mixed English language, the weird weapons lying around the house, the swords that were collected and hung on the wall, the strange appearance of the town, and most likely that itching and buzzing sensation that was always under my skin.

So much more, so many more details.

One came to mind quickly, a symbol that only brought death and anguish.

My breath caught as I quickly looked towards Mother. I swallowed down hard, trying to stop the rising bile in the back of my throat, while shaking my head before speaking.

I needed to know who I was, who I am, what I am. Who was I in this vessel that I took over?

I had a hunch, a thought, a feeling, and oh god I needed to be wrong for once. Let me just be Chi-chan, a random boy with an unfortunate but girly sounding name.

Don't let me be a body snatcher.

"Mahther." I called out, my speech slurring in my panic, but it made Mother's attention focus on me once more. Her eyes were sparkling in joy, she was radiant and dazzling. She was so in love, so happy, so proud that I was just now finally being responsive to her more, especially when she had to deal with a silent child for Months.

A child who didn't cry, who didn't call out for their Mother, who didn't make any pained noises when hurt, who just didn't utter one little sound.

The smile that appeared on her face showed more hope and love than I have ever seen before, and it was all focused on me, in my direction.

Too bad that if I was right, oh god let me be wrong, that I would end up breaking that smile into a million tiny fragments in the near future.

"Yes, Chi-chan?"

"Who, mother?"

"What was that?"

My face crinkled in frustration and panic as I thought, trying to make sense of my muddled mind so I would be able to tell her the words I wanted to say. My pulse was skyrocketing, I could feel my heart fluttering in my chest as it became harder to get ahold of air. It felt like I was dying. I was dying.

"Mother, who? Who is Mother?" I tried again, speaking a little more properly much to her happiness and amusement, trying to use the sentence rules that this language held.

"Me? You want to know who I am~?" Mother asked back, humming back with a smile as she played with me. I have no patience though. "I am a wife, and then I am also your Mother- Chi-chan!"

A sudden rush of anger flooded me, feeling my body tremble more. Is she intentionally fucking with me? Does she not see the panicked state I am in? I shoot her a frustrated and wary gaze as I quickly and violently shook my head, the black silky strands of my own hair slapping me roughly in the face.

"No, who is mother?" I asked once more, putting the irritation in my words to get my point across. I didn't know the word for name which angered me more at my incompetence.

"Ahhh, my name." Mother responded, nuzzling into my head despite me wanting to recoil. "Oh, Chi-chan is just so smart! My name is Uchiha, Mikoto my dear. I suppose you would need to know that if you were to ever wander off and get lost."

I stopped breathing entirely.

I swore that my heart has stopped as well.

My eyes widen.

I was right, oh god I was right oh fuck. Her blood, her blood will be coating my hands. The beautiful angel who has dealt with my shit and my abnormalities that should have gotten me abandoned or killed at this point, for 11 months and put up with me for so long only to get a semi-normal child for barely a few hours.

She dealt with me being strange, staring at the walls blankly, being mute, not making any response to life. She fought with Father, yelling and screaming, tears falling from her eyes and face as he hurt her with the words and frustration which were all supposed to be aimed at me but she took it. She told him how I was fine, I was normal, I was just a little lost. She protected me and oh god…

He blood will be spilt.

"W-who is… Who is Chi-chan?" I asked, trying hard not to tremble but probably failing. Trying hard not to scream. I was trying oh so hard not to vomit.

The hardest thing I was trying to not do was pitch myself out of her arms now and attempt to land head first once more onto the ground in order to spare her.

I wanted to save her.

Oh my god, she didn't deserve this. Not her, not this gentle creature. Not this angel. Not the light in the dark.

"Your name? Your name is Uchiha Itachi." She said, but her joy quickly transformed into worry and concern at my body response and my actions. Her hands, her arms that were always filled with love and comfort, tightened around me as she peered at my face. "Itachi-chan, are you okay?"

The words echoed in my mind, bouncing around in my head.

Blackness closed in on the edges of my sight as I felt myself quickly become light headed. The world spun around me.

I blinked one, in an attempt to get rid of it. It worsened though. I could feel myself become so nauseated.

I blinked once more.

Images of her blood flinging into the air from a sword, splattering on the walls, the floors, onto a young Sasuke's horrified face.

My eyes fell shut and I could feel myself grow limp against Mother who let out a terrified cry.

Her warm body was just too hot. Too hot. Too much.

One day though, instead of her arm touch, her loving arms, everything would become cold.

Her touch would be cold.

Her eyes would stare blankly ahead.

Her head would roll, rollrollrollroll, across the tatami matt on the floor to the edge of the sliding door.

And it will be all my fault.

To be continued.