Shisui remarked with a smile, "You are brilliant, after all."

Itachi ate the fish in his hand quietly, his mind in different place, but his heart was not here. If he had to pinpoint where it was like...

... nowhere at all.

Itachi didn't know how to deal with this situation, and so he lied and lied until he believed it himself.

It worked.

No matter what happens in the future, he will be fine.

He was just not comfortable being at home at the moment.

Brilliant. Superior. Talented. Genius.

Itachi hated being called those things. He was none of the above, he was sure of that. But Itachi knew he wasn't like his peers. He was... simply different, that's all. He acknowledged that; he wasn't an idiot after all.

("You are good at lying to yourself," Shisui said to him. He inwardly agreed.)

"Nii-san!"

Itachi looked up, Sasuke was in front of him, frowning cutely with his lips puckered outwards.

"What is it, Sasuke?" Itachi put the scroll he had stared at for minutes before Sasuke asked for his attention.

"Shisui-san's here." the contempt in Sasuke's voice was not left unnoticed, as Itachi chuckled lightly; amused at Sasuke's attitude towards Shisui. He had asked Shisui a few times to drag him from home, and Shisui had to make it like he stole Sasuke's brother away for a while. That made Sasuke resent the older boy... by a little, he hoped.

"Sasuke, be good to Mother, alright?"

Today's training session was going to be different, he felt it in his bones.

Shisui wanted peace; contrary to him already decimated more than a thousand of shinobi in the course of his 5 years of serving the village as a shinobi.

When the Kyuubi attacked the village three years ago, Shisui was a freshly made chūnin. No matter how badly he wanted to help, all shinobi under the age of twenty was all trapped behind a barrier willingly or unwillingly; in Shisui's case, he was unwilling. He badly wanted to fight, to defend his home, but the barrier... he knew from then on to study fuuinjutsu; in case something like that happened again.

Last night, he met the container of Kyuubi, in the Forest of Death. A three-year-old Jinchuuriki by the name of Uzumaki Naruto. It was absurd, even for him, who effectively fought in the third war when he was just six years old, armed only with the basic three academy jutsu.

"It's dangerous to enter this forest without supervision." Shisui never scolded someone, though he understood why Naruto wanted to train, it didn't mean it was the right thing to do to train alone at night in the Forest of Death. "Do you understand that you could get killed here? You're not even in the academy, I would assume no one even trained you yet."

"Train me, then!" Naruto jutted his lips stubbornly, "I have to prove someone, I can't back down from this!"

Shisui huffed exasperatedly when he remembered the kid demanding him to be trained. Naruto was a cute kid, just like Sasuke-kun, but a tad more... serious, if he had to categorize it. Maybe that was why he agreed to accompany the kid with his training?

"Shisui-san."

"Ah, you're here," Shisui looked down at an out-of-breath Naruto, "now, we have to wait for Itachi."

Naruto furrowed his eyebrows, "I thought Itachi-san was here?"

Shisui was surprised by the question; but nonetheless, he answered.

"Itachi wanted to buy dango first," Shisui coughed into his fist to smother a laugh, "honestly, it's funny for a boy as serious as he is to be addicted to it."

Naruto looked like he didn't get it, but he shrugged, "Dango sounds delicious, so it's no wonder."

That... sounded like Naruto never had eaten dango. He didn't mishear it, wasn't he?

"You never have dango?" Shisui asked though he had the feeling the answer would be a 'no'.

Naruto nodded, "Jii-san never bought it so..." unknown to everyone but to a select few, Sarutobi Hiruzen never ate dango because... Shimura Danzō disliked warabi mochi. Though almost an unrelated food, dango, and mochi had almost the same texture...

(Uchiha Kagami once commented it was ridiculous, but he died before he could convince Hiruzen to at least try dango once).

That was... not good. Even if Shisui wasn't a fan of dango, no one should live for three years and never had dango. Heck, his first dango was when he was two years old and he loved it back then. If only he didn't try shōyu ramen right after that, he might get addicted to it.

"Kid, you're missing out a big time...," Shisui shook his head. What would Itachi say if he knew this? Blasphemy? Yeah, that. "Itachi might give you one stick if you say that you never have one."

Is dango that good? Naruto had had no idea at all. "Okay?"

And that was the day Naruto found he liked dango... especially hanami dango. Almost at the same level as red-bean soup, he liked so much.

Hiruzen watched his almost-grandson through his crystal ball; his mind on the verge of breaking.

It was a peculiar sight as Uzumaki Naruto, his successor's son, was sparring with two Uchiha and actually held off quite good for his age to face a trained genin and chūnin.

That had to be a mistake. This crystal ball clearly was broken.

Mito-sama was quite a prankster back when Hashirama-sama was alive, after all.

(The sight of Naruto eating dango was also a prank, Hiruzen nodded to himself).

(Seems like Hiruzen and Itachi had one thing in common; they're good at lying to themselves).

Itachi loves his brother to the point that it almost like an obsession from an outsider's perspective. It doesn't mean he would train with his brother like he would with Shisui and Naruto.

"Oh, come on, you guys must be holding back!"

Well... that was an understatement. Shisui clearly held back by quite a large margin, and he himself also was holding back... only a bit though, that showed with how he quickly defeated the boy within a few seconds.

"But you're good for your age, Naruto," unlike with Sasuke, Shisui never attempted to attach -kun to Naruto's name. Itachi didn't know why, but he didn't ask; maybe Shisui treated Naruto like he treated Sasuke? "You just have to accept there will always be someone better than you."

"I know that. I mean, I wanted to fight you guys at your best..." Naruto sighed. "I'm sorry."

Shisui chuckled lightly, "Don't apologize, it's not something you should apologize for. Now, how about I teach you how to throw shuriken?"

They spent the rest of the day training until their bodies collapsed to the ground.

(Meanwhile, Shisui plotted- he meant, planned to introduce the art of sealing to the only Uzumaki he knew, namely Naruto. He needed someone to bounce sealing ideas with, and while Itachi is talented at practically everything, Uzumaki famous expertise is fuuinjutsu, so Naruto must know the art, dammit.)

It was like a routine now. Shisui didn't know since when he thought it was great to train with a pint-sized brat that isn't an Uchiha. He trained with Itachi simply because Fugaku-san assigned him to it; if the result of it being him liking Itachi enough to put Itachi's wellbeing first and then the assignment second, it wasn't anybody's business.

He wasn't ordered or requested to watch over or train or even tolerating Uzumaki Naruto. Yet, here he was, running together with the brat for an early morning training. It didn't help Naruto was the spitting image of his not-so-secret idol, Namikaze Minato or the Yondaime Hokage.

Okay, so Shisui could see why the Yondaime chose Naruto to contain the Kyuubi. He is Yondaime's son and an Uzumaki after all.

An Uchiha befriended an Uzumaki with the Kyuubi in his gut? Fate has a strange way to bond people, it seems.