“However strong you become, never seek to bear everything alone. If you do, failure is certain.” — Itachi Uchiha.

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Unohana spared a cursory glance at Itachi’s swords on the small table between them and looked back at the youth.

“Are you surprised that I pointed that out?” She asked as she picked up her cup to take a small sip.

Itachi looked at Unohana with a calculative gaze, going over strings of thoughts and possible routes this particular conversation might take and what her reasons might be for bringing it up.

“If you want to ask why I said this or the reason for my assumptions then I think it’s fair to say that I’m familiar with such eyes, and given what little I know of your history… it really isn’t hard to tell.”

Even if she didn’t drop her blades like he did, he knew he wasn’t under the danger of being attacked. He couldn’t tell what it was but there was something about Unohana that made it pretty clear to anyone facing her whether or not they were in danger.

“Why are you always calm?” Rather than an answer or question of similar topics, Itachi asked this instead.

She tilted her head slightly to the side, eyes widening just an imperceptible bit to show her surprise at the surprise question.

“Nothing seems to faze you. It’s like you care too much but at the same time you're overwhelmingly apathetic.”

Finally she picked up her sword and put it on the table in front of her. This was a rather aged practice of parley between two opposing bodies – a call of truce.

“When you’ve lived for as long as I have, seen what I’ve witnessed, and have done a fraction of the things I did, there are very little things that will faze you. You’re rather young, you wouldn’t understand.”

“Maturity is not the increase of age but instead the accumulation of experiences, good and bad, and I can say that even souls as long-lived as you have never done some of the things I did.” Itachi stretched his hands to pick up his cup, swirled it a bit while looking at the liquid inside, before taking a small drink.

Unohana asked again as they started falling silent. “Why do you want to defect?”

Itachi scrutinized her eyes, her breathing, and even the soft sway of her calm Reiatsu.

“Don’t you care for the Gotei 13?” Itachi asked once more.

“I do.” Unohana answered. “This is my home and if it ever comes to it, I wouldn’t hesitate in cutting you down to protect it.”

Itachi nodded at the statement, fully understanding the sentiment as it was one he carried throughout his life. An enemy of the Leaf was an enemy of Itachi Uchiha.

“You still have yet to answer me, Itachi.”

“How can I dedicate the entirety of my soul to something I don’t trust in?” Unohana understood that it was a rhetoric so she remained silent for Itachi to say his piece. “A lost leaf cannot blossom on its own except when it is grafted into a new tree.”

“True. In order to survive it has to hold tightly onto the grafting tree.” Unohana supplied, comprehending the essence of the analogy Itachi was using.

“But having its former branch plucked up because of thorns, even the lone leaf will entertain the hard choice of remaining cut off and withering to death if the new tree is overrun with thorns.”

Somewhere along their little back and forth, Yachiru had left them and went back to the 11th Division, instinctively knowing whenever Kenpachi was looking around for her.

You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

Itachi ran his fingers over the sheath of his blades, inwardly pleased with how they hummed in resonance to his touch – even the angry Amaterasu.

“How sad.” Unohana suddenly muttered.

“What is?”

“How pain can scar this deep into someone’s soul.” She said softly, her eyes seemingly seeing the ‘scars’ she mentioned. “Pain; it turns soft as cotton the strongest people.”

What was the nature of the conversation they had begun with Itachi had no idea but he relaxed slightly into his crossed legs. He’s had a few conversations with Kyōraku about similar topics but the man had a rather persistent distaste for sober talks.

“It is a necessary tool for growth. Except sometimes the growth we gain from the pain we receive is disproportionate; it makes it obsolete - driving one into a spiral of madness and tears that the only thing they could ever hope to use as a rescue rope is hatred… but even sometimes it too falls short of the pain.”

Itachi looked at his empty cup and made to drop it when Unohana pushed the pot of tea to him as well as her cup for a refill. “Help yourself, and please if you don’t mind.”

Itachi refilled their cups, both taking a sip, before he continued. “You asked why I would defect but I’ll ask you this; who will turn a blind eye when the roof they seek shelter under catches on fire?”

Itachi took back his blades and fastened them to his hips, an action mirrored by Unohana, and drank the rest of his cup in one gulp and gently placed it on the table as he stood up to leave.

“I appreciate the conversation.” He said as he turned to walk out.

Unohana nodded. “Likewise. Word of advice if you care to listen?”

Itachi stopped at the door but didn’t turn around.

“The Executive Militia and the Onmistukidō are in charge of tackling the ‘thorns’ and have more power in their less restricted movement, or at least their Commanders do. Do with that what you will.”

Disregarding her warmly accepting personality, Itachi couldn’t understand why she was doing this. First the talk, and now this.

“Why are you doing this, Captain Unohana?” He asked. “Did the Head Captain put you up to this?”

Unohana chuckled and waved her hand in a hiding dismissal. “Of course not. Let’s just say that the Seireitei would lose a competent and loyal Shinigami if you defected and I’d rather not want that. Geniuses like you, one so scarred yet so whole, are very rare even when you’re as long-lived as me. And I quite enjoy the philosophical conversations over tea.”

“…I would have understood you more if you’d been a manipulator. And you wouldn’t have been this hard to read.” Were Itachi’s parting words as he left her office.

“And if you’re interested you can ask Isane to help you with learning Kaidō.” She said to the empty room but had no doubt that he heard it.

……

[World of the Living]

Lisa led a group of Shinigami-in-training from the Shin’ō Academy on a Hollow extermination mission, happy for the break she seriously needed after the incident that implicated all the Captains down to their 3rd Seat.

“Junpei, Miwa, Kin and Daewoo; it's a group of low level Hollows. Tatsufusa and I will be your group and the other groups and step in once we determine it is too dangerous for you.” Lisa said and sent the three groups of four students towards three separate gatherings of weak Hollows.

She took a higher vantage point to get an unobstructed view of two of the groups while her 3rd Seat looked after the last one.

Her mind went back to the meeting a week ago, specifically to Itachi and how stronger he’d gotten in such a short time and couldn’t help but curse. “Fucking geniuses.”

She didn’t need her glasses to know that Itachi could go against any Captain, except the Head Captain of course, and wouldn’t necessarily come short. ‘Except maybe when they use their Bankai.’

She could follow Captain Kensei’s movement, barely, but Itachi didn’t look at the Captain and restrained him in an instant. That, she could never.

“Um, Lieutenant Lisa Yadōmaru, I think we’re done.”

She turned and saw Junpei and his group already back with their targeted Hollows nowhere in sight.

“That was fast.” She gave them an impressed nod and scrutinized them, mostly Junpei as he was the only third year student among this group of fifth years, and he looked more roughed up than the others. ‘Is it his Reiatsu? It’s not as much as the others but sensing it somehow creates an illusion of him being stronger than the others. Gah, I need to stop thinking about illusions.’

“Junpei, are you sure you want to try graduating this year?” She asked, not really understanding his reasoning. He took more beating from a normal scrub Hollow than anyone else – she just didn’t see him passing any of the exams.

Junpei perked up at being called and nodded with resolute eyes. “Yes, ma’am. I want to join the 2nd Division.”

Now it wasn’t only Lisa but also his groupmates and returning students that stared at him.

“Any particular reason why the Specialized 2nd Division?”

Junpei nodded and the faintest trace of a smile almost broke across his lips. “I need someone to tell me his name.”

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