The bamboo basket bounced against Terumi Mei's back as she hopped between snow-laden roots, humming the fragment of a children's rhyme. The air bit at her cheeks; her breath came out in little clouds. Grandmother had said don't go out alone again. Mei had heard it—half of it. Winter gnawed at the old woman's joints; the house was cold. If she didn't fetch kindling, who would?
Sticks piled quickly. She wiped her brow with a thin sleeve and glanced at the dimming sky.
"Mm… that should be enough! If I'm late, Grandma will worry."
She trudged through knee-high snow, small legs working hard under a basket nearly as tall as she was. Then she stopped, eyes widening.
"A rabbit!"
A fat one—easily ten kilos—lay stunned at the base of a tree, as if it had sprinted headlong into the trunk and lost the argument. Mei tied its legs with twine and lifted, face flushing with effort and triumph.
"We can eat meat…" She swallowed, then smiled fiercely. "Grandma's legs hurt. The big hind legs are hers."
Bundle secured, she set off, voice lilt returning. Rooflines appeared through the flurries. Smoke… didn't.
"Grandma! I'm back!" she called, lifting the rabbit like a banner. "Look what I—"
No answer. The village lay silent in a way that wasn't peace.
"Grandma?"
Red broke the white.
Mei's steps faltered. Several elders she knew—faces she'd greeted every morning—lay in the lane, cleaved at the waist. Eyes greyed by fear stared at nothing. The snow around them was not snow anymore.
The basket hit the ground. The rabbit thumped beside it and rolled once.
She ran.
"Grandma! Where are you? It's me—Mei!" Her voice echoed back alone, thinner each time.
Her own door stood there, familiar and wrong. She grabbed the latch with numb fingers and pushed.
Blood.
It painted the floorboards, the wall, the bedframe—the ceiling, even, where it dripped in thin, patient lines.
"Grandma…?"
In the center of the room, someone hung from the beams—kunai through palms, feet, and scapulae. Skinned by inches. Bone flashed where meat should have been. It was a picture drawn by someone who hated mercy.
"Grandma—!"
The world tilted. Mei crawled forward on hands and knees, elbows and forehead knocking the floor. She wrapped both arms around the ruined body, sobbing so hard it almost made no sound.
"Please… don't leave me. Don't—don't leave me, please—"
She begged the ceiling. She begged the wood and the cold and whatever gods pretended not to hear. The only reply was the drip of red on old planks.
Then, from a place beyond pain, the old woman's mouth moved.
"D-don't… cry, good… child…" The words trembled on a last breath. "Run. Don't look back. Don't stop. The ninja… are looking… for you…"
The light in her eyes guttered, but the will behind it shoved.
Mei's tears blurred everything. She lurched toward the shelf where they kept herbs—
Outside, snow scraped like knives along the alley. Inside, something snapped as oil caught.
Flame roared up the walls.
The beam over the body cracked and fell. Perhaps it was luck. Perhaps it was love refusing to sleep. The falling timber hit the old woman's corpse first, rolling it forward—shoving Mei sideways and out of the beam's path.
She sprawled, choking, heat clawing at her face. The house she had called home turned to a furnace in a breath. Soot sank into her skin. Grief hardened into something with teeth.
Her hands closed into fists until nails cut palm. It was nothing compared to what had been carved out of her chest.
"Grandma… I'll live." The words scraped. "I'll live and I'll avenge you."
She dragged the flaming timber aside with both small, burning hands. Her throat shrieked; her mouth stayed shut. Then she ran at the doorway as the ceiling fell.
The door burst outward. A little figure rolled into the snow, steam hissing as ice killed flame.
Mei gasped, lungs razored by smoke—and staggered to her feet.
A pair of black shinobi boots stepped into her vision.
The heel came down on her head.
Not enough to kill. Enough to hurt. Enough to own.
"As Lord Suikazan suspected," said the ANBU in a flower-patterned mask, pressing her face deeper into the slush, voice flat. "There was a child. She would come home."
"You… killed my grandmother!" Mei forced her head up against the weight. The mask loomed. The forehead protector above it was Kirigakure.
"Why—why did you kill her?!"
The answer was more pressure. Her skull thudded against packed ice. Stars flared.
"Tell me," the ANBU said. "Did you see a man in a black long-sleeved coat, black short hair, black-rimmed glasses?"
The words hammered nails into meaning. It was me. If not for her—if she hadn't met that gentle-eyed shinobi—no one would have come. No one would have died.
The ANBU saw the shift in her face and ground his boot harder. "Answer me properly and perhaps I let you live."
Mei stared up at him. Something boiled behind her eyes.
"You… monsters."
Her lips parted.
A white mist rushed out—hissing.
It hit his mask; the paint melted and ran. Where it touched skin, that skin smoked and sloughed.
The ANBU screamed and flung himself back. His boot lifted.
Mei slammed her palms to the snow and ran—two steps, three—turned the corner—
The alley was empty. No cover. No barrels. No doors ajar.
The ANBU sprinted after her, half a mask hanging, eyes streaming, chakra flaring—
—and did not see her.
His gaze slid past the spot where she stood, panting, five paces to his right. He scanned left, then right again, then swore and kicked a post into splinters.
He ran on into the firelight and vanished.
Mei stood there trembling, heat and cold fighting over her skin. After a long time, she looked down at her scorched clothes and fumbled in the inner pocket.
A small white wrapper came free, unburnt where everything else had charred.
The candy inside had melted to sweet paste. The wrapper had not. On its inner face, fine symbols curled and crossed like writing that didn't belong to any alphabet she knew. They shivered faintly in the wake of her ragged breath.
The ninja big brother's… candy.
Tears fell again, quieter now. She folded the paper against her palm and the world's attention slid off her like rain from oiled cloth.
(End of chapter)
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