Chapter 9: The Shadow in the Playground
The concept of "play" was another foreign dialect Obito Uchiha had to learn.
In the Hidden Leaf Village, play was preparation. Tag was about speed training. Hide and Seek was about infiltration and evasion. Throwing stones at the river was about trajectory and aim. Even the innocent games of house played by the younger civilian children were, in Obito's eyes, a simulation of social structures and resource management.
At the Sunrise Home for Children, play was chaos.
It was Sunday afternoon, the designated "Social Integration Hour." The rain had finally stopped, leaving the playground muddy and slick, the air thick with humidity. Twenty children were unleashed upon the small patch of green and the rusting jungle gym, screaming with the collective lung capacity of a banshee choir.
Obito sat on a bench near the perimeter fence, his good hand clutching a carton of milk. He was observing. That was his role now. The Watcher. The Cripple. The Boy with the Eye Patch.
"You look like an old man judging the youth," Jiro said, sliding onto the bench next to him. She didn't look at him, her eyes focused on a group of kids playing soccer with a ball that seemed to be on fire.
"They have no formation," Obito critiqued, taking a sip of milk. "They run in a cluster. One area-of-effect jutsu—I mean, Quirk—would wipe out the entire team."
"It's soccer, Obito. Not a war zone. The goal is to kick the ball, not eliminate the enemy."
"Inefficient," Obito grumbled. "If you eliminate the enemy, you can walk the ball into the net at your leisure."
Jiro choked on her juice, coughing a laugh. "Remind me never to play sports with you. You'd probably tackle the goalie."
"Only if necessary."
Their conversation was interrupted by a shadow falling over them. It was Kenji, the boy with the spider-fingers and the attitude to match. He was flanked by two other boys: Hiro, the slime-foot kid, and a bulky boy named Tatsu who had rock-like skin on his forearms.
"Hey, Newbie," Kenji said, a mischievous grin stretching his face. "We need a fourth player for 'Heroes and Villains'."
Obito looked up. "I decline. My mobility is compromised."
"Oh, come on," Kenji whined, his long fingers twitching. "It's easy. We are the Heroes. You are the Villain."
Obito stiffened. "Why am I the Villain?"
Kenji gestured vaguely at Obito's entire existence. "Well, look at you. You have the eyepatch. The scars. The creepy robot arm. You look like a villain's backstory."
Jiro stood up, her jacks bristling. "Kenji, that's not cool. Back off."
"It's just a game, Jiro!" Kenji laughed. "Unless he's scared? Maybe the 'Ninja' is just a chicken?"
Obito set his milk carton down on the bench. He did it slowly, deliberately. The cardboard made a soft crinkle sound.
He stood up. He was shorter than Tatsu, and thinner than Kenji, but when he turned his single eye on them, the temperature seemed to drop a few degrees.
"What are the victory conditions?" Obito asked, his voice flat.
Kenji blinked, surprised he actually agreed. "Uh, simple. You get a five-minute head start to hide in the playground or the woods behind the fence. We come find you. If we tag you, we win. If you evade us for twenty minutes, you win. No full-contact Quirks, just capture."
"Evasion," Obito repeated. "Acceptable."
"Great!" Kenji pumped a fist. "Go hide, Villain! The Heroes are counting! One... two... three..."
Obito didn't run. Running attracted attention. He simply stepped backward, fading into the shadow of the large oak tree, and then, he was gone.
The "woods" behind the orphanage were hardly a forest. It was a strip of overgrown shrubbery and trees acting as a buffer between the orphanage and the highway. But to a shinobi, cover was cover.
Obito moved through the underbrush. His plastic arm was tucked tight against his chest to prevent it from snagging on branches. His feet, clad in cheap sneakers instead of sandals, adjusted automatically to the terrain. Heel-to-toe. Roll the weight. Silence.
He found a spot near a dense cluster of azalea bushes. The ground was muddy. Perfect.
He knelt down. He looked at his clothes. The blue hoodie was too bright. It stood out against the brown and green.
Camouflage, he thought.
He scooped up a handful of wet mud with his left hand. He smeared it over the blue fabric. He smeared some on his face, breaking up the recognizable lines of his features. He didn't cover the prosthetic; instead, he wrapped it in a discarded plastic bag he found on the ground to dull the beige color and prevent the sun from reflecting off the plastic.
He wasn't playing a game anymore. The insults had triggered something. Villain. Scarred. Creepy.
If they want a villain, Obito thought, his heart beating a slow, steady rhythm, I will show them why you should fear the dark.
He didn't hide in the bush. That was amateur. He hid under the root system of a fallen tree nearby, pressing his body into the hollow of the earth, covering himself with dead leaves. He left only a small slit for his single eye.
He slowed his breathing. Inhale... hold... exhale. He suppressed his presence. He couldn't completely hide his chakra signature because he didn't have enough control yet, but he could minimize his physical noise to zero.
Ten minutes passed.
"Where is he?" Kenji's voice drifted from the playground. "He probably ran back inside."
"No," Tatsu's deep voice rumbled. "I saw footprints leading this way."
"Smart," Obito thought. "Tracking."
The three "Heroes" entered the woods. They were loud. They stomped on twigs. They shouted to each other.
"Come out, Uchiha!" Kenji yelled. "We have you surrounded!"
They didn't. They were walking in a tight cluster, watching the tree line.
Obito watched them pass within three meters of his position. They looked right at the pile of leaves he was buried under and saw nothing. Their eyes were trained to look for movement, for a person standing up. They weren't trained to look for a bump in the ground.
Pathetic, Obito analyzed. Zero situational awareness.
He waited until they passed. Then, he moved.
He didn't stand up. He slithered backward, using his left elbow and knees, dragging his dead weight silently through the mud. He repositioned himself behind a large rock they had already cleared.
"I can't see him," Hiro complained. "This is boring. Let's just go back."
"No!" Kenji snapped. "He's laughing at us. I can feel it. Tatsu, smash that bush!"
Tatsu punched a bush with his rocky arm. Crack. The poor plant was decimated.
"Environmental damage," Obito whispered to himself. "Careless."
He picked up a small stone. He looked at a tree trunk about ten meters to their left. He threw it.
Thwack.
The stone hit the bark with a sharp sound.
"Over there!" Kenji shouted. "Get him!"
The three boys charged toward the sound, abandoning their formation.
Obito rose from the mud like a swamp spirit. He moved silently behind the trailing boy, Hiro.
He didn't tag him. He just leaned close to his ear.
"You're dead," Obito whispered.
Hiro shrieked, jumping three feet in the air. He slipped on the mud and landed on his butt.
"He's behind us!" Hiro screamed, flailing.
Kenji and Tatsu spun around. But Obito was already moving. He wasn't fast—his body was still weak—but he used the environment. He ducked behind the rock, scrambled up the mossy side, and vaulted over the fence back into the playground.
"He's escaping!" Kenji yelled.
Obito landed in the playground. His knee buckled slightly, sending a jolt of pain up his leg, but he rolled with it, coming up in a crouch.
He was in the open now. The evasion timer was at eighteen minutes. Two minutes left.
"Get him!"
The boys burst out of the woods, covered in scratches and leaves. They were angry now. This wasn't a game to them anymore either; it was a hunt.
Obito scanned the playground. The jungle gym. The slide. The swings. Nowhere to hide.
Then I don't hide.
He ran toward the jungle gym. It was a complex structure of metal bars.
"Corner him!" Kenji ordered. He used his long fingers to swing onto the bars, moving surprisingly fast, like a spider. Tatsu blocked the exit.
Obito was trapped in the center of the cage-like structure.
Kenji dropped down from the top bars, hanging upside down, his face inches from Obito's.
"Gotcha," Kenji grinned, reaching out to tag him.
Obito didn't flinch. He looked at the plastic arm hanging at his side. He looked at Kenji's hand.
Substitution? No. Body Flicker? No.
Distraction.
Obito unclipped the strap on his chest with his left hand.
"Here," Obito said.
He grabbed his own prosthetic arm and threw it at Kenji.
Kenji's eyes widened in horror as the detached limb flew at his face. He shrieked and recoiled, losing his grip on the bars. He fell onto the sand below with a thud.
Tatsu and Hiro froze, staring at the plastic arm lying in the sand.
Obito took the opening. He scrambled through the gap Kenji had left, sliding down the slide and landing on his feet. He picked up his arm with his left hand.
"Twenty minutes," Jiro's voice called out from the bench. She was holding her phone, a stopwatch app running. "Game over. Villain wins."
Obito stood there, panting, covered in mud, holding his own arm like a club. He looked at the three boys. Kenji was groaning, rubbing his back. Hiro was still shaking.
The playground was silent. The other kids had stopped playing soccer to watch the spectacle.
"You..." Kenji sat up, pointing a trembling finger at Obito. "You threw your arm at me! Who does that?!"
"A shinobi uses every tool available," Obito said, his voice raspy. "You were distracted by the grotesque nature of the limb. It created an opening."
"You're crazy!" Hiro yelled. "You're a freak!"
Obito felt the sting of the words, but he shoved it down. He walked over to the bench and sat down heavily. He began the arduous process of strapping the arm back on.
Jiro watched him. She didn't look disgusted. She looked impressed.
"That was... intense," she said. "You looked like a swamp monster."
"Camouflage," Obito muttered, wiping mud from his eye patch. "Though the blue hoodie was a tactical error. I need black."
"You scared them, Obito," Jiro said softly. "Look at them."
Obito looked. The three boys were huddled together, whispering and casting fearful glances at him. They weren't looking at him like a victim anymore. They were looking at him like a threat.
"Better to be feared than pitied," Obito said, echoing a sentiment that felt old and bitter.
"Is it?" Jiro asked. "Because now no one will want to play with you."
"I don't play," Obito said, snapping the final buckle of his harness. "I train."
"Right." Jiro stood up. She walked over to Kenji, who was dusting himself off. She said something to him, low and sharp. Kenji looked at Obito, then looked away, nodding reluctantly.
She came back. "They won't bother you again. But... maybe next time, don't detach your limbs? It's traumatizing for civilians."
Obito looked at his plastic hand. He flexed the fingers. Whirrr-click.
"It was effective," he insisted.
"Effective isn't always good," Jiro countered. "Come on. Matron Satako is going to kill you when she sees the mud on your clothes. I'll help you sneak into the laundry room."
As they walked back toward the building, Obito felt a strange sensation. His body was exhausted. His shoulder hurt. He was covered in filth.
But for the first time since arriving in this world, he felt... solid. He hadn't used a powerful Jutsu. He hadn't awakened a Quirk. He had won using tactics, stealth, and a detached piece of plastic.
He was still Obito Uchiha. And he was still dangerous.
"Hey, Jiro," he said as they reached the door.
"Yeah?"
"Next time... I will play the Hero."
Jiro smiled, a small, genuine thing. "We'll see. You make a pretty convincing villain, though. The mud look suits you."
"Hn."
They entered the building, leaving muddy footprints on the linoleum. Obito glanced back at the playground one last time. The shadows were lengthening. The world was still huge, loud, and confusing. But he had carved out a small corner of it where he was the master.
He wasn't hiding anymore. He was waiting.