Uchiha Akai felt it for as long as he could remember.
Since he first enrolled in the Konohagakure Academy at the age of four, everyone treated him as an anomaly. He enjoyed bathing under trees and playing with the stray kittens around the village instead of instigating petty fights or practicing Kunai techniques. He, who bore the Uchiha surname, had no towering arrogance as the Konohagakure Mountains situated behind the Academy, nor was he a genius.
Graduating later than his peers during wartime, the village only named him Chunin not by the merit of combat power, but to be cannon fodder on the frontlines. The clan made his presence taboo; childhood friends snatched his training resources in front of him and mocked him behind his back; his parents' deaths shunned as dishonourable and his marriage to a common civilian particularly blasphemous. Nothing he did was Uchiha enough.
Yet these reasons were minor in retrospect, because the fact remained that even after all these years, his Chakra hadn't improved from his Academy days. He was weak, since and still forever. If he'd once been an outcast, now he was in exile.
"What are you thinking about, dear?"
The soft breeze of spring floated to his ears, then followed a gentle nudge that stopped him from tripping over himself. He'd fallen for this gentleness.
Akai blinked. He wrapped an arm around her round waist.
Uzano Yumeka was an ordinary civilian, as ordinary ordinary could be. The only daughter of a family of craftspeople, original settlers on the Land of Fire before the village was established, neither her or her great-grandparents had any Chakra. Though she'd never matured to stop complaining about the shape of her nose and chin, Akai always thought she had the brightest, cutest round pair of eyes, generous dimples, a silly, loving smile, and the most beautiful heart of all.
So did her family. A beautiful, generous heart—after all, they betrothed her, against hate and prejudice of the village, to the waste of the Uchiha clan. They were the reason he hadn't given up his life during the battlefields of the Second and Third Great Ninja War.
Now, his efforts would pay off. He could quietly raise their child together in an era of peace, without the dangers and stress of the Ninja World.
Akai gazed ahead between the trees and into the curtain of nightfall. They had made their way through the shadowed forests to a safe-house on the outskirts of the village, for reasons he'd always wanted to put behind.
"I've wronged you."
Yumeka chuckled. They had this sort of interaction often.
"You weren't so desperate to get stronger when we were younger and in the Academy."
Times were differentthen, Akai thought. And was not all a blur.
The Second and Third Great Ninja War was a great shame for the Ninja World. Civilians, with or without the slightest trace of Chakra, were recruited to fight as ninjas for power struggle of the Five Great Nations when peace and prosperity was promised after the first and following wars.
He reminisced about the day Yumeka first joined his class. He hadn't fallen for her at first sight; it was a gradual appreciation of the dignity and grace she carried and her silly smile. And before he knew it, he'd deployed onto the rainy battlefields of the Second Great Ninja War, promising to treat her well and uphold his love forever when he returned — a promise sworn again during the Third — promises unlike the shaky and short-lived peace treaties signed by the first generations of the Great Nations.
Akai's voice fell grounded to reality. He wasn't pompous, unable to be critical of himself. But his promise then seemed shaky and short-lived now, too.
"I want to grow stronger so we don't have to sneakily deliver our child outside, without midwifes, so we can raise her without being persecuted," he said in one breath.
"You can't control the Uchiha," Yumeka answered. "Or the world. Only yourself."
Again, it was a repeat of previous conversations they had and that would usually comfort him. Yet today, Akai couldn't shake off the negativity. There was a nagging premonition in the back of his mind that wouldn't go away. Every tree gazed into his soul. Every shadow flickered with the movements of a hiding clansmen. Every crisp crunch of their feet into the dead leaves and soil sank more regret and blame into his wary heart.
"... I married you," Akai murmured. "We can choose our own fates."
Yumeka grinned. "Exactly. The best decision I ever made. Uchiha men aren't exactly known for being husband material, but you—you're great, dear."
Akai didn't reply. He only held her closer.
"You're supposed to be the one consoling me," she teased.
He usually did, for the great majority of their relationship. But ever since her period stopped coming and her belly swelled with the culmination of their love, he'd somehow become more hormonal than a pregnant woman.
Akai wasn't proud of that fact, but mood swings and episodes of overthinking angst was familiar to him. In fact, he was the type to grow anxious about how he wasn't anxious. Perhaps that was the reason why he was so found of nature and the purrs of kittens when he was younger. They were the first to take all that away.
"... let me worry now. For you. For our daughter."
"Daughter?" Yumeka arched an eyebrow. "I thought you wanted a boy."
She was right to be suspicious. He'd wanted a son before.
But he'd grown sort of cynical from the hypocrisy of the Ninja World. Now came a bubbling desire to challenge its conservative traditions, cheap hypocritical values, and meritocratic way of life. Yumeka's own parents showed him how, evidenced by herself. Her parents gifted the Ninja World a woman like her, and he'd like honour that.
"A little girl like you would be everything."
Yumeka hummed like a bumblebee who's had a fill of nectar. He was glad to able to comfort her.
"A family with you is everything for me, too—ah!"
Akai was mulling over her soft murmurs so the muffled outcry startled his blood cold. He quickly caught her stumbles, and found the tangle of branches and roots in the small clearing that tripped her.
But it also marked their destination. The safe-house stood nestled in the forest, obscured by towering trunks and gripping shadows. He'd discovered it by chance during his routine patrols in the Second Great Ninja War and figured it was relic of the civilian inhabitants during the First.
Now, not even three decades later and past the Third Great Ninja War, the safe-house was not used to hide from the persecution of enemy ninjas, but from one's own kin, clansmen, and villagefolk.
He couldn't believe it either, but an impure descendant would be the tipping point to the Uchiha's tolerance—he'd risked going blind to find that out.
Akai raised his gaze to the midnight sky. Overhead, a full moon shone with such clarity he could've discerned its cracks and crevices if he looked for longer. The canvas of the darkness too was clear, devoid of imperfections. No brushstrokes of passing clouds. No glitter of distant stars.
When had the Uchiha clan, Konohagakure, or the Ninja World ever stopped him from fulfilling his promises? Only one woman could.
"You're certain you feel comfortable delivering here, Yumeka?"
She didn't answer. He watched her slowly bring his hands to her stomach instead. She craned her head towards him, allowing her hair to fall aside for a view of her smile that would've star-struck even the night sky.
"Our daughter is fine with it. So how could I not be?"