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No one ever looks up. Well, not really anyways.
Even in a society not-so-secretly run by assassins and killers that can scale the tallest of trees and walk on walls effortlessly do people fail to raise their eyes towards the sky and just watch. This musing had been on Itama’s mind for a few days now, as he watched friends and enemies alike go throughout their days undetected. He watched as they all swung their gazes side to side, sweeping forward and behind; eyes peering, keen and suspicious. Yet only a few ever looked up and only briefly at that, looking but never really seeing--
Heh.
He was starting to sound like his younger self, the one who was so young and innocent and full of wonder. Gazing up at the sky anytime he could if only to get even the smallest glimpse of that big open blue of a wholly unexplored plane of existence. Who always wondered why no one else seemed to look in the same way that he had, not even his own family. But dying and becoming a something of a shade of ghost had certainly given him a unique perspective on that.
Hashirama had his eyes on the far forward, searching for a seemingly impossible future of peace, even when he was younger, less weary of the constant fighting. Before the feud had taken his brothers from him he had at least kept his sight in a sort of balance. One where he had kept one eye on his dream and the other on the now, to keep himself from forgetting why he set his gaze forward in the first place. But now, after seeing a future that could have been, Itama wasn’t quite so sure anymore.
Their father always opposed Hashirama’s views however. Butsuma, who could never let go of the forgotten past even for the sakes of his own sons. Whose eyes were firmly stuck on what was behind, on old hurts and old hatreds. Whose determination to hold onto that old hatred kept him rooted in the past and ended up with his two youngest dead with himself not long after.
On the other hand, Tobirama kept his gaze solidly on what was right in front of him, never too far ahead and never lingering on what was behind. While he does wish for a brighter future, one of the same peace that his older brother seeks, he doesn’t allow idle fancies to distract him from what the inescapable truth of their present was. His grounding presence was probably one of the few things that had kept the clan alive for as long as they have, but it is also a great burden, to give up his hope for a better future to keep his clansmen alive. But he was always ready and willing to sacrifice his own happiness to maintain his brother’s and the clans. Always the pragmatist, his brother.
Back then...back then he thought there’d be a lot less conflict in the world should everyone just take even a single moment to watch the world of the sky. A plane untouched by the violence and hatred of war that plagued the world below, with the amount of awe it deserved. Touka would always joke that if he kept his head up in the clouds he would one day end up floating away to them with no way back down. At the time, he would laugh and laugh, saying how that wouldn’t be too bad, he always wanted to learn to fly.
He hadn’t known at the time how right she was.
He shook his head as he reluctantly brought his sight back to the unaware figure in front of him. He still had a job to do after all.
. . .
He made sure to watch as the being once known as Zetsu burned. He couldn’t let even the smallest bit of it escape to eventually reform and continue its plans once more. 'Else all that he had done, all that everyone had done, would be in vain and his family would be in danger. He couldn’t let that happen, not now.
Not again.
Whatever sort of plant it is that Zetsu was composed of certainly burned well. It could even be considered sort of pretty in an utterly destructive manner of dancing flames and wispy smoke curling into the night sky. It all brought about a new sort of peace within him as he watched the source of all the major problems his loved ones faced throughout the years turn to dust. It felt like a sort of… renewal. As he watched ash and sparks drift into the air, they seemed to become all new stars, a whole new sky full of possibilities.
Maybe…
Maybe now he could learn to look up to this new sky once more to see what this new world has in store for him now.
Just maybe.