I woke in the dark to the sound of my own stomach threatening a small rebellion.
Everything was still—no footsteps in the corridor, no whispered conversations, just the soft ticking of an old house settling into night. The air felt cooler against my cheeks, the bedding warm where it touched my skin. For a second I tried to will myself back to sleep out of sheer politeness.
Don't wake Hikari. She looked exhausted.
Then my gut rolled again, and the noble part of me lost the vote. I remembered a very unromantic truth from my past life: newborns are tiny, adorable tyrants. Weeks of round‑the‑clock feedings were standard. In other words, this wasn't me being difficult—this was biology sending a calendar invite titled "Mandatory Chaos."
So I did what babies do.
I cried.
Not the theatrical kind—just the raw, hungry kind that comes from a hollow ache expanding behind the ribs. It took all of three seconds for soft footfalls to cross the room. Arms—familiar, steady—scooped me up, and warmth wrapped around me like a promise.
"Shh, shh… I've got you," Hikari murmured, voice hushed by sleep but still gentle. Even half‑awake, she radiated patience.
Feeding happened. My brain, always so proud of its cleverness, promptly surrendered to the oldest program in existence: sustain life. The ache dissolved into warmth, my eyelids sagged, and the room blurred to soft shapes.
I was asleep before I finished the thought, thank you.
Morning arrived as a cool glow through paper screens. The house breathed differently during the day—wood warmed, tatami scented the air, and somewhere far off, I could hear the muted cadence of training in a courtyard. The Hyūga never slept for long.
The first thing I checked wasn't the light. It was the warmth inside me—my new compass. Chakra.
It had returned.
Slow, steady, gathering like water behind a dam, flowing along quiet channels I was learning to feel. Threads braided through my limbs, coiled behind my navel, and—predictably—streamed toward my eyes as if pulled by a tide.
Okay. You're climbing. If I wait, you'll cross the threshold and flip the Byakugan on by yourself. Let's not do that.
I turned inward and reached for the flow.
Not with hands—those were mostly decorative at the moment—but with attention. I pictured a shallow bowl of water and the tiniest ripple sliding across its surface. I tried to follow the ripple, then to nudge it. No forcing, just… invitation.
For a long moment: nothing.
Then a quiver, like strings under light fingertips. I didn't move the chakra—I almost moved it. A near‑miss that still sent satisfaction fizzing through me.
"Again," I told myself, and settled deeper.
I learned yesterday that scrunching my face only made me look like a constipated turnip, so I focused on breathing. Slow in. Slow out. Every exhale, track the warm current. Every inhale, gather focus at the bridge of my nose and behind the eyes where the streams converged.
The flow was slippery—more like mist than water. When I tried to clutch it, it slid away. When I softened, it lingered.
"Soft hands," I reminded myself. "Soft mind."
A few more passes, and the response grew from quiver to ripple. The streams curling toward my eyes hesitated, then resumed. Not under command—under influence. I wasn't steering the river. I was standing knee‑deep and learning how it wanted to move.
Which, unfortunately, didn't stop the inevitable.
The pressure rose.
I knew the sensation now: a bloom behind the eyes, a rising thrum that synced to my heartbeat. The world brightened at the edges, like someone was peeling a film from my vision.
"Brace," I thought, and did.
The Byakugan opened.
Layers unfurled. The room unfolded into anatomy and geometry—fibers in tatami, grain and moisture in beams, faint insect heat in the wall. Beyond, fifteen meters of life lit like a constellation: birds tucked into eaves, a cat prowling along the compound wall, two chakra‑dense signatures posted at window and door.
Guards. Still there. Still watching.
Then the bill came due.
Pain flared behind my temples like a struck bell—lower than yesterday, but sharp. I clenched small fingers reflexively and rode it out. Expectation helped. Pain is worse when it arrives dressed as surprise.
A tiny sound escaped me anyway. I don't think it would have fooled anyone.
Arms gathered me up a moment later. Hikari. She'd learned the tells already—the stiffening, the squint, the stubborn look that probably belonged on a much older face.
"Is someone being very serious this morning?" she teased, her voice a smile. Her fingers skittered over my belly in a feather‑light tickle.
I tried to keep a straight face—metaphorically speaking, since baby faces are terrible at poker.
But the second her fingers grazed my belly, all dignity was lost. A squeaky, involuntary laugh escaped me, utterly betraying my resolve.
By the time the tickles stopped, the Byakugan had already eaten through the last of the chakra pooled in my eyes. The expanded sight folded back to normal vision, taking the pain with it in a slow fade. I sank against her shoulder, all proud resolve replaced by post‑exercise wobbles.
"Better?" Hikari asked softly.
I made a dignified noise that could have meant anything from yes to tax policy is theft. She accepted it as yes. Honestly, so did I.
Feeding, burp, the usual gentle routine. I dozed but didn't fully fall. The day had other plans.
The rhythm repeated. Twice.
Midmorning: build, train, nudge the current, fail beautifully, succeed slightly. Threshold. Sight. Pain. Comfort.
Afternoon: again. The second session went better. In the training phase I felt the stream hesitate for a full heartbeat when I asked it to—an honest‑to‑goodness pause before it resumed its inexorable slide toward my eyes. Not control. Influence.
Progress.
Between sessions, I accumulated other tiny data points. The guards rotated at some interval I couldn't measure yet; the new pair outside had a different feel—one restless, one patient. The house had a pulse, too: footsteps concentrated down the northern corridor at midday; laundry or bedding aired briefly near the southern veranda where the sun struck warmest. Every time the Byakugan opened, the world mapped itself a little more, and my newborn brain groaned and grew around the input.
And Hikari…
She learned me as fast as I learned chakra. She could tell when I was stubborn‑focused versus just fussy‑hungry. She spoke softly when the pain spiked and laughed easily when pride made me scowl. When the second activation left me limp as a boiled noodle, she tucked me into the crook of her arm and pressed her cheek to my hair, humming something that made my ribs loosen.
Yes, I took notes on lullabies. Don't judge me.
By late afternoon, clouds drifted in to mute the light. The house cooled. Somewhere outside, bamboo clacked—wind in the grove, a hollow rhythm like distant wooden bells. My chakra pool felt thin, the current's tug weak and slow.
I stayed awake anyway, eyes half‑lidded, and practiced the lightest touch I could manage. Not moving the stream so much as listening to it. A breath would make it surge. A yawn would diffuse it. Emotion spiked it; acceptance smoothed it. I filed that away like it mattered—because it did.
When evening finally came, I didn't fight the sleep. Even strategists must surrender to biology.
But right before I slid under, a clear, simple thought surfaced, as polished as a vow:
Tomorrow, a little more.