"It always starts with the same dream."
Surrounded by white mist, Kirei steps gingerly through the abandoned Uchiha compound. Long after dark, the boy is alone, he calls out through the fog but has no voice. Slithering shadows, fiendish, watch from the edges of his vision. The buildings are taller than they could have been in his memory, disproportionate windows and doors, rattling with howling wind and showing, occasionally, the glimpse at red eyes which watched from beyond, each marked with the Uchiha's curse. Frightened, the boy calls out again, this is not a dream of his younger self, but of his return to the Leaf, Kirei's eyes fall upon the figure of a man in the distance, and he runs, yelling to draw the stranger's attention. As the young Uchiha approaches, the silhouette dances, quivering and then shifting into the form of a serpent which coils its body and ascends into the clouds. Stunned, the boy breathes deep and stumbles further, desperate to catch the shapes which perform on the horizon. He clasps the frame of a door, watching the eyes which in turn watch him before he pulls them free and collapses on the floor of an empty house, boarded windows clattering, furniture long-gone and replaced by sheets of white cloth covering the home's fixtures. Kirei stands and runs, darting from door to door, frustrated scowl becoming more pronounced as with each breach, the boy evaporates more spirits, observers vanishing into the night unwilling to be perceived. The taunting specters, gathering in the edge of Kirei's panic, only added to the fire of his investigation, which wound through the maze of streets and alleys, pushing between the interconnected residences and then emerging into the courtyard where lay his childhood home, which loomed and groaned into the wind.
Through the jagged strands of his fractured focus, Kirei struggled to stand. Imposed over the world, memories of childhood's end popped into the Uchiha's vision, orbiting through his peripherals as blonde threads caressed his forehead, trailing with the whipping motion of his neck as the boy tried to see through the cracks which formed, splitting the seams of his perception. The bleeding edge of reality's whim gave way to the Sharingan, Kirei's dojutsu burrowing into the remnants of his experience, which the ancestral power bore witness to throughout his youth. Eyes contorted to the fist of a student and Kirei ducked, only to notice the leg of some beast strike toward his chest, one which had not been there a moment prior. Impact with his torso sent the boy's frame from the ground, rushing shapes blurring into a messy canvas of black and green as he felt his shoulders collide with the dirt and dig within it a long trough, coupled on both sides with trenches excavated by his fingers which clawed desperately at the soil. The boy could feel pain and blood; inhaling was met with a sharp stinging sensation which he pushed through, familiar with the punishment of hand to hand combat, and stood to face his attacker. Storming through the darkness, the creature was upon him with fury before the Uchiha had time to ready himself and so, with the Sharingan's instruction guiding his fists, he ducked and spun his body, striking with the back of his forearm into thick scales.
The boy pushes against the door to his home, heavy oak frame rigid and unwilling to give way as the skies burst, releasing a torrent of rain to accompany the wind. After the first sheet of water pelts the boy's body, soaking him through, he manages to pry the door open and stagger into the hallway. Unnaturally long, layered thick with dust and each window shuttered with hefty boards, the house has few similarities to the one in his memory, it is desolate and ruined, devoid of life and attention. The sensation of unreality grips him; this can not be the world, Yara would not allow the compound to wind up in such disarray. Though it had fallen into disuse, the man Kirei called father still lurked here somewhere; he had always made the homes of his ancestors into his treasure. The boy wanders in silence, escorted by the eerie whistle and beat of the extreme storm, in the distance he can see the grim shadows of the creatures who watch him, but resigns himself to their gaze. With ease, Kirei slides away from the door to his bedroom, curiously untouched by the thorough stripping throughout the house, precisely as his mind remembers, with clothes and ninja tools strewn across the chamber. The kitchen is warm, the smell of tea and salt mixed with something sweet, caramel, bread, and fresh berries, Kirei inhales and approaches the stove, eerily silent but atop it sits the steaming teapot. Against the battering cold of outside's storm, the comfort of the warm kitchen, set against the backdrop of his empty mansion, gave Kirei a modicum of support.
As his eyes fix upon the table, he approaches and sets down onto it the boiling vessel before he stops, ears catching the sound of distant chanting. From the halls, the voices of monks echo quietly, beneath the patter of the rain and barely audible, the boy listens to the melody which dares to slip between the prison of sound created by the cacophony of rain. He stands, ignoring tower of steam which rises to his left, and follows the rhythm, haunting icaros sung in the name of healing deep wounds, trenches of blasphemy hidden in the unreality woven around Kirei's daydream. With trepidation, the boy walks toward the source of this occurrence, pattering feet accelerating into a run as Kirei bounds heel-over-heel into the unknown maze of corridors and uncanny patterns. As he approaches, he can hear the tune whistling through the howling wind and drowning out the fearsome storm, but the young Uchiha is no longer calm, even the surreal dreamscape rain did not feel as alien as the songs which how he chases across the winding expanse. At the end of his journey, Kirei reaches an ornate door, the memory of a gateway to Yara's forbidden study, but grandiose and ill-proportioned, the faces of demon masks carved in gold staring with distorted expressions, each clamoring over the back of another to reach out and consume the Uchiha whole. Unwilling to succumb to fear, Kirei reaches toward the door and with all his strength, pushes against the snapping, jawing chorus of jeering demons who reach down and tear the threads from his clothes.
Trees and darkness rushed either side of the blonde as he made his way through the forest, slipping away from his pursuers just enough to gain a moment's respite before he would have to turn again and face them. Kirei groaned, unable to steel himself against the burning pain behind his eyes, each vein filled to bursting point with the Uchiha's chakra, strained and at their limit. As the boy's head whipped around, the surroundings blurred, chakra signatures warping and trailing as if the byproduct of his strained Sharingan, which Kirei could feel degrading. An onlooker, perhaps another Uchiha, may have seen the state of the boy's eyes, and warned him against this path; to dip too deep into the ancestral power of the Uchiha is to lose one's self to tragedy. So it came to pass that Kirei, focusing as best he could on the barrage of limbs which emerged from the fog and blur, rose his arms in defiance, Sharingan working to overcome itself and lead the boy to safety. The first blow impacted his tired forearm and sent his heels sliding through the dirt as he would turn left, summoning fire to ignite and wash away his attacker but finding only delinquent sparks who refused his bidding. Kirei had no time for confusion, the arms of his foe gripping tightly at his shoulders, causing the momentum of the creature's charge to topple the pair. Fighting desperately, Kirei's fire begun to coalesce, first from the outside and into orbits around his body when finally he forced the Devouring Blaze to obey him again and lurch at the assailant who pinned him, pushing away his body and searing his scales enough for Kirei to scramble away through the mud. The Uchiha, struggling to get his bearings, would race to his feet and spin to face the horde who followed while he could still muster the strength to command his shoal of redeeming fire, and thrust out his hands in vicious conduction, calling forth the waves and spirals of his judgment which ate into the trees, dirt, and rain, leaving behind nothing but ash.
The rush of frigid mountain air greets the boy, lashing at his face and neck, blowing away the threadbare cloak and Konohagakure regalia to reveal a ceremonial robe beneath. Kirei spins, bare feet touching the snowy rocks, to seek out the door behind him, but is greeted by the landscape of a fading world beneath, devoid of color. With his eyes wide, the boy finds himself a the center of three altars, high atop a mountain which overlooks a valley that has been burned to the ground. Rising from the center of the ruined world, the icy peaks of Kirei's ascension almost touch the sky, threatening to pierce through the veil of reflection and into some Heavenly Plane where it sought to dwell. The boy heaves, vision swirling as the shrines, one by one, ignite in flame, casting shadows through bone sculptures onto parchment and charred cedar and shedding light on the macrame which made up the sacred scripture of these relic-shrines. Stepping from behind the rigid shapes, silhouettes appear in sequence, illuminating themselves in a triumvirate around the Uchiha and staring toward him with eyes which at the same time seem both living and dead. Kirei lays his eyes upon his other selves, staring back into three mirrors from the center as the apparitions steady themselves and raise their arms to prepare for war. Invigorated, the young Uchiha mimics his mimics and is unwilling to allow them the element of surprise, so with his smile wide, the boy embraces the dream and charges forward, fist flowing downhill toward his quarry, weaving as a mountain stream to find its purchase against the doppelganger. Beneath the locks of blonde hair, each emanating imitation halos in honor of Kirei's golden mane, their eyes awoke sequentially; first, a single tomoe spinning wistfully in the sea of red, and the second, twin marks of evolution which mirrored Kirei's own immature Sharingan. The third, the pinnacle of the boy's dream, called forth the spiraling manifestation of his perfected visual ancestry, the base Sharingan's final stage which, inevitably, Kirei could not overcome.
Pelted by another sum of crushed dirt, the boy's head came down without delay, ankle waylaid by typhonic grip as the approaching horde, with snarling fangs, bore down at his frame which cried out in the dark. Shrill and bold, Kirei's voice broke the cadence of withering snarls and with it the earth around him, unfocused geomancy rolling and cracking the ground to tear asunder efforts that sought to bring about his demise. With that, the young Uchiha sunk into the soil, which lifted him back along the length of a basin and routed him, providing a platform which would allow him to climb above the horde and seek out his companions who now he wished to serve as guardians. Eyes narrowing, breath ragged, and heart thumping wildly, Kirei wrestled with the hazy darkness, Sharingan still scorching with agony as he shook his head, closing his eyes and groaning as he tried to steady his thoughts, cease the chakra flow from his eyes, and do away with the dojutsu's influence to remove the fog of chakra and impulses which tore his body this way and that. Kirei jolted, the sound of a hatchet impacting the branches of a nearby tree called him from his unsuccessful mission and back into the trance of combat. Ducking and incoming swing, Kirei hopped from his platform and swept low, closing his eyes as he felt the Sharingan move beneath his eyelids, which did nothing to stop the light of the world from invading his quiet darkness. Persisting against his will, the familial eyes, their visual prowess, and legacy of bloodshed drove Kirei's form into a whirlwind of blows, gracefully dancing between a pair of monsters who collided into trailed strands of ninja wire already pulled tautly and strung against a tree. Though he longed to rest his weary eyes and be free of them to dream again, and rid himself of these hallucinations, Kirei gave thanks to the power which allowed him to continue living, against all the odds.
As the forest fades away, the daydream returns and Kirei is locked in a swirl of robes and open palms, his forearms sliding back and forth to deflect the strikes launched from every angle. Atop the mountain, the boy's eyes are black as coal, unreliant on the Sharingan to steer him as he catches the fist of himself and twists his body, sliding his palm to clasp at the clone's wrist and throw him past while sweeping his opposite side, forearm stopping dead the incoming strike of another foe. As he thrust from his feet and spun overhead after the block, Kirei would snip with his fingers, like a viper at the second him, who would squeal and tumble into a heap with his thrown partner. The two felled Kireis, swiftly evaporating, would give way to his final opponent who brought together his hands and bowed, before presenting to Kirei, the Seal of Confrontation. As the world stops, the Uchihas bring their hands together and acknowledge the final act of Kirei's unconscious thought, the dreamscape which rests underneath each sleepless night; where the boy fights against himself and loses each time. For months, dreams led him here to the pinnacle of this mountain where, after defeating the first two doppelgangers with ease, invariably he would succumb to the strength of his better half and awaken, drenched in cold sweat, knuckles bruised from thrashing in the night. This was no slumbering nightmare, the world blends together on all sides, the waking dream folding to the sensation of Kirei's real self fighting off the horde of hungry notions which hound him in the forest.
Cascading fists, Kirei hurled himself around his foe, frantically pivoting with his distended leg as axis behind the swamp creature as he brought up that same momentum into a thunderous knee which the Sharingan commanded. Kirei jumped backward, using the leverage of his falling enemy to lurch his body away and replace it with a swathe of earth and fire; mud rose up in droves, sticking to the bodies of his foes to hold them in place, and then came the flames to wash over them, hardening the ground into rock and roasting away at the enemies who stood against the Uchiha's mastery. As he landed, he spun into the oncoming fist of his twin, whose white robes contrasted the surrounding filthy forest of Hansha's grisly lineage starkly. Leaning into the blow, Kirei pressed with two forearms and retaliated with his foot, spinning his leg up for the other boy's hip while intending to dislodge him and push him down where he would be most vulnerable. Knowing his partner's every move, the mimic would hug into Kirei's body close enough to feel the warmth from his skin, dreamlike composition allowing it to move unnaturally through the impossible space between the boy's strikes so that he found no luck in his attempt to overcome the juxtaposition of real and illusory. Betwixt the coupling of the strange sensations, unable to decipher the dream from reality, Kirei found himself battling fruitlessly on both ends, disengaging from the immortal clone and distancing himself from his pursuers while he still searched through the woods for a sign of his companions.
Through the trees, Kirei caught sight, in the edge of his vision, a white shape approaching fast. Reacting to the flourish of a hidden blade, Kirei would stop and drop himself low, raising both legs in a spinning motion as his puppeted frame hopped with the momentum of that same spin into a standing position where he would extend his arm toward the other Uchiha's shoulder. Leaning back and away, Kirei's foe parried with predictable quickness, guided by eyes greater even than the power Kirei possessed, the mimic avoided by a hair the extending blade which snipped at the fabric of his immaculate robes, fraying the threads into the roaring wind. Kirei's eyes dropped low to see the incoming counter-attack, and he met it firmly with a parry before pivoting and sweeping with the exposed wrist blade for the flesh of his opponent's chest and complying with it barely, spilling precious drops of blood from his twin who gripped the low-hanging branch of a tree and dropped low. Unleashing his legs, the boy's foe would bring them together and scissor between them Kirei's knees, locking them and drawing him down with precise dismissal. Landing with a pained grunt, Kirei would bear his arms high, reaching for a pair of his kunai but finding the soft threads of silk robes in place of his Kirigakure military equipment and ninja tools. The seeping precipice of the dream and reality supplanted then, atop the forest, and Kirei rolled away through the snow, narrowly avoiding a blow for his head as he stood to charge into his foe, seeking to find a window of aggression he could use to gain the upper hand, hoping that the concoction of imagination and fact would not endure as the enemy did forever in his nightmares.
As the two came together, fists maneuvering in jagged patterns, Kirei letting fly a blow with his right hand, deftly parried by his doppelganger who swept his arms, trailing the strands of his robe, to strike with open palms at Kirei's neck. Ducking, the boy would respond by moving toward his quarry and then around, while simultaneously dropping his knee to bring his elbow down into the back of the clone's leg, who would topple forward into a somersault and recover. Either side of the dueling Uchiha, the trees faded to and from the world, contorting into rows upon rows of sacred altars, each adorned with carvings and statues, covered in offerings, and enshrined to the power of the boy's lineage. Weaving between the ornate gravestones, Kirei hopped back and kept focused, through the thumping pain behind his eyes, on the blurry shapes moving in the world around him, closing the distance toward his foe to make up for his fading vision. As Kirei came upon the other, he felt a sharp sensation in his ribs, to the right of his body, creatures from reality had assaulted him and sent him on a rapid descent, tumbling through the shrines and spilling oil down, mixing with the wet surface of an ankle-deep spring which now surrounded them. Intruding on the sanctuary of the standoff Kirei sought to end, soldiers of discord tore through the sacred memorial, rainbow patterns of polluted water shimmering brightly in sequence with each ruined, holy relic. As he stood, the rain soaking his clothes and clinging to his body became impossibly heavy, and the edge of his vision, piece by piece, began to close in around him.
With his last, desperate heave, Kirei summoned forth the sparks of his signature technique, slivers of impotent flame escaping the folds of aether and generating thin strands, not enough to singe the torn shreds of Kirei's cloak and jacket. As he fell, the fire fell with him, embers circling, defeated and alone into the drifting pool of still water. With a sudden flare, the light tore open at the seam of everything, ceremonial oil igniting at the touch of Kirei's chakra, metaphors burning brightly and allowing Kirei to see anew. Before him, he could see the shape of himself, reflected in the water below, and he stood, throwing himself to his feet in a single motion and engaging the other boy again. This time, in the surrounding technicolor blaze, which shone innumerable colors as the graveyard burned, fading in the very distance back into the real world while Kirei's blows soared between his defenseless quarry, who now could find no reprieve from the Uchiha's deadly onslaught. A fist came high, reflected in the water to impact the imposter's chin, sending him stumbling, and priming him for another blow which resounded from Kirei's foot as his heel met the opposite side of the head, eliciting a resounding crack from the other boy. Walls of flame climbed, arching high above the lake and burning away at the edge of his perception, enclosing as the fires of awakening tore the unreality asunder in favor of new clarity brought about by the struggle behind his eyes. With a final stroke, Kirei's deed was done, and the dream was through, the three-tomoed ghost abruptly vanishing with the obfuscation of heat and color to reveal the sodden forest and pallid trees, and around him, a trail of ashen remains, burning trees and cracked earth.
In the distant trees, Kirei could hear the sounds of conflict still echoing, no longer obscured by the blinding pain or surreal visions which seemed so far away now that Kirei felt the night air, unobstructed and true, caress him. In whatever state he had been in, he had led the monsters far further than he thought as his rampage took him to where the jonin who accompanied him could barely be heard, and the efforts of their personal struggles were lost in the in between. The thoughts of his mission returned slowly, filtered by the sensation of gathering himself and steadying his rapid heartbeat, deciphering the world for what it was and testing the truth of his perception. Still, Kirei tried to close his eyes and focus on dismissing the errant dojutsu that spun beneath his eyelids, but to no avail, his Sharingan yet refused to be abandoned. More curiously still, the dream's departure had lifted too the veil from his weary eyes, and now the trees seemed to stand out in contrast to the blurry mess from recent memory, feeling enhanced beyond his recollection in comparison to the comfortable haze in which he had spent these last tiresome days. Vision repaired, and searing pain gone behind his eyes did nothing to abate the sensation of torn muscles, broken ribs, and flayed skin which had been the result of his encounter with these creatures. There was no more fighting for the young Uchiha, his body would take it no longer, with or without the chakra reserves to persevre, the boy's sleepless mind had undergone a transformation, and it was all he could do to wander limply in the direction of his comrades, who he hoped would find him before inevitably, he could hold onto consciousness no longer.
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