Konoha Orphanage

-November 11th-

I craned my neck and observed the throng of kids. There were many of them, with various ages, sizes, and appearances. Some of them stared at me – the strange, definitely rich if judged by the quality of his clothes, kid that truly had no business being there – but they quickly grew bored and became engrossed in their game again.

Earlier today, Fugaku had dropped me at the orphanage – probably the closest thing that Konoha had to a daycare – with a strict order not to throw any tantrum (read: maim anyone). The orphanage itself was located on the outskirts of the village, with soft brown wooden walls and blue wooden roofs, surrounded by evergreen trees. It was very pretty, and most importantly, had no ANBU agent in vicinity.

It was pure heaven.

I explored the orphanage a bit, examining the packed, but homely sleeping area; noting the diminishing pantry in the kitchen and made a mental note to ask Fugaku to give the kind lady – Nonō-san, the mother superior, I recounted – extra money. I settled myself on an open space behind the orphanage and plopped down onto the lush grass and stretched my limbs, simply basking on the warm hug of morning sunlight. Lazily, I rolled onto my side and observed my potted plant, who now spotted small, green leaves on its growing stems.

"How's Amegakure?"

"Unbelievably wet, Sir, but the soil is very tasty."

I hummed, pleased. "Good."

"What about you, Meister, are you well?"

"Well enough," I replied, "definitely on edge… There's only so much that I could do with those bastards hovering inside my space. My sense is sending me danger warnings twenty-four-seven."

Because unlike other infants who were born with a blank slate, I already knew how a normal body was supposed to feel like, and suddenly having chakra inside my body was akin to having parasites that slither through my vein every waking second. Chakra as a whole was not something that I could automatically ignore like background noises, especially not when my chakra points constantly leaking spiritual energy – and a tiny amount of physical energy – bit by bit, into the ether; as I had found out when Itachi made me sit down and have meditation.

Sensor type 'leaked' their chakra too, Itachi had explained, when they entered their 'sensory mode'. Their chakra then dispersed into their surrounding and resonated with other chakra sources, enabling them to sense their targets.

A skilled sensor could detect their targets from a great distance, as well as differentiate persons by their chakra signature alone. They were even able to tell when other sensors were using their abilities. Outstanding sensors would be able to tell exactly who was among a crowd of people and even able to tell if their targets were lying based on any fluctuation of their chakra. Legendary sensors like Mū and Tobirama Senju could discern between chakra signatures of shinobi from different populations and even link them back to relatives.

Tobirama Senju and Minato Namikaze were even said to be able to detect enemy presence and numbers by simply touching the ground with their index finger, which I postulated were done by sending controlled pulse of chakra through the soil – which were a great conductor for chakra – and required perfect chakra control.

Similar to dimples – where genetics defects manifested in form of shortened facial muscles – larger, therefore comparatively looser, chakra nodes or tenketsu also appeared to be a product of genetic defects with currently unknown family or environmental predisposition, as sensor types more often than not popped up in a random family with no similar trait.

Unlike other sensor types, however, I did not know how to exit the constant hyper-sense condition – I didn't even know how normal chakra was supposed to feel like – or whether I physically could. To regulate my disproportionate chakra, my body would have to adapt and create a mechanism to expel the excess spiritual energy and maintain homeostasis, which might inadvertently cause irreversible changes to my chakra system.

One thing that I highlighted from Itachi's explanation of sensor types was that practice made perfect, thus longer time spent in sensory mode would increase the distance that a sensor could cover, and with experience also increase the accuracy and precision to do specific tasks, i.e. detecting specific chakra signature in crowded places from miles away.

Because I lacked a turnoff switch, however, as my sensing distance grew, the amount of stimuli that I received every day also increased exponentially. Sometimes it was useful, i.e. to evade the ANBU agents, other times it was downright useless, i.e. sensing two chakra signatures huddled together at the other side of the compound, only realizing a second later that they were copulating.

Most of the time I would focus my sense towards specific targets, mainly Sasuke, who was at the academy, near the Hokage mountain, which was quite far from our house. Granted, the center of the villages was bustling with chakra signatures, but they were also fainter, because they were barely inside my sensing zone. It was one of the reasons why I loved a secluded place so much. Being among crowds of strangers might actually drive me insane.

"I could eat them for you," Shinju offered.

"And have the village send even more ANBU agents? No, thank you. We will lie low for a while. Also… it has been almost a week. I don't feel comfortable leaving you in Amegakure. There are too many dangerous ninjas in there. I think it's time to move, don't you think?" I tapped my chin, contemplative. "Any preference?"

"Somewhere near my main body."

"Which is?"

"With you, Sir."

"Huh?" I did not know whether I misheard or misinterpreted what it said. The tree often used archaic words and spoke with older dialect, thus I could be wrong. Perhaps I had spoken in English and it had misinterpreted me? But I was sure that the tree understood me either way…

I almost asked it to clarify its meaning, but I hesitated. I did not want to sound like a fool. The tree was rather fond of mocking me.

A chakra signature made my head tilted unconsciously to the left.

"Meister?"

"Later," I murmured, "someone's coming."