Master Kunoichi

Dawn

rogueshinobi:

After silently studying her response, Katsumi set the dishes aside and clasped his hands in front of him, stiffly returning the gesture with a deep bow. She had proven herself worthy of his respect, as far as he had decided. Who knew? Maybe with time… she would be worthy of much more.

Straightening, he collected the dishes and carried them to the kitchen. After one look at their dump of a sink, he shrugged (though it was closer to a shudder) and dropped the dishes in with the rest. He wasn’t about to undertake that chore. Charity wasn’t really his strong suit to begin with, but this… this was a humanitarian effort. Even less likely to win his effort.

With a cocky flourish of dusting off his hands, he breezed out into the Lair boasting a little more confidence than before. His gaze played over it all again as he passed by: the rusty pinball machine, the training dummy dressed in a likeness he chose to overlook, the scattered cushions and creaky tire swing. Things he had first looked upon as inferior compared to the high position he had stepped down from.

He frowned. But there was something… quaint about it, too. Warmer than the cold halls of the broken cathedral.

Splinter tried not to stare as he bowed, but it was a difficult thing -- he looked so very much like his father. Her proud, beautiful son. She had convinced him to listen, at least. More than that... would take time. But they had that now, and despite everything, she could see that Shen’s spirit still lived in the child born of their love. In time, Katsumi would grow to learn what that meant. In time, he would find the part of him that was Sora still.

Moments after he vanished with the tea things, the stirrings of her other children drifted to the dojo. As Splinter moved to stand beneath the tree, the sound of the usual morning squabbles brought a smile to her face. Leanardo and Raphaella arguing over who used up the hot water in the shower. Donatella offering to deal with the water heater, and Raphaella forcefully reminding her that she was still healing from the last time Donatella had tinkered with the hot water. Michelangela complaining that it was too early to fight on an empty stomach.

They spilled through the doorway, Leanardo alert and eager, Raphaella resigned, but trying not to show how much she was looking forward to the fight, Donatella distracted by her thoughts as she murmured calculations to herself, and Michelangela sleepily rubbing her eyes as she yawned.

“Good morning, Sensei,” Leanardo greeted for the rest of them. Splinter did not miss the curious look she cast around the dojo. Ah, to be so young again.

“Good morning, girls,” Splinter said as they slowly assembled in front of her. Michelangela practically toppled over, and came to rest leaning against Raphaella’s side, earning a scowl from her sister. Splinter hid her smile as she folded her hands on her cane. “Your brother will be joining us today.”

That got their attention. Fully awake now, Michelangela leaned forward eagerly as Donatella and Raphaella exchanged a glance, both then turning their attention to Leanardo, who had brightened considerably at the announcement.

They had such good hearts, her precious girls. Surely, with them to guide him, Katsumi would learn what it meant to truly be part of a family.

Dawn

Katsumi dropped his eyes as Splinter spoke, but a second pair of eyes stared back out of frozen time at him, seeing him clearly for who he was. He studied the worn photo of his father, feeling convicted somehow by that soft, penetrating gaze. What he wouldn’t give to feel his hand weigh on his shoulder.

Collecting the photo, he spared it a final glance before securely tucking it away into his pocket. Then he hesitated, considering Splinter’s invitation, until he finally dared a wan smile. “Why not?”

They trusted him, and he couldn’t understand it. He had been welcomed into their home, taught the guarded knowledge of a kata, provided with tea, and now admitted into their training regimen. Were they stupid, or just gullible? What if he had been deceiving them this entire time? As the former son of the Shredder–their enemy–he deserved their suspicion, not their protection.

Once more, those two, impossible words rose in his throat, but he… he couldn’t say them. His pride choked them like thick vines strangling a new bud. Maybe someday, but not yet. Not now.

Helping Splinter clean up the rest of the dishes, his eyes met hers as they rose, and his gaze wavered, but didn’t completely fall away. “I’m sorry,” he confessed softly. Those words, at least, he could manage. “I won’t waste this chance, Mother.”

She had not been certain that he would accept her invitation, and the strength of her relief when he finally did took her somewhat by surprise. He was an unexpected complication, her returning prodigal. A rock thrown in to the stream of their lives, and no pebble to sink beneath the surface, but a boulder that had the potential to dam and choke the waters.

Yet the waters could also part to run around the new element, shifting the course of the stream around it and integrating it into its flow, finding a new rhythm. She rather thought that he would prove the latter... in time. And with care. But... they had made a good start. Unexpected though it might be, and troubled as he was, his return was a gift, and one that she did not take lightly.

She watched the play of emotion on her son’s face with interest, and no little amount of concern. After fifteen years, she had no trouble reading her daughters, but her own son was still an enigma to her. Yet, there were clues, for there was still much of his father in him, and she recognized the conflict within him.

So she worked with him in easy silence as they put away the tea, until their eyes met. Splinter held very still, then, unwilling to risk breaking the fragile connection between them. His quiet apology brought a smile to her face, however, and she bowed her head toward him. “Nor will I, my son.”

lea-nardo

Lea laughed, soft and abrupt. “I’m still not really used to it.” She said, “And I might have gotten taller. I haven’t really noticed.”

With another sigh, she looked out of the corner of her eye to see if no one else was watching, before she let the “strong” part of her fall away, just for a few moments. Her hold on Splinter tightened, and a few tears soaked into her fur. She missed her strength. How it felt steady and firm, and safe.

"I did not mean your height," Splinter said gently. But the time for words was over as Leanardo's tears fell. Placing a hand on her daughter's head and stroking lightly, it was enough merely to hold her. Leanardo had been given many burdens to bear over the last few months, and though Splinter had not been without her share of trials, she was both Sensei and Mother. Lending her strength to her weary child was the very least she could do.

#leanardo

Dawn

"But not New York…" Katsumi observed quietly after a short pause. But what should he have expected? It’s not like the Shredder was an easy opponent; he wouldn’t have risked his neck for a rescue, either. Especially if that person had been considered an enemy not even a day before, or had been stupid enough to get caught. He could only assume she felt the same. She should.

Releasing her, he roughly scrubbed his hand over his face and dismissed gruffly, “It doesn’t matter.” What did was the black hate that had been slowly consuming him since childhood like a steady drip-feed of poison. His father… and now a fire? What had the Shredder done? He needed to know more if his father’s spirit was ever going to find rest for the injustice it had suffered in life. There would be vengeance—of that much, at least, he was certain. Rising back to his feet, Katsumi turned and bowed stiffly. “Thank you for the tea…” Straightening, he thought better of his hard tone and added more thoughtfully, “…Mother.”

She rose to her feet, folding her hands into her sleeves as she watched the hardness descend across his face. It would take time, she knew. So much time. That he was here at all was a miracle. "There are more prisons than just the physical," she said at last. "And Saki has grown more... unpredictable. I could not know what she would do had we gone after you without a plan, and I could not..." her voice cracked at the unexpected lump in her throat, and she swallowed hard. Such displays were not like her.

"It matters," she said, forcing her voice to remain steady. "I do not thing I could bear to lose you a second time." She placed a hand against his hair, just for a moment. "And you are always welcome to have tea with me."

Sighing, she knelt and began to gather the tea things. "But another time. The girls will be arriving or practice soon." Her hand stilling on a teacup, she glanced up at him. "Will you join us?"

lea-nardo

Lea smiled, then let out a shaky breath as she went to hug her again. She was here. Really here.

"…I missed you, too, Mother."

#leanardo #so many mom feels

Splinter wrapped her arms tightly around her daughter. She was not normally given to such displays... but it had been so long. And her fingers traced over new and unfamiliar scars that she had not failed to notice.

"It is good to hear your voice again," she said at last, with a soft smile. "Though it may take some getting used to. You have grown since we last parted."

lea-nardo

"Splinter…"

"Leanardo..."

"I have missed you, my child."

#SO MANY FEELS #leanardo

Dawn

In response to her words, Katsumi quietly wrung his fingers deeper into the fabric of her kimono; if he couldn’t control the tears, he would at least control the silence. There were no words that could fit into this moment, anyway. It was impossible to describe how it felt, to be held like this. Safe, maybe. Or valued. And it all came from a woman he had long believed—no, been told—to be the worst kind of scum.

Too soon, peace soured into hate, and his grip tightened on Splinter’s kimono with a more vicious edge. Shredder would answer for taking this away from him. He would make sure of it.

After a moment’s hesitation, he asked softly, “Did you… look for me?” Did you care? What exactly had happened all those years ago, and why, if she really meant this—right now—had she given up on finding him then? This could have been different.

"My entire life, I thought you—Why?” He pulled away, no longer concerned about how he must look. It was almost cruel, only just now receiving affirmation that had been absent for so long. Katsumi half expected to lose it again. “Why didn’t you come for me?” Accusation crept into his voice, but he held tighter to her, desperately wanting to hear the right answers. He needed to know that he hadn’t been abandoned to the Shredder for nothing, and soon after, so quickly replaced. For once, he wanted to be wrong.

She felt the change come over him. Felt the rage creep into his hold upon her. Her only response was to tighten her arms around him, her hand tracing gently over the softness of his hair.

His words stung, but not as much as the emptiness when he pulled away. Yet his hands betrayed his heart, and he did not let go completely. She listened, fighting the urge to flinch as they struck home. Had she not thought them herself a hundred times over when she had learned of his existence? Yet there was only one answer, as there always was.

"Oh, my son..." She sighed deeply, as fire and smoke filled her vision. "Your father... Your father was dying in my arms. By the time I had carried him to safety, he was gone. And when I went back for you, I found the room in which I had left you in flames. Your little futon was an inferno."

She closed her eyes, breathing deeply to centre herself and restore some sense of calm, banishing the memories back to the dark corners where they lived. "I thought the fire had taken you. It never even occurred to me that she might... it was not in her nature as I knew it."

Splinter's jaw tightened, and her next words were laced with iron. "Had I known you were alive, I would have torn down every building in Tokyo to its foundations until I found you."

Dawn

Katsumi blinked, tilting his head just enough to make out the blurred waterfall of red cloth pooling in creased ripples by his side. As he drew a slow, shaky breath, the cracks in his armor seemed to expand until they finally split wide. Any mortification he felt was quickly overwhelmed by the love that he could feel pouring into him like an empty vessel. It filled the cracks and flooded them, gently clearing away the bitterness and fear he had clung to like a double-edged sword. After so long in the dark, it was almost too much.

Turning with his head bowed, Katsumi leaned forward and, after a tick of hesitation, rested his forehead against her shoulder. She smelled like heady incense and calligraphy ink. He couldn’t remember what Shredder smelled like; it had been too long since he had been that close, without armor to separate them.

Like a thrown switch, he brought his arms around her and pulled her close, burying his face into her robe. His tears silently soaked into the fabric the longer he clung to her, but it mattered less than he had expected. The first time he had embraced her, it felt necessary, but now, it felt right.

Too long, her child had struggled to grow in the dark, struggling to thrive in a parched, barren landscape, devoid of the love a child needed to thrive. But she was here now, to give him what he needed a thousand time over. She watched him shudder, his parched roots soaking up the comfort she offered, and for the first time, she saw a glimpse of the young man he was beneath the Shredder's teachings. He turned to her as a flower to the sun, and she welcomed him without reservation.

A long, slow breath left her as her son's head came to rest against her shoulder. She had no words for this feeling. Pain, yes. But the sweet, welcome pain of a heart too full to contain its joy. Of a heart regretful that this moment could not have come sooner.

His tears soaked through to her fur as he clung to her, and she needed no further invitation. She wrapped him in her arms, her hand moving gently against his hair. The gesture was a new one, but it felt the most natural thing in the world, as though she had done it a hundred times before. Her soul knew him, as his knew her when he stopped and listened long enough to hear the speaking of his heart.

For a very long time, she said nothing, letting her hold and her touch convey all the reassurance he needed. She had never been one for overt expressions of affection; her daughters knew to read the little touches for the expressions of love that they were. But Katsumi...Sora...

"You have a long journey ahead of of you, my son," she said. "But you have come so far already. Farther than you know." Smiling, she rested her chin against his head. "I am proud of you. You need no longer walk your path alone."

#Dawn #rogueshinobi

nodelinquent

KARAI WEEK: Day 5 ⤷ Photographs

Dawn

Katsumi lowered his gaze as Splinter spoke, and once again, her feather touch combed through his hair, soft and sincere and so different from what he was accustomed to. Accepting her caress like the sun’s steady warmth, he closed his eyes, though they didn’t remain that way for long. When she spoke of his father, his chest tightened, squeezed by the customary pain that any mention of him brought on, but this time balanced by something else. Gratitude, maybe. Or hope.

He watched as she drew out a photograph and set it before him. Half of it, Katsumi knew as well as his own reflection. The soft eyes, the dark hair, the faint smile… He had dedicated years to drinking in every detail with a devotion that he had never extended to any kata or mission. And yet, somehow, this old photograph was entirely new. Now there was another face to learn. A new story.

For someone as optimistic as Lea, maybe a fresh start could work, but not for him. Not for Katsumi. He couldn’t just forget his mistakes, clean the slate, and move on, but then, neither could Splinter. Instead, she had made something of it. For the first time, he could start to see a family resemblance.

"Then consider it done, Mother," he breathed. Setting aside his tea, he wordlessly reached into his sleeve and drew out the worn, ripped photograph he would never let out of his sight. He held it up to the early light, his gaze lingering on this one, lonely fragment that had sustained him for so long, and then, hesitantly relinquishing his treasure, he set it beside its twin on the small table.

It almost felt as if he had taken two steps back, only to take the same number forward again to reach this point. After experiencing both loss and gain, he was back to where he had started, but this time, it was a good start. Almost complete. His expression fell as he looked over his father’s frozen face. Almost.

Katsumi stared at the two photos together for a moment, his hands curling into fists over his thighs. So many years… Wasted earning a love that had been just as fake, just as much of a lie as the title Shredder had claimed as her right. Meanwhile, this love—so freely given—had always been his. No strings, no manipulation, no demands…

"—I know that I’d rather give my trust to the woman who still keeps your picture in the in the kamidana and prays to it every day, even after you poisoned her—”

The photos blurred and blended into a misty haze. Startled, Katsumi clenched his eyes shut and ducked his face, powerless to contain the quiet tears that spilled over like a cleansing tide.

Splinter watched in silence as emotion played across her son's face. She had brought him as far as she could, but there were certain steps he needed to take on his own. Yet when he withdrew the photograph from his sleeve, her breath caught, just a little. Such a tiny scrap of paper, yet he relinquished it as though it weighed a thousand pounds, and she knew what it had cost him.

I wonder if he would like Donatella to make him a whole one...

She watched his hands curl into fists as he stared at the photographs. Splinter reached out, gently laying her hand against the larger one. "He was a good man," she said softly. "Very kind. Gentle. But full of mischief. That, I think, you may get from him." She sighed softly. The ache was still there in her heart, familiar as ever, yet there was a new softness to the edges of that hole. "He loved you so very much, you know. You were his greatest joy."

Splinter fell silent as Katsumi bent his head, closing his eyes in a fruitless attempt to stem the tears that spilled from them. She was on her feet in an instant, moving without a thought, shifting around the table between them to drop to her knees at his side.

"Oh, my son," she breathed, reaching out a hand. "I am here."

Her hand paused a hairsbreadth from his shoulder. The invitation was there, but that final step was his alone to take.

Dawn

I know you are.

Katsumi’s conflicted eyes snapped to Splinter’s, and his mouth parted to protest, but words failed him briefly as he listened further. He couldn’t understand it. “But I also ditched them to clean up a mutant I created!” he suddenly interrupted. “I took Lea and forced her to fight my Footbots until they almost killed her.” He looked away, distractedly tearing his fingers through his hair. “—I tried to take out O’Neil; I used his brainwashed mother like a puppet; I—I’m Katsumi.”

His drawn face turned to her, wanting to believe her words, but unable to accept that she could forgive his mistakes for so little in return. Even Katsumi couldn’t quite reconcile it, and he was his own greatest ally.

"If you already knew that I’ve done worse, then how can you still be okay with this?” He swept his hand to indicate the tea, them, the dojo—everything. “Just being your son and doing one or two things right can’t be all it takes.” He had done so little to serve her, to earn her approval. There had to be something she wanted from him. A catch.

"Yes," Yotsuba said slowly. "You are Katsumi. You have done many regrettable things, but there is good in Katsumi. I have seen it. As there was wickedness in Sora -- you used to delight in pulling my hair to hear the sounds I would make."

The ragged path his hand had torn through his hair had left a few flyaway strands sticking up in odd directions. Absently, she reached out and smoothed them back into place.

"You have done terrible things that you believed were right within the web of the Shredder's lies. And since you have learned the truth, you have done what you could to make amends. You have acted in ways that remind me time and time again that you are your father's son."

She reached into her obi and pulled out the photo she kept close to her whenever her heart was sore and confused. Pausing only long enough to run a finger over that beloved face, she placed the faded colour photograph on the table between them.

"I have made mistakes that cost me everything I hold dear, and I have spent fifteen years trying to build something worthwhile out of the ashes that were left of my life. I do not claim that I have done everything right, but you have met the products of my efforts. I think we can both agree that there is something of worth there."

A sip of tea cleared the lump in her throat, and she set the cup down carefully before continuing, when she could trust her voice again.

"We cannot change the mistakes of the past. But we can work to build a better future. To atone for our wrongs and to do what is good and right. You have taken those first steps freely and of your own will, despite the years of falsehood you have had to overcome in order to do so. I will expect you to continue down this new path you have chosen for yourself, but yes, my child, that is all it takes."

anisivarmart

"You have your mother’s spirit..so fierce and yet so scared…"

#SO relevant #dawn

Dawn

Katsumi studied the rough hands that cradled his cup, calloused beyond a strictly physical sense. Shredder had not been the only one to disregard compassion.

His eyes widened slightly at Splinter’s invitation. He… couldn’t. If he told her everything, she would know Sora was dead, and what then? He couldn’t go back to the Foot after his treason—not that he would ever want to, anyway. But if she knew the truth of who he really was… He would have nothing. No one.

A bitter realization struck Katsumi following that thought. Then again, it had always been an impressively crafted deception, hadn’t it? There had been no one on his side from the very beginning. Only himself.

Mother… His hands tightened around his cup. How could he lose what he never had?

After a long silence, Katsumi finally answered softly, “You may be my mother, but she was my teacher. If you think I was any better than her—” He shook his head, a bitter smile curdling his lips, and he huffed a short, humorless laugh. “You of all people should know what the Foot Clan is like. We deal with a problem by silencing it. Funny thing is…” His face pinched a little when the persistent echoes of their groveling pleas rang in his ears. Ears he thought had been successfully trained to be deaf to them. “No one ever told me they never really shut up.”

He had a way of tilting his head just so, a certain look on his face, a twist to his mouth... It was like looking at a window on the past. Shen had done so, when something had troubled him. She had hated it just as much then as she did now. It had been her solemn duty to banish that look from his face. She had known all the little tricks to bring a smile to her husband's face, but she had no such keys to her son.

He wore bravado like a second suit of armour, but beneath it, she could see the fear in him. He was so scared. Of her? Or of losing her? There was blood on his hands -- Yotsuba was no fool. She knew that much. She could see the marks of the Shredder's teachings running through her son.

And yet, she could see Shen, too. It was not just his face. It was the humour, which Saki had never had. It was the adherence to honour in the face of everything Shredder had made of the Foot. It was the part of him that had seen the worth in her daughter, and been drawn to it as a sapling grows to the light. Saki could never have taught him those. She had never known them herself.

"She did not teach you everything that you know," Splinter said, her gaze drawn to the photograph watching over them. "She would have taught you to let that plant creature kill my daughters. She would have taught you to kill me without hesitation. I do not think you are better than she, my son. I know you are."

She raised a hand, smoothing the fur behind her ear as she gazed down at him. "I know what the Foot clan is. I know what they do. And if you think that I cannot guess at what you have done, or that it would cause me to turn you away now..." She reached for the teapot and refilled her cup, letting the steam sweeten the air between them. "Well then. I suppose that means I have much to teach you."

Dawn

Katsumi slowly shook his head as she spoke, unable to accept her words. It was all very poetic—something he should have expected from her—but he wasn’t so naïve. She saw something in him that didn’t exist.

Splinter moved, and his eyes lifted, following her hand as it touched her neck. A pang of guilt pierced him when he realized what memory she was tracing. It had been one he had revisited constantly back in Shredder’s prison, when he only had his incriminating thoughts for company. If a poison dart had been the worst act he had committed in his lifetime, then maybe he could believe that the one or two right choices she spoke of had redeemed his mistakes.

But a poison dart was a mercy.

Katsumi flinched away from her touch, unable to bear it for a different reason now. “You wouldn’t say that if you knew the things I’ve done…” he finally whispered when she had finished. “You don’t want Katsumi.” He lowered his cup into his lap and ducked his face, too tired of it all to prevent the sting of betrayal and loss from creeping into his voice now. “She didn’t.”

Katsumi had to remind himself again that he had only been a pawn all along, just another piece in Shredder’s vendetta. Yet she had still known him better than anyone else—better than this essential stranger kneeling before him—and with that full knowledge, rejected him.

He wanted to hate her for what she had stolen from him. He wanted to strip her of any respect, loyalty, or love she still leeched from him. But sixteen years weren’t so easily forgotten. Even now, even after cursing her from his cell and giving her title to another more deserving of it, he was still too weak to completely renounce her, or ignore the hurt.

#dawn #rogueshinobi #Poor messed-up baby

Sorrow weighed heavy on Splinter's heart as she looked into her child's pinched, conflicted face. There were many things Saki had done for which there would one day be a reckoning, yet this was the one that twisted in her heart perhaps the most. Her son could not even bear her own touch without flinching away from her.

His words were almost worse. Splinter had no doubt that, in her own, twisted way, Saki had loved the boy as much as she was capable of the emotion. What was worse, she had made him love her back. Shen's happy, giggling baby, who had craved nothing more than the love and affection of his parents -- growing up in that place must have been like a tree struggling for nourishment in a desert.

She didn't.

Sighing, she sipped at her tea and set it down carefully, turning the cup so that the paint caught the light. "She never did place any value in compassion. She saw it as weakness."

Raising her gaze, she fixed it steadily upon him. He was hurt, her little lost boy. The secrets in him festered and burned beneath the surface. Nodding once, she folded her hands in her lap.

"Very well," she said. "You are right. I do not know all you have done. And I fear that as long as you harbour these doubts about yourself and your place with me, this break she had made between us will never be allowed to heal. So tell me." She spread her arms. "Lay it out between us. All of it. And let me decide whether or not I want you."

Dawn

The tea wasn’t half bad. He wasn’t sure what he had been expecting, exactly—maybe for it to taste like sewer water, from the look of it.

Katsumi swirled the cup in his hands and watched the dark liquid stain its edges. He opened his mouth to speak, but for once, he couldn’t think of anything to say. Nothing that would be safe, at least.

Lifting his eyes to hers, he could see for himself just how serious she was about helping him, and finally, he could think of something to say. “Why?” The cup shook in his hands with a brief tremor, and the words spilled from him now, soft but forceful. “Why do you even care? I… I’m not him.” He violently swept his arm in a distraught gesture at the photograph over his shoulder, whether to indicate the infant or the man who so closely reflected his face, not even Katsumi knew.

"I could try to be. For this—you, them—I could try." His voice rose, nearly pleading now. "Tell me what I need to do, Mother, and I can try to make it work. But—" I’m not Sora. His words to Lea from the previous night returned, and Katsumi dropped his gaze to his cup. “I can never make it right.”

Ah. So that was it. She watched the cup tremble in his hands and ached to reach out and still those tremors with her own, but before he could begin to heal, he must first be allowed to lance the wounds that festered within him. There was much work to be done before he could heal, and very little of it would be pleasant, she was sure. But necessary? Oh, yes.

Even so, his words fell like the soft kisses of razor-edged knives, and she could only imagine how much worse it was for him. But she forced her hands to be still where they were until he had finished.

"Oh, child," she breathed. "I care because you are my son." She looked to the child in the photograph, and shook her head sadly. "No, you are not the young man you would have been had you been raised in my care. But the child in that picture is you. He is -- you are -- the product of a love I had thought only existed in storybooks until I met your father. Your first breath, your first smile, your tears and your laughter -- all of them were seeded and nurtured by that love. It was a long time ago, but it remains a part of you, and it is as much your legacy as the Shredder's teachings."

Her hand drifted to her neck, brushing over the spot where a dart had pierced it only a short time ago. Such a little pain, over so quickly for all the pain it had brought in its wake. Yet there had been more to that night as well.

"I know it is difficult to reconcile," she said. "You have done things that a child raised in this home never would. But in the face of all of that, beneath the Shredder's influence and absolute rule, you chose to save my daughter's life. You chose to save me. We are all the product of our choices, and in the end, you chose to risk yourself to save this family. And that is what I see when I look upon you."

Only then did she dare to bridge the gap between them, reaching out to lay her hand against his arm.

"You are Katsumi. But you are also Sora. Both of these truths live within you." Her hand tightened briefly before she let him go. "You ask what I need you to do? You must find the best of both of these aspects of yourself, and use them to determine the sort of man you wish to be. And you must remember that as you do this, you will not be alone. I am here for you, my son." She smiled gently. "By whichever name you wish to be called."

#Dawn #rogueshinobi

Dawn

Katsumi’s grip tightened on the frame briefly, and then he straightened and squared his jaw and shoulders, setting the old photo back in its rightful place with a dismissive finality. He loved to hold Sora, he internally corrected her.

Following Splinter’s direction, he left the kamidana and quietly took his seat where she indicated. He rested his hands over his knees, and from engrained discipline, carefully averted his eyes and waited for her to take her cup before he would even consider touching his own.