---
Year 60. Two years later.
Mali was four years old.
He stood in the garden at dawn. The compound was quiet. The sky was gray. The first bird had not yet sung.
He stretched. Arms overhead. Back arched. Then he dropped into a crouch and began.
Running. Laps around the compound perimeter. Bare feet hit dirt. Breath stayed steady in a four-count rhythm. The guards at the gate no longer watched. They had seen this a thousand times.
Climbing. The maple tree. The compound wall. The cliffs behind the Naka Shrine. His fingers found holds in rock that should not have existed. His body moved upward like it was moving forward.
Crawling. Through mud and wet grass. Elbows and knees. Cold ground. He did it until his limbs shook.
Jumping. Onto boulders. Onto the low roof of the weapons storehouse. His legs were thick. Corded. The power in his calves was real.
Striking. A wooden post wrapped in cloth. Hundreds of strikes. Thousands. The cloth frayed. The wood splintered. He wrapped it fresh and kept going.
Bodyweight exercises. Push-ups on fists. Pull-ups from branches. Sit-ups until his stomach burned.
Other children had tried to join him once. They lasted an hour. They never returned.
"He is a monster," one said, in the courtyard near the main hall, loud enough for adults to hear.
A woman pulled her son closer. An old man muttered something about bloodlines.
Mali heard none of it. He was already running again.
---
His body was wrong.
Not wrong in a bad way. Wrong in a way that made people stare. Four years old. Tall as an eight-year-old. Shoulders broader than they should be. Limbs long and corded. When he walked through the compound, heads turned.
"Is that Takami's grandson?"
"He is four? Impossible."
"What are they feeding him?"
His mother answered the questions when they came. "He eats everything. He trains every day. It is the way he is."
---
The twins were awake when he returned.
Mali stepped through the back door, mud drying on his shins. A small body hit his leg.
"Ma-ri!"
Kazuki had learned his name first, though it came out as two syllables and much spit. The boy clung to Mali's knee with both hands. He grinned up at his older brother with a face still round with baby fat.
His dark eyes — Uchiha eyes, already bright — blinked up at Mali
Behind him, Hana crawled across the floor with the terrifying speed of a child who had just discovered movement. She went straight for Mali's other leg and grabbed his ankle.
Mali looked down at them.
He reached down. He scooped Kazuki up with one arm and tucked him against his hip. The boy immediately began patting Mali's face with both hands. Mali let him.
Hana made an angry noise from the floor.
"You have to wait," Mali told her. "One at a time."
Hana did not wait. She grabbed his pant leg and tried to pull herself up. Her grip was surprisingly strong for a one-year-old.
Mali sighed. He bent down and gathered her up with his other arm.
Two babies. One four-year-old. They hung off him like extra limbs.
Their mother was in the kitchen, preparing rice. She glanced over and smiled — a tired smile, the smile of a woman who had raised a prodigy and then been given twins.
"They missed you," she said.
"
"I am their favorite." Uchiha mali puffed his chest.
---
The morning passed in chaos.
Mali sat on the wooden floor of the main room, legs stretched out, while Kazuki used his stomach as a drum.
Hana had claimed his right shoulder and was trying to climb his head. Her tiny fingers found his ear and pulled.
"Stop that," Mali said.
She pulled harder.
He reached up, gently pried her hand away, and repositioned her in his lap. She immediately grabbed his thumb and tried to put it in her mouth.
Kazuki, jealous of the attention, flopped onto Mali's chest and pressed his face into his brother's shirt.
"You are both ridiculous," Mali said.
Neither twin cared.
They stayed there until Kazuki went quiet in a way that Mali had learned to recognize.
A smell rose.
Mali closed his eyes.
"Again?"
Kazuki looked up at him with an expression of pure innocence. The smell got worse.
Hana, not to be outdone, began to squirm in the way that meant she was about to deliver her own surprise.
Their mother appeared in the doorway. "Do you need help?"
"I have it," Mali said.
He did not have it. But he was going to do it anyway.
---
He cleaned them.
It was a process. Cold water from the basin. Cloth. Powder. New wrappings. Kazuki squirmed like a captured fish. Hana tried to escape entirely, crawling away with her bare bottom in the air while Mali was still dealing with her brother.
"Catch her," Mali said.
Their mother caught her. Brought her back. Hana wailed in protest.
Mali finished the job with mechanical efficiency. He had done it a hundred times. He did not complain. He did not flinch. When Kazuki kicked a foot into the water basin and splashed both of them, Mali just wiped his face and kept going.
[This is training too,] he thought.
But when it was done, and both twins were wrapped clean and dry and pressed against him on the floor, their small bodies warm and their breathing slowing toward sleep, Mali felt something settle in his chest.
---
Takami arrived at midday.
The old man's henge was perfect — white hair, deep lines, slight stoop. He looked exactly like an elder should look. Old. Tired. Not dangerous.
In the garden, the henge dropped.
"Did you finish the morning sequence?" Mali asked.
"Yes."
"The breath holds?"
"Four minutes in. Six out."
His beard — black now, with only threads of gray — caught the light. His posture straightened as he sank into a cross-legged position on the grass.
" Evryone is talking about my grandson, That my grandson is a prodigy. That he trains like a demon. That he is four years old and could probably outrun half the Police Force."
As they start training, Pranayama. The difficult breathing. Antar Kumbhaka. Bahya Kumbhaka.
Bandhas locked tight. Mali led. Takami followed. The old man's face grew red, then settled. His chest expanded and held. Four minutes. Five. His eyes stayed clear.
When they finished, Takami was breathing hard but steady.
"Your turn," he said.
Mali dropped into the breath cycle without hesitation. His small body went still. His lungs filled. The locks engaged — root, belly, throat. His eyes closed. His heart slowed.
The inner sense opened.
He saw Takami — bright, dense, a furnace of chakra coiled tight. He saw the twins inside the house, small warm lights flickering with infant energy. He saw his mother, steady and smooth.
And at the base of his own spine, the Lam chakra pulsed. Still alone. Still the only light in his own system.
But brighter now.
He released the breath. Opened his eyes.
Mali looked at his grandfather. The old man's eyes — dark, sharp, unchanged by the henge — held his gaze.
"Again," Mali said.
They breathed.
---
Evening. Naka Shrine.
Another elder meeting. The torches were low. The shadows were long.
Fugaku was there. Fifteen years old. Standing near the back with his father Ishario. The boy's face was calm, but his eyes moved. He watched who spoke, who stayed silent, who nodded and who did not.
Takami noticed.
[The future Clan Head is still undecided. That could be useful. Or dangerous.]
The scarred elder from two years ago was speaking again. "The Police Force is hated. The Village isolates us. Hiruzen's policies are no different from Tobirama's. Kagami's path has won us nothing."
"Kagami's path kept us alive," a moderate countered. "The radicals would start a war we cannot win."
The argument was old now. Worn smooth by repetition. But it still burned.
Takami said little. He watched. He waited.
When the meeting ended, he walked home alone. The stars were out. The compound was silent.
In the back garden, a small figure sat under the maple tree, breathing.
But tonight, the small figure was not alone.
Two smaller shapes were curled against him. Kazuki on one side, Hana on the other. Both asleep. Both wrapped in a single blanket. Their heads rested against Mali's thighs.
Takami walked into the garden. He sat beside his grandson. He dropped the henge and felt his body straighten.
He looked at the twins. Then at Mali.
" My grand child , come to me"
Both twins made faces and hugged Mali, and he looked down at the small faces pressed against him. Kazuki's mouth was slightly open. Hana's hand was curled around a fold of his shirt.