I wanted to speak, to offer some word of comfort or condolence, but my throat felt like it was closing. This girl—this kind, generous girl who'd saved my life without question—was an orphan because of me. The chakra blast she'd mentioned, the battle that had destroyed her family, I'd been there. I'd been part of it.
"The strange thing is," Yuki said, looking up from her tea with a small, sad smile, "I don't hate the ninja who caused it. Grandfather taught me that hatred is a poison that hurts the one who carries it more than the one it's aimed at. Besides, I doubt whoever was responsible even knew our village was there. It was probably just... collateral damage."
Collateral damage. The clinical term for ruined lives and broken families, for dreams cut short and futures erased. During my time with Akatsuki, I'd used that phrase myself, a way to distance myself from the human cost of our missions. Now, hearing it from the lips of someone who'd lost everything because of my actions, it sounded obscene.
"How do you do it?" I whispered.
"Do what?"
"Forgive. How do you forgive someone who took everything from you?"
Yuki considered the question seriously, tilting her head like a bird contemplating a particularly complex problem. "I think," she said slowly, "forgiveness isn't about the person who hurt you. It's about choosing not to let that hurt define your whole life. My parents wouldn't want me to spend my years consumed with anger over something I can't change."
"Besides," Dr. Hayashi added, "holding onto hate is exhausting. It takes so much energy to stay angry, energy that could be used for healing instead."
"But don't you want justice?" I pressed. "Don't you want the person responsible to pay for what they did?"
"What would that accomplish?" Yuki asked. "Would it bring my parents back? Would it undo the destruction? Or would it just create more pain, more loss, more orphans like me?"
Her words hit me like physical blows. This girl, who had every right to demand blood for blood, had instead chosen compassion. She'd made peace with her loss in a way I'd never been able to make peace with mine. Where I'd let grief and rage transform me into an engine of destruction, she'd chosen to become a healer.
"You're remarkable," I said, meaning it completely.
"I'm not," she said with a self-deprecating laugh. "I'm just trying to live the way my parents would have wanted. They believed in helping people, in making the world a little bit better wherever they could. So that's what I do."
"She's been my apprentice since the tragedy," Dr. Hayashi said proudly. "Natural talent for medical jutsu, and a heart big enough to heal the whole world if she could."
"Grandfather exaggerates," Yuki said, but she was smiling now. "I just want to make sure no one else has to lose their family the way I lost mine."
The irony was crushing. She wanted to prevent others from experiencing the loss I'd caused her, and she was unknowingly caring for the very person responsible for her orphaning. If she knew who I really was, would she still speak of forgiveness and healing? Or would even her vast compassion have limits?
"Your tea's getting cold," she said gently, and I realized I'd been sitting in stunned silence for several minutes.
I took a sip, tasting ginger and honey and something indefinably comforting. "It's good. Thank you."
"Rest now," Dr. Hayashi said, standing and beginning to clear away his medical supplies. "You've lost a lot of blood, and your body needs time to recover. Yuki will check on you periodically to make sure the healing is progressing properly."
As they prepared to leave me alone, I called out softly. "Yuki?"
"Yes?"
"Your parents... what were their names?"
"Kenji and Akemi Hayashi," she said without hesitation. "Why?"
"I want to remember them," I said truthfully. "They sound like they were good people."
"They were the best," she said with quiet pride. "I hope someday I can be half as good as they were."
After they left, I lay in the darkness of the clinic, staring at the ceiling and wrestling with the magnitude of what I'd learned. The girl who'd saved my life was an orphan because of my actions. The family whose hospitality I was accepting had been destroyed by my choices. The kindness being shown to me was being offered by someone who had every reason in the world to wish me dead.
Kenji and Akemi Hayashi. I repeated their names silently, adding them to the growing list of people whose lives I'd ended through action or inaction. But this time was different. This time, I could see the immediate consequences of my crimes in the form of their daughter's grief and resilience.
Yuki had chosen forgiveness over hatred, healing over revenge. She'd made herself into someone her parents would be proud of, despite the tragedy that had shaped her life. If she could find a way to transform loss into purpose, perhaps there was hope for even someone like me.
But first, I had to decide whether to tell her the truth about who I was. She deserved to know that she was harboring the person responsible for her parents' deaths. But the knowledge would shatter her peace, destroy her faith in the possibility of redemption, and turn her greatest act of mercy into her greatest regret.
Some truths were too heavy for innocent shoulders to bear. But some lies were too poisonous to let fester in the darkness.
Tomorrow, I would have to choose which burden to carry alone.