It had been a throwaway question, noise to fill the space while Sasuke regained control of what his breath wanted to do, but she answered with the utmost seriousness -- as if she'd really thought it through, knew that this was what she wanted to do. And a month ago, Sasuke wouldn't have questioned it; might even have thought the rationale reasonable enough, even if he had doubts about what actions she'd take if faced with her kin across a battlefield. The question then would have been loyalty, and now ...
Lofty wasn't the word he would have used to describe the responsibilities of being Hokage, not anymore. Preparing them for the world ahead wouldn't always mean protecting them, and the cost of protecting them wouldn't always be one that was easy to pay, and as for peace -- there was the faint edge of losing control at the edge of his breath again, and Sasuke yanked it back, glanced over at the tuft of dark hair still visible in the glass. Remembered what he was here for, and what normalcy was supposed to look like.
What price the peace, he thought, and carefully didn't say. There was the ever-growing web of information his team had been wading into these past weeks, strands of connection that stuck and clung to a conclusion he didn't want to draw, and there was here and now, someone he'd agreed to be a friend to, naive or not.
If the question then had been loyalty, the question now was what loyalty meant. But that wasn't a question he wished on Adela.
"It's a remarkable goal," he said, once the pause had dragged too long and he wasn't sure how to respond anymore. But if Obito knew, and Obito supported (or at least didn't actively discourage) the notion -- whatever Sasuke might think privately of his sensei's decisions about Adela, he didn't believe they were outright wrong. "I'm glad that Hokage-sama knows. He'll be able to advise you."
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Lofty wasn't the word he would have used to describe the responsibilities of being Hokage, not anymore. Preparing them for the world ahead wouldn't always mean protecting them, and the cost of protecting them wouldn't always be one that was easy to pay, and as for peace -- there was the faint edge of losing control at the edge of his breath again, and Sasuke yanked it back, glanced over at the tuft of dark hair still visible in the glass. Remembered what he was here for, and what normalcy was supposed to look like.
What price the peace, he thought, and carefully didn't say. There was the ever-growing web of information his team had been wading into these past weeks, strands of connection that stuck and clung to a conclusion he didn't want to draw, and there was here and now, someone he'd agreed to be a friend to, naive or not.
If the question then had been loyalty, the question now was what loyalty meant. But that wasn't a question he wished on Adela.
"It's a remarkable goal," he said, once the pause had dragged too long and he wasn't sure how to respond anymore. But if Obito knew, and Obito supported (or at least didn't actively discourage) the notion -- whatever Sasuke might think privately of his sensei's decisions about Adela, he didn't believe they were outright wrong. "I'm glad that Hokage-sama knows. He'll be able to advise you."