Chapter Text
Shiranui Genma enters the world without a sound. He’s not dead, he can hear his heart beating like a drum inside of his chest; but he is dead silent. The midwife is concerned. His mother has died not long after childbirth, his father is long gone.
The midwife looks at the silent child with the dead mother and the missing father, and thinks, mute .
Genma looks at her, and thinks, imbecile .
Everything in this world is too bright for him. The walls are white; the midwife is dressed in stunning blue and white; he’s wrapped up in a white bundle. There’s too much white in this scenario for his taste.
Genma doesn’t know how he’s ended up this way. Being reborn is one thing; being reborn in a place like this , where black seemingly has no place in this world of color and shocking white, Genma cringes at the thought.
He can feel heat tickling at the back of his throat and he swallows it down hurriedly. He doesn’t know this place, doesn’t know this world. Is it the same as the one he was in before? Genma doubts it. He’s not going to spew fiery arrows like Pubert did.
Pubert. His baby brother from another world. Genma briefly wonders if he’s dead.
The midwife feeds him with chalky milk, bland and tasteless and disgusting. Genma wishes for the mix he used to get; vodka, raw egg, arsenic. It was spicy, it was sweet, it left a strong aftertaste. Milk pales in comparison.
When she dumps him in the orphanage, Genma isn’t very surprised. He wonders how long it took her to make that simple decision, even with the tiny brain of hers. Surely, she must have known that the only available option for him was the place where other parentless children went? She certainly didn’t have the money to raise him (nor the will, or the capability, with the defeatist attitude of hers that he had seen on occasion) and he wasn’t going to settle with being raised by a fool.
The matron of the orphanage isn’t much better. Genma knows that he isn’t supposed to have a whole realm of knowledge at the age of a few months, and he shouldn’t possess such finely honed motor skills either. But Pubert was crawling at the age of two weeks and he was sliding down banisters and avoiding death at the age of five weeks. Genma can do better.
Still, he doesn’t understand this world. They aren’t speaking English (that’s for sure), and he can place the language as Japanese. He knows Japanese, vaguely, brief letters brushing across his mind as he listens to others talk.
“That baby in the corner, he’s so silent, I wonder if he can talk at all.”
“I think he’s mute.”
“Oh, he isn’t, I’ve heard him cry when he’s hungry. He’s just eerily silent otherwise.”
The matron creeps around him, holds him with a tentative grip when picking him up for feeding and burping him. The older ones, dressed in everyday clothes and walking around helping the matron do odd jobs, those stare at him for prolonged periods of time. They’re probably trying to see if staring will jolt a reaction out of him, but Genma just stares back.
He’s still a bit unnerved by the world shift, if he’s to be honest. Addamses are adaptable, certainly, but he hasn’t seen a single Addams in this world yet. Genma believes that he’s in an entirely new world, one unconquered by Addamses, one in which he’s all alone.
Genma was once Wednesday Addams, now he’s just Shiranui Genma, a boy instead of a girl, Japanese instead of American. But he’s still an Addams by blood and soul-- something that will never be torn away from him, not when his mother was so invested in blood magic and curses.
Now, though, he stays silent and watches others go by. He can’t try the things he used to, even with his motor skills the way they used to be as a baby girl. He’s quiet as he props himself up to look around, taking in the sights.
The orphanage seems to be poorly funded. Many orphanages are, he thinks. But with so many children here, this is probably the only orphanage in town. And being the only orphanage, it should receive more money. The walls are old and cracked, the doors creak when opening and closing, drafts blow in every now and then, and the younger ones get chills. He’s in a room with at least ten other beds, the baby room, he supposes. All of them are weeks old, and rooms like this aren’t very helpful to the growth of babies. Especially those without an Addamses’ constituent.
He’s a month old when he stands (for the matron to see), and the matron almost faints clean away. As it is, she stumbles, reaching for something to hold onto when in this room, all there is are walls and beds. Futons. Just a couple of cloths on the ground. There’s nothing for her to hold as support.
Genma pads over to one of the other babies and stares. They’re exactly like what normal babies look like. Round faced, not a hair in sight other than the wisps on the top of their head (and sometimes, not even then), bright eyes and smiles. He’s not sure what he was looking for. A head full of hair, perhaps. A moustache, like Pubert had.
He’s comparing too many things to his old life, and Genma doesn’t think that’s too good. It’s probably not healthy for his mental health.
“Genma!” The matron says. “You can walk!”
He stares at her. She’s dumb, isn’t she , he concludes. No one can stare at someone who’s clearly walking for that long and not realise the obvious.
He’s tempted to talk, too, but that might be a bit much for her. She would probably faint this time. He toddles back to his futon, settling down and wrapping the cloths around him. His very own cave. One where he can do secret human experimentations and play around with chemicals. Maybe recreate one or two of the 17th century torture devices. He wants a guillotine of his own.
The matron flushes when she catches Genma’s staring, and rushes out. She’s concerned, in a way that most people shouldn’t be when it comes to babies. Hotaru Karui has heard of geniuses, of prodigies, of children who graduate from the Academy in one year and at the age of seven. But she has never - and has never dreamt of ever seeing - a child stand and walk at the age of one month.
His development is too fast, and she’s worried at what it might mean. The child is always quiet, staring at everything, taking it all in. Karui is certain that he knows what he’s looking at, understands what they’re saying, and that sends chills down her back. Not just in a professional, matronly sense, where she’s just another woman caring for orphaned children and when she sees a child who’s too strange, she’s worried for them. It reminds her of when she used to be on the field, at the frontlines, fighting in battles that gave her the scars on her body. They’re hidden, with long sleeves and pretty makeup, but they’re there.
That calm stare and silent padding of feet makes her shudder. Karui doesn’t really know what to think. She tells one of the older children there to look after the orphanage for a short while, and she hurries off to the Hokage’s office.
When she retired, she’d sworn to never step foot in there again; not because she hated the Hokage, but she had lost too many friends on the battlefield because of decisions he had made in that very office, and the office was a place of bad memories.
“I would like to see Hokage-sama,” Karui says to one of the ninja on guard. “It’s urgent.”
The ninja looks at her speculatively. “Do you have an appointment?”
He says it like the Hokage is a dentist. Karui shakes her head, but presses further. “This is urgent, I have a child at the orphanage, he’s standing and walking at the age of one month.”
Both ninja look incredulous. They share a look, before turning back to her. “Are you sure you’re not seeing things?” One of them asks her kindly. “Maybe the stress is getting to you?”
“I know what I saw.” She snaps back. She takes a breath. “He’s been in my care since he was a week old, I know how old he is. I record all of their milestones. I didn’t expect to have to record his so early. I would like to ask the Hokage for advice.”
The ninja shrugs, stepping aside. “I’ll check if he’s busy.”
-+-
When Genma wakes up the next morning, he’s just in time to see a new face walk in through the doors. The doors to the room open, and he is treated to the sight of a man with scars on his face. Genma’s eyes widen, and he sits up, instinctively wanting to find out more.
Those scars don’t look self inflicted, and as someone who, in their past life, had no scars to speak of, this is interesting.
The matron hurries over to Genma’s side, patting the futon lightly. “This is Shiranui Genma. Genma, meet Hishi-san. He’s a ninja.”
Ninja? With the shuriken and all? Genma is vaguely impressed. His father would have loved ninja. Some of them fight with swords, right? His father loved fighting with swords. And the death that came with the job; his father would probably have wanted to be a part time ninja.
Hishi sits down, lips upturned a smile as he looks at Genma. “Hi!” He says cheerfully. “I’m Hishi. Can you tell me your name?”
Genma doesn’t recoil, but it takes him a large effort not to. Cheerfulness is something… he doesn’t really appreciate. He stays silent. He won’t deign a cheerful person with a reply. He thinks a man with scars like that would have been cool with jaded silence and short answers, but no. He’s a cheerful man.
“I see what you mean, Karui-san.” Hishi says, smile never leaving his face. “I’ll take him!”
Genma’s eyes blow wide open, and he scrambles back, pressing against the matron. He looks up at her in a panic and she smiles reassuringly back. He doesn’t want to be sent to a cheerful person! The Addams family would disown him!
Hishi scoots closer, arms wide. Genma tries to hide behind the matron. He hates hugs.
Hishi is a cruel, cruel man with no care for children’s opinions, and Genma can respect that character flaw. Hishi picks him up like he weighs nothing, and sweeps him out of the room with a flair that he thought only his mother possessed. The matron follows closely behind, papers all out and ready for adoption.
Genma struggles just a bit, but he knows it’s useless. For all his motor skills and strength, he’s still a baby. He can’t beat an adult, let alone a ninja . He resigns himself to having to kill this man at the earliest possible convenience while making it look like an accident. He once said he would scare his husband to death, if he ever wanted to become a Black Widow; but he thinks that scaring this ninja to death isn’t very feasible.
Hishi signs everything with a flourish and strides out of the orphanage. Some of the children there look jealous, eyes turning steely and hands clenching at their sides. Genma tilts his head at them. Are they jealous that he’s being adopted?
He turns beseeching eyes onto them. Please change places with me , he begs in his mind. I don’t want a cheerful man bringing me home. He might make me smile in pictures.
None of them can read minds, disappointingly, and Genma swallows tightly as he watches the orphanage shrink. The matron wasn’t the best of guardians, but at least she controlled her facial expressions better than Hishi. The man seems to have only one expression-- crazily gleeful.
The village though, is a welcome distraction. Everything is a bit too happy for his liking, but it looks like something he can place from home. Streets full of people, haggling, shops selling food, clothes, and ooh , weapons , now Genma can appreciate that. He leans in the direction of the shop, making grabby fingers, and Hishi looks down at him.
“You want to go in?” He asks, inclining his head at the weapons shop. Genma raises an eyebrow and goes back to straining in Hishi’s arms towards the shop. He feels that Hishi should stop asking stupid questions when the answers are so blatant.
He can’t see Hishi drop the smile and stare at Genma with a studious glint in his eye, not when Genma is so focused in getting into that shop. He wants to see if there are blades, the big kind, the guillotine kind.
Hishi smiles, swinging Genma back into position. “Not today, Genma! Maybe tomorrow, or the day after! Today, we’re getting you settled in, nice and ready.”
He brings Genma to a house located a bit far from the heart of the village, wandering inside the forest until all Genma sees are trees. Tall, towering trees that he’s never seen before; Genma thinks that he can sky dive off them, with their height. Hishi is slightly quieter now, his footsteps growing softer until Genma can’t hear the crunch of his feet on the leaves below. It’s like he’s being carried by a ghost. He likes it.
They stop at a house in the woods. It seems like a perfect place for murder, small and unassuming. Hishi presses Genma tighter against his chest and strolls along the rocky path, opening the door with one hand.
“Genma,” he says on the doorstep. “This is your new house. It’s quite dangerous outside, so don’t leave without my permission, okay?”
Hishi looks at Genma with knowing eyes. Clearly, the man is aware that Genma has a mind far beyond that of a one month old. Genma looks away, unwilling to make any promises.
The possibility of death lies out there? Why would Genma not explore?
“Genma, I can’t compromise on this.” Hishi says sternly. “I’m in charge of you now, I need to make sure you’re safe. If you want to do something, you tell me, and I’ll supervise. But you have to let me know.”
Genma looks at Hishi and thinks of Gomez. Gomez Addams let his children run wild, allowing them to pursue their happiness to the best of their capabilities. Hishi reminds him of Gomez. A man that only wanted his children to be happy, but wanted to be there to make sure they were on the right path to happiness. There were certain ways to cut your arm off, after all, to let it stick back faster. Certain ways to collect blood to let it remain fluid and not congeal after a few minutes.
“Okay.” He says. His first words in this world, and he says them to Hishi. “Okay, I’ll tell you.”
Hishi smiles like he’s known all along, and strides into the house. The house is big-- one of those houses that looks small on the outside but big on the inside. The living room is easily bigger than the size of the room he slept in at the orphanage, each room Hishi brings him into is slightly smaller than the living room, but comfortably bigger than the orphanage room. It strikes Genma how small the rooms back in the orphanage were; then again, he was a one month old baby surrounded by ten other one month old babies, they probably didn’t need a lot of space.
“Do you want your own room?” Hishi asks with a blinding grin as he slides into one of the smaller rooms near the end of the corridor. “Or do you want to stay with me first, in the master room?” He turns towards the end of the corridor where the door to the largest room in the house is wide open. Genma can easily fit thirty guillotines in there and have space for his bed. And an electric chair.
But the idea of his own room is appealing, some semblance of privacy after all this insanity. A place for him to sift through his thoughts and meditate, just like his mother taught him to. Genma squirms in Hishi’s grip and leans towards the smaller offered room. Hishi’s smile doesn’t drop, but it does falter a bit, and Genma pauses.
Does Hishi want Genma because he wants Genma, a kid to take care of, or because he wants to keep an eye on Genma? Genma’s not stupid, he can gather enough of the situation to understand that the matron had escaped to inform the leader of this town about his strange development. The Hokage, they call him. The matron went to tell the Hokage, leader of ninjas in this town, and he sent this ninja after Genma.
Perhaps it’s a mix of both, Genma decides after Hishi sets him down. Hishi has to keep an eye on him - otherwise, he wouldn’t have strolled into that orphanage. He doesn’t think ninja like Hishi go to the orphanage for community service; when ninja go into an orphanage, they have reasons. But Hishi has been nothing but kind and cheerful (the thought makes Genma shudder) and though Genma dislikes cheerfulness, he likes to think that he can tell when someone is genuine.
Hishi seems real enough. It’s not like Genma’s intentions are very honorable either. He toddles into the room, taking stock of everything. It’s not what he would intend for himself, with the colors of the wall, but the dark purple is better than the yellow-white of the orphanage. He jots down black , on his mental to-do list. The bed is an actual bed, with a pillow and blankets and a bolster. It’s huge enough that Genma can sink in it. He’s desperate to try. Sleeping on a futon means he can feel the floor on his back; the hard floor is nice, the coldness seeping in through the sheets. But he really likes a bed. He’s just too short to get up.
He turns away from the distracting bed; he wants to take a closer look at his room. A closet, big and drafty, with doors he struggles to open. He manages, but barely stops himself from toppling back when the doors open. A table, teenager sized. Chairs, teenager sized. A full length mirror. It’s Genma’s first look at himself, and he peers at his reflection.
Tiny hands. Tiny feet. Auburn hair. Auburn eyes. He presses his palms against the mirror. For some reason, he’s dissatisfied. A girl with black pigtails and black eyes in a black dress, that’s what he wants to see. He wants to see Wednesday Addams, a girl of 12, a girl who can remain forever 12 if that’s what she wishes. Not Shiranui Genma, a boy of one month, someone who will probably continue growing and growing until death takes him again.
He takes in a deep, shuddery breath, and feels Hishi’s hands wrap around his middle.
“Not used to it?” Hishi asks, smiling at their reflections. He pokes Genma’s cheek. Their reflections mirror their actions. “It’s your first time seeing yourself, isn’t it? I can’t imagine being this aware of the world around you but not knowing how you look like. Is it a shock?”
Genma looks even smaller next to Hishi with his tall stature, loose limbs and disarming smile. Hishi’s brown hair reaches his shoulders, framing his face in a way that highlights his cheekbones and sparkly purple eyes. A dark purple, the color of Genma’s new room. Hishi is classically attractive, Genma realises. Not deadly stunning like his mother, or immaculate gentleman like his father. Definitely nothing like his uncle, Fester Addams, with hunched shoulders and a bald head that would only look attractive to Addamses.
He pulls at Hishi’s hair, playing with the long strands. “Can I grow my hair too?” He asks. He isn’t sure if Hishi will allow it. It does go against all known gender stereotypes, after all. Only females had long hair.
“You can do whatever you want to your hair.” Hishi assures him.
Even shave it all off like Uncle Fester? Genma thinks, lips curling up. Not likely .
He curls up against Hishi and mumbles something about his stomach. He feels Hishi smile against his head and brings him to the kitchen.
If Hishi makes him smile in pictures, Genma thinks that it wouldn’t be so bad. He sets the limit at one picture, though. His facial muscles don’t work that way.
-+-
His heart throbs like a metronome, a steady pulsing heartbeat that is faster than it should be. Hishi is shouting, shaking him, eyes wide with worry. There is smoke in the air, a fizzing of left-over electricity in the atmosphere.
Genma’s slightly burnt at the edges, his clothes giving off the scent of smoke while Genma himself is laughing brightly, lips broken apart in merriment and his eyes scrunched up. Hishi looks amazed, stepping back from the child to see the damage. Or rather, the lack of damage. Hishi is a ninja and times of war are approaching. He’s not stupid to the point that he wouldn’t trap his own house. The reason he insisted on following Genma into the entrance is to watch over him and ensure he doesn’t step in the path of a seal meant to kill enemies.
He looks away for one moment, he swears just one second , and Genma steps on an electric minefield, a thousand volts jolting whoever triggered it. He’s too late to switch the boy out with another object, too late to shunshin over and grab the boy, so he watches with horror as the boy falls to the ground, smoke curling in the air.
Hishi rushes over, panics at the lack of reaction from the haze of smoke and bats it away furiously. He’s rendered useless in this time of panic, can’t think straight when the thought of killing small Genma in his mind pops up. Genma lies stockstill on the ground, and Hishi can’t see his chest moving, briefly toying with the idea of the child having stopped breathing. He doesn’t let the thought linger in his mind; it makes him want to throw up.
Then Genma’s heartbeat rings out, strong and powerful and alive , and Hishi is left in horrified amazement that this boy is still alive. A thousand volts would kill a grown ninja whose element is lightning, let alone a young child who hasn’t hit a year of age.
And Genma laughs , something Hishi hasn’t heard in the entire two months that he’s adopted Genma, and it breaks something inside of him. Does the kid really enjoy tripping the line of life and death so much? The line was a fine tightrope; Genma had thrown away all semblance of balance and was just swinging his way across. Hishi can’t understand the kid.
But Genma is laughing, laughing like the world’s done a great favor to him, and Hishi chokes out a half-hearted laugh at the sight. It sounds like crazed laughter to his ears, yet Genma takes it all in stride and beams at Hishi.
“Do you have more of those things?” Genma asks Hishi breathlessly, using Hishi’s hands to straighten himself. Hishi stares at Genma’s too small palms in his own. A three month old child wanting to play around with thousand volt seals meant to slaughter enemy ninja?
Hishi wants to say no, oh does he want to say no , but Genma looks so happy, happier than he’s ever seen and Hishi truly wants Genma to be happy at home. The Hokage instructed him to keep an eye on the prodigy, ensure that he is brought up to be loyal to Konoha, but Hishi can’t think of Genma as someone to be moulded into Konoha’s tool. He wasn’t brought up that way and his parents would probably whip him for trying to bring up any child that way. Children should be happy, should enjoy their childhood, should be laughing and brimming with happiness everyday like Genma is right now and-
And Hishi can’t find it in himself to deny Genma. Will it kill the boy? Hopefully not. Will it severely injure the boy? Again, probably not. Will it make him happy? Yes.
He swallows, eyes softening as he looks at the boy. “I have more.”
Genma visibly brightens at this, tugging on Hishi’s hand as he pads around the entrance, searching for more minefields. Hishi maintains a respectable distance away (even if Genma is superhuman and won’t die because of this, Hishi probably will) but keeps a wary eye on him. Hishi knows basic medical jutsu, enough to place Genma under a stasis jutsu and stabilize his condition until he can rush the kid to the General Hospital.
The kid triggers one seal after another, electricity hissing through the air and fire tendrils whipping around the boy. Wire springs out of the ground, sharp enough to lop off Genma’s head but the kid dances around every single one with a grace a child shouldn’t possess. He avoids the shuriken like they’re nothing, some graze him here and there but he pays no attention to the wounds; the senbon he catches with glee, grabbing them tightly in his palm as he laughs, spinning around the entrance in circles.
When the smoke clears, Hishi is tense. He waits, on guard, green glowing in his palm for emergency medical jutsu. Genma stumbles over to him, hair in a mess but eyes the brightest he has ever seen, and Genma shows off his stash of senbon in his cupped palms.
“Look at what I got!”
Hishi flushes. A child just avoided most of his wire traps (admittedly, there were targeted at adults and not tiny children, so the height was off) and caught majority of his senbon. The jutsu seals he can’t explain, because he really can’t understand how Genma survived it all. But he’s vaguely proud of Genma. It’s a growing emotion, taking up most of his chest cavity.
“That’s a lot of senbon.” Hishi tells him. “Very impressive.”
“I like sharp things,” Genma says absentmindedly, stroking one of the needles. They’re sharp.
Hishi crouches down and cups Genma’s face in his hands. “But you should take better care of yourself. I don’t want to see you get hurt.” Hishi lets his palm hover over Genma’s cuts, the green chakra seeping in and making the cuts disappear, the skin fully healed.
“I didn’t get hurt though.” Genma points out. “To get hurt, I must feel pain. I didn’t feel any pain. I just got cut, I didn’t get hurt.”
Hishi squishes Genma’s cheeks in between his palms and looks at the boy. “I don’t like seeing you get injured. There.”
Genma stares at the man, before turning away, fiddling with the senbon. He doesn’t like gooey emotions like these, the ones that he can’t really understand. He’s a bit unsure with the situation right now. Weapons are easy to deal with.
He offers the senbon in his hands up for inspection once again, and asks, “can I keep them?”
Hishi blanches a bit, face paling. “You want them?”
“Yeah.” Genma thinks for a while. “And do you have poison, too?”
Hishi doesn’t want to know how Genma even heard of the word poison. Surely there isn’t talk of that at the orphanage. His smile is a little strained this time, but genuine nonetheless. He shrugs in reply. “Let’s leave that for another day. Now we’ve got to get you cleaned up and I have to reset my traps.”
Genma looks up. “Can we play with the traps again tomorrow?”
Hishi is a seasoned ninja, and yet he struggles with the answer. He’s not supposed to break in the face of torture, he shouldn’t be breaking in the face of children. “... We’ll see. You really gave me a shock today, y’know?”
“I know.” Genma says. “Is that bad?”
The kid speaks really well for someone who can’t have had much exposure to the language. “Not really, just a bit hard to take in. When I’ve absorbed everything, we’ll see, okay?”
Genma traces the needle’s edge, places one in his mouth, and lets himself be herded back into the house for a bath. The needle is sharp and pointy-- it draws blood when it pricks against his tongue and the sides of his cheek. He presses it further; the taste of blood is tangy, metallic on his tongue, and familiar.
It would taste better with the spice and sharpness of poison, but he doesn’t say it out. Hishi’s shocked; Genma shouldn’t shock him even further. Not now, that is.
For now, he will contend with using the senbon to test if his pain tolerance is as high as it used to be, and if dismembering himself leaves him sane.