Characters: Kushina, Mito
Summary: A bitter trade has been made.
Pairings: None
Author's Note: This is a look at Kushina's thoughts just after Mito's death. Needless to say, considerable angst will ensue.
Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto.
Kushina never knew either of her grandmothers—one wasn't an Uzumaki and died in childbirth and the one who was an Uzumaki met her end, young, in battle—so naturally she adopts Mito as one. Mito fits the bill: old, gray and kindly, looking after her when no one else is around to. Kushina loves her in that fierce way that she's capable of and clings to her like a barnacle to stone.
And just like that, Mito is gone.
The story falls into place in familiar patterns. An unjust act and an act of damnation is the process it comes down to. The injustice is Mito's death and Kushina's transformation, and the damnation is Kushina's and Konoha's both. Most of the village doesn't know, but they are stained in Mito's blood. Kushina can see it. They are stained in the blood of their feared and hated protector, and they go on about their business as though nothing has happened.
It makes Kushina sick.
Now, she sits in the tiny bedroom in the little house that is now hers alone, and breathes on the window as the rain slips over the glass, steady and gray. Konoha is crying, but all the tears into world will not wash her clean of blood.
Thunder grumbles directly overhead and Kushina jumps, ignoring the intense pain screaming through her body to draw a blanket from the tatami over her shoulders.
Again, another clap. The thunder is clamorous this time and Kushina lets out a small shriek. Her small, high-pitched, six-year-old voice rises in the gloom. "Mito-sama? Mito-sama!"
No answer.
And she remembers.
Kushina's head slumps against the low windowsill, her long hair spilling to the floor like blood, her whole body melting against the floor.
A bitter trade has been made without Kushina's consent. She has lost Mito—ripped from her small hands, the loss stinging on the skin—and in return she has had forced upon her a terrifying presence. The Kyuubi lies dormant in her belly, sleeping but not dead, waiting for its chance to lift its head and strike.
No "trade" is worth this.
Nothing is worth the feeling of going to a house that is no longer home, and the loneliness that comes when a name is called and nobody answers, will ever answer. Nothing is worth that.
The rain's song is monstrous, and Kushina can not think or feel for the wave of sickness that rises like a black death in her heart.
She's alone now. She always will be.
Nothing is worth—
