Chapter 627… Just… Chapter 627. Among other things, Kishimoto flipped off his female readership again, and now I'm angry, not just because of that, but because I was honestly hoping that when Karin got back she'd want nothing to do with Sasuke, she'd be completely over him, and all she'd want to do is punch him in the face and leave. But no. Kishimoto just couldn't resist the urge to flip off his female readership. Again.

But once you get past the meta-level for why Karin went right back to being a clingy fan girl, when you look at it as her being a person with actual agency, it's depressing. Really, really depressing, because Karin is starting to read as someone extremely vulnerable to domestic abuse. So here is my attempt to showcase her thought process, in my typical fashion.

I own nothing.

She'd told herself that when she saw him again, she would be stronger than this. That she'd scream at him, maybe spit at him, maybe even try to land a blow on him (Though Karin doubts she could land a blow on Sasuke, all things considered). After all, the last time they had met, Sasuke had very nearly killed her. He had told her that she was worthless and a burden, and he had meant it. Karin could tell that he meant it. He let her know exactly what he thought of her.

Lying there on the bridge, bleeding, dying, nearly dead, Karin had told herself that she was done with him too. That no matter how much she cared about him, no matter how much she liked him, no matter how much she wanted to jump his bones, that she wouldn't have anything more to do with him. He was poison, he was going to kill her, and Karin was smarter than that.

She's been angry at him for so long. She's thought up all the things she was going to say. She even knows what she planned to do once she had said her piece and tried to punch him in his pretty face. Karin was just going to walk away. Where, she doesn't know, but she was going to turn her back on Sasuke, and never look back again.

And yet, here I am again.

All of her resolve had shattered like so much fragile glass upon seeing him. All of her strength had melted away, as Karin fell right back into the slot she had occupied before Sasuke tried to kill her, before he had started showing the darkness inside of him.

Fawning. Sugar-mouthed. Clingy.

That's what she is around Sasuke. That's what she's always been around Sasuke. It's what she'd resolved to stop being around Sasuke, but apparently just couldn't manage.

Karin has always been conscious of this, of how her behavior changes whenever she's around Sasuke and there's no need to be serious, to be the one who keeps a cool head in a bad situation. Back when there was no need to, she never gave it much thought, and in the jail cell here in Konohagakure, she tried not to think of it at all, the same way she tried not to think about Sasuke at all except for how much she hated him. But now, when she's gone right back to fawning over him like some… some… some lovelorn puppy, gone right back to clinging to him despite all of her resolve to be better than this, she can't help but think about it.

Why am I doing this? She wonders, recoiling at the image she gets of herself. Why do I keep doing this to myself? Why am I always this weak, clingy little red-haired bimbo who has to latch on to Sasuke like a leech? Why?

I have a scar on my chest the size of a tennis ball. He put it there. He did this. He tried to kill me. She swallows hard, a hot lump in her throat—no, don't cry, do not cry, not over him, never over him. He did, though. He really did try to kill me. He was going to kill me. I was useless to him, and he just threw me away like you throw away the trash. Who goes back to that?

He's not sorry. He's not sorry that he did this to me. He might claim that he's sorry, but he's probably just saying that because he needs a tracker. Probably the only reason he was ever sorry to start with is because trackers aren't easy to find. He doesn't care about me. He proved that in a way that was impossible for me to ignore. Who goes back to that?

Who but the most hormonal, weakest-willed woman goes back to that?

Honesty burns. Honesty drowns. Karin looks at herself, really looks at herself, and she hates what she sees. Hates how she can't even conquer her own caring and desire for a heartless boy. Hates how she's fallen into a pit that she can't climb out of, that the walls are so slick and smooth that she can't climb out of it. She's always known that people see her as weak for the way she acts around Sasuke, for how blatant and obvious her attraction to him is, and she never thought of herself as weak, until now.

Karin never thought she could be so weak, until now.

But she is. That must be what it is. She's just too weak to resist the current, the drag from below in the water. Desire is like a riptide that drags you below the surface of the water, when the person you desire is not kind or caring towards you. Desire is poison and drowning when the object of your desire is cruel and heartless. Eventually, Karin is going to drown. She's going to get dragged under the surface of the water, and not be able to claw her way back up again. Eventually, Sasuke will get tired of having to hang around with a "useless burden" and try to kill her again. This time, he'll probably succeed too.

All of this, Karin knows. She can see all of it clearly, and hates herself. She can see the trap, but can't keep from falling into it again.

Because what is Sasuke? A pretty face? A hot body? Some broken thing she thought she could fix? (Maybe someone who had gone through the same things at Orochimaru's hands as she had, and made no comment about the scars on her limbs.) Certainly not a future. Of all the things Karin associated Sasuke with, the future was never one of them. And all of that has gone away now, in the face of the fact that he was willing to kill her.

But she can't keep away. Even knowing that he's either going to get her killed or cut out the middleman and kill her himself, she can't keep away. Must be the goddamned pheromones, Karin muses, the last bit of humor she can muster inside of herself, before humor goes away, and all she can see is this:

She's sinking again, and can't find it in herself to swim back up to the surface.