Author's Note: It's been a long time since I've written anything, hasn't it? Heh. I guess my life's been pretty hectic, filled with drama at every turn. (Gosh, I feel like I'm in some reality show.) Anyway, I've been reading up on my Naruto, and I'm now almost an official Narutard! . I started this a while ago, but I didn't finish it. Just bear with it.
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Damn you!
Fists driven into wood, slammed again and again. Blood trickling from cuts, seeping into old bandages wrapped to keep the majority in. Splinters shoved deeper and deeper into flesh. Mind reeling. Thoughts approaching unknown corridors of consciousness. Thoughts tearing off old scabs, reopening old wounds.
Damn you!
Sasuke clutched onto a branch that remained on the stump, just barely keeping himself supported. His body was exhausted, but his mind was awake and alive. His memories played back before his dark eyes, forcing him to remember long gone days, to remember them.
His eyes clouded over and he saw his mother standing before him, her black hair waving in the slight breeze. He remembered how she sounded every night when she sent him to bed, when she kissed his forehead.
Such memories did not bother Sasuke. It was what accompanied them
Her lips had touched another forehead each night, her hands had tucked in another body. She had loved another son, and she had been betrayed.
Sasuke breathed heavily, furious with himself for being so weak. He pushed himself off of the tree trunk and continued his barrage of punches. He hardly noticed as sliver after sliver made its way into his flesh. Gritting his teeth, he hit harder and harder with each punch, seeing not a tree, but a face.
The face of Itachi.
Damn you!
More memories, these of a horrible night in a horrible place, now rushed at Sasuke, making him grunt in pain. His eyes looked towards the sky, but instead of the sliver of a moon, he saw the blade of a bloodied katana. A certain special katana.
"Damn you, brother!" Sasuke yelled into the night. He was sweating something horrible now, but he merely snarled and attacked the trunk harder, a crazed smile becoming more and more prominent on his face with every piece of wood that came chipping off.
He found himself tearing his left arm down the trunk, wood trapping itself under his nails. They tore at the skin, and he began to bleed from the nails, but he found he didn't notice. He was already shoving himself away from the tree trunk and crouching over, holding his arm by the wrist, his curse mark burning. His bangs flew wildly in the sudden current, and the sounds of birds filled the night air.
Tearing his eyes up, his Sharingan focused on the tree, on Itachi. A growl forming in his throat, Sasuke let out a cry and charged at the trunk. The Chidori blasted it to razor sharp bits, but Sasuke stayed immobile as the rain of splinters fell. A few cut his face, drawing blood, but Sasuke didn't even flinch.
In his immobile state, he felt something slip and fall to the ground. The sudden absence was enough to cause him to look down and see just what it was. The moon glinted off the metal, causing it to shine in the night, and Sasuke narrowed his eyes. He bent down and picked up his headband, his symbol of being a ninja, and held it limply in his hand.
The headband was what tied him to Konohagakure, what kept him there. It was what tied him to his clan, to his past.
To his weakness.
Grasping the band harder, and moving swiftly from the training field, he felt the curse mark pulse. His Sharingan faded, and he smirked slightly.
It was decided.
If Konoha couldn't give him the strength he needed, then he'd go somewhere that could. He'd seek out the one that offered him apprenticeship. He'd find the one that would make killing Itachi a simple matter. He'd train and train, and eventually, he'd be stronger than everyone, than Itachi, than Naruto.
He'd find Orochimaru, and he'd learn how to avenge his clan.
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Author's note: I know it's not cannon, but it's coming out of a mad writer's block, so please be kind. Please review, and maybe I might write more!
