Legend of the Valley of the End

Part I

Once upon a quiet time, when the world was young and the people a few, there lived a young man whose eyes were as dark as the moonless night. He was called Sasuke, and a fair young man he was, that his black eyes and raven hair made him look like a proud warrior, though he was not.

Sasuke lived alone in a humble hut, near a waterfall, in a clearing inside a forest, where no man braved to step foot. It was called the Valley of the End, and its name spoke of its purpose. Separating two lands was a waterfall whose waters were never still. Hearsay tells that whoever is unfortunate enough to find this place shall lose whatever thing he holds most dear.

It is with the thought that after losing his brother he could lose no more, that Sasuke decided to settle in this place, where every morning he would wake up to the misty, pale surrounding, the sun never bright nor the sky never blue to his eyes.

His life had been routinely ordinary and dull, and Sasuke was so used to it, that when one day a boy came, he was utterly surprised that he had almost killed him. He had mistaken the boy for a wild animal wandering in the bushes, that upon coming into view Sasuke jumped on him, and held a sharp stone over the boy's head. Realizing seconds later, that he was pinning a human and not an animal down, he lowered his guard.

The boy looking straight into Sasuke's eyes held a questioning expression, yet none of fear. He blinked once or twice, waiting for Sasuke's reaction, and seeing that Sasuke was not going to kill him, he smiled.

"Hi. I'm Naruto," he said in a rough voice, his wide smile gleaming with joy, as if someone finding a friend for the first time.

"Sasuke," was all that Sasuke muttered, still confused with the situation he's in, simply following the flow of the water.

"You have glass in your eyes," Naruto said, and it was the first time Sasuke noticed that the boy's eyes were bright blue.

"Huh, what?" Sasuke said, finally releasing the boy and rubbing his eyes.

The boy chuckled at Sasuke. "That's not it. Don't you know the story of the wicked sprite who made a mirror?"

Naruto took Sasuke's silence for a no, and continued. "It's a mirror that reflects the opposite of what really is, such that when something beautiful is held in front of it, it is reflected ugly."

Naruto pointed to the sky, and Sasuke's eyes followed the boy's hand. "The sprite took it up to the heavens. Way, way, up, that it shattered into a million pieces."

The boy remained looking up to the heavens for a while, and Sasuke noticed his dreamy expression, as if he were soaring the sky himself. When the boy removed his gaze from the sky and turned to Sasuke however, the dreamy look was gone."

"You have it. You have a piece of the mirror in your eyes."

Sasuke's face turned into a scowl. "I have no time for your jokes. Go back home."

Sasuke thought that his life had returned to normal, when the boy had not reappeared in the days that followed, but soon enough the blonde boy with the piercing bright blue eyes came back.

"Sasuke," Naruto greeted casually, as if they had been long time friends. Sasuke just ignored him and continued preparing his lunch.

The boy sat in one corner, watching Sasuke place the fish on top of the fire. He remained there until the fish was cooked, and remained still when Sasuke was licking the last of the meat off the fishbones. He remained fixed in his corner even as Sasuke began feasting on wild berries, but the boy's stomach began rumbling when Sasuke was halfway done.

Looking embarrassed as Sasuke finally looked at him, Naruto just flashed a silly smile. Sasuke sighed as he stood up, and handed Naruto the basket where the remaining wild berries were. As he turned his back, he heard the blonde say, "Sasuke is kind."

As time passed, the boy's visits have become more frequent, and Sasuke found himself cooking for two instead of one. Sasuke soon learned that the boy came from a village near the forest.

"The village is called Konoha, and it has the best ramen. The villagers only cook it around the Feast of the Kyubi during winter, it takes quite a while to prepare."

Naruto talks about a lot of things – about Konoha, about the people, about many things Sasuke has learned to live without. Naruto sometimes talks about the other end of the valley too – if Sasuke had ever wanted to see what's on the other side. Sasuke just tells him that either side would be the same.

From time to time the blonde boy goes back to talking about the glass in Sasuke's eyes. Sasuke had learned to shrug it off, but at one time he heard the boy say, "Maybe if I cry and my tears get into your eyes that glass would melt!"

"That's silly," Sasuke responded.

"It is, right?" Naruto said, thinking that he had once again uttered a stupid idea.

"I wouldn't want you to cry," Sasuke added, quite unaware himself why he had spoken such words. Upon seeing Naruto's smile however, he felt satisfied.

The rainy days came, and just as it was during the sunny season, Naruto kept visiting Sasuke. On one particular day however, when the skies brewed a violent storm, and when Sasuke had a lot of things in his head, Naruto had said something that the raven-haired boy did not like.

"Why is it, that on rainy days like this, the glass in your eyes become so visible?"

Sasuke had thought it best not to answer, but when Naruto had spent the whole afternoon trying to get an answer from him, he finally shot the boy an angry look.

"Why do you keep coming back here? Don't you know what this place is called? It's the Valley of the End! If you keep coming here, you'll lose something precious! So before you do, go back to your own little village and stay there!"

At that moment, Naruto's bright blue eyes had suddenly gone dim, and just before he left Sasuke's hut he said in a low voice, "But I have nothing to lose…"

Naruto did not return after that. Not a week after, nor when the rainy days were over. Upon the boy's absence Sasuke had felt a weight in his chest that grew heavier each day. He had contemplated going to the village of Konoha to look for the boy and had finally arrived at a yes, when Naruto showed at his doorstep.

"I made you some ramen," was Naruto's words when Sasuke opened the door. "As I told you it takes a while to prepare, and I was only lucky that this girl Sakura agreed to help me cook some before the Feast of Kyubi. I was hoping you weren't mad at me anymore"

It was a mixture of excitement, and a wishful longing fulfilled, and perhaps even with the mention of another girl, that Sasuke rushed towards the boy and enveloped the boy in his arms.

"It was also on a rainy day that I had lost my brother," Sasuke said, trying to explain what had long happened. "Please forgive me, I don't want you to leave me."

The blonde responded to the warmth by succumbing to it, and whispering the words, "I want to stay by your side too."

That night they feasted on the ramen that was arduously prepared by Naruto. It was as if life came back to Sasuke when he heard Naruto's stories once more. Though he felt uncomfortable at the mention of the name Sakura, he was somewhat glad that Naruto spoke of someone from Konoha, not from the outsider's point of view anymore, as he had always done.

When the bowls were washed and the table was cleaned, and when Naruto finally grew tired of telling stories, Sasuke led the boy to his bed. As he undressed the blonde whose face had gone red, Sasuke spoke. "You tell me that I have glass in my eyes. A glass that makes the ugly look beautiful, and the beautiful look bad."

He stopped momentarily to place a kiss on Naruto's lips. When they parted he continued, "Yet why is it, that when I look at you, I only see the most precious thing I've ever had?"

Naruto chuckled, just like that day when they first met. He playfully put his finger on Sasuke's chest as he said, "This. It's because you're looking at me with this."

That night when the two had consumed one another, Sasuke lay awake with a smile on his face, looking at the peacefully sleeping blonde. It was also the first night Sasuke had noticed a particular mark on Naruto's stomach. A black spiral tattoo that though incomprehensible to Sasuke, left him feeling uneasy. As his eyes followed the spiral line to its endpoint, he began to shiver. It was just as if he looked into the future, and saw that what awaits them is doom.