Title: Glass Tears -- Chapter one. Numb.
Summary: Naruto has his own secret mission, to fix this pain in his heart. WIP, Several pairings will be involved, main being Gaara and Naruto, though not limited to. People don't go through life with just one relationship, now do they?
Disclaimer: Kishimoto owns the characters. I just made little voodoo doll copies of them to act out my every whim. And so I don't get lonely on those cold nights. Don't give me that look.
Warnings: Multiple relationships will develop, gasp! Some, well most involve boy on boy love. Don't like, well, than don't read? Why are you even here in the first place?
Numb. He clenched his hand against his chest, his mind grasping at words to describe the sensation spreading through his chest. Yet, his simplistic vocabulary could only grasp one word, numb. The feelings slowly seeping away, fading into light tingles, until they were no longer distinguishable. Like that irritating numbness he got when he sat on his foot for too long, cutting the circulation off enough that his nerves decided to go on vacation. There was even the ignorance of direction, where he had to glare at the defying muscles and concentrate until he could move them again. Only, it wasn't movement that faltered before him. It was feeling. He was numb to feeling. Unable to turn up his lips into a smile, unable to bring that shine to his eyes. He concentrated hard on the cold inside his chest, trying to find the center of it; his fist clenched tightly, narrow fingers gripping bronzed skin. Nothing. It was not a battle wound. When a kunai shoves its way uninvited through layers of flesh and bundled nerves, it hurts; it's a sharp pain that shoots up following the nerve paths to the very base of the spinal cord. It's strong, fast, and stings. It's definite. It has a beginning and an end. Besides, if the pain became too much, the body fights it off. Numbs it. Yet, that sort of deadness was a relief. A break from the pain. This was different. Wasn't it?
Naruto lifted his other hand from the cool grass held them together at his chest, and rolling onto his side, his legs pulled up as tight as he could against him in a position that could only be referred to as fetal. Not one a shonobi should be in. Nonetheless, he hoped that maybe if he curled up tight enough the soft earth around him would reach up and swallow him in. He stared with such an intensity he usually saved for those that threatened his important people at a few blades of hopelessly innocent grass that nearly swooned and wilted under the heat of his eyes. Though slowly they blurred as the denied tears welled in his eyes, the numbness that stretched the void of his chest slowly pulsing. It hurt, this lack of feeling, more than anything had ever hurt him before. More than the hate, more than the loneness that had filled his childhood, because, even that would be a relief, something to feel, painful or not. This was killing him, and he desperately called out in the silence without words for help, just to feel something, to … that was it wasn't it. He wouldn't admit it to himself, but that was it. To feel human, because if he had emotions of a human, maybe, just maybe they'd cancel out the inhumanness of that demon locked inside him. Naruto blinked back the traces of tears, already drying as the cold spread through his chest to the rest of his body.
Where the hell did this come from? Naruto had been lazily sprawled under the setting sun after a hard day of training. His jacket laying open under him, shirt pulled up to his arm pits, letting the warmth of the last rays soak into his lightly bronzed skin. His mind had been free to wonder, and as he had often, found himself lost among his little collection of happy memories. He had smiled widely, for he had happy memories. There was a new honesty to that trademark smirk of his he wore plastered across his face. A true happiness tied into it under the surface. No longer was that mask fake. Yet, why did he suddenly feel so numb inside? This new sort of pain spreading through him. No, it wasn't new he realized. It was all too familiar. A painful reminder that his life wasn't always filled with those late night ramen meals with Iruka-sensei, that rare smile Sakura flashed him that had turned butterflies in his stomach, and even the almost sibling rivalry he shared with Sasuke. No, this feeling clenching at his chest painfully reminded him that dark and so utterly alone period in his past had been real, not just a past nightmare that he sometimes secretly let himself believe.
Naruto didn't get it. That time may have been real, but it was over. He had those people, precious to him, a reason for living. Yet, here he was, brooding, stuck with a nightmare lack of feeling not all that unfamiliar, and--he was brooding. Why was he, Naruto, brooding? No that was not something the future Hokage did, that delicate task was left for the ever-apt ice princess Sasuke. There was a sign something was off, normally Naruto would of taken the time to appreciate the juicy nickname he'd just come up with, yet hardly paid attention. Sighing, Naruto stood up; wincing from tensed muscles, he didn't remember telling to tighten. They'd have to work on their communication skills later.
Naruto was not a thinking man. He didn't waste time formulating plans; he just got up and did it. He was headstrong. Ready to kick the needed ass until said subject either got some sense knocked into them or was knocked out of the picture. He preferred the first, while he didn't make a display gloating over it; he rather liked it he made people believe again. It made him feel worthy, useful. That he'd in some way, no matter how small, made someone reach again for those fading dreams. He'd only wished it were so easy for himself. Sure no one would ever believe you if said that Naruto had ever faltered in his quest for the ultimate of acknowledgements, but you'd be more dead on than one of the remaining two Uchihas with a handful of shurkins. Under that plastered on grin lay a mess of emotions and fears and doubts tangled and jumbled enough to rival those sunny locks he sported. Naruto may be known for his denseness, but even the thickest walls cradle soft and broken in areas, cracked from the stresses and harshness life so casually dished out every waking minute.
A cold wind, coming with the recent setting of the sun bit at Naruto's bear arms, and pulled him enough out of his thoughts to drape his coat over his shoulders. His mind was already aching from a flood of incoherent thoughts, so he simply let his feet carry him, looking rather unNaruto-like, his usual energy and sway hidden under a lost and dazed stagger in the world of thoughts. Years of no set bed times and an relentless urge to be on the move had left Naruto with a rather well versed and accurate mental map of the layout of Kohona, as well as a nice list of places he could walk to blindfolded and at kunai point without so much as break of sweat, much less a thought. Not that there was a high likelihood of him being forced to make his way blindly to his favorite ramen restaurant or that over look of the Hokage carvings in the mountains he loved, but it proved useful at times like this where he didn't have thoughts to spare about useless things like which direction to go in. Oddly enough, Naruto broke out of his squirming mind to find himself staring at a familiar stone monument. Carved into the cool stone were the names of all the nin that died in service of their village. However, his hazy sky blue eyes quickly focused on another monument, something so much smaller, but with just as much meaning to him. A set of three wooden posts, worn and jutting out of the ground. Where Team seven had began. Where several times in the past Naruto found himself lightly touching the smooth stump under cool moonlight, just to reassure himself that it was real. That it had not been a dream his sad and lonely little heart had made up for him in an attempt to remain sane.
Naruto reached out a slender hand, the pads of two of his fingers lightly brushing over the middle block. The one he'd been tied to after trying to eat the lunches by himself. The one were both Sasuke and Sakura had humbly, well, in his mind at least, offered to share his lunch. The one that they'd left him tied to for half that afternoon after passing Kakashi's test. A small smile curled at the edge of his lips, but one that winced and faded at a familiar low and icy voice cut through his thoughts.
"What the hell are you doing here dobe?" Sasuke stepped forward toward him from under the shadow of the very tree he had once been hanging irritated and upside down from. His hands relaxed, his stance defiant as if to all the world, and he stared at Naruto. The kitsune couldn't help but wince slightly at that tone, something he regretted immediately due to the Uchiha's smug and approving chuckle. Sasuke enjoyed making the unruly blonde cringe, with an entirely cruel pleasure, and he carefully waited for the boy to snap at him, ready to retort right back.
Much to Sasuke's surprise, Naruto remained silent and merely pulled his hand back to his side and turned slightly were he stood, his back still to his rival, but head cocked enough to see him. Sasuke's face may have remained emotionless, though the edge of smug smirk uncurled slightly in the hints of a frown. Naruto was Naruto, reliable, strong, not that the Uchiha pride in him would even admit upon threat of death, but Naruto was something you could rely on to be his loud obnoxious self. Sasuke wasn't sure what he hated more, seeing the blonde haired imp like this or the fact that he cared, either way, he resolved to not let him brood, and helped out the best way he knew how.
The back of his fingers flicked rather sharply against the side of the brats head. "Yo, snap out of it idiot. You look sick or something." With that, he shoved his hands back in his pocket and turned away.
That was enough to snap the boy out of his thoughts and in a delayed reaction his hand went to the attacked scalp and he snapped back at his rival, inside slightly grateful for the escape. There was something serious and heavy on his mind, only he couldn't figure out what it was. "Bastard, what the hell you'd do that for!"
Sasuke smirked, seeing the heat return to his rival. "Cause you were off in la-la land like a complete idiot, and I can't be seen with such an inept teammate, now can I?"
"Why you-" Naruto threw a fist, which Sasuke easy dodged. It was a lame and pathetic way of saying, 'yeah yeah, I'm alright now, thanks', but it got the message through. As did the sudden loud and demanding rumbling of Naruto's stomach, painfully reminding him he hadn't eaten since morning, and the last rays of the sun had already hid themselves round the edges of the sky. Naruto stopped and pondered his stomach a moment before fixing his jacket and grinning wickedly at Sasuke. "Ichiraku's?"
"Dobe." Sasuke muttered in a half sigh. He bounded back fast, which put Sasuke at ease he supposed. Sasuke quickly headed back towards the restaurant, it wasn't a bad idea, he hadn't eaten in a while either. Naruto rubbed his head sheepishly and bounded after him, though the strange numbness in his chest was not about to be fixed as easily as the hungry pining of his stomach.
A/N: This is like, my first fanfic, ever, and the first chapter might be short or what not, but I'll have the next up with in a day or so, see, I lack what is commonly known as a life, and will therefore be there to spit out chapters at a rather quick paste. If you take the time to read this, please, just drop a simple comment telling me that someone actually read it. It'll make me update faster too. 333.