Inari spat out another lungful of blood. He choked on the coughs rising after; knees buckling beneath him. He slid across the mud and blood as he fell, hands reaching out.
Naruto lowered himself carefully onto his ankles beside Inari's hunched form. Resting his forearms across his thighs, he leaned over his childhood friend.
Between swallows, he managed to speak. "They'll come. You have to trust them. Konoha will come."
The sharp scream of metal against metal faded to the back of Inari's mind. He shivered uncontrollably and his eyes fought between sight and blindness.
Six feet of wood, a spear screamed as it whistled into the space between them, brushing by inches from Naruto's nose.
"Come now." Naruto arched his back and shifted - ready to rise. "Fight, Inari." His eyes hard, he raised his head and watched the other end of the battlefield.
"They'll be here."
Inari closed his eyes, and tightened his shaking wrist - fingers digging into the ground. "Naruto .. "
His forehead swept over the dirt, as if in prayer, muscles twitching uncontrollablly.
"I believe.." He swallowed the bile of his throat ".. in you."
What passing-bells for these who die as cattle?
Only the monstrous anger of the guns.
Only the stuttering rifles' rapid rattle
Can patter out their hasty orisons.
No mockeries now for them; no prayers nor bells,
Nor any voice of mourning save the choirs,--
The shrill, demented choirs of wailing shells;
And bugles calling for them from sad shires.
What candles may be held to speed them all?
Not in the hands of boys, but in their eyes
Shall shine the holy glimmers of good-byes.
The pallor of girls' brows shall be their pall;
Their flowers the tenderness of patient minds,
And each slow dusk a drawing-down of blinds.
Anthem for Doomed Youth, WILFRED OWEN (1893-1918)