Meteors, a naruto fanfic

He tosses the sack on the table. Councilors startle, eyes wide and jumping from their seats, as the bag opens and one of the heads starts to roll.

"I have killed them," Obito says. "All of them. You will find that I have disposed of all of your problems."

Obito dumps the heads onto the table without preamble with a sickening thump, and the heads roll unevenly, matted hair and loose gray skin catching on the smooth wood of the table.

The councilors look amongst themselves and Yagura stares back at him, the heads of the eight conspirators rolling obscenely on the table. They are roughly the size of bowling balls and just about as heavy. Fibers of severed nerves and ragged muscle hang from vertebrae like raw meat on a leg of ham, and their eyes are open, opaque. To Obito's amusement, the looks on the faces of the councilors are exactly the same: the same muted horror, the same widening of the whites of the eyes.

"Why?" Yagura says. He has the face of a child but the mind of a man, watching Obito distrustfully. "You have no alliance with the shinobi of the mist. Why go through all these lengths to catch my attention?"

"Because we can be of use to each other," Obito says. Yagura's eyes narrow.

It is a tactical decision, first and foremost: the Akatsuki war machine needed seed money, and the meager offerings from petty jobs aren't enough to stock the war chest that Obito desired. The most expedient way would be to offer his unique set of services, and what better customer was there than a village whose leadership was in constant flux and whose populace was torn in the midst of a civil war?

Then there is the fact that Yagura is a jinchuuriki, an obvious advantage. It is the proverbial killing of two birds with one stone, shoring up the war chest and garnering a tailed beast in the process. That the Blood Mist was also most certainly responsible Rin's death is only an added benefit, and while Obito knows the costs of involving himself in unnecessary conflict, the thought of exacting revenge proves too tempting to refuse.

"Money?" Yagura's advisers sneer. "All you want is money?"

"Of course," Obito says. "Why else would I offer you my services? And I must advise you," Obito says. "You'll find that no one else has this particular skill set. You would be wise to take advantage."

He is being insolent, but Obito knows that. Among the kiri nin, there can be no deals without an element of bravado and arrogant self-aggrandizing. There is a ripple among the crowd. Obito waits patiently for the jinchuuriki to respond.

"And why should I not kill you here, as a murderer of the shinobi of the mist?" Yagura says. "These are our problems. Our dissenters. Why should I let an outsider help?"

"Because I have done what you and your top men could not do," Obito says. "In the span of a few short days, I have wiped out the leaders of their precious resistance. Consider this my gift. I just want you to know that I am available, should you once again require my services."

"How thoughtful," Yagura says, dryly. Obito gives him a little bow, then turns, pulling up the hood of his cloak.

"Wait," Yagura says, and Obito turns.

"There are still more men," Yagura says.

"As I said," Obito says, smoothly. "Should you require further assistance, I will be happy to help. For a small fee, of course."

Yagura is watching him. There is a sharpness to Yagura's eyes that Obito finds easy to manipulate, and Obito waits as Yagura bends an ear to an advisor, who whispers to him, carefully.

"Twelve days," Yagura says. "You have twelve days to deal with the threat. Do as we ask, and we will reward you handsomely. But fail to do so, and you will pay with your life. Do you understand?"

"Of course," Obito says, and Yagura gives him a thin-lipped smile.

xXx

The place where Rin died lies just to the east, a few hours by foot along the outskirts of Kirigakure. There, craggy rocks jut out as if half-hewn from the haggard cliff face of mountains, an empty expanse, as a thick fog settles with the stinging cold. This is where the rebels are now, Yagura's dissenters, and when Obito enters there's nothing but a rush of blurred colors and white noise, and the grayscale of dark that's upended with the sudden starburst of blood.

"Your bloodline limit unneves me," Yagura says, even after Obito keeps his sharingan carefully hidden behind his mask. "What will keep you from turning against me?"

Obito turns. The genocide against bloodline limits was the result of a botched assassination attempt, a bloodline limit shinobi breaking into the palace compound and very near killing the Mizukage in the process. Already a paranoid man, Yagura reacted by walling himself off in his palace, letting no one come within ten paces of him and choosing to sit flanked by weapons and guards, before raining down holy terror and setting in motion the bloodline purges.

But it isn't surprising: jinchuuriki are notoriously unstable, and Obito knows it is this paranoia that makes him very easy to manipulate. But first is the matter of trust and Obito if nothing is a stickler for details.

"I do not desire the Bloody Mist," Obito says. "You will find no safer comrade than I."

Obito watches silently as Yagura nods, and quietly layers a thin genjutsu over his words. Unlike the kyuubi, control of the Mizukage is as easy as controlling any other man, using genjutsu suggestions and subtle manipulation. Controlling the kyuubi was like trying to restrain a wild dog on a fraying leash, and Obito is grateful that the Mizukage is relatively easier.

"Perhaps there are other people you should be worried about," Obito says, and Yagura's head snaps forward, paranoia edging the corners of his eyes.

The next spate of executions do not surprise anyone: Yagura has always been a ruthless man, despite the youthfulness of his boyish looks, and when he one day orders the execution of allhis advisors, no one so much as bats an eye.

Obito watches. From the sidelines, he watches as Yagura orders the finishing blows, killing the five councilors who witnessed Obito's arrival in the first place. Bodies roll, blood spurting from wounds in their chests, and quietly Obito fingers the bandage in his pocket, saying nothing and watching the thick syrup of blood pooling on the marble floor.

xXx

He's had the bandage for as long as he can remember: old and frayed, the once pristine whiteness is now tinged with dirt and old blood, the tough canvas cloth softened through years of repeated rubbing between calloused thumbs and forefingers.

He doesn't know why he keeps it. It serves no purpose other than the sentimental reminder of a time when Rin had bandaged up his hand. But he was young then, and foolish, and at the time it seemed to be of utmost importance, saving that scrap of bandage and keeping it in his pocket like a talisman, a charm to keep everything else at bay.

He keeps it now, stuffed deep inside his left-hand pocket. Quietly he fingers the rough cloth and looks outward, rubbing the material between the pads of his thumb and index finger. It is more out of habit than anything else; he watches the fog roll and how the thin streaks of watery sunlight crest the horizon, before stuffing the bandage back in his pocket. He turns quietly, fixing his mask and pulling on the hood of his cloak.

The day Rin had bandaged his hand, Obito had cut his hand during a sparring session with Kakashi: he had just narrowly missed the trajectory of a flying shuriken, blocking it with his palm and ducking to the side.

"What did you do?" Rin said, and she grabbed Obito by the arm before he could say anything, staring at the huge cut on his left hand.

They sat on the training bench, Rin holding his hand in her lap and wrapping his wound with white bandages. At the time, Obito was red-faced and embarrassed, but Rin taped the bandages expertly and gave his hand a satisfied squeeze.

"You shouldn't pretend when you get hurt," Rin said.

And then, "Remember that I'm watching you."

He kept the bandage on for two days before Kakashi pointed out his dressings were getting soiled, they needed to be changed, and it wasn't until Kakashi left that Obito discreetly fished out the used bandages from the trash, peeling back the sticky gauze and the parts that were saturated with blood.

He cut the clean parts off, which was still long enough to loop around his hand twice, and he stuffed it in his pockets. Rin had given it to him. Some men carried photos and others carried locks of their sweetheart's hair, but Obito was happy enough to have this memento, a reminder that Rin actually cared about him.

Now he fingers the piece of fabric in his pocket, rolling it between his thumb and index finger and frowning a little at his handiwork: Yagura's top advisor, mutilated, neck snapped and contusions blooming over his chest, while Yagura himself slowly comes back to consciousness.

His scar hurts, but Obito ignores it, kneeling beside Yagura and pulling him up from the ground.

"What...what happened?" Yagura says. Obito bows.

"You killed him," Obito says.

"W-what?"

"I tried to stop you," Obito says, conversationally. "But you could not be reasoned with."

Yagura's eyes widen.

It is not enough to control a man. They must be broken, their spirit and will trampled down until they can be molded like mounds of clay. Already Yagura is remembering the blackouts; periods of time where he cannot remember. A normal man will stay forever in his genjutsu but Yagura is a jinchuuriki. He will soon realize just how much he is being controlled.

"I didn't," Yagura says. He slowly sinks to his knees. "I couldn't. He was my best friend-"

"Look at your hands," Obito says, and Yagura sees them: the desperate scratch marks, how his adviser had clawed at him, inflicting those wounds. "Is the feeling returning to your fingers?"

And Yagura looks at him, horror-struck.

It does not take much. Yagura's mind breaks, snapping under the weight of his horror and guilt, and quietly Obito steps forward and tips Yagura's head back. He plies a thin layer of genjutsu and is pleased to see how his eyes roll back into the sockets, the tension in his body dissipating and going slack. Yagura's body is a house with its walls collapsed on itself, brittle bones and taut skin, and soon enough the hairline fracture of Yagura's fragile mental state gives way and weakens, until everything opens, the cave of Yagura's mind gaping like a torn out eye.

Just beneath the surface, Obito can see Yagura's chakra dampen, the chakra of the Three-Tails simmering quietly.

"Do you remember?" Obito says, and Yagura, the doll, nods listlessly.

"Yes."

And there is nothing but Obito's words from Yagura's lips, doll's eyes, fixed and unmoving, cold gray skin, bloodless and pale.

xXx

His scar is hurting again. Above him, the sky has opened up into a downpour, and the cold dampness of his surroundings aggravates the neuropathic pain.

"Tobi!" White Zetsu says, and he sees the way Obito is guarding himself, the balanced tension in his neck and shoulders. "Oh? Tobi what's wrong? Is your face hurting again?"

"It is none of your concern," Obito says, and Black Zetsu stares at him, as if in rebuke.

"You have been gone a long time. How long is this supposed to take?"

"As long as it requires," Obito says. "Nagato already knows of my plans: I am confident he will execute them."

"You are wrong," Black Zetsu says. "They act as freedom fighters. They take part in skirmishes in which they have no involvement.

They have not yet captured bijou, nor have they made any plans to."

"That is fine for now," Obito says. "There is not enough money to fund such missions. Furthermore, I have my hands on the Three Tails. I am only waiting for the right opportunity to exploit him."

"Attaboy, Tobi!" White Zetsu says, but Black Zetsu raises a hand.

"We must not delay," Black Zetsu says. "You have raised enough money already. Why not take the Three Tails now?"

"It will raise their suspicions," Obito says. "If their Mizukage disappears, they would have every reason to suspect me, and by extension, the Akatsuki. We are not strong enough to weather that threat."

"There were talks of a coup, Black Zetsu says. "Why did you not dispose of the Three Tails then?"

Obito stops.

It was Kisame who warned him about Zabuza, and Obito had rewarded him well for that particular tidbit of information. But now Black Zetsu is watching him, and Obito knows, just as well as Black Zetsu knows, that the coup was ample opportunity to leave: he could have had Yagura "escape." The villagers would believe him to be alive while Obito could transport him to the Akatsuki at his leisure. No one would miss him, a deposed kage and tyrant, both.

The mask aggravates him; rain falls, sliding down the sides of the smooth wood, and it's all Obito can do from reaching inside and sooth the pin-prick stinging with his hand.

"I do not answer to you," Obito says. "The Moon's Eye Plan will take effect. It will just time. Patience. And I promise you, your precious Madara will be brought back."

He lets his words linger, sharingan turning, as if he could cut daggers with his eye.

He has bled their country dry. He has funneled money into the Akatsuki's war chest and ruthlessly killed any and all who opposed him. He had taken particular glee in this, because they killed Rin and because this had furthered his plans.

And yet. This is not what he wanted. He has taken a small measure of revenge, but he knows his ultimate goal is still much higher.

"Just remember," Black Zetsu says.

"We are always watching."

"Then watch," Obito says, throwing Rin's words back at them, then watching with satisfaction as they meld back into the wall.

xXx

"Mizukage-sama! Please!"

The man screams, the chains above him rattling as the guards sear the hot iron into the man's flesh. He is the man directly responsible for the attack on Kakashi and Rin. Months of careful research and planning have brought him to this, and Obito relishes in his vengeance. The smell of smoke and charred skin is sickly sweet in Obito's nostrils, but the thin genjutsu net keeps anyone from seeing him; they see only Yagura, impassive and unmoving, as the man who likely engineered Rin's death screams out and writhes.

"Please," the man says. "Mercy!" Another stab; the man cries out again, agonized. Obito lets Yagura step forward.

Blood and vomit trickle from the corners of the man's lips, which are cracked and peeling at the sides, and a thin sheen of sweat shines from the man's head. Slowly the man's mouth and face begin to move, a paroxysm of pain and supplication, and his lips twist into a grotesque parody of human speech.

"Mizukage-sama," the man says. He snivels. Wretched human being. "Please."

"Kill him," Yaguara says, and the man's eyes widen.

"Mizukage-sama! Wait-"

The sword slices through him like a satchel of wine. Blood spatters onto the paving stones and drips from the wounds in his belly, the puddle of blood catching the light of the torch like a reflection on water.

His scar hurts. Nothing makes it go away.

xXx

There are talks of a rebel fighter, a woman with two bloodline limits. Terumi Mei, a survivor of the bloodline purges. Quietly Obito makes note of his newest threat, and decides it would be prudent to let her win.

She attacks the compound. Obito waits while Yagura's men try to put up a fight, before slipping away in darkness, taking Yagura with him. The former Mizukage is quiet and surprisingly docile, and when he removes the Three Tails, it is surprisingly easy to control.

The Kyuubi was not easy to control. Unlike Madara, who broke and rode the Kyuubi at will, Obito only had one eye, and he could barely restrain the beast, who was newly released and thrashing for freedom. The Kyuubi reared and bucked and thrashed against his control, and it took all of Obito's powers to keep the Kyuubi subdued. Afterwards, when the whole debacle with Minato and the re-sealing occurred, Obito removed his mask and was surprised to feel it, the thin trickle of blood rolling down the corner of his eye.

The Three Tails, however, is a completely different matter, and Obito has no problems at all subduing it. Around him, the monster groans and heaves and thick waves of chakra are sucked up into the dark; it's only then that Yagura's body falls, limp and lifeless, careening against the jutting rocks and landing with a dull thud.

"Are you satisfied?" Obito says, and Black Zetsu says nothing, melting into the walls.

xXx

There are talks of genocide. Half-whispered rumors swirling among the ANBU nin. Obito has eyes and ears reaching the farthest corners of the world, and he is not surprised when he hears the Uchiha are threatening to rebel, and the Leaf is considering taking action.

Konoha. Even now, the name sticks in his chest like swallowed pieces of old dried bread, and it incenses him, the threat of violence against his clan.

"Where are you going?" Black Zetsu says, and Obito throws him a look.

"Konoha," Obito says, and he fixes his gaze forward.

He plans on making war. Tear down the village that killed Rin and would wipe out his clan. "The Kyuubi is there," Obito says. White Zetsu smiles and Black Zetsu doesn't say anything, just watches as Obito pulls on his traveling cloak.

xXx

He is intercepted by the unlikeliest of people.

The morning is cool and the sky is still dark when Uchiha Itachi finds him, and Obito can't help but notice the dark, desperate look in Itachi's eyes, sharingan turning like slow-burning coals. "Will you help me?" Itachi says.

Obito looks at him. He is, as all Uchiha are, a beautiful child, long neck curved like the edge of a scythe. The sharingan peers out from wisps of bangs in the murky half-light, and silently, Obito counts the ways in which he could destroy him.

"You are asking me," Obito says, slowly, "If I will help you destroy our clan."

It is not a question. Itachi nods.

"Yes," Itachi says.

"Why?" Obito says.

"I wish to challenge myself," Itachi says. "To measure my capacity. What better way than to challenge Konoha's elite? And I'm sure you have many grievances against our clan."

"You will have to think of a better lie," Obito tells him, and Itachi's eyes widen imperceptibly. "A would-be psychopath would not have the foresight to ask for help.

How old are you?" Obito says.

"Fourteen."

"I see."

Leaves rustle. A crow flies, its feather floating silently down.

xXx

He stands at the edge of a cliff face and looks down on his handiwork. Drenched in moonlight, the Uchiha quarter burns. Smoke rises. Orange flames lick the violet sky, and it almost looks beautiful. A world destroyed and remade.

When it was over, Itachi had staggered and retched and vomited into the river when he thought no one was looking, but Obito saw everything. Saw him crying in front of his parents and saw him spare his brother's life. Itachi had that same look as he does now, haggard and drained, both eyes red and puffy. But when Obito approached, Itachi looked at him with a studied hardness, face bone-white against the dark line of trees.

"So?" Obito said, and he could not keep out the bitterness in his voice. The mocking. "Did you measure it? Your capacity?"

And Itachi said nothing. Obito watched as the boy's shoulders shook. An internal struggle to keep control.

Rage. It comes and crashes down on him like the weight of a thousand boulders, and he wants nothing more than to snap, break, tear the world that would have a child burn up in the center of phoenix flame, the injustice of forcing a fourteen year-old boy to shoulder the elders' manifold sins.

He pulls out Rin's bandage. He twists the fabric tight around his knuckles, wrapping it twice and pulling hard, until the edges start to cut into the flesh of his hand.

xXx

That night, Obito lays out the things he has kept with him since childhood:

The first is the bandage. Hopelessly sentimental, but he allows himself the indulgence.

The second is a small action figurine his parents had gotten him, their first and only gift. They had died a few months later, in the war.

The third is a picture of Rin, meticulously cut from the remnants of their team photograph, which Obito had destroyed in a fit of confusion and despair: afterwards, when the drumming of his heartbeat had settled and his vision was no longer cloudy, he spent hours on the floor piecing back the ripped pieces and taping it together, much to the Zetsu's amusement.

The fourth is a note, which Obito used to keep tucked away behind the picture frame of the team photo. It was right after he had gotten beat up by Gai during his first attempt at chuunin exams: he had been embarrassed and sulking and he didn't want to talk to anyone after that. He found it folded up and shoved unceremoniously in his locker, written in bright blue pen:

Dear Obito,

That was probably the worst fight
I've ever seen, but that's okay :3
You never gave up.

That's your best quality. Keep at it
and please cheer up :-)
- Rin

And she signed her name with a heart next to it.

At the time, Obito had been torn between feeling mortified and ecstatic, because Rin took the time to write to him but also because she noticed how much he sucked, but he kept the note anyway, conflicting emotions aside.

Now Obito spreads the note out on the ground, re-reading it. The note has been folded and re-folded so many times the creases are starting to tear into the paper, and the edges of the note are soft and careworn. Carefully, Obito lays them all out in a row, the note, the bandage, the photo and the figurine. He lays them out with quiet reverence, pausing to touch either the little figurine or the note or the pieced-together photo.

He starts a modest fire. In the flames, the edges of the photo and the note blacken and curl, the figurine begins to bubble up on itself, melting slowly with dripping plastic. It's only after some time that Obito decides to keep the bandage, plucking it out from the flame and smoothing the charred fabric, which has begun to curl and fray under his fingers.

The fire crackles. Embers rise on the up-current, kissing the nighttime air, and Obito watches, fire reflected in his eyes, and wonders when his heart too will shrivel up like so much paper.

xXx

Zetsu reports the Akatsuki's movements. They're fighting a war, then they're fighting another war. They act as soldiers of fortune, hired guns, fighting the good fight, an obvious holdover of Nagato's good intentions. Most if not all the missing nin on the Akatsuki's roster are doing it for the money, but Nagato runs the organization like they're Ame Freedom Fighters, furthering political agendas and overthrowing tyrannical rule.

"Why has this not been done?" Obito asks, when Nagato and Konan meet him on the outskirts of Amegakure, rain falling like battering rams against the side of the cave. "In all the years of the Akatsuki's service, and you have only one bijou: the Three Tails, which I had captured myself."

"I apologize," Nagato-as-Pein says, the Tendo Pein's purple eyes sliding up to meet his. "There is much injustice in this world. We only seek to rectify it."

"You are floundering," Obito says. "There is no saving the trash that's collected on this world. I seek to end it," Obito says, and he turns, a sharp rebuke:

"Get me the bijou, and I swear to you, this will end all war."

Itachi joins the Akatsuki, thinking he's infiltrated Obito's organization. Pein may not know, and neither do the other members, but Obito is well aware of Itachi's furtive messages, sent by hawk to Danzou by secret.

It does not matter. To control the bijou needs a working pair of sharingan, and Itachi is a missing nin. He will do nothing to jeopardize his cover.

xXx

He claps his hands and spins into a pirouette, laughs loudly and proclaims some singsong nonsense about how killing thirty men was a lot of fun, but Deidara is horror-struck and Kisame is standing, silent, and the thick, sickly smell of blood and bodies rises up from the ground.

"Why do you act like that?" Nagato asks him one day, when they're standing alone at the mouth of the cave.

"Because you are the leader," Obito says. "I cannot have them suspecting me."

He does not tell him that acting the fool allows him to keep a close eye, and the Moon's Eye Plan goes back on track, and the next day, Itachi and Kisame drag in another bijou.

That night, he looks at himself in the mirror. His face is pale and his eyes are rimmed with black circles, and the scars on his face are still angry, jagged. Uneven patches of skin sewn together and knitted to bone, splayed outward like a crater of broken rock, and silently he wonders if Rin were to see him, if she'd be afraid.

xXx

This is how he imagines it:

Small hands would come to touch the back of his head, coming close to his hunched figure sitting on the bed. She would be standing. Her body would be a dark shape against the moonlight of the window, and she would stand close beside him, letting him bow his head to touch her chest. They would stay like that for a moment, Rin's hands on the nape of Obito's neck, his forehead against her sternum, eyes closed and nudging his cheek against the soft space between her neck and shoulder.

Dear Obito,

That was probably the worst fight I've ever seen, but that's okay.

You never gave up.

That's your best quality.

Keep at it and please cheer up.

And it feels like this: a gentle palm at the back of his neck.

A warm hand, comforting and squeezing the back of his shoulder.

xXx

He is furious. Nagato is dead and Konan has defected, and Obito just sits and seethes with a slow-boiling rage.

"Tobi? What's wrong?"

He kills the Zetsu without even blinking, neck snapping and body slamming against the wall with a dull thud.

xXx

The fight with Konan does not go as he had planned.

Rain falls, and Obito stands, water rolling off his torn cloak and shoulders. His scar hurts and the ache is deep-seated and familiar, and reflexively he reaches his left hand in his pocket, to finger the scrap of fabric tucked in there.

But there is nothing. Obito's eyes widen a moment, when he realizes he must have lost the bandage in the explosion.

After the killing spree in Kirigakure, after Obito had spent the night crying into Rin's body, he dragged himself to the cave where the Zetsus were staying, and asked if he could take a bath. His body was sweaty and sticky and old dried blood stuck within the crevices of scars, and Obito longed to stand beneath the comforting spray of warm water.

He looked at himself in the mirror. Scars marred the right side of his face, and his one eye was bloodshot, hair falling over his shoulders in matted curls. Without the scar, Obito had the exact likeness of Uchiha Madara: the same gaunt face, the same tired expression. The same bruises making dark circles under his eyes.

He cut his hair in the sink with the blade of a rusted knife, yanking out fistfuls of hair and letting them fall around him. One harsh cut. Another. Tufts of hair fell in large clumps on the floor and sink, and Obito hacked it off unevenly, almost violently, angry clumps of hair sticking along the sweat of his forehead and face.

Because she was dead, she was not with him. He thought of cold skin and wide, wet eyes; her body, a heavy weight in his arms, bent and broken like a torn up doll's.

Warmth. It fills the back of his one good eye and fills his vision with a cloudy haze, and it's as if the events of the last few years finally spills over: because his body is battered and his soul is split, and her bandage is torn away from him, like a gouged-out eye or a broken limb, the hole in his heart that will never fully heal.

xXx

Her gravestone is smooth, brushed free of the falling snow that has started to settle on the ground. It is the first and last time Obito will visit her here, standing over her nameplate in his mask and traveling cloak. Visitors have just left flowers here, the petals glistening in a darkness that seems suffused with lonely starlight. His Rinnegan turns, remembering.

Obito has seen much. He has seen armies rise and nations fall, the drum-beat cadence of civilizations booming and bursting like burnt out stars, and he reminds himself that there is no pain. Only the clarity of purpose to light his way.

In the cold, his scar aches. Quietly, Obito adjusts his mask, letting the tips of his fingers trace the edges of pitted scars, before pulling up the hood of his travelling cloak, his sharingan spinning, the swirl of the kamui teleporting him far, far away.

end.