Operation: Mindcrime
Summary: Amidst the turmoil of New York's inner city streets, a young junkie finds himself interred in a mental ward, accused of horrific crimes. Not knowing whether he's alive and dreaming or dead and remembering, young Sasuke fights to understand how it all started, and how he wound up here, lost and alone forever.
Prologue: I Remember Now...
AN: This story is a loose fusion between Naruto and the Queensrÿche concept album Operation: Mindcrime. This is a work of fiction that just so happens to have a disturbing resemblance to reality. All publicly recognized properties in this work are property of their respective owners, and no copyright infringement is intended.
"Dr. Davis, telephone please. Dr. Davis, telephone please," rang out over the loudspeaker amidst the cacophony of the busy hospital floor. Nurses and doctors scurried about, busy worker bees in the crowded halls of this hall of healing.
One nurse among the many marched through the confusion towards a quieter and more secluded wing of the hospital. The blue-eyed blond nurse whistled a quiet tune while she walked, a sweet melody in time with the sharp tap tap of her low heel shoes on the hard tile floor. With each step, her blond pony-tail bobbed merrily. "Dr. Blair, Dr. Blair, Dr. J. Hamilton, Dr. J. Hamilton" came over the PA, but she paid it no heed. She had more important, more personal duties to perform. Swishing a long forelock of hair out of her face, she opened a door to a dark, cold room.
In the room, a single patient lay in bed, drifting between consciousness and unconsciousness. It was hard to tell in the low twilight, but he was twitching uncomfortably in his bed. The black haired, fair skinned young man smelled of cold, putrid sweat. "Detoxing apparently..." the nurse mused.
The sole light in the room came from a small television, tuned to the local broadcast channel. The newscaster spoke with a clear, educated Manhattan accent: "... the Soviets. In other news, the bizarre murders of political and religious leaders that have shocked the city over the last few months seem to have ended as suddenly as they began. No terror groups have claimed responsibility for the slayings, but police have a suspect in custody under observation at a state hospital. His indenity is being with held pending futher investigation. Sports and weather next—click"
As the news unfolded from the TV, the young nurse chastised the barely conscious patient: "It's ten minutes past curfiew, why are you still up? Hello? Hello!? Hn, perhaps you need another shot." She walked over to the bedside, and inserted a readied syringe into the IV line in his arm. She smiled with impish malice at the line of track marks on his arm. "That should do it," she remarked, as the man shifted, feeling the methadone burn its way up his arm. He grunted and twisted in the bed as the nurse walked over to the TV and shut it off with a sharp click of the nob. She walked to the door, and swiftly stepped past the threshold before stopping a moment. She peered around the corner of the door for just a moment to whisper "Sweet dreams, you bastard!" With that final epitaph, she left the young junkie to wallow in silence.
Slowly but surely, the small tremors in the junkie's body stopped. He tense muscles relaxed, and he sank back into his pillows, staring up at the cracked and nicotine stained ceiling tiles. His eyes fluttered open as the methadone took the edge of his endorphin withdrawals, but still left him in enough pain to be lucid. He stared blankly for a few moments, his mind slowly escaping the fog of heroin withdrawal.
"I remember now," he muttered to himself, "I remember how it started... I can't remember yesterday... I just remember doing... what they told me..." A flood of memories came rushing back, and he shot up in bed. His white-knuckle grip on the bed rails slowly started to loosen, but he continued to stare at the mirror across the room from his bead. The look upon the man he saw in the mirror was shame. The simulacrum's bloodshot, mournful eyes bored into the junkie. And here was his apotheosis.
Endnotes: Just a short prologue to pique your interest and get you wondering. I'd love some review action. If I don't get some, I'll start going into withdrawals just like poor Sasuke. And you don't wanna see a grown up and intelligent writer go into delirium tremuns. Trust me. :P
