Sasuke had had enough.
That thing had plagued him since he was twelve. When he had been living with Orochimaru, it had been the focus of many nightmares. This was no small feat, considering who Orochimaru was. It wasn't rare for Sasuke to walk in on the man while he was in the middle of experimenting, and seeing the pale figure giggle perversely while he sliced open a poor brunette was really not something he needed to see. The multiple times he would walk into a room to find that it just happened to be Orochimaru's shower place for the week ("We don't want potential enemies to know the place where I'll be all defenseless and wet every night, Sasuke-kun") had left permanent imprints on his mind.
It did not help that Kabuto was in there with him.
It really didn't help when they invited him to join.
Oh, and there was all the tortuous training sessions under the snake and his grey-haired mat- apprentice that would leave Sasuke unable to sit, stand or do anything right for days.
But, eh, at least he could get used to that.
Impromptu flashes of wet, pale men he could not.
Anyway.
So this thing had haunted his dreams and made a fair bit of his life really unpleasant. In fact, it was the main reason he vehemently rejected all of Naruto's offers to come back to Konoha. Sasuke wasn't an idiot, he knew he could come back at any time without a little more than some questions about Orochimaru and an extremely light slap on the wrist. He knew that the Leaf wouldn't really try and stop him from going after Itachi. But fucking hell if that village tried to make him chase after it again.
He'd almost gotten Naruto after the war was over. Sasuke had hoped he was strong enough to take down his friend non-lethally and then get the fuck outta there. Maybe see if he could get everyone to believe his body had been destroyed by his final attack so he could just disappear and forget about that damned four-legged furball. But no, Naruto had crapped all over his plans again, beaten him within an inch of his life, and in his half-alive delirium Sasuke had actually submitted and agreed to go back to Konoha. Luckily, he had formed a plan to get away by the time they'd made the journey back.
Sasuke realized that he could just outlive the little shit. So he made some bullshit excuse about needing to see the world to get "perspective", "understanding", and "atone for his sins". Okay, it wasn't complete bullshit, but a good part of it was. So he left, and made sure he was gone for at least 7 or so years before he went back. After it was dead he could live in peace with his friends Naruto and starting-to-catch-his-attention Sakura.
Of course, that was until he came back to Naruto being the Hokage (fucker actually did it) and needing to go and make sure the Kaguya bitch was 100% dead and in no way coming back. He had nearly panicked when Naruto told him he needed him for a mission (nonoNO anything but that one), but relaxed after realizing Naruto wouldn't waste a triple S-ranked ninja on a genin mission. Sasuke was reluctant to have to go on a mission that could take years to complete, though.
He had already been gone for 6 years (7? He was isolated for a good chunk of the time and really wasn't sure anymore) and had found out that the world was boring as fuck. There wasn't any conflict besides bandit squabbles which he could take care of with a wave of his hand. Then he remembered what the hell he went through to beat Kaguya and figured it had to be more interesting than aimless roaming waiting for a fucking pet to die. So he went, thinking he'd be back soon.
It took twelve.
Fucking.
Years.
He missed the birth of his daughter, an event no one thought to even attempt to make him aware of, to complete the mission. Honestly, he didn't really even find anything at all for eleven of those twelve years and when he did find something, it was aliens.
Aliens.
Otsotsuki aliens.
Yeah.
The next couple of months was the result of him thinking he could use his Rinnegan's dimensional powers to get to Konoha immediately. Sasuke figured since he could travel between dimensions he should have been able to drop into one dimension, open up a new portal, and pop back out into Naruto's office. Or somewhere nearby, at least. It wasn't his fault his theory was based on his understanding of Kamui.
Seriously, how does that shit work?
Anyway.
After he and Naruto stomped the Kaguya relatives into dead, he thought he could finally settle down. Get to know his daughter, get reacquainted with his former classmates, maybe teach Naruto's little demon of an offspring on the side.
(Really, it was like Naruto as a kid but somehow more annoying. At least the kid was a fast learner.)
But then his daughter had come home, dirt all over her used red dress (why did Sakura still have that thing?), or what was left of it. It was but a couple of thin pieces of cloth now, linked by little more than single threads. Sasuke was pretty sure the only thing covering his daughters private bits was the fact that she was hunched in on herself and it seemed like only the front of her had taken any damage. When he asked Sarada what happened, she meekly replied, "D-Rank".
Sasuke felt his heart pounding in his chest.
"What.. What D-Rank was it?," He said.
The sound of his own quick breaths and blood rushing through his veins was so prominent it was lucky he heard Sarada's reply at all.
The girl shuddered before uttering a single word.
"Tora."
The house was silent before Sasuke's Rinnegan flashed and he was suddenly in his daughters place, Mangekyou Sharingan blazing at the source of the small "mew" that threw him into alarm. Literally blazing. The unfortunate feline to have crossed paths with a Tora-aware Sasuke was engulfed in black flames.
And Sasuke decided he had had enough.
The one cat wasn't Tora, and the beast was still running rampant. He was about to run and see if he couldn't catch the Daimyo's wife before she was too far before he paused.
No, even ridding people of the cat wasn't enough, now.
He should have taken care of it decades ago.
And he could.
Because Sasuke had power.
See, a common misconception among those who knew of his abilities was that his Rinnegan's glorified Substitution Technique was instant. But really, nothing could happen instantly. Breaking light speed was something he could do without breaking a sweat, but that still wasn't traveling instantaneously. He still had to take a step to move.
What his Rinnegan *really* did was allow him to switch places with any point in his line of sight he focused extremely fast (not instant though) and then rewound time. He would be one place, then be another, and his eye then made time revert so it he was effectively in two places at once for a single moment. So while it was effectively instant, it wasn't in actuality. Sasuke never really bothered to look, but he was pretty sure Lord Second's Hiraishin did the exact same thing.
But that's not all.
The time reverse effect also stacked with how many times he would consecutively switched. If he switched two times, right after the other, then the time reverted wouldn't be twice as much as if he'd only done it once, but as if he'd done it three times. Since time would revert exactly the amount needed for the switch to effectively be instant, it would go back farther the farther he switched. So, if he really tried, he could revert time several seconds.
But Sasuke wanted years, so he'd need quite a lot chakra. Probably more than Naruto had, and that was a metric fuckton.
Luckily, his magical eye bullshit could help him there too!
...Sasuke was man enough to admit it gave him an absurd amount of insane abilities for being just an eye.
An hour later, which was filled with helping his daughter fix her clothes and trying to calm himself, Sasuke was out, a few kilometers away from Konoha.
"Susano'o."
With a quick flick of the wrist, his chakra sword had cleared out a giant field for him to use for his time shenanigans.
Sasuke made a couple Shadow Clones and began his plan. The Shadow Clones had one purpose, which was to supply him chakra. His Preta Path was essentially actual, real, perfect chakra control. He never wasted a bit and could suppress it so well he may as well not exist. As it turns out, perfect control also included chakra that wasn't even your own. He could take and give chakra with immense ease. Preta Path's only ability that wasn't tied into perfect control was absorbing ninjutsu. So the clones' jobs were to sit around and use the Preta Path to draw in natural energy to supply him with chakra when they dispersed.
Did Sasuke mention he figured out Senjutsu while hiding from Tor- seeking to atone? It wasn't even that hard.
Rinnegan hax for the win.
Anyway.
Sasuke moved to started switching like a madman, before he stopped. If he was going to be going back in time.. how could his clones give him extra chakra to work with? Would they stay around? Sasuke had never used his technique enough for it to rewind enough to undo his clones, but they always seemed to be unaffected, as extensions of himself.. But it could just be that his Sharingan enhanced perception was just that good.
Sasuke shrugged.
If it didn't work then oh fucking well, he'd figure it out later.
Some time later, or earlier, whatever, he didn't want to bother himself trying to figure time traveler terminology, Sasuke stopped.
He was 12 again.
Well how about that.
Sasuke made another clone and observed it. He somehow still had his Eternal Mangekyou Sharingan, even though he thought he needed his brother's eyes for that. Huh. Interesting.
He didn't even look at the other eye, not only having seen the grey ripples in the corner of his vision, but obviously he still had it otherwise he couldn't have gotten to the past. Sasuke moved to spear the clone in the gut with a Chidori finger, before he stopped.
Wait.
How the fuck did he still have his Rinnegan?
Sasuke got that because the damn Sage of Six Paths gave him chakra. But.. he'd rewound time, so that shouldn't have happened yet. But then, Sasuke supposed, he does usually stay unchanged when he uses his Super-Substitute...
Wait.
HOW THE FUCK WAS HE YOUNG?!
Sasuke ran his finger through his clone. Fuck that. He didn't have time to figure this bullshit out, and he really didn't care. He had a mission, dammit.
Sasuke made as many clones as he could, which was around 20. They were to go across the Elemental Nations and kill every damned feline they came across. One would think that 20 wasn't enough to do that, especially with Shadow Clones, but Sasuke was an S-Rank overpowered motherfucker with practically unkillable clones that could also replenish their reserves and make more of themselves. So yeah, twenty as a starting number was more than enough.
And Sasuke himself? He went back to his old apartment.
He opened the door and looked around. He let out a relieved breath, not seeing another him. Good, he didn't have to kill himself.
Sasuke checked his calendar. It was around a month before his graduation exam, and that first mission with the damned cat.
He had time.
Sasuke sat down on his couch, before he looked over at his window.
Closed window.
Well, that just wouldn't do.
He needed an easy way in and out after all.
Sasuke ran his fist through the glass.
Sasuke was excited.
He'd spent a month being exceptionally bored. Things were pretty much the same as last time, except he was way more friendly with Naruto. For all he complained about him, Sasuke had realized that without Naruto seeing him as some antagonistic force to be overcome, the blond was hardly as annoying as Sasuke had thought.
Sasuke didn't really see any reason to change anything else. After all, everything turned out pretty well the first time. He and Naruto handled Madara and subsequently Kaguya just fine in the end, and this time he had an extra thirty years of experience and a retarded god eye. Of course, that didn't mean he'd try to make sure everything stayed the same. He just wouldn't go out of his way to make things different, is all.
The only thing that hadn't been good was the continued existence of Tora.
But that would soon change.
Sasuke grinned.
It was time.
The first of many excruciating missions to catch a damned cat.
But not this time.
Sasuke would make sure of that.
"Target located," Kakashi said.
Oh, fuck yes.
Sasuke made a clone and had it take Naruto, Sakura, and Kakashi farther from Tora.
He was going to fucking destroy that pussy.
Uh.. cat.
The cat.
The cat was going to die, okay?
Okay.
Sasuke's eye morphed into his Mangekyou, and he said a single word.
"Amaterasu."
And it missed.
His attack that forms at the focus of his eye missed.
A cat.
A cat dodged an attack that the Fourth Raikage barely could.
What the hell was this thing?
"Universal Pull!"
With great satisfaction Sasuke watched the creature flail as it flew towards him.
His satisfaction turned into shock when upon contact Tora disappeared.
'Okay, I guess that won't work.. for some reason. Stupid fucking cat.'
He forced the cat towards him again and before it could touch him he bellowed out,
"Almighty Push!"
And Tora flew.
But as the annoying ass bitch of a cat tends to do, it survived being blasted at 10G force by twisting itself midair and landing on it's feet.
Sasuke blinked.
'Okay, fuck this.'
Forgetting that his innocent teammates and not-so-innocent sensei were in the surrounding area, Sasuke unleashed his Perfect Susano'o upon the poor unsuspecting house pet.
Luckily, knowing themselves pretty damn well, the clones had moved the three onlookers far farther than would have been necessary if Sasuke hadn't created an absurdly large chakra construct in the forest.
Sasuke's Susano'o's sword rose, demolishing a few birds in it's way, and descended like a burning meteor.
It struck Tora, and shattered.
So Sasuke decided to summon an actual fucking burning meteor.
The orb of rock came thundering down, covered in flickering flames the shade of night.
It also broke.
Sasuke, at this point, was beyond his breaking point. He was a man who had taken down Gods, and here a foot tall cat was laughing in the face of his most powerful attacks. Forgetting that just because he was technically a child didn't mean he should act like one, he furiously jumped up and down in an attempt to smash Tora, failing to notice that Tora wasn't even under him.
The feline was bathing itself but a couple feet away.
In his blind rage, Sasuke pulled out his chakra bow and charged Indra's Arrow, firing it directly below him, effectively drilling a hole down to the lava layer of the Earth's crust. The trees that had the stupidity to be upright at this point promptly fell over and cried.
Upon seeing that he was had not, in fact, blew a feline into oblivion, Sasuke recalled his Susano'o, deciding that he would punch the demon into submission if need be. The moment he touched the ground Sasuke leaped forward towards his furry adversary, and tackled it. A few moments their scuffle lasted, before Sasuke got a firm hold on the beings head, hoping to use his Human Path to decimate the creature.
He pulled his hand away, holding nothing.
Sasuke stumbled back, eyes wide and mouth wider upon the realization that his Human Path had failed.
Tora had no soul.
He had been right.
It was a fucking demon.
Tora stared at him, and mewed.
Sasuke panicked and, mind full of thoughts about a demon cat, had accidentally used his Animal Path to summon the Nibi.
Whoops.
Upon seeing that the great mystic cat known as "Tora" was to be her adversary, the Two-Tailed beast quickly scampered away. She did not wish to die at the hands of such a powerful being.
Having regained his bearings, Sasuke used his Ashura Path to turn his arm into a canon that he hoped would fire homing missiles. He never was too good at this particular ability.
Fortunately they were homing missiles. Unfortunately, they all stopped existing before they hit Tora.
Sasuke blinked. He didn't quite know how to handle that a cat had just deleted things from existence. Hoping it was just him hallucinating, he experimentally fired another set of missiles.
One again, they vanished before they touched Tora.
'Huh. Okay then.'
Hours later, Sasuke was exhausted. He could barely move his legs, and he had to shake off unconsciousness multiple times already. He had attempted multiple times to get the cat to just fucking die, but nothing had worked. Multiple applications of his paths outright failed to work. Tora would teleport when caught by Universal Pull, would land on it's feet when Almighty Pushed, dodged Amaterasu (even when he used Kagutsuchi to make spikes that would follow the damn thing), and any weapons from his Ashura Path just ceased to exist when they got close.
Sasuke had resorted to traps after about an hour. Once, he made a sizeable pit of Amaterasu and Rinnegan-Substituted Tora above it, only for it to hang in the air, turn itself rightside up, and walk to the ground.
So yeah, he had just about given up on killing what he decided to refer to as "that fucker" after it made reality it's bitch and walked on air.
Tora walked by and nuzzled Sasuke. He resisted the urge to strangle that fucker because he knew it'd have some way to get out of that too. Sasuke was also pretty sure that fucker knew what it was doing, and didn't want to give it the satisfaction of rousing a reaction out of him. As Tora turned to walk away, Sasuke had a moment of clarity.
He threw a kunai.
The blade embedded itself into the skull of that fucker and it promptly collapsed, dead.
Sasuke's eyes were wide. All it would have taken for that fucker to die was a simple kunai.
Then he broke down in fitful giggles, relishing in the feeling of it's dead it's dead it's dead.
There were no other cats, his clones had made sure of that.
No more genin would have to suffer searching for that fucker, no more jonin tormented by the memory.
Tora was dead.
Fuck Tora.