"Naruto" Normal Speech
'Sasuke' People's thoughts
"Juubi" Summons/Gods/Monsters/Other being's speech
'Kurama' Summons/Gods/Monsters/Other being's thoughts
"Rasengan" Techniques/Spells/Jutsus/Terms
Disclaimer: Only thing I own is my 3ds!
Prologue
Dead Man Walking
The past will always come to haunt you.
That was a phrase that one Namikaze Naruto understood perfectly.
Maybe that was the reason he always found himself spacing out, his gaze lost as his mind always wandered to his childhood.
He always got teased for it of course, either by his friends or family. Not that he minded much; after all it always worked to calm him down.
If they knew what memory he always chose to play back in his head, he doubted they would tease him as much.
Then again the only one that knew what had happened that day was his family and a few of the ANBU.
Even then they didn't know the whole story, for he had refused to tell them.
He didn't want to sound like the scarred little child they had made him out to be after all.
He would admit though, that he had thought of telling someone about it more than once. At first he hadn't done it out of fear, thinking that if he didn't talk about it then it would simply go away.
But now? This was his own problem to deal with, he couldn't, no, he refused to drag anyone into this.
Into what exactly, you might ask.
Well the answer to that came in the memory of one particular day.
Namikaze Naruto would never forget that day.
Even if years had passed, even if he had only been six year old at the time, he was sure he would never forget it.
It was impossible after all, that event had marked itself in his memory. A mental scar that he doubted would ever heal.
He had never understood properly until that day, why his mother was always so over-protective over him and his sister. He even knew there was always someone watching over them whenever they went out of the house without their mother, even if the old man Hokage said otherwise.
There was always someone there, it was either their godfather, godmother or even Kakashi-nii or Shizune-nee, but there was always someone looking over them as if they could disappear at any second.
He had never understood why.
That is until that one day.
Their mother was out, leaving him and his sister alone. Not that he minded of course, as he loved spending time with her, even if she could be quite the cry-baby from time to time.
They just played as usual, nothing special but that was just how they liked it. Playing ninja was always a favorite of them. They simply loved to pay hero, just like their father had been.
It all looked like it would be just another day for them.
But of course he had been wrong.
He didn't know what it had been, he didn't even know how, but he just knew something was wrong at that time. Kakashi-nii had always told him to trust his instinct, so he had acted immediately.
For a six year old, he believed he had acted quite well now looking back at it.
He told his sister to hide in the closet of their room, also telling her to not make a sound. She had been both confused and scared at how sudden his actions had been, but a smile from him had always been enough to calm her down.
He had to hide how scared he was feeling at the moment, after all every second it passed made him feel even more dread.
He didn't know what made him leave the room. Maybe it had been morbid curiosity, or maybe he just wanted to confirm that whatever he had been feeling had been just that, a feeling. Something that he would later just comment to his mom and laugh about it, getting a frown from his sister, reproaching him from scaring her like that.
Sadly that had not been the case.
He froze in place as soon as he had left the room, if he had been scared before then at that moment he had been terrified, for just outside of his room has been a man he had never seen before.
And even if the man was wearing a mask, his gaze alone had told him that his life would never be the same after this day.
Funnily enough he had been correct, but probably for the wrong reason.
Next thing he remembered had to be waking up in a man's arms as they moved through what he would later know to be the forest right outside of Konoha.
The man was not alone though, as other three individuals were accompanying him, all of them with masks that blocked their faces from view, but their voices at least told him that they were men.
However it was the content of their conversation that had struck him the most.
Kidnapping, slavery, experiments, clients, son of the Yondaime Hokage, only one. That and more had escaped their mouths, putting his mind in disarray and sending despair straight into his heart, even if a part of him felt glad that his sister wasn't with them.
He might have been young, but he knew what that had meant. At that rate he would have never seen his mother, his sister and his friends again. He would have been taken away from the village his father had died protecting, just because someone he didn't know at all hated him for simply existing.
That had been the second most frightening moment just in that day.
But he didn't want that, of course he didn't!
So he did the only thing he had managed to think off at that moment, and with tears threatening to escape his eyes he clamped his mouth over the hand of the man that was carrying him, biting with so much force that he was surprised he didn't bit off any fingers
He had to admit it though; he had regretted that action just a second later, as pain was the next thing he felt as the man suddenly dropped him in surprise, his body falling to the ground below them.
Considering how big the distance between the ground and the branches had been, suffice to say it hadn't been a pretty landing.
He would later find out that surviving that fall should have been impossible.
His whole body felt both numb and in searing pain. He didn't know if that was even possible, but that was simply the best description his six year old mind could give.
He didn't pass out though, and even if just breathing was enough to send waves of pain through his whole body he tried to drag himself away in a futile attempt to get to safety.
It was useless of course, a part of him said, but he refused to believe that, even as his body shook in both pain in fear as he heard the men that had taken him away landing just behind him.
"You idiotic bastard!" he heard one of them yell, his body freezing just by hearing that voice "You almost fuck up the mission!"
"Oh please, just shut your trap" he heard another one of them speaking, followed by the sound of footsteps coming closer to him. He tried to drag himself away but he soon felt pressure in his back, as the man pretty much stepped over him "The brat is still alive anyway, I don't see the problem"
"Can we stop losing time here? I don't know about you but I don't want to end up in one of Konoha's prison" his body trembled, tears finally leaving his eyes as the man that was above him used his foot to turn him around, forcing his terrified blue eyes to look at the white mask of his kidnapper.
"Heh, he's even crying now" the masked figure said as he moved his hand towards him, his own sobs becoming louder the closer the limb got to him "Do yourself a favor kid and be silent, or else I'll have to cut your tong"
His sobs didn't lessen though, for at that moment the only thing he wanted was to be back home, back at his house, with his mom and sister. He didn't want to be here.
So with closed eyes he prayed, he prayed for someone, anyone to come and help him.
He begged for his mom to come and save him.
He begged for Jiraiya or Tsunade to rescue him.
He implored for Kakashi-nee or Shizune-nee to take him away.
He even begged for his father to come and help him, even if he knew that the man was no longer with them.
But even so he didn't care, he was desperate, he just wanted to be saved.
The thing was, something did hear his plea.
It happened in less than a second, too fast for his mind to process. He didn't understand what was happening, but he became sure of one thing.
They weren't alone.
Blood was splattered on his face, hair and clothes just as the man above him left out a soundless scream. He didn't know how it looked for the rest of the man's friend, but from that position he could see perfectly what had happened.
Something was poking out of the man's chest. A long, thin arm had penetrated him completely from his back, the limb itself covered in blood.
There was nothing connected to the arm though, almost as if was just floating there. It ever so slowly raised itself, taking the man with him, finally releasing him from the pressure he had felt.
But even so he didn't dare to breathe as he watched the scene unfolding in front of his eyes. It looked like the man's friends had finally caught on what was happening, but they weren't reacting either.
He had not been the only paralyzed apparently.
The bleeding man twisted in pain, but it looked like he was about to do something by the way his arms moved. However he had stopped that action too, and for just a second he thought that the man had simply died right there.
But the real answer came just as abruptly as before, for suddenly the man's head was ripped entirely from his body, blood spurting out immediately, almost as if it was raining, bathing him in the red liquid just as his widened eyes looked at what was being revealed.
He wasn't the only one that was being bathed in blood after all.
Monster could be the only word to describe the abomination he had met that day, its whole body covered red by the blood of his victim, one of its claws still sticking inside the man while the other one simply held its head.
A metallic looking head rested atop of its body, but no eyes could be seen, just as thin black legs rested below it. Around it were strange objects, floating behind like a cape, some covered in more blood than the others.
A crashing sound soon followed, for the monster simply threw the corpse to the side, alongside the head, and then it looked down, directly at him.
It might not have eyes, but he just knew it was looking at him. At that moment he had expected to feel plenty of things. Fear beyond whatever he had felt before was what he had expected, but instead he simply felt nothing.
He didn't understand, and years later he would still not understand how, even after watching that, he felt no fear for this thing.
Even after what it was about to do.
The monster suddenly turned, the black sockets in which its eyes should have been were aimed directly at the three men that had just watched their partner die.
The spectacle he was forced to watch that day would forever be printed on his brain.
He didn't know what the thing had done; he just knew that he had stopped his kidnappers from escaping. Two of the objects on his back had opened, and by the sound of it something had came out from there too.
It was only for the blood that had then covered him that he recognized the sword and chains that were used to kill the men.
"No, stop, stop it!" one of them screeched in desperation and pain just as he had been dragged inside the objects by the chains that were penetrating his body, the screams disappearing as soon as he had been locked inside of the thing he had finally recognized.
They were coffins.
The second one didn't even have time, for the monster's claw had suddenly clamped over his head just before crushing his skull as if it was nothing.
"GET AWAY! GET AWAY FROM ME!" the last one ended up bleeding on the ground as the second object that came out of the coffin was stabbed in his back. A sword he recognized, even if he had never seen one like that.
His screams died alongside him once the beast grabbed the sword by itself and stabbed his head with it.
At that moment he hadn't thought about it, but later he had wondered why they hadn't tried to do something to stop the monster.
What he didn't know at the time was that, if he had felt what those four man had felt coming from the monster, his own mind would have been broken, for whatever it was it was not something that humans should ever have to face.
And yet he still found himself calm, just as the monster floated above him, multiple chains dragging the remains of the man that had kidnapped him into the coffins as if it was normal.
Maybe he should have felt disgusted, or afraid of that act, but at that moment there was only one word that could have described how he felt.
Satisfaction.
His eyes still wide, he saw as a bloody claw extend itself in front of him almost as if aiming to touch him, but the creature stopped just a breath away from actually doing it.
But even so fear didn't appear neither in his heart or face. Even as a part of him wondered how that was even possible in his current situation, a bigger part had decided to simply accept what the monster was offering him.
But everything must come to an end, for the feeling of security he had suddenly disappeared just as the beast suddenly looked behind it before vanishing without a trace, almost as if it had never been there in the first place.
Then the anxiousness and fear gripped his heart once again.
The pain assaulted his whole body.
Tears once again left his eyes as his body shook to the core.
The last thing he remembered was the embrace of his mother as her soothing words filled the forest.
But even then the words felt on deaf ears, for his mind could only thing of the being that had answered his cry of help
"Great, he's doing it again…" he heard an annoyed voice to his left, followed by a sigh. He recognized that voice of course, and that sigh was pretty much a trademark already.
"Naruto-nii…" another voice said to his left just as someone tugged his sleeves. Of course this was a voice that he recognized easily too, and her actions managed to take him out of his thoughts just as he gave both his companions a wide-eyed look before scratching the back of his head with a chuckle.
"Sorry sorry… I was spacing out again, wasn't I?" he said as his gaze went from his younger sister by just a minute to his best friend, even if the guy would never admit it.
"Are you ok, Naruto-nii? You've been doing that more lately… even Kaa-chan is worried" his sister, one Namikaze Mito, said with a frown just as her blue eyes looked at him in concern.
"Hmph, you better not start doing that during missions if we're forced to be in the same team" Uchiha Sasuke said as he crossed his arms over his chest, his black eyes looking at him with a frown of annoyance "What were you thinking about anyway?"
He gave both an expressionless face just before grinning from ear to ear, moving his arms around both of their shoulders, putting them in a weird one-sided group hug that got a squeak of surprise from the girl and a grunt from the boy.
"I was just thinking about how we're going to rock Kakashi-sensei's test today!" he answered, simply getting a small smile from his sister and a roll of the eyes from the Uchiha.
"Let's go then" Sasuke suddenly said as he got out of Naruto's hold and continued walking through the street, both Naruto and Mito sharing a look before following him, their objective being their training ground of course.
He had never told anyone about what he had seen that day, of the monster that had saved his life. At first he thought it had been a trick of his mind, but it was impossible to say that now.
He slowly turned his head back, finding nothing but a street filled with people walking through it, receiving smiles from anyone that met his gaze. This was normal, this is what anyone could see, but he knew better.
He knew that, after that day, he had never been alone.
He knew that, alongside whoever the Hokage send to look for him, there was always an extra pair of eyes looking at him.
He knew it was there, the same being. It was always there, watching him like a hawk. For eight years that's how it had been.
He didn't know what was worse though…
If the fact that he had something like that following him like a shadow.
Or the fact that he could no longer imagine his life without it.
Well not really a new story, just a kind of rewrite from another one of mine, then again with how different this one will be I don't know if rewrite fits.
Almost my first story without FemSasuke. Let's see how it goes and how well it's received.
Thank you all for reading this of course!