Written this out because my HDD crashed and become a huge mess, a tragedy lol, as my important academic papers and works cannot be salvaged. This piece is of work is a tragedy fic, or more like it, never write tragedy stories before, just a way to vent off my frustration.
Disclaimer: Masashi Kishimoto owns Naruto and the Last Movie and Hajime Isayama owns Attack on Titan/Shingeki no Kyojin
It is tragic.
Too tragic.
He is a great hero, of Konoha when he saved his home from total destruction caused by Pein.
He is a remarkable savior, of the entire world when he stopped Madara's catastrophic plan.
All thanks to his tenacious hard work and relentless vigor and countless failures that push him closer to his ideals.
However now… he looks like an empty shell, eyes void of his usual vibrant blue and expression void of his usual trademark grin. There's nothing left, as if life has been sucked out of him, all form or shape of positivism leaving no trace behind.
Naruto has completely changed. As symbolized by only one action, which quickly turns into a habit and now, has been an integral part of his lifestyle.
Naruto always wears the red scarf around his neck and sometimes traces its soft fabric absent-mindedly or just looks at it contemplatively.
Naruto will always be caught doing that while he eats his favorite ramen. Or while he trains alone or together. Or while he converses curtly with his friends. Or while he's simply doing nothing, such as just staring at the sky with a blank expression which slowly turns into a sad one, sometimes guilty, or regret, or hopeless, or curious as of lately.
At first, he thinks it is some kind of hallucination toying and mocking him because he sees a familiar glimpse of red, but he's not sure. It's so fleeting, gone too quickly before he makes sure of what it is. But it keeps appearing, just occasionally but with persistence, which steadily makes it hard to ignore and he gives in. He partially puts the blame on the ethereal grace and speed it possesses, or to be more precise, the person wearing it.
Is it a red scarf? Or a part of that person's attire which is colored red?
Every time it flickers in his vision, he tries hard finding out what the red piece is because that person, he deduces, is flying amongst massive towering trees, with finesse and elegance he doesn't know a shinobi can possess.
Wait. Upon closer inspection, that figure is not jumping from trees to trees, more exactly like swinging airborne.
Oh. Seems the image is growing closer and closer each time it revisits him, or maybe he moves by his own without realizing it, getting closer. Naruto cannot tell. And do not care either, not in this realm so otherworldly and warped, fantasy and reality undistinguishable. At least, he gets a better view, of the object of his curiosity, now accompanied by swishing and whooshing sound.
But what captivates him first is not the perfect rhythm it creates, or a young woman with shoulder-length silky black hair and a fair complexion that person turns out to be, or her lithe and defined form under the tight and foreign clothing, or a strange kind of equipment strapped around her waist which seems responsible for the aerial maneuver.
It's actually the red fabric wrapped neatly around her neck. The loose end flutters gracefully in perfect unison with her dark green cloak dancing in the air, making every inch of the sight surreal and breathtaking.
So, it is a red scarf after all, the blond muses in awe and wonder. Yet it's not just a mere piece of clothing. It can't be that simple if it can somehow embellish her unique beauty to perfect completion. A very definition of elegance and beauty in a nature's setting, bold red against lush mahogany, precise grace against wild wind, well-guarded mystery against probing sunray.
But what takes most of his attention is her face, which seems trying hard to hold something in. His eyes, having been trained and accustomed to her dangerous pace from several encounters, do not miss her glassy onyx eyes and downturned lip which adorn her crestfallen, but still beautiful, countenance. He just watches though until she is gone, just like usual every time she appears in his dreamlike vision. Anything new he discovers about this stranger is automatically added into his memory, but this time he discovers something different.
Her crying is not something new but somehow seems unusual, in peculiar kind of way, or…familiar kind of way?
It's the first time he sees her close, closer than ever before, when she sweeps low right above him. With tears still streaming down her porcelain face, bowed in such a way that he can see straight into her eyes, or better said, a pair of bottomless pit of darkness. Which is now looking down right at him, or more likely, at nothing at all.
An old proverb once says a person's eye is the window to one's soul, right?
Naruto finds the saying to be absolutely true, because her pitch-black orbs reveal them all, every last bit of the mystery from the darkest and the deepest part.
The anguish. The regret.The irreplaceable loss. The void. Her own tragedy.
A tragedy which seems familiar and Naruto can relate to. His own tragic story, woven in a soft red fabric, almost has never been apart from his neck because it is the only connection he has. Ironically, the same scarlet ties he cherishes the most is also a harbinger of tragic news. It speaks of painful memories about how their love must come to a real end, because of a stupid destroyed moon or some stupid fate, being fickle as usual. Unlike the first one that she gave him, the one which enthralled him with endless affection, admiration, and devotion shown as sweet reminiscence of her true feeling, her long-lasting love, pure and true. That tangible piece, the sacred symbol, is gone though, completely destroyed during his battle with the moon-bastard. He only has the second scarf, knitted to the end for three full days, only to be given as a parting gift.
Not as a second chance, after he realized how slow and dense he was, and rose up reassured from his stupid depression, and finished off that moon-creep hard and good. The ending was not as it was supposed to be, not for him. Never for him. It's not like happily-ever-after ending in most fairy tales, which involves a hero saving the princess.
Nope, in this story, the princess is also the hero.
That's why, this time Naruto does not just stand there and watch. No. He's not going to stare passively at her back, or the dark green cloak waving like a flag. He's going to follow her, the stranger who seems to experience a similar situation, a similar tragedy.
And to top it all, she wears a red scarf, as he does similarly.
And so his feet move, from a fast walk, into a run, now a sprint. She's flying farther and farther and Naruto dashes as fast as he can, unsure if his chakra is helping him, and unsure if chakra is even existent in this other world. He throws off any uncertainties and doubts which cross his mind, not allowing anything bother his focus off the agile, tragic beauty ahead of him. Not even if his woods surrounding somehow magically blurs into a tunnel, the raven unaffected as she keeps swinging forward to the light awaiting at the end.
His blue orbs are totally fixed on her, mostly on her scarf, dancing elegantly in every momentum. It seems she has almost reached the end, and his mind still stays focused on her, trying to catch on anything which resembles her. Anything, like her stark black hair, or vivid red scarf, or even the dark green cloak, before her body is engulfed completely by the bright light. The last image he sees before she disappears is an outline of a wing waving proudly on her back. Still running hard, Naruto stretches out his arm and shoves his torso forward. He cannot lose her. Suddenly, everything turns bright, too bright.
The light swallows Naruto too.