heartbeat: Hello, everyone! Despite a KakaTen story I have to update as well, I was inspired and I just had to write this story.

It's angsty, dark, somewhat gory but not really, sensual (later), dramatic, all that good stuff and some of that not so good stuff.

In short, it's rated M for a reason. You have been warned.

Enjoy!

disclaimer: I do not own Naruto.

IRRATIONAL 1
He shouldn't have said it.
I warned him.
I gave him a chance.
He condemned himself.

I was mad.

He watched her eyes grow wet. One glistening tear escaped and dripped to the pristine, white floor below.

"Why?"

He turned his head like a stubborn child and tugged at his restraints half-heartedly – there was no use trying to break free; his chains weren't made of metal.

"Why?" she repeated, a little more loudly.

No answer. He looked down, admiring the bracelet she wore on her wrist, relishing the splash of color after days stuck in the same white-washed room. It was enough to drive a person crazy.

"Neji!" she shrieked hysterically. "What's happened to you?"

His noncommittal shrug obviously wasn't a good enough answer for her.

"Listen to me. Neji, listen to me," she repeated urgently, reaching out to touch his shoulder but recoiling at the last minute as if she were afraid he would lash out at her. Her fear was rightly justified.

You're a monster.

"The police, they're coming soon," she whispered, her eyes darting around frantically. "They're going to question you. If you won't tell me the truth, fine. But do not lie to the police, Neji. Neji, I don't know what's gotten into you. I can't believe you'd do something like that!"

He closed his eyes, struggling to pacify his slowly growing annoyance. Her nagging, conducted in an irritating voice, high and strained from worry, was starting to crawl under his skin and irk him in unpleasant ways.

Shut up. Shut up. You don't know her.

"Hiashi-sama can't help you now," she continued quietly. "He's already done so much, convincing the police that you've always had mental issues and that you need help. He's already postponed your trial and talked to the boy's parents. Don't burden your family anymore, Neji. Think rationally."

He took a deep breath. "Where is she?"

"Gone."

"I swear, if you tell me she's dead…" He glared at her through his unkempt hair, "…if she's dead, I'll kill you, Hinata! Do you hear me? I'll kill you!"

He struggled against his constraints, forgetting that they were strong and made to hold against futile attempts. All he wanted to do was hurt the girl in front of him, his cousin, Hinata. Make her scream from the pain and beg for mercy. He wanted her to suffer.

Shut up.

Shut up.

You're going to regret it.

Hinata jumped back and huddled against the wall, gazing fearfully into Neji's insane, bloodshot eyes as his fingers groped for her throat.

"N-Neji, no…she's not dead. She's…alive."

"Alive?" He barked, resisting the urge to laugh. "You told me she was gone!"

She shook her head vigorously, searching desperately for a believable lie. "No, no, no, she's alive. She's just…afraid."

"Afraid that he'll come back?" He stopped struggling and his bloodlust faded away. "She doesn't have to worry! I made sure he won't come back! He can't come back. Because. I. Killed. Him."

Hinata blinked away her tears. It broke her heart to see her beloved cousin like this. What had happened to him? What had caused him to snap? When had become so unstable, so volatile? He was a different person now, one whose common sense and logic were overridden by anger and hate.

"Neji, why?"

He shouldn't have said it.

I warned him.

I gave him a chance.

He condemned himself.

"Where is she?" he repeated slowly.

"I…I don't know."

Neji took a steadying breath and sunk to the floor, his chains – painted white – rattling as he moved. "He deserved it."

"Did he really deserve to die?" Hinata asked.

"Yes. Yes, he did."

"Neji, I…I disagree."

His breathing became labored and his eyes rolled in his head as he sprung to his feet and lunged for his cousin, once again forgetting about his handcuffed limbs. "Say that to my face, bitch! Say it to my face! Come closer and I'll hurt you! Fuck you! Fuck you! He deserved to die! I'm going to kill you, Hinata!"

"I'm sorry, Neji, so sorry," she whispered.

"You deserve to die!"

The door swung open and two men in uniform stepped in, both aiming their pistols directly at Neji's heart upon seeing him threatening Hinata. "You should leave, Hinata-san," the younger one instructed, his raven eyes never leaving Neji's white ones, his finger never moving from the trigger. "A psycho ward is no place for ladies."

"But, Sas-" Hinata started but he cut her off.

"Go."

She whimpered and exited the door, not even bothering to bid her damned cousin farewell.

Bitch.

She's a bitch.

She whores around, you know.

The younger officer took a step closer to Neji, who was panting heavily and firing daggers with his crisp, pale eyes. "Hyuuga, you're an idiot."

Neji smirked, recognizing him. "Feeling hypocritical today, are we, Sasuke?"

"At least I didn't kill a man." Sasuke suddenly pressed the barrel of the gun against Neji's neck and loomed over him like a ferocious bird of prey. "I'll admit: I've made mistakes in my life but never at the cost of someone else's life." A memory flitted about his head but he pushed it away.

"Well, I wasn't about to kill myself, you see," Neji answered in an eerily calm voice that one might use to comment on the weather with.

Sasuke snarled and the other officer stepped closer, enclosing Neji. "You should have then! I would rather scum like you die than an innocent person!"

"He wasn't innocent! He deserved to die!" Neji roared, swinging his fist in a perfect arc and colliding with Sasuke's arm. He stumbled but caught himself.

"Why you…"

Are you that stupid?

Are you picking a fight with me?

Sasuke was stopped, however, by his senior, who placed a gentle hand on his shoulder. "That's enough, Sasuke. Now, tell me, boy," he continued, addressing Neji, "we know you killed him. We just need to know why."

Neji pursed his lips and eyed the two officers as if they were toddlers playing some sort of make-believe game. "I already told you: he deserved it. I simply gave him what he was asking for."

"We know for a fact that the deceased did not have a death wish. You are lying," the elder officer ended.

"I'm not!" shrieked Neji. "Why the fuck won't any of you believe me? He deserved to die! I gave him a chance to save himself but he was too much of a dumbass to do it! You should all die." Upon remembering that he was chained to a wall, he began gnawing at them, scraping his fingernails up and down the white metal, heeding to regard to his bleeding fingernails and aching teeth.

"Hey, Hyuuga, I can see why they put you in a psycho ward," Sasuke finally said after a good, long while.

The elder officer sighed and stood up. "I need to speak with the Director. He should know that we're going to need her help. We're not done with you, boy. Think of it as a grace period. Your justice will be served in due time."

You're a cold-hearted killer.

The next time the door opened – it could have been minutes later, or days; Neji had no sense of time in that white, white room – he was surprised to see a tall, curvy woman enter, throwing her last reply to someone outside over her shoulder before shutting the door.

He cocked his head curiously. What was this woman doing here? Her nimble fingers flipped through the papers on her baby blue clipboard and her dark hair curled softly at the ends.

They're screwing with me.

Of course, they were. How clever of them to send a harmless, vulnerable-looking woman to try and seduce him into disclosing whatever shit they were set on obtaining. It was sick, really, the lengths authorities would go to in order to get what they wanted.

He watched her carefully, feigning indifference, as she straightened her navy blue sweater and smoothed her skirt. The color of her sweater was comforting to him – it reminded him of nighttime and cool breezes and happy dreams.

Ah, but those tricky bastards wanted to lull him into a sense of false security. Who was she really? An assassin? An undercover police chief? A mind reader hired to extrapolate his secrets?

She flashed him a quick smile, showing him her pearly whites. He was relieved to see that her canines weren't unusually pointed; it ruled out 'vampire'. He felt his hostile tension begin to subside.

"Hyuuga Neji," she finally said in a voice that surprised the shit out of him. It was neither gentle nor melodic, as he had assumed, but rather demanding and authoritative. He wondered how so much confidence could be squeezed into such a misleading character.

"Hyuuga Neji," she repeated firmly, stalking over and forcing him to look into her brown eyes, "when I address you, I want you to at least look at me so I know you're listening."

He slowly scanned the room for hidden cameras or crouching gunmen. When he saw none, he swiped at her leg and she stepped away coolly, watching small beads of scarlet blood form and trickle down her calf. Wordlessly, she took some tissues from her purse and dabbed at it gently.

Neji looked down at his now-bloodied fingernails – covered with her blood – and felt nauseous.

"That was very rude of you, Neji-san," she chided, pressing tissues against her wound.

He had the sudden urge to offer to help but quickly killed that desire.

You have no manners, no civility.

You lost all of it.

You're a murderer now.

"You should apologize."

He ignored her order. "Who are you?"

She pressed her lips together into a thin line and furrowed her eyebrows thoughtfully. "Well, I'm not going to lie and tell you that I'm your friend. But honestly, I'm not your enemy either. I'm simply here to do my job because I was employed to do so."

"Job," he repeated.

"Yes. I'm a psychiatrist. A psychiatrist is someone who-"

"I know," he interrupted her, "what a psychiatrist is. Those officers, the Director, everyone – they think I'm mentally unstable, don't they?"

She cleared her throat, wondering whether answering would be considered unprofessional. "…They believe I can…help you through this traumatic period in your life."

"Who are you?" Neji echoed hollowly.

"My name? My name is Tenten," she answered after he nodded.

Neji peered up at her from his squatting position and noticed how her earrings flashed blindingly in the light, stinging his eyes. Growling like a caged animal, he shut his eyes but still saw the lights, like twinkling stars, a full moon, a car's headlights.

And then, right then and there in front of the person who was supposed to help him, he snapped.

Neji bellowed like a wounded buffalo and reached for her earrings, intent on ripping them from her ears, perhaps even bloodying her pretty face in the process. He only saw her take an unruffled step back and watch him closely with her hands on her hips before he heard the squeaks and groans of metal grinding against metal, his mind completely fogging over with a veil of deep, dark red.

Everything was red.

Red like blood.

His blood.

His blood covered my fingers.

And someone screamed, egging on his bloodlust even more.

He felt his hands connect with flesh and he tore at it with his bare hands, biting at it, kicking, scratching like a deranged animal. Like a monster with no boundaries, he relished the feel of feeble squirming and fidgeting, his victim mustering up whatever strength they had left to make one last fruitless attempt to escape.

He laughed, laughed, like a madman and grinned down at his prey with groundless eyes glazed over with scarlet film and maniacal glint. The bloodied heap, what was once a body, looked achingly familiar.

Its face caught his attention the most.

Blue eyes, bright blue eyes.

Just like hers.

They were hers.

Realization stabbed him in the gut and he doubled over.

I killed her.

"Stop, you can't see him now. He's unstable and erratic. The last thing you want to do-"

"He's my goddamn patient, Sakura!"

More white walls. But this time, I'm in a bed.

I glance at the sheets.

White.

I'm starting to detest that color.

"I know you're his psychiatrist but please, he's fucked himself up pretty badly. Let us treat him first before you do your mentally and physically grueling sessions."

Treat?

There are blood stains on my clothes and bandages wrapped tightly around my fingers and up to my elbow.

Did I do this to myself?

"He's a danger to himself. Let me talk to him. No matter how many times you patch him up, nothing's going to come out of it if I don't speak with him."

"Tenten, I don't think you should push him. He might snap."

"You know what, Sakura? Screw you and your good intentions. Now get out of the way before I make you do it!"

Tenten managed to shove a reluctant Sakura out of the infirmary and locked the door with a satisfying click. She spun on her heel and strode over to Neji's bed – he was strapped in, of course.

"You're awake, Hyuuga. I see your eyelids twitching."

Neji cracked open an eye and didn't bother to continue his apparently-transparent guise. He frowned upon seeing her for the second time that day – luckily she had the good enough sense to remove her earrings – and he wondered why her skin was still unblemished, her cheeks still rosy, her skin still intact…why she was still alive.

"I thought I killed you," he whispered.

Her eyes widened for a moment, registering shock, before professionalism compelled her to appear apathetic. "I am alive and well, as you can see, Hyuuga. Have you always had hallucinations?"

"I killed you," Neji insisted at once. "I felt your blood and saw your flesh being ripped apart by my bare hands."

Admittedly, Tenten was feeling rather queasy at the moment but it really was a walk in the park compared to the things that she had seen for real. "Perhaps you are reliving the murder you committed; is it safe for me to assume you did so because of your guilty conscience?"

"I am guilty of nothing," he murmured, his eyes seeming to see straight through her.

"You're confused."

Neji's dangerously befuddled mind ticked slowly. "You're a…psychiatrist."

She nodded, not quite understanding where he was going with this. "Yes, I am. I may be a contemporary, unorthodox, unconventional, more-damage-than-good psychiatrist but I always achieve gratifying results."

"You're not like the others," Neji said lightly.

"No, I'm different, a breath of fresh air, if you will."

Breath of fresh air.

I'm going out.

I'll be back soon.

All I want is a breath of fresh air.

"Are you?" He sounded skeptical, his words laced with underlying malice.

Tenten noticed his tensed muscles and contorted face and made a note not to reuse the phrase, although she would have to look in on why he made him act so. "No, I'm not."

"But you said you were," he countered.

She resisted her urge to sigh. He was not, by far, her most violent, unreachable, almost impossible case but they were talking in circles and getting nowhere. Her job was to rehabilitate him – pluck him from his murderous mindset and transform him into a safe, peaceful, law-abiding, normal citizen – before he was too far gone to be saved.

"Neji, I want you to look at me." She waited until he begrudgingly turned his up and displayed his clear, white eyes. "Good, now I want you to repeat after me: 'Authorities are jackasses'."

"Excuse me?"

Tenten whirled around and clutched her heart upon seeing Sasuke, still suited up in his uniform, step into the infirmary and give her a onceover. "It's a psychological procedure," she explained without him asking, averting her eyes.

"What will that do to him? The Director didn't hire you to resent humankind even more," Sasuke reminded her in a harsh tone.

"Don't tell me how to do my job. Now get out of here, Uchiha," she mumbled threateningly. In his bed, Neji smirked at this woman telling the cocky bastard off. He needed someone to push him off his high horse and send him plummeting to the hard ground below.

"Sakura came to get me actually. She told me to control 'my lady'." Sasuke looked pleased.

Neji's eyes narrowed.

His lady?

"It's her own damn fault for trying to get in the way of my work," Tenten snapped viciously. "Speaking of which, that's exactly what you're doing now. So leave or I'll come at you with a serrated knife." She held up said weapon for emphasis and Neji silently cheered her on.

"Fine. Just don't come home too late." Sasuke moved towards the door but stopped and turned around halfway through.

"What?" she demanded brusquely.

But his words were directed at Neji. "Hey, psycho, if you try anything, I'll see it you spend the rest of your life in jail."

"It's no good," Neji answered coolly. "I'm already detained in a mental prison."

"Sasuke."

He turned around and waited for Shikamaru to catch up to him – it took quite a while; damn his leisurely pace – before resuming walking. "What's up, Nara?" he asked in a voice only a few touches short of a snarl.

"You heard Tenten got transferred to the psycho ward, eh?" Shikamaru guessed.

"She prefers to call it 'psychiatric hospital'," Sasuke said. "She told me she offered herself for the job. Why she'd want to waste her eight years of medical school and degree on deranged psychotics is beyond me."

"Well, I'm sure she's not too happy about you gambling your pretty face for public safety." He could be so damn witty sometimes.

Sasuke scoffed. "We're a strange pair. She's sometimes too dedicated to her job of 'changing others' lives', though. She sent me away just now so she could continue trying to help that Hyuuga nutcase."

Shikamaru looked perturbed. "She got Neji? You seem awfully calm."

"Should I be worried?"

"I don't think I'm at the liberty to disclose such information, but I'll risk my ass just this once: there are rumors about the murder he committed," Shikamaru said in what was a failed attempt at a stage whisper.

"I know all the details."

"Really?" Shikamaru raised an eyebrow skeptically.

Sasuke cleared his throat worriedly. "What?"

Eyes wide, Shikamaru glanced around once before leaning in.

"He's dangerous, Uchiha. They say he not only murdered that man, but his ex-girlfriend as well because she irked him. Apparently, she nagged him, he shattered, and he killed her without a moment's thought. If I know Tenten, and I do, she's a nagger, Sasuke."

He refused to believe it.

"I'd tell her to be on her toes or he's gonna kill her."

heartbeat: And there you have it! Neji is a deranged, psychotic, cold-blooded killer and Tenten is his therapist.

More plot hints in the next chapter, many, many plot hints!

Please REVIEW because you all are my motivation! Constructive criticism appreciated!