Characters: Minato, Kushina
Summary: Death doesn't suit them.
Pairings: MinaKushi
Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto.
Death does not suit them the way it suits others. Others, well, when they die they look so peaceful. In death some have grace. Their hair spreads out, their faces still, and they just look like they're sleeping. Loud noises could stir them.
Not so with Namikaze Minato and Uzumaki Kushina.
Picture this: a stranger happens upon their corpses before Kakashi does. The pale light of an ill-favored autumn morning shines on them in shafts and patches. Their bodies are still cooling, and the stranger has to wonder just what on Earth happened. They both look so vital, so healthy apart from the fact that they're dead. How did such a young man and an even younger woman meet death this cold morning?
The fair-haired man has died with a smile on his face, but he doesn't look like anything akin to peaceful. That smile is washed down in blood, grotesque, teeth painted crimson. His face is pale and strained, the muscles stretched tight and taut over bone. Flat on his back with his hands spread wide, he resembles nothing quite so much as the sacrifice on the flat table of some ancient pagan altar. His left hand stretches out towards the woman. Still reaching for her, even in death.
The stranger's eyes fall to the woman.
She is still beautiful, even in death. Heartbreakingly lovely even with gray starting to fleck her lips, the sort of girl men would surmount mountains to have, the sort of girl wars should be fought over. Or maybe not; it's hard to tell in this lighting. She may just be as plain as tree bark, and the lighting only gives her the semblance of beauty.
Unlike the man, this one has been afforded no dignity in death. She lies on her side, curled up, the broken body of a grotesque, oversized baby. Her long scarlet hair flutters out; her skirt has been pushed obscenely high, just barely covering what it's supposed to. Blood and amniotic fluid is liberally caked on her thighs.
The stranger looks and wonders. A thought is given to wondering what their story is. One has to wonder when they started going out or if they were ever married. One wonders what they said to each other in the darkness, what their faces held in the light. One wonders if they said "I love you" one lat time before Death met them, or if they ever said it at all.
Here is a story that will never be told. Here is a story that probably could have been a bestseller, but will never be read. No one will care about this, no one will want to know and no one will ever wonder. It will all be forgotten without ever having been known.
Death does not suit them. These two were meant for life and living, not for cold rest and eternal stillness.
Death does not suit them, but anyone can see that they're dead. There's too much blood and too much finality written on their foreheads for this to be simple sleep.
Besides…
A newborn's plaintive cry splits the crisp air. He is naked and cold, and wants his father to pull the blanket more securely over him. He is hungry and aching, and wants his mother to put his mouth to her breast and hold him close.
If they were just sleeping, surely they would hear.