Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto, dammit. *Sobs*. It belongs to Kishimoto.
Pairings: SasuNaruSasu mainly GaaNaru SakuLee KakaIru ShikaIno KibaHina
Notes: Right well, I'm sorry if Naruto comes across as a little OOC throughout this story, but I do have my reasons. He is darker than you could come to expect, I think, but I can't blame him when you look at the facts. He has been hated his whole life for something that was beyond his control, been abandoned and neglected. Sakura the girl he 'loved' was a bitch to him really, even if she didn't mean to be, his supposed best friend/best rival just ran off and ditched him, just increasing hsi fear of abandonment, and then nearly killed him simply because Naruto, a little misguidedly I think but still, tried to 'save' him.
There is only so much a guy can take before he loses that optimism. But I don't think I have changed him that much. He still is a joker with friends. Hmm... I'll put OOC as a warning for all characters just in case.
I kinda like writing angsty Naruto bless him. He has a lot to angst over.
Anyways, enjoy.
/\/\
Chapter two
"Save your son?" he repeats a little dumbly, his laugh is humourless and cold. "Your son doesn't need my help." He spits the words, the bitterness poison on his tongue. In the back of his mind he is ashamed to speak to the Uchiha matriarch like this.
Fuck, he really is going insane. He is talking to a dead woman in Sasuke's eerie little ghost town and feeling bad for being so bitter toward her. There is fury in the thought, fury and confusion and annoyance.
But she just smiles that sad little smile, horribly kind as if she knows, as if she understands. He wants to tear it off her face, to let go all his frustrations on this image of Uchiha perfection.
He doesn't want her understanding. He wants her gone. He wants her to disappear so he can wallow in this bout of self-loathing in peace before he is up to face the day once more and can lose himself in friends and missions and smile, and truly mean it.
"Maybe by saving one, you can save both." Her words seem worldly and wise, but Naruto has never wanted worldly and wise words. They are not what he searches for in friends and comfort. He sneers at her, an ugly expression Naruto loathes and yet cannot hold back.
"Itachi is beyond any saving grace I could offer, Mrs. Uchiha." Despite this being a dream or a hallucination, whatever it really is, calling the woman by her given name is impolite. He never knew her in life, to address her memory like that would be disrespectful and Naruto has learnt to be mindful of the dead. "He's dead." His voice is lowered now, as if to soften the blow against her.
Did she see Itachi coming? Did she know it was her eldest that murdered her in the dead of the night? Does she know her youngest son has followed in his footsteps and killed also?
Does she wonder where she went wrong?
He wants to tell her, he finds he wants to hurt her in some way. A search of his soul and mind would provide an explanation but he doesn't want to look, afraid of what he might find. Something black and pulsing and ugly, he thinks, a darkness he has always had but barely just begun to accept.
"I made no mention of Itachi," she says softly, those dark orbs piercing his soul, reaching into him and seeking something, something Naruto cannot name or even guess at. "You are confused and even more broken than he and I ever suspected."
"What?" he feels a little insulted at her comment, perhaps because it makes him sound weaker than he is, but more because he knows there is a semblance of truth. "Who?"
Her eyes study his face with sadness in her gaze and his question goes unanswered. "And yet you are the best one for the job. Each place is unique; no one else has gone through what you have. Similar events have occurred, yes, but never the exact same.
"Your past is the hardest of all out there. Only you can do this."
Naruto stares at her, shaking his head. He presses the heel of his palm into his forehead. "What is going on?" It's barely a whisper, and yet it carries on the wind. "What do you want?"
"I have told you what I want, Naruto."
Naruto laughs and it is a shattered thing. Mikoto closes her eyes against the sound. No child should laugh in such a way. "I tried," Naruto says quietly, he sniffs distractedly, avoiding her dark gaze. "I tried to save him once. He never needed it. He is strong enough to save himself." He swallows thickly.
"I want to wake up now, Mrs. Uchiha. Let me wake up."
"You are awake, Naruto. This is not a dream. Not this time, this warning had to come in person." Naruto drags a hand down his face, looking around him at the still houses, crumbling skeletons that once bore life and the dead pond, a single ripple of a nightly bug spreading across the surface.
His breathing is unsteady – facing the mother of the friend he failed has made him uneasy. She still treats him with kindness, her voice never leaving that soft, musical pitch and yet Naruto can't help but wonder if an edge will seep into that tone like a knife.
He almost hopes it will. No one else will blame him for failing to bring Sasuke back sooner, to keep Sasuke from leaving in the first place. He jumps when there is a hand on his face, glancing up at the Uchiha woman. Her smile is serene and remorseful.
"You have no choice, Naruto. Your soul is bound to his in a way that cannot be severed until this ordeal is over. When he dies, you will be brought over the boundary and I will explain more then." Mikoto leans in and kisses Naruto's forehead – it's obscenely motherly. Naruto wants to push her away, to question her on this mysterious 'Him.' He wants to rip her eyes out just to stop them gazing at him like that. "For what it is worth, I am sorry. I am sorry for all you that have and all that you will endure at the hands of the Uchiha's."
"What do you mean?" Naruto draws back sharply from the warm comfort, finding his voice once more. "What do you mean?"Her expression truly is apologetic as she draws away, far enough for Naruto to march away if he wishes but close enough to keep a loose hold on his wrist to prevent him.
"Soon, Naruto," she promises in a lullaby of a voice that soothes him into a pleasant kind of mindlessness. "Sleep now, Naruto. Sleep a dreamless sleep." With a touch of her fingers to his forehead, Naruto's body sinks into the nothingness of slumber with the ease and comfort of sinking into a warm bath.
His last sight before the clouds roll in is a soft-faced Mikoto, laying him down with yet another sweet kiss to his forehead.
/\/\
Jolting movements.
A continuous sway.
Left-right, left-right, left-right.
Is he being carried? Is he walking?
Sleepiness once again conquers over his conscious and Naruto finds he hates the sensation of sinking.
/\/\
Voices, a crowd of them. They rumble and sing and dance just over the surface of his consciousness. He can register them but he does not yet want to join them. He is peaceful here in the dark – dim images of a flash of red, a girlish giggle and a happy kind of sadness. Or is it a sad kind of happiness?
There's warmth here, a lingering sense of something he cannot quite grasp. He likes it here.
But the voices are insistent. They demand he comes back to them, rejoins them in their world. He doesn't know why he is so reluctant to go.
"Naruto, come on, man, before I really start to panic."
"I will hit you, Naruto; I swear by everything I hold dear I will thump you!"
"Troublesome."
"Calm down, Kiba. He is f-fine. Just e-exhausted, I'm sure. He h-hasn't b-been sleeping well."
He eases his eyes open. Something pangs in his chest and he feel guilt. The voices are concerned. Who is he to keep them in such an unpleasant state? Those eyes flicker open, his sight blurred through a haze of drowsiness. Figures crowd his vision – figures that get clearer with every blink.
"Naruto, you complete jerk." A slam to the solar plexus that leaves him winded and wheezing before those same guilty hands tug him into a hug. "What were you thinking?"
Naruto is still trying to catch his breath as well as come round. He recognises this scent enveloping him and the pink hair that brushes his face. He knows the strength that ploughed into his stomach.
"Sakura." It comes out as a breathless sigh. It's a comfort to feel her arms around him, crowding him with concern like the sister he never had.
She draws back then and brings Naruto's still disorientated attention to the others in the room – Shikamaru lazes on the opposite chair; Kiba kneels to the side of Sakura who is seated in front of him with Hinata hovering close to the Kiba, a reassuring hand on his shoulder.
"What was I thinking?" He repeats dumbly and there is a vague sense of déjà-vu. He blinks, gently pushing the pink haired girl away from him and frowning at her. He remembers what happened the night before – the gathering of Rookie 9, minus a certain someone no longer welcome at Naruto's home, the eyes monitoring his every move from reflective surfaces, the beckoning voice, so warm and persuasive, Mikoto Uchiha, her plea for her to save her son...
He can't tell them that. They'd report him to Tsunade quicker than you could say 'ramen' and she'd force him into an overnight observation. She has been making allusions between stress and his state of being, his 'out-of-character behaviour', as if growing up and losing that childish optimism is a crime. She always used to rag on him to mature, and now that he has she worries.
He hasn't completely lost his optimism. He still believes there is good in everyone and everything and most people deserve a second chance, it's just he has realised that the extent he used to believe them wasn't realistic and would eventually kill him.
"What happened?" He needs to know what they think happened, and then he can work with it, make up believable lies to ease their worry.
"You went weird on us and left us," Kiba starts, with a shrug. "Then we decided, ya know, that two three hours of you wondering somewhere by your self is long enough and then find you collapsed outside of Ichiraku's." Kiba moves forward on his knees. "What were you doing, man?"
The blond struggles to sit up right, Sakura slipping of the edge of the sofa and onto her knees beside him. "I needed to think I guess, Sai had said some things that hit close to home." He glances at Hinata, before smiling a little. "I guess exhaustion got the better of me."
Shikamaru gazes at Naruto from across the room, unconvinced. He and Naruto stare at each other, Naruto trying to project innocence and Shikamaru searching those eyes for the truth. Finally the brunette nods his head, leaning back opting to stay out of this little truth-or-lies game for the time being.
He isn't any of his business after all. Naruto isn't hurt or damaged in any way. Case closed, no need to worry.
"But hey, I'm good now," Naruto says with a smile. His stomach rumbles. He glances out at it with amusement. "Good but hungry, so unless any of you thought to cook for the poor, beaten down soul that I am, move off and let me get some ramen."
Another hit, this time to the head. "Idiot, you can't eat ramen!" Sakura is towering over him now, fisted hands on her hips. "You passed out; you could've hit your head. You are eating something that will keep your strength up!"
Naruto opens his mouth to argue, but Hinata cuts him off with a gentle, "s-she's right. Just f-for today, at l-least."
"Hinata..." He drags out her name with a whiney tone but she doesn't waver. Sakura grumbles something about making him stay on a healthy diet as she marches into the kitchen to inspect his cupboards, even though she doesn't expect to find much.
Sakura comes back out of the kitchen. "There is nothing worthwhile in these cupboards," she discloses disdainfully. "Hinata come shopping with me, please." The dark haired Hyuuga ducks her head in acknowledgement, smiling lightly to Naruto and wishing him to get well before she joins Sakura at the doorway.
Kiba swoop sin closer to Naruto. "Look mate, I know you're in a bad way and all that, but..." he glances wistfully at the door that is beginning to swing closed by its own violation.
Naruto swings a hand to his head dramatically. "Woe is me, my best friend is ditching me, in my frail and ill state, to chase skirt instead, only to mooch back over when he is rejected."
"You know what?" Kiba says threateningly, clenching his fist. "I don't think you're ill enough –"
"You can go!" Naruto interrupts hurriedly. "You have my blessing and all that. Shoo, dogboy, shoo before an actual decent man comes and woos your fair lady."
"I knew you'd understand," the brunette grins. "I'll catch you later." And with that Kiba is gone, pursuing the girls like an eager pup. There is a comfortable silence drifting over the flat like a haze and Naruto warily glances at Shikamaru, hoping he'll find interrogation (well, Shikamaru's interrogation is never too hard-pressing – although now Naruto thinks about it, that lazy trait melted away as his youth did, much like Naruto's optimism and Sakura's value in vanity) too troublesome even now that the other three are not hovering around him like anxious bees.
"You're not telling us something."
For Shikamaru to leave it alone is apparently too much to ask. Naruto tries of innocence and levity, so he shakes his head. "No, I don't think so. I haven't been sleeping well – nightmares."
It should suffice. For anyone other than the damn Nara it would suffice. But he sees too much, knows too much – even though he doesn't want to, sometimes sees his intelligence as a curse because it means people expect him to actually do things, he can. Nothing escapes him for long.
"Uchiha came to see you."
Naruto jerks upwards, registering a faint dizziness in the back of his head, but ignores it. "What?"
"He wants to know why you were at the compound."
"What? Who says I was there?"
"The panic in your voice does," Shikamaru answers simply.
Naruto narrows his eyes, realization dawning. He should've known really, he should know how Shikamaru works by now. "You lied to me."
"No more then you just lied to us."
Damn Shikamaru's never failing logic. Naruto falls back into position with a sigh. "How'd you guess?"
"A hunch." There is another pause. "And the fact you mumble in your sleep, something I have never really noticed before. I am not going to ask why, far too troublesome to get any more involved in this when there is no evidence of violence, but watch yourself."
Naruto laughs. "Why is it the two least profound people have taken it upon themselves to make sure I'm okay? Sai even got through a little speech – that if I thought he cared enough, I would've sworn he practised – without once even mentioning 'dickless'." He shakes his head and glances at the Nara. "Should I start looking for the signs of the apocalypse?"
Shikamaru returns the smile. "Don't worry about it; we're just having an off day."
Naruto hums thoughtfully. "Thinking of off days, you and Ino, eh?" Shikamaru wishes he had kept the peaceful silence that had stretched between them after the girls and Kiba disappeared, because Naruto is grinning wickedly and Shikamaru knows he has a whole stock of embarrassing, prodding questions lined up just for him.
/\/\
Naruto is left alone in his apartment, having waved his guests away after Sakura had sat him down and cooked him what she deemed to be a good, well-balanced lunch. Naruto hadn't been quite so sure.
There had been laughs, giggling little things over childish gags of old crushes and teasing prods at current romantic interests, of which most were aimed at Sakura who had settled down with the exuberant Lee six months ago after six years of damn persistent pursuing and her own reluctance due to the intense studying she took up under Tsunade. She had laughed along good-naturedly, the easy smile and glittering eyes a beautiful sight to see and Naruto could almost feel the ghost of that past affection flicker interestedly before it was doused with his love for her in a purely sisterly way.
She filled a whole he had always wanted but never, in his youth, from her. A sister. A family. Someone he could turn to at any time with any issue and know that even if it angered her or if she disapproved, he wouldn't be turned away from her comfort and advice. His family was an extensive one.
As he closes the door to their backs as they melt into the quickening evening, Naruto is left with a warm feeling swelling in his chest like a bubble, a thing that brings a smile to his face and erases his confusion of last night, or at least pushes it deep into his unconscious to be dealt with some other time. When he looks around now, he doesn't see himself as the unwanted boy without parents, that feeling of missing out on something has faded to a mere pulse that threads through his body only very now and then, the fear of abandonment slightly lessened although he knows that will never fade – it is ingrained within him.
He will always fear being alone.
But he shakes his head, waving away the mist of thoughts not yet ready to relinquish this warm, happy feeling spilling over his chest. So, willing it to hold a little longer by simply recalling a few of the bad jokes and resulting indignation, he clears the kitchen – well, he dumps the plate and glasses in a bowl of cold washing up water – and takes himself to the shower.
When he comes out, hair damp and body a little chilled in his state of undress, an orange towel hanging over his shoulder and a loose pair of jogging bottoms sitting low on his hips, he wanders thoughtfully across the hall to grab a top, stopping only when his subconscious lightly nudges at him, the Kyuubi scolding him for his apparent obliviousness to his own surroundings.
Frowning, Naruto backtracks, to find Sasuke leaning against his door, arms folded and gaze fixed at the window, gazing at some far off place that Naruto could never see himself.
"What are you doing here?" he cannot keep the bitter hostility out of his voice. Only yesterday this same man had ignored him outright and now he is standing in his home as if he has every right.
He had once. But that right had been revoked.
The haughty, self-important expression his face allows a familiar anger to curl through his veins, a slow burning fire of built up rage stroking at him, coaxing him. But Naruto can't get away with that behaviour any more, not the childish, screw-the-rules, fighting-is-always-the-answer rashness. He had schooled himself out of it after a near miss in which his hot-headedness almost killed Sai who came to aid him whilst on a mission a few years back.
Naruto may make more mistakes than the average person, but he hardly ever makes them twice.
Sasuke doesn't bother to grace him with even a glance – not Naruto, the boy who risked everything to rag him back to his damn sense. No, he is worth nothing. He is nothing. Naruto's eyes flash with fury – Fury, an old friend back to welcome him with warm arms, ready to embrace him with the fire of the seemingly righteous.
The warmth is replaced by a cold hurt and worthlessness. He hates, loathes how the Uchiha's dismissal can still effect him so much, after four years, you'd have thought the blade would've dulled. But apparently it only knows to get sharper. Like a razor.
Naruto rubs his chin, thinking distractedly that he could do with a shave (a means to assuage the building tension in his body with things detached from his anger) as the Uchiha speaks. "You were at the compound, Uzumaki." The blond winces at the employment of his last name, a symbol of the distance between them, before he could stop himself. He too, has become accustomed to calling the Uchiha by his last name – a cold civility when needed. But he doesn't like it. He thrives on friendship, on being around people. He needs to be needed, to know that he is wanted in some way – and the Uchiha denies him of that need. It makes Naruto feel weak like a child in front of the man that commands a power he should never have been granted, or at least, given in moderation with the proper guidance in order not to buckle.
Naruto cannot imagine Sasuke without the invisible, naked power he welds with a deadly precision.
Still those darkened orbs don't face him, and Naruto finds himself glad as he joins the Uchiha in his gazing out of the window. He doesn't want to see the blankness of those eyes as he hears the emptiness of his voice.
"What makes you say that?" Cool, collected – Naruto praises himself in speaking so steadily. A few years before and the infuriation and the confusion and hurt would have seeped through like poison oozing from a wound.
"You were meeting with someone. Who?" Sharp, cold statements – impersonal like a surgeon's knife.
"Why should I answer you Uchiha?" Naruto counters. "You don't deserve anything from me. Get out of my home. You are not welcome here."
Those eyes look at him now and Naruto meets the gaze with pseudo-bravery. A lesser man would've crumpled but Naruto learned years ago that weakness is mocked and strength is respected, even if grudgingly, in the narrow world of the Uchiha.
The dark haired man's face remains impassive – a beautiful, hateful mask of indifference. Once upon a time there had been cracks, little crumbling slivers that Naruto had managed to wriggle his fingers under and tear away to reveal the soft fleshy part of Sasuke – but the Uchiha had resealed those rips in his armour and Naruto has no way of penetrating it now.
They are worse than enemies now, because an enemy implies some kind of hostile relationship between them. But this thing between them is purely one-sided; a one-sided rage. A one-sided loss.
Naruto isn't even worth the old derision. When the Uchiha had muttered an insult, it is merely a monotone word, with no meaning, no feeling behind it. Just a word tumbling from lips on automatic. It hurts more than the rage-fuelled threats of the villagers when Naruto is young.
Naruto sneers at himself in disgust – god, he sounds like a snivelling pathetic child.
They stare at each other – tension crackles like electricity from Naruto, it thrums with an uncomfortable life under his skin. He is waiting, anticipating... what?
Nothing Sasuke will give him, that's for sure.
"Well, isn't this a happy little reunion?" Naruto's gaze, grateful for a distraction from the bottomless pits that devoured his soul, flies to the window where Kakashi crouches, feet planted squarely on the window sill. Naruto doesn't care that the relief bursting in his chest is so visible, that Sasuke can track each and every shred of discomfort and tension and thanks on his face should the Uchiha so please as he grins up at the silver-headed man.
He steps forward, navigating his living room with ease before stopping a foot or so in front of the window – Sasuke seemingly momentarily forgotten and yet ever present in the back of Naruto's mind.
"What are you doing here old man?" Naruto asks as Kakashi hops down from his perch and straightens. "If you're here to try and make me convince Iruka that you're a good person, you can bugger off. You sold Kiba and me out the other day. In fact, I hope the couch eats you in your sleep."
Kakashi just grins at him – well, Naruto assumes the man is grinning, else his eyes have had a serious tick for a long time and he should probably have it looked at – and shrugs.
"Not my problem."
"Is so your problem old man. Sold out for sex – teammates should look out for each other." Naruto barely registers what he has said but Kakashi does, his eye flicking over to Sasuke who has resumed staring dispassionately out of the window.
The dark haired man doesn't even twitch. Kakashi almost wants to applaud him if that wouldn't be grossly inappropriate.
"I was never your teammate Naruto," Kakashi says instead. "I was your teacher. Besides, it is very good sex."
The blonde blanches, wrinkling his nose in disgust. "Sick, Kakashi. Real sick." That said Naruto rubs absently at his nose. "Why you here, Pervert-extraordinaire? I assume it isn't for a run down on -" The blond cuts off his sentence with a shake of his head. "No, I can't even finish that sentence."
"What? Can't put Iruka and sex in the same sentence?" Kakashi's grin, if it could be seen, would be an evil one, the same twisted smile a tormentor wears when indulging in his addiction.
Naruto claps his hands over his ears. "La la la," he sings, eyes closed in case Kakashi would make any rude hand gestures. "I can't hear you." With his ears blocked by his hands and his own singing, Naruto misses Kakashi's soft, "This includes you as well Sasuke. No sneaking off now when his back is turned."
He also misses the grunt Kakashi receives in reply. When he cautiously releases one of his ears, azure eyes narrow as they glare at Kakashi, the silver haired man simply smiles.
"Why you here, old man?" he grinds out instead, arm crossed over his chest in disapproval of his mentors perversion of Iruka – his innocent, if a little unstable, teacher – and almost protection against hearing of those inclinations.
"Tsunade wants the both of you."
Naruto raises an eyebrow but nods, watching as Kakashi takes pride of place on the window sill once more. "You know, you could use that thing over there, you know the wooden thing with a handle and hinges and most importantly a lock. Ordinary people do – hey, what are you doing?"
Naruto tugs slightly on his arm where Kakashi has taken hold of it, his arm snatching out and grasping him like a manacle. The man leans in slightly, head tilted toward the blondes' neck and Naruto titters nervously.
"Kakashi?" What the hell is the man doing? He shifts a little and Kakashi draws back, grin firmly in place, even if his crouch on the window sill seems a little tenser than before.
Had the man just sniffed him?
"Since when was I normal?" Kakashi then salutes them in farewell and drops out of vision. Naruto gapes at the space his once-mentor had been before dashing over, palms flat against the wood to keep himself from launching out of the window. His eyes scan the outside, searching for those familiar gravity-defying spikes so he can yell a question after his teacher but the silver-haired man is nowhere to be seen amongst the chattering villages going about their business.
Naruto steps back, snapping the window closed and rubbing his neck self-consciously. "Well that was weird..." Frowning he turns to confront the Uchiha, only to find the spot the silent bastard had occupied is also empty.
The sad thing is that it still stings.
/\/\
Naruto pushes open the door to the Hokage's office with little ceremony. He kicks it shut behind him and throws himself into a chair beside Sasuke. "Afternoon my favourite Hag," he grins with no sense of preservation, perfectly ducking the book that is lobbed in his direction. It slams against the wall with a shattering force, Naruto is a little disappointed.
If Tsunade really put her back into it, the wall could've cracked. He aims his most disarming smile at her as he settles.
"Impertinent idiot," the woman grumbles as she too sits back in her chair. "Just you wait, Uzumaki," she threatens with a finger poised in his direction. "Revenge is a dish best served cold."
"I'm only trying to make sure you have the opportunity to have the best meal as is befitting a lady of your station," Naruto says with a cheeky wink and Tsunade growls but it is a fond, affectionate thing behind the irritation.
"I can see that Jiraiya had a lasting impression you brat." Her eyes flick over the satisfied grin and she shakes her head. "It isn't something to be proud of, he was a damn lecher." Again a sad fondness laced her words and she smiles though before shaking her head.
"Excuse me." Icy tones. Naruto doesn't flinch as he once had. He keeps his eyes forward, not bothering to allow them to slide to the side in microsecond glance. "Sorry to interrupt, but we were called here for a reason Hokage-sama." Cool politeness. Cold respect. Is it true, that respect or a farce?
Tsunade straightens and nods her head. "Of course. Nothing too strenuous I'm afraid, but I rather wished to deliver the news myself." Her smile is turned on the blond who stares back. "The Kazakage has asked the medical scrolls he so kindly lent us back, with a request that Naruto spends a little time with him."
Naruto's eyes light up with an excited flame. "Oh yes," he beams. "I love that man. I really do. Naruto is having a holiday." He pumps his fist in a victory motion, before settling with a goofy grin. It had been some time since he had been his silent friend, more time then Naruto deems necessary.
He knows his friend is busy, running a country does eat up ones time. But still – he misses the red-headed, emotionally-stunted, would-be-could-be murderer.
"Why am I to go along?"
Tsunade draws her attention from the relaxed and cheery blond to face the Uchiha. Stoic as ever, face unreadable. It is almost unsettling how well that mask fits his face. Tsunade is sure there will come a time when his mask eventually melds to his face and that the two will become one.
"Because the Kazekage is also in possession of a scroll of ours – compensation in case something should happen to his scrolls."
"Trust the bastard to be over protective, as if we would do anything to his damn scrolls." Naruto scoffs, with a roll of his eyes.
Tsunade glares at him for his interruption. "I need someone to bring them back, I'd rather they be brought back as soon as possible, undamaged." Her eyes are burning with something else, Naruto notes, but neglects to work out what. He takes a peek at Sasuke, who is gazing at her before he nods stiffly.
Something passed in that gaze, Naruto realised belatedly. But he does not know what. The childish demanding part of him feels insulted at being left out, and commands he finds out what secret they shared, but the more mature, adult side of him that sounds oddly like Iruka reprimands such thought.
It is not your secret to know.
No, Naruto agrees, it isn't. Instead he stands, with an exuberant gesture, dashing over to the Hokage, pressing over the desk and brands her cheek with a kiss before cackling a little manically and entirely gleefully and darting from the room.
Sasuke appears unaffected by the blonds' joy and stands more sedately. "Thank you, Hokage-sama." She stares at him a little longer before she nods her acceptance and he leaves the door shutting with a snick behind him.
She slumps back in her chair and rubs her eyes tiredly. "Come out Kakashi, we have things to discuss."
/\/\
The Kyuubi comes to him that night in a dream. The room Naruto is in is a small little thing, cosy and comfortable – the walls are an obnoxious orange and yet there are flickering shadows, grasping, ghoulish things that reach out for him from the darkened corners. He learnt long ago to keep away from them.
Hence the reason why all the furniture except the fireplace, the source of the dancing light, is about a foot away from the walls – just in case.
Naruto wanders around the room, avoiding the far side where the darkened bars to Kyuubi's cage lingers, glinting with malicious intent as the light of its weapon bounces off cool metal. This space is his mind, he came to realise. It has changed and matured slightly as he has grown – there are pictures, snapshots of life and desires and wants. Writings of his dreams and aspirations, cracks in the walls as evidence of his pain.
As his respect, grudging and unwanted, for the demon his houses grew, so had the demon's cage, which now takes up a second room behind those bars. He stares up at the pictures above the fireplace, the only safe haven from the shadows. There's the original team seven, and the secondary one; Iruka awarding him his headband after the Mizuki incident when he was twelve; Sakura and himself from the days when his crush still hadn't waned; a group shot of all his friends: Hinata, Neji, Kiba (who is glancing, Naruto notes for the hundredth time, sneakily at the Hyuuga heiress) Shino (preoccupied with a bug); Ino and Sakura either side of a pissed-off looking Sasuke, their scowls only skin deep; a Sai painting just off to the side, just a little way away from the group and yet still a apart of them; Choji, and Shikamaru are lounged at the front, Temari and Tenten seated with them as Lee is in mid-run across the shot.
Naruto smiles and goes to the touch the picture, when the voice of the Kyuubi, smooth and chilling, drifts across the room.
You stink of those Shifters of time and space, jumpers between dimensions.
He frowns, hand dropping to his side and as he turns to face those dreaded bars of his adversary and guest. "You know of them?" He asks. He had half been hoping everything had been a dream, something he could easily forget about – out of sight, out of mind.
He doesn't want to think of those things. He approaches the cage as the Kyuubi answers.
Of course I do. We demons are not handicapped by your human perceptual inadequacies or your intellectual limitations.
The blond reaches the bars, and, with a sense of rash, stupid immortality, he smirks at the creature doused in darkness within. "And yet you got caught by us."
A tail lashes out of the darkness barely giving Naruto time to avoid it – the appendix thrashes against the bars. The metal's rattles threateningly, a funeral chime. Naruto straightens, cursing his foolhardiness. He can feel the satisfied grin of the demon wrap around him like a cocoon of slime.
Still the kit fears the beast. A tail slithers out from between the bars and grasps Naruto's chin, who jerks as if to release himself. The Kyuubi only chuckles gutturally as his eyes glow in the darkness that consumes it. Good. That is how it is meant to be.
"What do you want?" he grinds out instead, hating the feel of the tail against his skin, smooth, soft – deceiving. A tail of flame and pain and torture wrapped almost lovingly around his chin as another sneaks out and tenderly strokes his cheek. Faux comfort. A mockery.
Naruto steels himself under the soft touch, accepting his punishment for his idiocy. He braces himself for the violence that should follow – but then something, a cold thing creeping up his spine like a parasite, suggests that perhaps the Kyuubi has something else under his belt better then doling out physical pain.
Just to relay a word of caution young one, comes the smooth reply. Naruto is jerked forward by the tails, face to face with the bars. He can feel the demon breath on his face – hot like lava, with the smell of ash and smoke. A snout presses to his ear in a parody of a human whispering to another. An unnecessary feat – Kyuubi needs not to open his mouth to utter his words. What is to come will be of your own doing, borne from your inherent weakness.
Then the blond is released and the demon skulks back into the darkness, his tails withdrawing. Naruto frowns, pressing against the bars. "What? What do you mean Kyuubi?"
Those smouldering eyes gaze at him languidly. You shall see soon enough.
"Why warn me and not tell me why?" He is getting sick of his questions being left unanswered.
Because your anguish is so sweet to the taste, young one. Those eyes slip closed until there is nothing but black within the cell. Until next time, cub.
/\/\
So there we have it. What do you think? This is certainly darker than I first anticipated me thinks. OH and yes, I have decided there will be a little Gaara/Naruto in this because it really is hot, besides they both understand each other so well I think. That will come in next(?) chapter. I think. (: Thank you for reading.