Chapter 3: Hit the Switch

"It's been three days. I'm losing my patience."

"...Shit.. just fucking say it..." he mumbles. "He's gone."

"What?!"

I can't close my eyes. I've gone over every single possible solution or strategy, but nothing makes sense, and all that comes to me are dreams. Dreams of men that eat each other... I don't sleep... I can't close my eyes.

It's like I can see their faces, engraved in the backs of my eyelids, drowning in the black. The faces of the people I've had to kill. Innocent people. But that's not the worst part. I enjoyed it.

All day, I would walk behind these two strange cloaked men, they tug me along with my hands tied together, whispering to each other, talking about me. They don't trust me. And they shouldn't. There are still bits and pieces of my memory that seem... missing. Dormant, I'd say. It's all still there, but, indeed, they are the memories of a dead man. But I do remember very clearly the criminals that are Hidan and Kakuzu. And it is clear, they know me.

I haven't said a single word to them since I left Konoha. My lips have crusted over, and rip when I open them. My mouth always tastes like blood. I don't know if it's in me... if I can betray my country, if I can betray everything I've ever believed in. I don't know if joining these men in whatever the Hell they want is in me.

But it isn't really about joining Hidan and Kakuzu, is it? It's about joining Jashin, in doing whatever the Hell he wants.

Jashin... what an enigma you are. You have given me the ultimate gift, eternal life. But you never told me what I'm supposed to do with it. Are you truly an evil God? ...

This morning I awoke in a room, not blindfolded or tied up at all, but the only door was locked. A small boy stared back at me from across the room. We both sat pressed against opposite walls, staring each other down, waiting for something to happen, for someone to open that door.

"..What's your name?"

A few more silent tears dribbled down his face, and he coughed, "K... Kaoru... What's your name..?"

I opened my mouth instinctively to respond, but when no sounds came out, I realized I didn't know the answer. I'm a dead man.

"..Mister, don't you know your name..?"

"It's..." Shikamaru, of the Nara clan. "Shika... Shikasuma." The bastard traitor. Of the worthless garbage.

"Shikasuma... what... what do you think those men are going to do to us..? The one in the mask, I think I saw his face... he's evil isn't he..?" in his eyes, the fear I saw in them was genuine. Pure, fear for himself, for his family, and honest fear of the two men who abducted him. The pure, honest eyes of a child. He's just a child.

"Yeah... I think he is..."

I am Shikamaru, of the Nara clan. All I ever wanted out of life... was to float on. With a nice, quiet girl, and we'd have a nice, quiet daughter, we'd have family barbecues and share a cold beer with our close friends, and when my little girl graduated the academy, I'd retire, and spend my days playing shogi, and tending to the deer of the Nara clan's land. All I ever asked for... was a simple, quiet, easy-going life. I don't know, maybe I'd travel, just live off the kindness of strangers, until I finally settle down. Go wherever the wind was blowing, looking out of myself. The only reason I became a ninja was so I could retire someday. I've only ever wanted... to be simple, soft, and pure, like those clouds...

But the longer I sit here, staring into the pure, soft eyes of this child, the more anxious I get. I can feel it getting darker outside. I don't have much time. Can I still live simply, quietly, like this? Would I allow myself to be happy, with the guilt? Can I still be a shinobi of the leaf, and kill in order to live..? Would Jashin, or even Hidan, let me?

I'm running out of time.

He set it up this way on purpose. This is my choice.

The most important question is... can I live with myself, knowing I have to kill this little boy? I trace the triangle hanging around my neck with my finger. But it gives me no answer.

"Just fucking watch, okay? ...Bitch, listen!"

"Fine, fine. Whatever..."

"You see this?"

"... Yeah."

"... It's yours."

"What?"

"Just fucking take it... And don't fucking lose it!"

Hidan gave his necklace a short tug and the back snapped, dangling it in front of me.

"... Uh..."

"Did I fucking stutter?" he shoves it into my hands.

"Okay, and what the fuck am I supposed to do with this?" I snap.

He rolled his eyes, "You wear it, dipshit, it's a fucking necklace," he barks, ripping it out of my hands again, spinning me around, and of course I just let him, and he hooks the beaded necklace around my neck. I just let him. Waiting for him to say something, staring down at my chest, feeling the weight of his treasured pendant, turning to see that I am alone again.

Always, I'm alone. I don't fucking understand any of this, so I guess I'll just take my anger out on this stupid wall that keeps glaring and mocking me until I brake a toe. Damn it all. What even was that just now?! Who the Hell is he- Who the Hell is Jashin?! No, I don't owe him shit, I can't do this. Am I supposed to just keep living this way, blindfolded and stumbling awkwardly behind them for the rest of my life? My eternal life is to wander in limbo until my fucking brain rots away and my whole vocabulary is nothing but maniacal laughter and profanity?! DO YOU EVEN HEAR ME, UP THERE?! No. This can't be it.

I'm staring out into that vacuum again
From the back porch of my mind
The only thing that's alive
I'm all there is...

What the Hell is a necklace going to do for me? Sentiment? I don't need his sympathy, I need an answer...

These glaring white walls are suffocating, but not more so than that locked door. Or these dead-man's cloths.

I just want to stop crying.

... Then stop.

My eyes have turned red as stoplights
You seem ready to walk
You know I'll call you eventually
When I wanna talk, 'til then you're invisible

I'm tired of walking, tired of listening to them, I just want to sit somewhere and just not think. I'm too tired to think. Tired of looking into innocent eyes and watching him rip them out.

He's just a kid. I don't even know where I am, I don't know where I'm going, but unless I kill him, I'm going to be here all night. I'm wearing my teachers cloths and my enemy's crest- I don't even remember what my face looks like anymore- but I have to make this decision. I can stop and die here, and I won't have to ask any more questions, won't have to walk anymore...

Cause there's this switch that gets hit
And it all stops making sense
And in the middle of drinks
Maybe the fifth or the sixth
I'm completely alone at a table of friends
I feel nothing for them
I feel nothing, nothing.

And even still, feeling alienated from my body, all that goes through my mind is how good blue looks on him. Blue like the pretty clear sky... yeah, maybe someday I'll meet you there, kid. Until then, I have to get some answers.

My arms are weak, but they stayed firm until Kaoru's pretty brown eyes roll back into his skull. ...

Just... FUCK.

Well I need a break from the city again..

Hidan's pendant in my left hand, Asuma's headband in my right. Either way, I can't stay here. I don't know who or what I am, but I don't want to be here- If I stay any longer I just might disappear into the cold white walls. What to do... what to do...

Breath, in through your nose, out through your mouth... straighten your spine, relax your shoulders, relax your face, sit, breath, relax, think... What are you doing with your hands? ... Stop that, relax your hands at your sides... Breath, think...

Staring into the black underside of my eyelids, there are those men again, dead man stumbling around, staring at me, but it's okay, just relax. They pass me by silently and uncaring as I continue further and further down, staring down the blackness. It looks like a starry sky... And I keep going, I can feel myself going farther. What's happening? This isn't what I intended, but here I am, no reason to stop now. The faces became fewer and fewer...

Breath, relax... They all look so sad. Funny, that one there kind of looks like Hidan, but it can't be him. White hair, bloodshot eyes, a gimpy leg, his bones sticking out- his rotting face is practically falling off, and his ripped cloths are unfamiliar. He's staring back at me, sadly, stumbling around like all the rest.

And I feel compelled to look down upon myself, and see I'm hardly anything but a dusty skeleton, bits of slimy flesh barely clinging on. I lift a hand, and one crumbling finger collapses into dust. And I'm just stumbling along, with the rest of them, in this endless, black nothingness.

But it seems I have a direction, so I keep going forward, farther and farther from my body. In the distance, deep in the dim, sparkling fireworks of my own neural discharge, I'm sure I can see eyes. Just barely, and my breath catches as they stare back into me. I keep going forward, but those piercing, faint eyes aren't any closer.

Those eyes are so cold, cold like my body, and it gushes- I'm going to puke. Eyes open so wide it burns, my throat's dry walls scratch and collapse, I finally stand and stretch my stiff body. Kaoru is still warm. I understand now. I'm fucking crazy.

I have to get out of here.

I have been less than frequent
She's under no obligation
To indulge every whim
And I'm so ungrateful, I take
She gives and forgives and I keep forgetting it

"I knew this was a bad idea, we should have killed him when we had the chance."

"Pff, yeah fucking right, moron, good luck with that, he's like me now," Hidan scratches the back of his neck.

"Shut up," Kakuzu's muscled hand digs into Hidan's throat, "Stop acting so casual. We have to get him."

Hidan escaped the grasp angrily, spitting at him, "Are you a fucking tracker nin now?! I don't fucking know where he went, damn bitch, seriously," he rubs his neck, turning away.

Kakuzu's anger is about to explode. His partner could be so dull, his ignorance made Kakuzu's head spin. But he's done talking about this; he hadn't planned on returning to Konoha anytime soon, and it was a detour from their current destination, but the little rat has heard too much. Kakuzu was going to find him. And kill him. A thousand times if he had to. He'd fucking bury him in the ground and piss on him every day and see if he grew piss flowers. Then he'd brew them into a tea to give to his uncultured, uneducated fanatical partner. But at the moment, he collects his belongings, walking coldly and silently out the door, Hidan treading on his heels.

And each morning she wakes
With a dream to describe
Something lovely that bloomed
In her beautiful mind
I say, "I'll trade you one
For two nightmares of mine,
I have somewhere I die,
I have somewhere we all die"

"...Ino... Ino wake up." I don't know what I'm going to say to you, but I have to say something.

"...No, stop it, I told you, I don't want to dream about you anymore. Go away."

I don't know why I'm here. I keep forgetting, I'm a ghost. This girl doesn't even feel like my friend, my comrade- she looks like an old photograph and it isn't mine.

"...Ino... please."

Her eyes are wet, and she covers herself in pretty floral sheets.

You know who I am. Maybe you can remind me.

There's this burn in my stomach
And there's this pain in my side
And when I kneel at the toilet
And the morning's clean light
Pours in through the window
Sometimes I pray I don't die
I'm a goddamn hypocrite

Sitting on her bed, I can take a breath. I stink, but her room smells nice. I can feel her warmth, even though she's hiding under her sheets. Yeah, I'd hide from me too. I know I can't stay long. But can't I? Can't I be a new person here, in Konoha? Can't I be a... murdering criminal servant of Jashin and still have Ino and Choiji as my friends...?

Again, the cold symbol of my "savior" gives me no answers... With a heavy heart and a sigh, I know I can't stay here. Even though I want to so badly. I want to. I want to. No matter where I go, I can't live a peaceful life, so at the very least, I won't stay here and hurt you.

"Okay, Ino. I'll go. I'm sorry, I won't keep coming and hurting you anymore. So just keep sleeping and dream about... barbecues and cold drinks with your friends, laughter on a warm summer evening..."

And I'll just go, off into the dark again, staring out upon the village, a distant place, and it blows right past me. I can't stop until I have answers. These questions, that's all I have keeping me on my feet right now, and that's just going to have to be enough. This confidence is lonely, but if I can stand, I should... This pendant is heavy around my neck, but these legs are my own, these eyes that look out into the world are my own, I control these hands and these lips, so I'll decide... who I am, and who you are.

But then night rolls around and it all starts making sense

There is no right way or wrong way

you just have to live

And so I do what I do

and at least I exist

What could mean more than this?

What would mean more, mean more?