Just because you met when you were little doesn't mean it's anything special. Grow up, you moron. When has it been that you fell in love and lived happily ever after? When has it been that it actually became happy?


Chapter 9


Is life fair? Is happiness a lie?

I don't know, I don't know…

Just stop laughing. Stop pointing. Stop screaming and hating.

I can't bear it, I can't, I can't…


When Naruto was little, he'd think to himself that he actually had a family.

That one day, he'd be able to look at all those smiling faces and have one right on his own. One day, he'd have parents, ones who loved him very much. He'd have a little brother who'd follow him everywhere, a mother who was understanding, and a father who always had time for him.

And while he was at it at this moment, Naruto supposed he wanted to become Hokage.

It wasn't that he had given up.

It wasn't like that, not at all.

With a sigh that escaped through his lips, Naruto watched as the academy students streamed out of the doors like schools of fish in the waters. The sun that had begun to set cast an orange glow that made everything look beautiful.

A slight breeze swept through the leaves, but Naruto just zipped up his jacket and ignored it, his eyes trained on children of various ages, some accompanied by parents, a sibling, a relative or friend… He noted some who laughed without a care, some who strayed shyly back—those with friends, and those walking alone.

Friends were people that you could blend in with. You could be there, but in the end, not even exist.

A hidden cycle, a hidden meaning—with a broken smile that was filled with bitterness, Naruto stood up on the rooftop and turned to leave.

"Hey, who's that on the roof?"

"I think it's that Uzu-something kid. Y'know, the one who--?"

"Oh man oh maaaan. Y'mean that?! My mom says that he's responsible for why the teachers are so rough on us!"

"You're kidding me!"

Naruto closed his ears to the conversation, but several words still made it to him as he quickly left the scene.

"…moron!"

"Fool…!"

"IDIOT. …hate…that guy."


Hinata stared blankly up at the night sky, with its seemingly endless darken shades as it drew further on into black.

Where had the days gone when it had been that she had been allowed to be in love, when she had been allowed to admire? When had it been that Naruto had changed, and that she did as well? The sinking feeling in her stomach grew more noticeable as the moments passed by.

She had to have changed.

Or else she wouldn't have even recognized this as her.

There was something she was avoiding.

There was something she was not considering, whether it was for her own good, or for her own happiness.

Somewhere in her mind, Hinata vaguely wondered why the stars were not out tonight, with the absence of clouds and the absence of anything foreboding. There was also concern with the lack of the moon—should it not be out there with the clouds gone?

After all, for the past few days, it had been clear, cloudless with beautiful stars and a bright moon with its many phases.

Hinata should've took this as a warning.

But then again, how can anyone truly notice the calm before the storm before it is far too late?


Tsunade stared solemnly at the paper she held in her hands, completely ignoring the people before her desk, waiting for her reaction.

Off to the side, Shizune stood nervously, eyeing her sensei, before eyeing the large group and back again. In her arms, Tonton made several noises akin to a pig, but seeing as Tonton WAS a pig in the first place, let's not go over to that.

Finally, one of the men spoke.

"Well? What is your reply, Godaime?"

Shizune would have slit his throat for such an impolite tone, had Tsunade not held up a hand, as though she knew what Shizune had been thinking. The young woman was both grateful and annoyed. Who did these people think they were?

Apparently, Tsunade thought the same thing as she raised her eyes from the paper, her voice cold as she spoke.

"What is the meaning of this?"

At that, the youngest of the group smirked and bowed mockingly.

"Why," he smiled, "Godaime-sama, we're merely taking out the trash as we were hired to do."


Sasuke stared stone faced at the picture he held in his hands.

When Team 7 was none the wiser, and when life was not as harsh, none of them had realized a time had to come.

He stared at the palm of his right hand, his eyes narrowing as it closed tightly.

With his lips drawn into a thin line, Sasuke flung the flimsy picture aside, outside of the window.

He didn't even bother to watch as the night wind carried it off into the darkness. After all, they were all, at some point, bound to meet once again in that place where even light could not reach…

You can't hate enough…that's why you're so weak. Why are you even bothering if you're so weak?

Why bother if you're so weak that you can't even comfort a friend? Someone you regard as close as a brother? Though, I suppose that term's lost on you…

Sasuke pounded the wall.

"Shut up," he ground out. "Shut up."


Sakura stared almost unblinkingly at the picture of Team 7.

When had they all started to change?

Or rather, when had Naruto started to change?

"Start falling in love…" she murmured quietly. "…start noticing others in love…"

Sakura remembered the times when he would follow her around—so close to stalking—when she would punch him in the face and wherever would be harmful—she missed that kind of ignorance on both their parts—when Hinata would love Naruto so obviously, and he was the only one who didn't know.

They had all changed.

One way or another, they had all changed.

"Shit." She whispered, suddenly remembering.

Sakura sat herself up from lying on her bed, the picture left on her pillow as she made her way to her calendar, her eyes drawn to a red circle.

"…what does it mean…?" She asked herself, her eyes never leaving the words imprinted in the circle. "…what does it mean, when we're told to circle our calendars and wait for 'Judgement Day'?"

Sakura could not forget the events that had happened within the past forty-eight hours and then some. She would never be able to truly forget...

But something about Kakashi-sensei's announcement and the 'Judgement Day', seemed to align with each other.

A chill made its way to her spine.

It was just her imagination…right?


"Tsunade-sama?" Shizune inquired. "What was that all about?"

The men had left with smiles, jeers and laughs, all without displaying a single sign of respect towards the Hokage—that is, if you could call fake smiles a sign of respect, as though you were going to pierce a knife right through her forehead any minute.

Shizune had constantly been at her wit's end, from their arrival up to when the young man who had smiled had laughed, "Aren't you glad that the demon plaguing your village will soon be rid?"

"Shizune," Tsunade spoke, her voice sounding as though her life had been drained from her. She looked weak as she set the paper back down with shaking hands and sat back in her chair. Her eyebrows furrowed as she rubbed her temples. "Bring me some sake."

Concerned for both Naruto-kun and for Tsunade-sama, Shizune actually allowed Tsunade what she wanted.

The next several moments were spent in silence as Tsunade completely ignored the cup and placed the sake bottle to her lips, drinking greedily.

"Tsunade-sama?" Shizune asked finally, when Tsunade pounded the container back onto her desk, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand. Her breathing was heavy and her eyes narrowed, glowering at the doorway. "What's wrong? …what happened back there…?"

"Naruto." Tsunade growled, reaching into her desk drawer and pulling out another bottle of sake.

That was all that Shizune needed to hear before she understood. "I'll take the paper away, Tsunade-sama." She said quietly. "I'll stop them from distributing it."

"It's too late." Tsunade waved a hand at her, calming down enough to pour herself a cup instead of chugging it all down in one go. Rubbing at her temples, she sipped tentatively at the cup, as though it was her life's support, a precious fluid. "…they've done it even before seeing me."

Shizune was enraged. "But that's-!" She cut herself off, to avoid spouting obscenities. "T-Tsunade-sama, you're not allowed to publically distribute anything that is not prior approved by the Hokage and the Council!"

"Apparently, they already went to the Council." Tsunade murmured into her sake.

"What?"

"And they gave them the same contract, so much time to make duplicates…" Tsunade grumbled, pouring herself another cup.

Shizune stared at the contract as she picked it up from the floor, where Tsunade had tossed it while yelling at the group to GET OUT and NEVER SHOW YOUR FACES HERE AGAIN. Her eyes read each line slowly and carefully before they darkened.

"This is…" she breathed.

"Only the first half of the page was distributed." Tsunade told her. "The Daimyo had a least that much sense to avoid causing a revolt."

Shizune did not answer that, only reading out a select sentence of the second half of the page in a low whisper, more to herself to understand than anything else. "…in cause of this, Uzumaki Naruto is now…" At once, she snapped, looking up with a frantic expression, running to the front of Tsunade's desk and pounding it with both hands so that the woman looked up at her.

"Shizune?"

"Tsunade-sama!" Shizune felt like screaming. "This…you can't allow…!"

"It's out of my hands, Shizune." Tsunade said quietly. "…it's already been deployed."

"But Tsunade-sama, surely you can use the ANBU-!"

"Shizune." At that tone of voice, Shizune stopped cold and stared at her mentor, whose lips offered no smile of comfort, whose eyes were as cold and hard as steel. "Do you think I haven't thought of that? Or for anything else at that matter? Do you think I would run away willingly, retract my fangs from those who wish to disturb what should be left alone?!"

That's right. Shizune realized, and her heart sank. Those men had the ANBU's power on their side…even the ANBU who were strongly against this idea would not able to complain or go against orders. Because they had no such say in something like this…

…that was why the Kyuubi no Kitsune couldn't have been taken down, defeated, so much more easily those years ago.

Because the ANBU back then had been personally serving as the Daimyo's bodyguards in a country that was barely outside his own. Because the Daimyo had been so paranoid that the other Lords were going to kill him when no one gave a damn about his fat, stingy hide.

Shizune did not meet her eyes, lowering them. "…sorry."

"It's alright, Shizune." Tsunade closed her eyes. "Because if anyone's going to be sorry, it'd better be that idiot of a Daimyo for give the a-okay to such a thing."

Shizune cracked a smile, but her heart wasn't in it. Neither of theirs were as they silently contemplated what would happen.


Just as Naruto was about to escape from the words that seemed to echo again and again each time he looked at the Academy, he collapsed onto his knees, his arms shaking under his own weight and beads of sweat trickling down his forehead. Each breath and gasp was a fight for air, a fight…!

His body shook uncontrollably, and Naruto coughed and hacked as his body seemed to react badly to something.

Somehow, the sunset had turned into the dead of night, and the presence of other humans as well as the overwhelming stench of blood surrounded him.

Slowly, he unraveled himself from his crouching position, but did not stand up straight all the way. His eyes looked back from left to right, taking in what he could before it could be too late for him to know anything. It was hard to see around him, but he had his senses—he could hear, he could feel.

Movements in the air were not hard to tell once sight was out of the question…

His eyes adjusted themselves and Naruto saw what he saw.

Five before him, surrounding him like the curved line of a semi circle, all facing him while leaving no opening. He guessed there were more behind him. His feet, placed a little bit more shoulder width apart in terms of diagonal distance from the other, slowly inched back. His eyes never left the masks of those who were clothed in black, nor did they leave the weapons they held with practiced ease.

The sound of a kunai embedding itself near the back of his right heel let it be known to his trained ears that his hunch had been right.

"So what did I do?" he asked quietly, shifting his right heel all the way back so that it touched the edge of the kunai. Naruto inched his left leg back as well, before he stopped, not trusting himself to move any further, to risk anything else. It was already enough that he felt like he was going to die. After all…

You just didn't send more than a single ANBU against a single Genin. His throat strangled up, and Naruto forced himself not to choke on his fear.

In the air, there was also an indescribable tension, something that would not allow his shoulders to unwind, nor allow his breath to leave him. As though time had frozen still with the clock ticking the last moments he had of his life, Naruto somehow felt like he could not move, frozen still.

The only sign that he was still able to feel, was the fact that he felt a slight trickle of sweat run down his brow.

Within a few seconds, Naruto felt several kunai against his neck, and amongst other places.

The blades of the kunai cut into front of his neck, and several on the back. He could not move his torso in a way to fall down and heal from this because it was centered between two straight, thin blades that could easily slice him in two.

Naruto did not want to hear it, the sound of a mace pounding against the rooftop, growing louder and louder.

The reaction the roof shingles had against such a heavy and deadly weapon was to leap up from their places each time it pounded against a portion of the roof.

He swallowed, feeling as though someone had forced down something like cloth into his throat to prevent him from breathing.

Frozen in a position where his body wailed for mercy, but where weapons warningly sliced his skin and drew fresh lines of blood, Naruto had no idea what was going to happen next.

His heart began to resonate and copy the same pace as the mace as it grew heavier and heavier.

His ears recognized the sound of some sai being removed, but he didn't realize it until he fell to his knees, the weapons piercing into his skin and through his neck, that it had already been jabbed straight into his spine.

Naruto fell onto his front with his arms and limbs and entire body as weak as though they weren't even there. Somehow, he managed to fall onto the side of his face, and watched without really understanding as several pairs of zori dispersed from his view.

He heard silence, before he heard the trickle of blood.

Then pain, agony as each weapon was viciously yanked out of his body, reacting with a scream, a yell something his throat made as though he had finally been able to breath. Then all sound was cut off from him as his throat itself felt like it had been chopped out.

Naruto was vaguely aware of the tip of a katana blade reaching under his chin and pulling his face up. His eyes were struggling to stay open as his brain dully noted the fact that it had to shut down or risk the possibility of survival completely.

Maybe, his brain reasoned a naïve person's thoughts, they'll let us go if we play dead.

They won't, his common sense honed from years at the Academy spoke, because dead shinobi will only be dead if you dismember them, cut off their heads and burn the body. Keep your eyes open. We need to stay alive…we need to stay awake.

It was easier said than done.

His body agreed more with his brain than his common sense, and was sluggishly ordering his eyelids to close automatically. He caught himself a few times, forcing his eyes open, but it was like fighting against a flood.

It was inevitable…yet he still fought, without purpose, without realization, because he couldn't remember why. It was just doing it that made off with his energy.

He caught blurry views of masks in his eyes as they opened and closed, opened and closed—each time, smaller than the last, before his eyes were barely a slit open, clouded over as his breathing began to still.

There was silence in the air, before a deadly voice laced with nothing but itself made itself heard to all in the vicinity. It was clear, loud, and made Naruto jealous. Why could this person speak so clearly, so powerfully, so well?

The voice was like a lullaby to him, an invitation to close his eyes. But then the words themselves made him stay in the state of his body, made him fight to stay awake, made at least, a little portion of his brain realize what was happening.

"Uzumaki Naruto," Said the voice, loud to everyone else, but quiet in his own ears. "You are charged with treason to Konohagakure and stand accused of consipiring against the Daimyo of Fire Country. Thus, your punishment will be assigned accordingly."


"Hinata."

At once, she stood up, looking incredibly flushed. "H-hai, O-Otou-sama?!"

"I'd like to speak with you," Hiashi's voice was strangely calm, "about a certain subject."

"W-What would t-that be, O-Otou-sama?" Hinata asked nervously. It was rare that Hiashi would ever sound so calm when he was not enraged around her, or ice cold. She did not like the look of things as it forebode something awful. "W-Would you like to sit, O-Otou-sama?"

Hiashi looked hesitant, before he spoke in affirmation. "Very well. This conversation will probably take quite a while."

Something in her heart sank at those words, and Hinata swallowed, but forced herself to remain calm and steady herself. She hid the nervousness and the fear she felt and offered him a seat on the other side of the table, before reseating herself at sieza position on the mat.

"Would…w-would you like t-tea?" She offered timidly, afraid that he'd lash out by her. Hinata was prepared for him to start yelling, but was startled into silence when Hiashi nodded and spoke very clearly.

"I would."

Hinata stared at him for a few seconds, frozen.

"…Hinata." Hiashi said after a while. "My tea?"

"E-eh? O-oh, y…yes!" Flustered, she poured the tea into a new cup, but spilt some of it on the flooring. If Hiashi noticed this—which he probably, for certain, most likely did—he made no comment on it. He did not even pause to look irked and annoyed.

This made Hinata all the more scared.

…why was her father acting like this?

Her heart pounded in her throat so loudly she was afraid he'd hear and immediately make her burst into tears in his interrogation. She was already far too nervous, far too scared of what he would've done to her, to have such a calm heart. Just a few words could make her have a cardiac arrest.

Hinata nearly did when she heard her father say the next few words, just after he took a sip of his tea and took his time to enjoy this, while Hinata shook on the other side of the table in fear, in fear of what was to happen next.

"Hinata." her father said calmly, quietly, his eyes locking onto hers. "We need to talk."

Hinata flinched, but somehow, she managed to unfreeze enough to hear him after he had spoken her name.

"T-Talk about who?" she squeaked out, uncharacteristically assuming it was a person.

Hiashi raised an eyebrow and shook his head. "If I'd known you'd have already had a slight inkling to what I was talking about, I wouldn't have wasted any time at all being courteous." His voice sounded tired, but after he finished speaking, his gaze hardened back into that of the man who was her father.

"We need to talk." He said. "About Uzumaki Naruto."


SLAP!

Within a few moments, the youth was reduced to tears as she stormed away shouting words that cut through him like a knife. Before he knew it, with his hand pressed against the cheek that stung with the feeling of her blow, tears were falling down his face.

"She's gone, onii-san." A little voice piped up.

He turned to see a little boy with yellow hair sit at the bench on the other side of the hedge. The child wasn't facing him, but the adolescent had an odd feeling that the boy had been watching him…watching him and—

His heart tightened as he looked miserably down at his feet.

"Don't worry, onii-san." The little voice continued. "I get hurt all the time."

"Not like this," he replied. "I don't think you get hurt like this."

"What?" The boy turned and looked at him with the bluest eyes he'd ever seen. "What do you mean, onii-san?"

"What's your name?"

"Naruto."

"I see…well, I'm Ryouta." He said quietly, hand still on his cheek, but his eyes raised to look at the child's eyes. "Naruto-kun, when you're in love…when you want to be with someone very much, you don't want things like this to happen."

"But she hurt you."

"I still love her. That's why it hurts here." He gripped at his heart, and Naruto copied it. Then, Ryouta noticed something. "Naruto-kun…can you come out from behind the hedge?" The boy gave him a confused look, but complied, tottering out.

He was bloodied…

"Are you okay, Ryouta-nii-san?" Naruto asked politely.

Ryouta stuttered something, staring shocked at Naruto's body, turning purple and brown. At that, Naruto just grinned, though it hurt his face and he stopped smiling.

"It's alright, onii-san. It always happens, so I've sort of gotten used to it." Naruto beamed up at him. "So, we're both hurt! That's okay, because…!"

"Not okay…" Ryouta murmured softly. "It's not okay, because you're hurt on your body, I'm hurt in my heart."

"Onii-san?" Naruto cocked his head to the side. "I don't get it. I'm the only one who's really and honestly hurt, right?"

"You're not the only one who's hurt." The boy told him quietly. "There are many ways to hurt. But the heart hurts will the worst. I'm hurt in my heart…and you're probably going to get hurt there someday too."

Naruto stared up at him with a confused expression on his face. "…I don't get it."

The teenager did not answer him, and turned to run after his girlfriend, who shouted at him, hit him, but he still hung on. They were both crying.

Naruto watched them with big eyes. "…she slapped you, onii-san. Are you dumb?" he asked no one but the wind.


Hinata stared at him awhile, before she looked down at the paper he placed onto the table.

"...J-Judgement…?" She slowly read. "…demon?"

Somewhere, her heart stopped.

"It's…at dawn…?"

She looked up questioningly at him, despite already knowing. Hiashi spoke what she knew, and within a few seconds, Hinata was reduced to tears.

"The execution of Uzumaki Naruto."


End...?