Naruto was sitting there blinking, watching his lover bleeding silently, watching the sunset collapse over the horizon, watching Itachi stare after the spot where Kabuto once was, watching his own hands shake. Naruto had just witnessed the biggest betrayal of his life. This meant Orochimaru couldn't stand, it meant Sasuke was free, it meant Naruto could escape with his life and his lover. This was perfect, the perfect escape, the perfect getaway. No one had to get hurt. But when he thought about it, someone had gotten hurt. And even with people he hardly knew, there was something wrong about what had happened. Orochimaru was just…lying there. Not upset. Not angry. Not jealous or frustrated or anything. He didn't even seem to care about Kabuto being gone. This was wrong. So wrong.
"C'mon, Naruto," Sasuke whispered, tugging on Naruto's sleeve and trying to get up. "Help me up and we'll get out of here."
Naruto grabbed Sasuke's hand and heaved him up. Sasuke couldn't stand; Orochimaru had clawed at his leg when he went down, and there was a deep gash across the back of his kneecap that made it too painful to put any weight on that leg. Naruto lifted him gently from the ground and started to walk. But they'd gone twenty paces before Naruto dropped Sasuke carelessly and whirled around. He ran back to Orochimaru, flipped him over onto his back and pinned the older man.
"Why the hell aren't you even sorry that he's gone? Fuck it, he's probably the only person on earth who cares about you, you ungrateful little bastard! Sasuke can't even stand, thanks to you—and…and…you're just…." Very quickly Naruto was crying and pouring out everything and connecting it all back to Orochimaru to make everything his fault. He shook the blond spikes of hair out of his face and collapsed, crying, and Orochimaru wondered who was in control here, the crying mess on top or the pinned man on the bottom.
"And Sasuke's constantly terrified that you'll find him and hurt him and do hell knows what to him! And you've been trailing the Uchiha clan for years, tormenting them! And you interfered in the Chunin Exams years ago! And you, with those creepy snake eyes that are in my dreams every night! And you just let the only guy who'll ever like you walk away!" Orochimaru was just lying there, soaking it all up, uncaring. Naruto was outraged. Unable to think of anything else to do, he smacked Orochimaru across the face. His hand left a print on Orochimaru's cheek, raising a tiny bit of color to his white face. And then Orochimaru laughed.
"You."
"What the hell?" Naruto screamed through his tears.
"I can ruin everything. All I need is you."
"What—what are you talking about? Ruin everything? Why the fuck would you want to do that? Or put it that way or—agh! Shit! Put me down, you crazy bitch! Agh!"
And then the two of them were gone. It was silent in the clearing for once in the last hour. The silence lasted a long time, and as dark clouded the sky as Japan fell into night, even the insects were silent. No buzzing, chirping, nothing. Quiet and dark blue blanketed everything, white fingertips of light inching its way along the night sky to mark pieces of the Milky Way, handfuls of salt cast into the overhead world settling to mark stars and constellations. It was dead midnight, and everything was still completely silent, as though this section of the world were trapped in time.
The giant abyss above the field was beautiful. Chains of stars were unnamed constellations. Sirius, the dog star, glittered, momentarily the brightest the brightest thing in the sky as a wispy night cloud floated over the moon and a particularly bright patch of the Milky Way. The Big Dipper poured a swirled mix of stars into the sparkling ocean above Japan and half the world. Leo Minor screamed his roar to the skies. Sagittarius's fingers were poised, ready to lease an arrow towards the horizon. Cassiopeia lounged upside-down, hanging beautifully in her chair, revolving around the North Pole, her head facing the ground half the time. The whole night sky was beautiful. Red stars, planets, Venus's glimmer, Saturn's ring, a glint of the moon through scattered clouds, a dust of the Milky Way here and there, darting through the constellations.
Just watching the night sky, waiting patiently for summer shooting stars, could be just as fantastically exciting as watching colors dance and twirl in the Northern Lights. A shooting stars gliding along the sky from one horizon to the other was a miracle in itself. Making a wish, tracing the tail it left with your finger as if it were close enough to touch. It was all amazing. A gorgeous light show for all who cared to watch. Even Aurora Borealis could hardly stand up to stargazing on a clear night under a sky free of light pollution, just lying in the grass and collecting dew until early morning. It was easily something you could spend hours on end doing.
Silence was still keeping a careful watch over everything in the field at quarter-to-one. Another hour ticked by, and still no sound escaped anything within a five-mile-radius, not even what should've been a gently trickling stream. The timing was perfect when a rock rolled in to block the path and dam the stream. The animals were silent. The stars blazed passionately overhead.
The silence coated the night, the sky, the trees, and the pile of limbs and clothes in the middle of the clearing. Sasuke, still in a motionless heap as Naruto had left him, was staring at the grass a few inches from his face, silent tears dripping down his flawless features, weaker than ever, vulnerable and bleeding and afraid of what he would—or more importantly, wouldn't—see when he raised his head.