~Chapter IX~

~You Know My Name~

If you come inside things will not be the same / When you return to the night / And if you think you've won you never saw me change / The game that we have been playing / I've seen diamonds cut through harder men / Than you yourself but if you must pretend / You may meet your end

"Okay Naruto," Kakashi sighed, running a gloved hand through his disheveled gray hair. "Let's try this again. What did you see that night in the alley?"

Naruto had been at the police station a lot in the past two days. Kakashi and the other detectives became more and more insistent in their questioning of him each day. He understood their urgency, he really did. They wanted to save as many people as they could from such a slaughter. To do that, they needed all the information at their disposal. However, Naruto could not give that to them. Twice as many lives would be wasted if he sent those detectives to the Uchihas' doorstep. They'd barely have time to blink before those monsters snapped their necks.

"It's like I said," Naruto replied, surprised as always at how well he managed to control his voice. "If I saw anything, I can't remember it now."

"So you remember everything but the murderer's face," Kakashi sighed, getting sick of the repetition of words passed between them.

"I'm starting to think I never saw the bastard."

Kakashi held Naruto's gaze, sternly, with a look that said "you better not be lying to me, or else." Naruto reciprocated with his standard "that's all I know" stare.

"Why did you claim to have seen him?" Kakashi asked, quieter this time, and Naruto knew this question didn't come from the man's analytical side.

"I was angry and I was in shock," Naruto said, placidly. "The more I think about it, the more it felt like a desperate delusion; a hallucination by my hysteria."

Again, Kakashi sighed into the folds of his mask and Naruto recognized the familiar exhaustion on that hidden face. The man must have been working the case through the nights. It looked as if he hadn't slept in weeks. Dark rings were heavy beneath his slightly bloodshot eye, making him look ten years older. His gray mess of hair was losing its shine and was in more disarray than it was supposed to be.

It made Naruto fell guilty when he withheld his secret. He maintained his sorry excuse for peace of mind by telling himself Kakashi would be better off exhausted as opposed to dead. He'd already lost Sakura to the vampires. He couldn't lose this man that was like his father too.

"Naruto," Kakashi spoke again, leaning over the table in the interrogation room they sat in. "You have to tell me what you saw. I can put this psychopath in a padded cell forever if you tell me the truth."

"I am telling the truth," Naruto said, adding as much blandness to his voice as possible. "Why would I deliberately not tell you something that could catch this guy? He killed two innocent girls."

Kakashi held his gaze for one more long moment before lowering his weary eye and waving his hand to dismiss Naruto.

"I'm sorry Kakashi," Naruto murmured as he got to his feet. "I wish I could help. More than anything, I do."

Kakashi did not respond or look at him, instead milling through the papers in the portfolio in front of him. His shoulders heavy with guilt, Naruto exited the interrogation room and signed out of the police station. Upon his departure, he was greeted with the nipping November winds that had swept into Konoha.

His hot breath came out in little, misty puffs in response to the cool air. He tugged his dark brown coat tighter around him against the slivers of wind snaking passed him. He could almost smell the snow slowly rolling in from the North in preparation for December. No one was out traversing the town that icy November Sunday and Naruto was pretty sure it wasn't the temperature that kept them indoors.

It just wasn't natural for Konoha to look so empty. Naruto felt as if all the color had drained away from the formerly thriving town. The sky was a wintry gray and shadowed the town accordingly. It was heartbreaking to see what the murders had done to the town so quickly. This troubled Naruto as he dragged himself through the dusty streets. He was more upset about the fear instilled in the townspeople than the death of the girl he loved.

His mind had been dwelling on the funeral day for quite some time. He still didn't understand his reaction and he was constantly comparing it to the grief he saw on Neji's face as he passed by Tenten's grave. He had never felt more than hollow. Even as he went home and lay in his room alone, images of her reeling across his thoughts, he still felt nothing.

He felt dark. All the happiness had drained away from him. He was a shell filled with empty darkness. He was sad and he was mad but, it didn't make him want to explode. Not yet at least. He knew he wanted revenge. He wanted it more than anything - more than wanting her back - which was another thing that troubled him…Shouldn't having her back be what he sought the most? He loved her after all. He'd slept with her…

"Naruto!"

He jumped at the loud sound, the memory of barking doctors and detectives breaking through his not-so-sound mind. He tensed and whirled around to face the direction where the voice had come from. Even when he recognized Hinata, Kiba, and Lee approaching, he still didn't relax. It didn't initially register with him that it was his harmless friends surrounding him.

"I haven't seen you in days Naruto!" Kiba said first when they joined him. "Been busy, huh?"

He didn't answer at first and had to blink a few times to rid himself of the illusion of bared fangs and red eyes speaking to him.

"Um…yeah. I've been busy," he replied, not able to hide the absent sound in his voice.

Kiba and Lee didn't take any notice but, Naruto didn't miss the concern that passed through Hinata's silver eyes.

"How have you been?" Lee badgered him. "When do you come back to school? Everyone's been missing you!"

Everyone? Who was 'everyone?' Naruto had a pretty good feeling that Sasuke was included in 'everyone.' It scared Naruto to death knowing that his friends were oblivious to the demon beneath the smiles. It scared him that they trusted Sasuke and were so naïve to his malicious intent. He'd been out of school for a week and it just hit him then that his friends were entirely vulnerable and unprotected. He could lose any one of them at any given moment.

"I'm not sure when I'll be back," Naruto said after regaining his shaken voice. "The police have a lot to ask me."

"O-Oh," Lee faltered. "That's right. I forgot. I'm sorry…"

"…Any leads?" Kiba asked, quietly, after the awkward pause, scuffing the ground with his shoe.

"No," Naruto replied, too quickly, his voice going cold and void as it had been when Kakashi questioned him. "None at all."

Lee cleared his throat to break the unsettling silence creeping over them and said, "Um…why don't we head over to my place and we can have a movie-thon or something?"

"We can order take-out from Ichiraku and everything," Kiba added, though he wasn't as enthusiastic.

Naruto was about to reject them but, the hope in their eyes and the terror in his own heart changed his mind. These were his friends. He had no others. He'd already lost so many people he cared about…Life was to fleeting to take time for granted. His friends were in danger as well as himself. He was the only one that knew of Sasuke's true identity. Surely he could protect them somehow so long as they were all together.

"Should I assume we'll be seeing Shikamaru, Choji, and Sasuke there?"

It took all of his willpower to force Sasuke's name out into his list of friends. It repulsed Naruto that he had to treat Sasuke like an innocent comrade. He knew it would drive him mad but, he couldn't put his friends through the truth. Even as close as they all were, they would never believe him either.

"Sasuke can't make it," Lee said, getting all teary-eyed and over-dramatic. "He and Itachi are working on a project all night."

This made Naruto's heart falter. "Project?" All night? It couldn't be. Would they be out killing again?

"Naruto?"

Hinata touched his arm, hesitantly as he went rigid before them. He didn't outwardly respond to the contact but, did snap out of his reeling thoughts enough to reply.

"That's too bad," he said to Lee. "I would have liked to see him after all this time. Oh well. Shall we go?"

Both Lee and Kiba brightened at Naruto's fake smile and headed off to leave. He moved to follow but, Hinata pulled him back with force he didn't know existed in her.

"Naruto…Are you alright? You're acting…unlike yourself."

"I don't know what you're talking about Hinata. I'm perfectly fine," he returned, voice eerily calm.

He pulled out of her delicate grasp, careful not to be to rough and betray his true feelings inside. She clearly did not believe him. He hadn't seen her so determined about anything in quite some time until now. Her wintry gaze bore into his, searching for his true intentions.

"You're not fine," she said, lowering her voice. "You witnessed a murder…"

"I'm very well aware," he replied, struggling to keep his voice smooth. "You'll never have to remind me."

"…I-I'm sorry -"

"Hey! What are you guys doing? Come on! I don't want to be outdoors for much longer."

The two friends glanced down the street at Kiba's call. The two boys were shivering against the cold and shuffling in unease. Naruto spoke back to Hinata quickly, catching her off guard.

"What's done is done. I can't change the past but I can damn well make sure my future is brighter."

He stuffed his hands in his coat pockets and hurried after Lee and Kiba. After another hesitation, he heard the girl's footsteps stumble after him. He would make sure his future was brighter. In his future, he didn't intend on having Uchiha Sasuke there to destroy him.

It felt like hours that Naruto stared at the blank screen of his laptop. He had arrived home from Lee's house at around ten o' clock that night. He really appreciated all his friends were doing for him. For hours they had sat around the TV, making fun of celebrity gossip channels and laughing at old comedies. No one had brought up the tragedies in town or Naruto's absence from school. They had all acted so normal, like nothing was going on that could harm them.

Choji gobbled down chips all night and even shared them with everyone instead of hogging them all to himself. Kiba had brought his puppy, Akamaru, to play. Puppies always made everything better, Naruto realized. You were always happy when a puppy was in the room. Shikamaru had brought over some video games. For a while, the boys had been trying to train Hinata in the ways of the gamer. She was getting better and the highlight of that night for Naruto was when Hinata had actually beaten Shikamaru for the first time. Her excitement and Shikamaru's disbelief had actually brought a genuine smile onto his face.

It was only when he'd entered his lonely apartment that Naruto was disheartened by the truths swimming in his head. He had some piece of mind, knowing that none of his friends were going home alone that night. Lee's dad insisted upon driving them all home. Lee went too, so his dad wouldn't be driving home alone. It was a sigh of relief knowing his friends would be safe…well, somewhat safe. If Sasuke was anything like the vampires Naruto was familiar with, what could stop him from taking out a car full of teenagers? That thought was what brought Naruto to his laptop that night. What did he really know about vampires? What he saw in movies and read in books was all fiction for all he knew.

That was why it took him so long to decide whether or not to pursue a quest for answers through the internet. Half the information from the web was always false and when he was searching for something that wasn't supposed to exist, there probably would be nothing true to find. A logical idea then came to Naruto. All of these stories had to come from somewhere. Vampires had been in legends and folklore for thousands of years. Such a frenzy couldn't have been sparked solely from some imagination. Someone somewhere had to have witnessed something like Naruto had to begin the vampire legend and he was determined to find that truth.

Taking a deep breath to calm himself down and gather his thoughts, Naruto turned on his laptop and got online. He opened up a search engine and began by typing the word "vampire." Immediately, his hopes of finding honest sites was crushed. Half the links that came up were for fan clubs, newsletters, book sales, and signings – how was he supposed to know vampires were big in literature right now? Groaning in misery, Naruto flopped back onto his bed and tangled his hands in his blond hair.

"Why?" he whimpered, pathetically.

Naruto dropped his hands and looked at the screen again, feeling hopeless already. He glanced at the search bar and his brows furrowed. Okay. Maybe his search was too broad. Not everything with the word "vampire" in it had to do with gothic romance novels, right? Trying hard to maintain his concentration and confidence, Naruto retried his search, typing in "vampire legends" instead. Well, there was less movie media at least. There was still a lot of fictional book series links though. He scrolled through a few pages in search of a link that could lead to a research source at least. There were one or two that he bookmarked before he tried a different search.

For hours, Naruto scoured the web for reliable information. He was enticed with hundreds of pages of folklore after he'd renewed his search with "history of vampires." Turned out, he was right and not everything with the word "vampire" in it led to a teen romance story. He delved deeper into the story behind "Dracula" and the classic vampires from decades before his time. He was fascinated with the different cultures he found in his search. He hadn't had a clue that the vampire phenomenon had spread so far.

He learned a lot that night but, there was always a seed of doubt in him. Despite all the stories from hundreds of years passed and all the different countries they spread to, he had no idea if anything he read was true. Did garlic really steer them away from a home? Did holy water really burn their skin? It was far past midnight by now and Naruto was bug-eyed from staring at the screen for so long. He couldn't turn off the laptop yet thought. There had to be someplace that had the true answers he was looking for. He tried one more search: "the truth about vampires." The first thing that came up was a list of other options. "Did you mean: the truth about abortion? the truth about hot dogs? the truth about aliens?" et cetera, et cetera. Naruto took no notice of these because he was instantly attracted to the first link beneath the other options. He didn't know why he was so drawn to the title. Maybe it was instinct, maybe it was desperation. It was such a simple and foreboding title that there had to be some seriousness to it, he told himself. The link title curtly read, "We Hunt. We Know…They're Real."

Praying that it wasn't some porn or spam site, Naruto clicked the title and entered the website. His heart felt like a butterfly in his chest as his screen was filled with pictures…pictures of vampires. He just knew they were vampires. Every fiber of his being was telling him that the pale faces staring at him were real. The red eyes were not photo-shopped, the fangs were not plastic, and the skin was not white face paint. There were tons of photos all bunched together and overlapping on the screen like an unorganized bulletin board. Each photo was different. Some were clearly taken by professionals and others were amateur but, caught a good enough picture to give you a relatively good image.

Beneath every photo square was a date and location. Naruto's heart pounded in his chest as his eyes flickered across the screen at each photo. Brazil, May 2007: a photo of a vampire in a café; Korea, December 1992: there was a vampire entering a night club; Canada, March 2007: a female vampire entering an old, castle-like mansion. There were dates going as far back as the 1950s. Some photos were black and white to go along with the old date. Every photo had a setting that fit the location and date. Palm trees swayed in the backdrop for Florida photos, kangaroos hopped in the background for pictures from Australia, snow was on the ground in December, the sun was shining for June, people had fluffed up hair for the 80s, and people held cell phones in photos from 2000-2009.

Naruto stared at the screen for eons it seemed, taking in every detail of every picture. What had he found? Who had found all this proof? Hands shaking, he scrolled down the short page. There was only one place to go past the photos. There was a single link that simply said "Chat." When clicked upon, Naruto was brought to a page with a black background and a chat box with white type. The top of the page said "Ask Away." In the large box, he read that only one person was online with the username "Huntress." Too excited and curious to think about consequences, Naruto clicked "Begin Chat" and a bar popped up in the chat box for him to type in. Heart racing, Naruto typed, "What is this?" He clicked "Enter" and his question appeared in the chat box as:

Anonymous: What is this?

He stared at the screen in silence, waiting for "Huntress" to reply since they were the only one online. Their reply darkened his mood immediately. They replied:

Huntress: A chat room.

Grinding his teeth in frustration, Naruto typed back:

Anonymous: I know that! What is this site?

Huntress: Proof.

The reply came so fast that Naruto was caught off guard. He took his hands away from the keyboard for a moment and closed his eyes. His lack of sleep and eagerness was giving him a short fuse. He had finally found some promising information. He couldn't ruin it by having a temper. He took a deep, calming breath and shook his head to clear the sleepiness away. He shook out his hands to loosen up his joints and focused on the chat.

Anonymous: Proof about vampires, right?

Huntress: That depends.

Anonymous: Depends on what?

Huntress: Who do you work for.

This made Naruto falter and sigh in annoyance. Great. A paranoid crazy person, convinced that the government was out to get their brain or something. This wasn't going to be easy.

Anonymous: No one.

Huntress: FBI? CIA? NCIS? NYPD?

Anonymous: What the hell? NCIS is for the navy, dumbass. And I live in Japan! We don't have NYPD!

Huntress: How do you know what it is then?

Anonymous: How does anyone know anything? TV, idiot! Besides, unless you've murdered someone, I doubt any police department of any country would be on this site!

"Damnit!" Naruto growled to himself.

This person was infuriating! He was about to give up on the site, not seeing how any of the photos could be authentic if this crazy person was on. Huntress did not reply to his fuming words for a long time, although it didn't say they had logged off. Just as he was about to slam the laptop shut, a reply appeared beneath his and it made his racing heart stop in its tracks.

Huntress: Congratulations Naruto. You passed the test.

They knew his name. How the hell did they know his name? Without his command, his fingers typed in the question. Huntress replied:

Huntress: How does anyone know anything? Its not TV by the way. Now tell me why you're here.

He should have been terrified. He should have abandoned the site the second he saw his name. But, he was drawn to the site. The instant he'd read the link, he'd known this was where he'd get his answers. He didn't know how and he didn't know why but, he knew he could trust Huntress. They could help him. Somehow, he was sure of it. He just had to stay calm.

Anonymous: You won't tell me how you know my name will you.

Huntress: Not yet.

Anonymous: Fine. I came here for answers.

Huntress: About what?

Anonymous: Vampires.

Huntress: Why? Tell me your story Naruto.

He bit his lip, unsure of himself now. There they went, using his name again. It was discouraging but, he forced himself to reply, keeping it short.

Anonymous: The girl I love is dead because of one. I want revenge.

Huntress: You're positive?

Anonymous: I saw it.

Huntress: How much do you know about vampires Naruto?

Anonymous: Only what's in movies and books.

Huntress: You have a lot to ask me then.

Maybe it was his tiredness making him loopy that made Naruto laugh at this. Maybe it was his relief that someone appeared to be listening to him that made him laugh. He didn't know. He just knew he could finally get answers. He could finally learn how to make Sasuke suffer.

Anonymous: Who exactly are you anyway.

Huntress: You'll soon learn my name. For now, all you need to know is that I am a hunter.

"Kakashi!"

The shout awoke the detective from the first sleep he'd had in days. Granted, it was on his office desk and beneath loads of paper but, still…it was sleep nonetheless.

"What is it?" he asked the officer in the office doorway.

"Another murder, sir," he said, gravely.

Kakashi closed his eye and remained calm. He'd planned for this. He couldn't leave in a rush. He had to remember what to bring to get proof for the mayor.

"Okay," he replied to the officer, looking back at his solemn face. "Fetch Asuma and -"

"Detective Hatake!"

Another young officer rushed into the office, pushing the other one out of the way in his rush.

"There's been another murder!" he panted when he stopped in front of the desk.

"I know," Kakashi sighed. "Izumo just told me -"

"No! You don't understand. There's been another one. Two in one night!"

Cold crept over Kakashi at this news. Two murders? There were two?

"Locations?" he asked, deftly.

"The town church," the first officer said, voice shaking.

"The Gardens," the second officer said.

"Those are on separate sides of town…" Kakashi said, putting a hand on his head in despair.

"We know…sir," the panting officer before him murmured, hanging his head in hopelessness.

"What are we going to do?" the other asked.

Kakashi had no answer. The only thing he could think about was that now there were two…Now there were two.

Arm yourself because no one else here will save you / The odds will betray you and I will replace you / You can't deny the prize it may never fulfill you / It longs to kill you, are you willing to die / The coldest blood runs through my veins / You know my name