Chapter 7
VIII. Respectfully Yours
The flashing at night, the sirens grow and grow
Oh, history involved itself
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She is dozing lightly when he comes in. Facing the bed, her back is to the window, and she refuses to turn around. The mound of paperwork is at her side, and she picks up her pen and resumes, completely ignoring him.
"Who taught him?" He says, and she wants to throw something at him. And she would, if she wasn't in her hospital, or the patient's mother, or married to the Hokage.
She laughs, and puts down her glasses, closing her eyes and turning around. She stands up, ignoring the damned papers for once, and finds herself barely at his shoulder level. This man once took her training, and protected her with arms that she once swore were big enough to span the horizons. These were the same hands that pulled down her dress straps, and held her like glass – the same ones that killed, and killed, and killed.
"I did. In case … you came back, and wondered." She looks at the sleeping body on the bed, hooked up to wires and tubes. "He always knew a little bit. It couldn't have been Naru- but he always kept it quiet." She doesn't add the fights at school, or the arguments. The difficulties of being two people at once.
"He can't stay." He says, his arms crossed, looking so achingly fierce. She can't answer, and instead, smoothes the sheets around this son, their son, if only by biology.
"He can't stay." He repeats, a little more softly this time.
"I know. You're still in the Bingo books of half the villages." She bends down, and kisses the boy on the head, trying to remember every hair on top of his head. Inhaling the scent of ash from a long burned out fire. She gets up, and exhales until she feels empty.
"When he gets tired of whatever life you and Sound offer, let him come home to me. If not for us… for naruto, for old times' sake..." She says.
He looks away. Turning, she walks towards the door, her back towards him.
"And as his mother, I will heap tenfold the punishment on whatever-whoever dares to hurt him... That includes you." She inhales. "Thank you and good-bye Uchiha-san."
There is no reply, but she no longer expects it. He watches her close the door, her long fingers splayed against the wall. He notes that there are creases in her eyes from laughter, and wonders about the man who gave them to her. Who lay down beside her every night. Who would have given everything for them all, and did.
He steps closer to the bed, and holds the railing. The boy takes after his mother.
Pictures were in all the newspapers - son of the hokage - and he was always checking the bingo books, just in case. But those sepia-toned cutouts that he always made himself throw away. There are unescapable facts in his life. He has paid for their lives in the blood of the opposed. His family is gone, and for years he knew he would be the last to have red spinning eyes. Then, Sakura came back one day, her hands cringing, and he knew.
Once, he had purpose, been so sure of every step. One night, he felt something alive buried beneath Sakura's expanding body.
Then he stole eleven years at the cost of his teammates, and looking down at this marvel, he is not sorry.
Shiro wakes up, and the sky is the russet gold of sunset. Quickly pulling the tubes and IVs from his arms, he sniffs the bandages around both his hands and arms. No infection, and the smell of salve meant they were trying to prevent scarring. Leaf charity at its finest.
The guards are in front, but most of the ANBU will be out searching. Bits and pieces of information come to him.
Uchiha-sama waited until the blue punk was hospitalized before vanishing with his son. By now, the scandal must have spread.
He pulls himself out of the window, and onto the roof. No guards. He rolls his eyes, and decides to take the long way.
By the time he has reached it, he is bent over, trying to ignore the throbbing itch of his arms. The trees have thinned out, and now there is only him, the moon, and the two Uchihas. Father, son, and holy spirit.
Uchiha-sama doesn't seem surprised. There is a sheen of sweat, and his clothes are singed in many places. The Sound cloak is gone, and instead, there is the fan peeking out on the back. He is breathing heavily, standing still against the grass.
"How long before they come?" He asks.
"Fifteen minutes, max." He says.
By his feet, the boy is unconscious, still with his battle clothing on, shuriken in his hands. Someone has gently placed him on the side.
"Go back to your team, and to Sound."
The wind makes his own hospital gown too thin.
Already, there is a thump thump of heartbeats coming.
"Sir." He says, quietly, and watches for a moment as his Otokage looks straight through him, and onto Konoha.
Then darkness.
He wakes up to find the cliff surrounded by ANBU. There is a bruise on his shoulder, and he stands up in front of them, and without pause rips off his bandages, letting them follow the wind. And when he marches back to Konoha, it is one painfully proud step after another.
This time they don't give him morphine, and he wakes up smeared in aloe vera, his arms already rebandaged, and all four limbs in shackles.
A man is lightly dozing in the corner, and even without the hat, his identity is obvious. He looks disheveled, heavy bags beneath his eyes. A menacing five o'clock shadow.
Shiro looks outside. Different view. New roof, and lots of guards.
"I wouldn't try it. They've been told to kill on sight." The man doesn't open his eyes, and after a bestial yawn, they open red and bloodshot.
"So Konoha has learned from its mistakes." He won't even pretend to have respect. Fifteen years is a long time to lie.
The man drags his chair next to the bed, making as much screechings as possible. The same robe of yesterday, slightly smelling of forest. Large chapped hands with nubby fingernails.
"How did you know where to find them?" The man asks.
"I once saw a picture of the place." He doesn't add that it was from a folder meant for 'reconnaissance.'
"Not the complete truth, but I'll accept it." The man taps his thumbs together.
There is a staring contest, set within a long inverted silence. Neither blink, or move, until he leans back, inhales and exhales slowly.
"Look kid, I don't care who the hell you are. I don't care what problems you have with Konoha, or anything about Sound loyalty. Some things are bigger than that. So that being said, where is my son?"
His voice begins low, and doesn't gain volume. Instead, it grows stronger. A heaviness creeps into his voice, and it fleshes out his face, draws his eyes together, until the man looks so certain, and fiercely collected that it's possible to imagine him carrying the kyuubi. Or destroying Akatsuki.
"Why do you think he left?" Shiro finally says, "the second time." And the Hokage furrows his brows, before laughing grimly.
"Seriously kid? I can give you all the excuses in the world. But t…" He drifts off, receding into his own memories. "Fear? Responsibility? Konoha's unforgiving hypocrisy? Maybe love. Yeah, heh, I'd like to believe the last one – and I do. But…One day, when you're old in this business, and you know the dead more than the living, you might understand. Your teammates are alive. Doing well. Maybe even happy." He gives a half smile. "It's enough."
His glare makes the boy sit up straighter, pay attention, because if he miscalculates, there will be hell. And he can imagine both kage's, in one team, tempered by Haruno-san. How powerful they must have been. A very long time ago.
"I really don't know." He says. "Sir."
They refuse to release him, even though he feels fine. His arms are lightly scarred, but the effect is worth it. He has been given walking privileges, and he decides to stroll around, in slippers and with his ass hanging out, on the fourth floor.
One door is cracked open, and he walks by slowly, stopping at the door. Isamu is on the chair, asleep so heavily, his head has fallen off the wall, and his mouth is hanging wide open.
She's still asleep, and her charts say she's had a few scares. They recommend another week, but tomorrow the sound genin are returning. Home.
He puts the chart down, and walks up two flights of stairs, until he is alone in his room.
Haruno-san is the one to release him. She hands him his clothing personally, and clinically watching him as he put it on. He can't blame her, but he can still fight.
He morphs into her face – not the one in front of him, but the one from years ago that had stood at his bed, offering him all of this. There are very minor differences, a slight line here, years over there.
"Kimmuro-san," she says, looking up, and she's won. Stony-faced and angry. He begins to think that if the circumstances were different, she might have been smiling.
"Fifteen years is a very long time." He throws out.
If he was anyone else, she would have refused, but instead, she scoffs, her hair perfectly pulled back, and takes off her glasses.
"I don't think I've ever thanked you," he finds the words hard to form.
"Now would be a very bad time to start." She says, before looking down again, and marking down some data from the machines.
He waves to her before she goes, and then leaps out the window, trying to avoid the judging faces. Azami-san is there, waiting.
"You ready to go home?" She asked.
"Oh. Yes." He answers.
A/N: Lyrics by Sufjan Stevens.
ALMOST. One more epilogue and it's finished.