I don't own Naruto
For a moment, there was absolute silence.
Naruto watched that little hand reach out, pushing against the shadow upon the floor that should've been flat. The darkness stretched, bursting open like a chrysalis, and Naruto could clearly see that what was escaping was the hand of a small child. It was followed by its twin, blunt nails painted black just like Naruto's own. Those little hands waved around, slapping flat against the bubbling shadow they emerged from, fingers curling, clawing into the flooring.
With wide blue-green eyes, Naruto watched as they scrabbled for real purchase, to the point that the effort left the fingertips irritated and torn, smearing blood. Though this was only for a moment, because those hands soon became wrists, then forearms, and when they found purchase, they heaved.
A body dragged itself from the shadows, nearly falling face first before the unnatural shadow shrank down into something moderately normal, hiding beneath the newly revealed form.
Naruto was speechless.
Harime was in the body of a small child, probably around seven. She had long unruly hair the shame shade of red as Naruto's, and she wore a white silk sleeveless shirt under a black lace apron dress with a tutu-like skirt.
But the cute attire didn't take away from Harime's gruesome appearance.
There was no telling how tall she'd be, because her legs were cut off, blunted stumps stopping above where her knees should've been. The rounded nubs replacing the rest of her legs were a patchwork collage of raised pink scar tissue and black stitching. Harime also had no eyes, of this Naruto could tell, because though they were mostly closed, thick lashes bowing towards her cheekbones, there was a sliver of space left to the open air, and within, there was nothing. Thankfully they weren't bleeding, but there was bleeding elsewhere.
Harime's mouth was pursed into a grim line, stained crimson, her brows holding a faint grimace between them in what Naruto realized was the result of pain.
She was in pain.
"Maa maa, you seem surprised, Naru-chan." Harime tittered, young voice hoarse, slightly thick before she coughed, a splurt of blood falling from her lips.
Naruto realized that Harime's throat was raw because she was always altering her voice to sound older. To sound like her.
"Come now Naruto, I'm not feeling very welcomed." Harime pouted, bloodied bottom lip jutting out.
Naruto wanted to wince at the display.
"Wh… what happened to you?" She breathed.
"That's an interesting story actually," Harime rasped, lifting a hand to smear away the metallic fluid trickling down the corners of her mouth before replacing her grimace with a smile.
That innocent little upturn tore Naruto's heart to shreds. She… she almost looked like a normal kid.
"You see, we never merged."
Naruto's face drained completely of color.
"Yeah, you accepted me, I felt it." Harime began, foregoing mimicking Naruto's voice to use a young voice that suited her more, though there was a rasp to it, probably from the constant voice altering, but there was also a natural hint of it. Though Naruto couldn't remember, she imagined she'd sounded similar years ago.
"But it was too late. After half of your soul was placed in me, I began to change, because I was originally based on your negative emotions, your soul was destroying me, because at the core you're not evil. But that's the thing. Something in me changed, because the something in you, the humanity, was at odds with me."
Naruto tensed, the arm that had been out of control, the strange threads beneath her skin suddenly reeled her limb back in, stitching the segment of her forearm back to its joint.
Harime choked on a giggle, and Naruto had a feeling that her other half didn't need eyes to know how she looked in that moment.
"The day I was given my own body and half of your soul something sparked, and when we later tried to merge, it didn't work because that sparked thing changed something in me at my core. I've always been sort of sentient, but at the same time I've only ever been an extension of you. Your soul imprinted on me, it left pieces as it tore me apart, little fleeting thoughts, ideals… morals. It tore me apart with madness, and I was surprised, because I thought that even if I knew nothing, I knew madness."
Naruto sucked in a breath.
All of her heartstrings had been struck with that last murmured remark.
"But I didn't know this." Harime continued, determined to lay all she had hidden before her creator. "It was true sentience. I'd grown into my own entity. I had individuality, and when we tried to merge it was useless because we weren't two parts of the same person anymore. I became Harime, and you were Naruto. So when I tried to return to Naruto, I was rejected. I couldn't be something I no longer existed as."
Harime's head perked up, and she shifted around on the floor, spreading her bloodied fingertips, and dragging herself around so she was fully facing Naruto. Slowly, Harime used her hands to pull herself across the floor, closer to Naruto.
The redhead took a single step closer, freezing as Harime stopped about a foot away from her, looking up with those eyeless pits, red stained mouth twisted in a bleak grimace.
"I'm not sure if you realize this Naruto, but Shisui, Yondy, Kakashi, and even Sasuke and Sakura can tell you, because they were there. Konohamaru came later but he saw the blood and the stitches on your stomach… I gave you most of my organs. I don't think you know that yours had rotten so much that they couldn't be saved. I knew even if I gave you back your half of the soul, the process of decomposition you had underwent because it was missing would simply kill you anyway. I doubt the fox's chakra could save you even then. Maybe prolong the time you had before you died, but you'd still die anyway."
'Wh… what?' Naruto's pupils dilated, her eyes going wide.
She remembered.
Sakura had looked at her stomach after she returned from her coffin after "merging". Sasuke had done the same thing. Hell, even Konohamaru had studied her after summoning her coffin to bring her back.
Of course she hadn't taken much note to it, but she remembered Sasuke and Sakura were present in the Hokage's office when Harime had torn out her liver because it "smelled rotten". Konohamaru must have gotten there after Harime put her to sleep.
Naruto had just assumed they were looking because the outfit she had been wearing showed off her midriff, and obviously there should've been a scar.
But it wasn't just a scar, was it? She was supposed to be covered in them, and her teammates knew that.
Konohamaru knew that.
They hadn't elaborated on the strange looks they had given her. Naruto had taught them through their interactions that she wasn't very forthcoming with information, so it made sense that they hadn't asked about her lack of scarring.
'Well, it looks like Harime is even less forthcoming with information than me.' Naruto thought grimly.
But to what purpose?
Why did Harime keep so much hidden from her? Why only now was she telling her these things?
"What they don't know, is that I put your rotten organs inside of me, a sort of clean up you know?" Harime went on.
Naruto's expression grew somber, but inside, she was horrified, not for the first time, she wondered, 'Harime… what have you done?'
"I didn't think it would matter, because I was going to cease to exist outside of you." Harime laughed bitterly. "Imagine my surprise when I broke the jutsu that gave me half of your soul and my shadow ate me alive. I didn't disappear into your shadow, though it probably looked that way. It was mine. I was swallowed, and my body began falling apart, but I didn't die… as you can see. Anyway, you were pulled into this coffin and I attached myself to you to tag along."
Naruto remembered when she'd woken up that first time in the Resting Place, where Harime greeted her in that odd willowy shadowed form with glowing eyes.
'It was a lie…' Naruto realized. 'A damn lie. The whole time that form was a puppet she manipulated with her mastery over the Nara's Shadow Jutsu.'
Harime smiled, bloodied teeth illuminated in the candlelight.
"Your organs rotted me from the inside out. Even when you woke up, and we started to train. Even when we were creating the Reaper Modes. Even when we began to get along better. I don't know why I became so closely knitted to the shadows, I don't know why it's so easy for me to manipulate them. I've never heard of a Nara that could literally hide in their own shadow, or someone else's, but I can, and I used that ability to my advantage to hide my form from you. I hid in my shadow and the puppet you mostly see is what I used to interact with you. The reason it was so warm, the reason its eyes glowed, was because inside of it, is nothing but chakra. I don't know how or why, but my chakra is red, and the eyes of my puppet light up that color when I'm using it. Even when my puppet is "bleeding", that's just a trick too. A little Blood Release fun and you can make almost anything seem live like, ne?"
It was starting to make make sense. Things Harime had done and said… they suddenly didn't seem cryptic or like random dark remarks or actions. She… she had a reason for everything she did, just like Naruto, and the reason she'd done the things she had up until this point was to hide the truth from Naruto.
'She was trying to protect me.' Naruto thought. 'I… I knew that… I always knew she wanted to protect me, at first it was the reason she existed, why I created her… to protect me. And even now… after becoming her own entity she still… still everything she does… is to protect me.'
She protected Naruto from the ugly truth of her form, and she protected Naruto from death by bringing her back to life. She went so far…
'Just for me.'
And that…
It hurt.
"You remember Naruto?" Harime pulled the redhead from her thoughts. "After we created the last Reaper Mode, Harbinger… you went to the Resting Place. I took that chance to separate from you. I came here, back to the Graveyard and for the first time I dragged myself from the shadow that consumed me. What was left of the form that had looked like yours… I don't know how to say. A lot of my flesh had been too damaged or rotten to salvage. It was like having a disease that was killing me but I wouldn't die."
Naruto forced herself not to flinch. She stared into those unseeing pits, and recognized that the form Harime resided in currently, was a reflection of her own pain. Harime had endured so much pain. And that was because she was always protecting Naruto.
"While you were resting, I summoned The Wardens of the Toy Box, Ichi and Ni. You know how to modify bodies, and so do I. So by extension, our clones do too. I had them fix what they could, change what was salvageable, and remove what was damaged beyond repair. The result is what you see now. This isn't a child's body."
Naruto wasn't surprised by that. She had already kind of figured…
"It is a body remodeled after a child." Harime explained, gruesome grin withering slightly. "I knew with what I had remaining I couldn't have my teenaged self reformed without serious deformities."
Did she not consider her current body deformed? She was a collage of scars. She didn't have any legs. Any eyes. How damaged had her body been if all she could salvage was enough to create the body of a small legless child? How much rotten flesh had Ichi and Ni cut away?
"Aw, Naru-chan. Here I am spilling my guts and you can't even muster up enough to say something?" Harime rasped, red seeping past her lips as her grin reformed into a small smile.
"What can I say?" Naruto murmured.
What could she say? Nothing would suffice. This… Naruto didn't know what this was.
Apparently unsatisfied with that, Harime dragged herself a bit closer, reaching out, wrapping her little hand around Naruto's right ankle.
Her hand seemed so delicate. So small and easily crushed. Naruto wanted to take that had, to pull Harime to the feet she no longer had.
"What does the fox like to call me?" Harime asked quietly.
Karin watched the scene unfolding behind the barrier with the Yondaime and Shisui flanking her left and right.
She… she was absolutely speechless.
She was shaken beyond comprehension. Karin had absolutely no idea about anything. There was so much that Naruto and Harime kept hidden inside of themselves, Karin was overwhelmed by what had just been revealed.
'So… so much suffering.'
How?
How did they both function under so much pain? Karin could not understand it.
She didn't understand them.
Harime dragged herself a bit closer, reaching out and taking hold of Naruto's right ankle.
"What does the fox like to call me?" Harime asked quietly.
Naruto remained silent.
Karin wondered about the identity of "the fox", but the current situation held onto her much more fiercely than such a background detail.
"What is it!" Harime screamed, making Karin tremble in her skin, even as all it served to do was cause the little girl to collapse in a fit of painful, bloody coughs.
"Abomination." Naruto whispered hoarsely, the skin around her eyes tight, face bloodless as she watched red dribble from Harime's mouth.
"Exactly." Harime hissed in bitter satisfaction. "It's not like he was ever wrong, but now it's so close to the truth it's sad. I am an abomination."
Karin flinched violently. She was shaken because even she had thought that. Many times she thought of Harime as a monster, living evil, and an abomination. She knew that Harime knew it.
She just hadn't thought that Harime had cared.
"I have no eyes, the organs I still have are damaged beyond repair, and I…" Harime released Naruto's ankle, letting her hand fall to the floor, her face lowering to stare sightlessly downward. "I don't know what I am. I don't know who I am."
Karin watched Naruto's face twist in what she recognized as guilt. Her crush lowered herself to her knees, so that she was closer to Harime, who lied on her stomach on the floor.
"I don't know how to fix you." Naruto said quietly. "I don't know how to help you. I can't even help myself."
Karin almost forgot how to breathe.
So badly she wanted to do something. To be of use and take away Naruto's pain… she even wanted the same for Harime, however twisted and strange that may be.
But Karin knew she could do nothing.
All she could do was watch uselessly beside the Hokage and Shisui as things went on.
"You can help me." Harime said fiercely, looking up, the corners of her empty eye sockets tightening as her expression twisted into a scowl.
"All I know how to do is despise and destroy. I look at pretty, delicate, things and all I can think of is how to crush them. How to mutilate them. It's horrible… I hate it. But I don't know how to do anything else. To be anything else. But you do. You're different, Naruto. You can help me be different too."
"Harime…" Naruto wasn't sure what she had intended to say, but Harime didn't give her the chance to try and figure it out.
"You created me to kill, and to hate, and to like it. But the game isn't fun anymore." Harime said, shaking her head. "I don't want to play anymore."
Naruto was unable to stop the temper welling inside of her.
"What…?"
Why was Harime talking like that? As if… as if Naruto wanted to still be playing the same horrible fucking game too.
'Why didn't she just tell me?' She thought, wounded and furious. 'Why couldn't she just have told me!'
"Do you think I wanted this?" Naruto huffed, powerless to her feelings, unable to contain them. "Do you think I had any intention to create life only for that life to feel pain? I didn't ask for this any more than you did!"
"But do you see what you did!?" Harime returned heartedly. "Look at me! Look what I have to endure! Do you think this is fun? It hurts. It hurts to smile, it hurts to blink, it hurts to breathe. It hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it HURTS!"
"What do you want me to do?" Naruto snapped back. "I'm sorry. But I can't fix this! It's too late!"
"You don't need me anymore." Harime went on, Naruto noting that she wasn't really talking to her anymore, more of thinking out loud.
"So why?" Harime asked brokenly. "Why can't I go back? Why can't I die? Why can't I go back to nothingness, to when I didn't exist?"
The redhead thought that she'd be less hurt if Harime had slapped her. And again her temper swelled. Harime was talking as if Naruto didn't understand anything.
If she had just told her the truth… Naruto wasn't sure what she would have done. But they wouldn't be doing what they were, trying not to scream at each other in an effort to convey their own feelings.
'She acts like she's the only one. Like I don't understand her.'
How dare she?
Who knew Harime better than Naruto? Just like no one knew Naruto better than Harime.
How dare Harime act like Naruto was some stupid bystander that couldn't understand her pain.
"You think I never wanted to disappear?" Naruto spat. "That I never thought it'd be easier to just die? Don't talk to me like I don't know what that feels like. Don't talk to me like I don't know what it's like to be a nightmare... To live, in a nightmare."
"Why would you create me only to make me suffer?" Harime hissed, coming back to herself. "Yeah, you know that pain well. So why'd you make someone else feel that too? What? Didn't want to suffer by yourself?"
Naruto recoiled, and she knew for sure then that she'd have preferred to have been struck.
Naruto's eyes burned blood red as the sclera flooded with black pigment.
"What did you just say?" The redhead gritted.
Harime knew damn well she had no control over her creation. Her mind split to handle the stress of the things Danzo made her do. How dare she imply that was her fault?
"I hate you." Harime whispered, tears pouring from the trenches that should've held her eyes.
Naruto could not bring herself to fully acknowledge them. Those tears. She herself felt hurt too, and as usual, to hide from her pain she simply became angry.
"You hate me? That's hilarious." The redhead snarled. "I hate myself."
Naruto was satisfied when Harime grimaced visibly at her declaration.
"You already know, because you used to be inside me. But I'm going to say it anyway. The things I've thought and wondered about. The things that connect us, that you so carelessly blurt out as if I don't already know. I would have understood. All you had to do was reach out."
Naruto's right hand darted out lightning quick, taking Harime's chin in a tight hold, lifting the child's head so that she could stare into the pits in her face.
Of course Harime couldn't see how harshly Naruto was glaring at her, but the redhead knew that she could sense it.
"Why was I born?" Naruto recited, speaking the thoughts she had never dared to. "Why is my father the Hokage? So that he could have someone to take his frustrations out on? So that he can be annoyed with the waste of space he helped to create? Why did my mother have to die? So that I'd be lonely? So that I could become the Kyuubi's Jinchuuriki? Why did Danzo choose me? Why did he torture me? Why did he make me torture others? Why me? Why. why. why? Was I born just to be stepped on by others? Why can't I go back to being good? Why is it so hard to be good again?"
Harime's breath hitched, and just like Naruto, her pain hid itself behind temper and she lashed out. The child slapped Naruto's hand from her chin.
"Don't make laugh. Just reach out? All you had ever shown me was that I was something to be hated the day you created me." Harime snarled. "Can you blame me for not telling the truth?"
"Maybe not but I thought I showed you that you could trust me." Naruto snapped. "I stopped treating you like that. I trusted you. Why couldn't you do the same?"
"Why would I?" Harime asked dangerously. "Even now you want to distance yourself from me. Maybe you accept me. That still doesn't change the fact that you don't like how I am. That doesn't mean I don't disgust you. But you made me, so it's your fault. How could you make me and then treat me like that?"
'That's true…' Naruto thought. 'I do hate how dark she is, because it shows how dark I was and still am. But I… that's just how it is. She's become someone so close to me… so I just accept that she's darkness.'
Naruto didn't have to say that aloud for Harime to hear it. The eyeless girl could sense those feelings in Naruto's silence. And they enraged her.
Her face twisted, becoming ugly with rage.
"I hate you." Harime said again. "I hate you I hate you I hate you I hate you I HATE YOU NARUTO!"
The redhead reeled back from those scathing words. And then her own expression twisted, mood taking in Harime's rage and reflecting it back.
"Fuck you…" Naruto sneered, both hands reaching out.
But instead of taking hold of Harime's neck like she'd wanted to for a split second, she grabbed the collar of her dress, dragging Harime up as she stood. Naruto held the legless girl up by the front of her frilly dress, glaring as hard as she could, receiving one back with equal fury.
"Fuck you… FUCK YOU HARIME!"
The redhead spun quickly on her heels, gaining momentum before she released, sending Harime soaring across the Graveyard.
Limp as a rag doll, Harime flew, but at the last possible second she curled into a ball, hands reaching out and taking hold of an arch shaped grave before she could fly over it.
She jerked to an abrupt stop, paused in a hand stand atop the grave. The grave was black with the words Murder of Crows carved across it.
It was a jutsu inspired by the one Shisui and Itachi created to turn themselves into crows, but it wasn't really Naruto's style. So she'd done the jutsu and sealed in into the grave, in case she ever wanted to see it again and if she wanted to further work on it.
"That's just like you, Naruto." Harime gritted, still holding herself upside down. "Resorting to violence as soon as things don't go your way."
"I never took you as a hypocrite, Harime." The redhead shot back. "Isn't that just how you are?"
Harime screeched in wordless rage, allowing herself to drop down, so that she landed behind the grave facing Naruto.
"You always think you're so smart Naruto." Harime hissed. "It pisses me off!"
The eyeless child wrapped her arms around the grave, so that her fingers brushed over the words carved into it at either side from behind.
"Murder of Crows: Come forth." She ordered darkly.
Naruto's eyes widened when the kanji across the grave glowed blue, and she only had a split second before the shrill cries of crows filled the air, alongside the crackling of lightning.
The air distorted as she leapt to the left with all her strength and speed, dozens of crows made of pure crackling blue lightning descending upon her vacant position, several of them exploding in a violent show of sparks.
Naruto landed in a crouch, her right knee jarring uncomfortably before it separated from her body, a mass of threads spilling from the limb.
"Damnit!" She cursed, falling on her side, hand coming out to catch her as the remaining lightning crows zipped towards her.
Naruto stumbled into a standing position, grabbing hold of her segmented leg before leaping up, holding herself together as another explosion of sparks screeched across the checkered flooring she'd vacated.
As the threads stitched her leg back to her thigh beneath her jumpsuit, Naruto curled into a flip, feet landing with an audible slap atop a cross shaped grave. She was in a crouch, and looked up to glare at Harime, only to come face to face with the last lightning crow that she hadn't sensed.
It screeched, and slammed into Naruto's chest.
Immediately, Naruto's muscles seized, and pain screamed through her body. She spasmed, the red veins in her eyes bulged, tears of blood gushing from them as her pupils dilated.
"NARUTO!" Karin screamed.
But none of the three people behind the barrier could help Naruto.
She fell face first from the grave, and lied there, muscles twitching from time to time.
"Harime what did you do!?" Shisui bellowed. "Why would you do that!"
"Release this barrier immediately." The Yondaime gritted.
"Oh shut up!" Harime snipped. "You three stay out of this. This is between me and my Naru-chan."
"Harime!" Karin protested.
The three were promptly ignored.
"S-so… th-that's how you wanna p-play this, huh?" Naruto grunted, struggling to lie her palms flat on the floor, shakily pushing herself up. "O-okay then…"
"Naruto you're alright!" Karin exclaimed.
But Naruto ignored her alongside her father and Shisui, like she had been doing since she realized Harime hadn't come alone.
They had no place here, and she would do what she had to whether they were watching or not.
Harime cackled, dragging herself around the grave she'd just released the contents of.
"Oh how I wish I could see the look on your face Naruto!" The little girl giggled. "Not so high and mighty now are you?"
With a grunt Naruto pushed herself against the back of the cross grave she'd fallen from, body wailing in protest at the movements.
Naruto reached up with a trembling hand, wide grin slashed across her face.
She sank her fingers into her left eye socket, taking hold of the slick orb before yanking it out with an abrupt movement followed by a geyser of crimson.
"Won't b-be any f-fun if you d-drop right a-away…" Naruto stuttered, spasming again.
"Oh Naru-chan, I just love it when you rasp in pain like that~" Harime mocked, blowing a theatrical kiss at her creator.
Naruto's grin widened.
"F-for you… you shitty l-little b-bitch." She coughed, tossing the eye in Harime's direction.
The legless girl reached out, sensing something coming her way. She caught the orb between her little bloodied fingers, her own grin stretching.
"Oh what fun. You wanna play with me Naruto~?" Harime tittered, peeling her right eye lid back, inserting the eye into her empty pit.
Harime blinked, her left eyelid remaining closed as her hand began to glow a faint red color as she healed the ocular nerve into her right eye socket.
She crawled closer, snickering here and there as her eye met Naruto's.
"Oh look…" Naruto snickered. "We match!"
Harime's new eye bulged when she saw Naruto reach up and behind her, fingertips stained with blood after gouging out her own eye. Naruto's fingers curled over the top of the grave she leaned against.
"Hangman's Tree: Come forth."
Harime's grin dropped as her single eye became wider.
"NARUTO YOU PIECE OF SHI-"
The grave behind her shook as the floor beneath it erupted, roots made of pure black stone scurrying across the floor before a large trunk burst into existence behind Harime, branches shooting out before ruby colored blossoms bloomed among them.
The legless girl tried to scuttle away, but red tendrils quickly fell from the blossoms, catching the candlelight above, revealing they were made from pure blood.
The tendrils wrapped around one another, forming a rope before they shot past Harime, and quickly wrapped around her throat, forming a noose.
Harime screamed as the noose tightened and snatched her clean off the floor, drawing her closer to the towering black tree, and back in the line of sight of the three behind the barrier.
"Oh my gosh!" Karin choked, slapping her hands over her mouth as Harime swayed from the branches like a twisted ornament, hands tugging at the ever tightening chokehold the blood rope had around her neck.
The legless girl struggled viciously, foaming at the mouth as her single eye burned red and the sclera flooded with black.
Naruto dragged herself to her feet, smirking.
"Oh Harime look at you~" She giggled. "Such a cute little decoration for my execution tree."
Naruto threw her head back and laughed.
Tendrils of darkness leapt up, away from the hiding place among the trees roots, spiraling up and attaching themselves to the stumps where Harime's legs should've been. They grew in volume, stretching and forming a pair of legs that stitched themselves to her stumps.
"Think that's funny huh?" Harime choked, swinging herself back and forth, gaining momentum until her new feet met the trunk of the dark tree behind her, using it to push off, at the same time swiping her hand through the air, liquefying the blood around her neck so that it released her. It splattered across the bodice of her dress, eating holes through the lace as she shot through the air.
Naruto stopped laughing quick enough to sidestep Harime, so that she soared past her, landing on all fours before she whipped around, launching herself at her creator, fangs bared.
Naruto grunted when Harime slammed into her, one hand fisting in her creator's hair while the other took hold of her shoulder as she savagely sank her teeth into the side of Naruto's throat.
The teen cried out in pain, left hand flying up, fisting the back of Harime's hair and ripping the child's face away from her throat as it gushed blood. Naruto tossed Harime to the side, her hold slipping on the long strands before tightening around the ends.
Snarling, Naruto's right hand went to staunch the bleeding while her left slammed Harime into the floor by her hair. Enraged, Naruto yanked Harime up, swinging her around and ignoring the child's pained cries as she slammed her into the floor at her right.
Harime grunted as she was thrown around like an abused toy, slammed back and forth several times before her right shoulder crunched, popping out of its socket at the abuse. When Harime screamed, Naruto lifted her up again and tossed her away like trash.
Harime tumbled across the floor, at the last moment catching herself and sliding back in a crouch. The little girl clenched her teeth as she popped her shoulder back into place, watching Naruto's jiongu stitch the torn flesh at her throat closed.
They both stared with their single glowing devil eye, faces twisted into ugly snarls.
At the same time, they charged.
Shisui watched as Naruto and Harime traded vicious blows, throwing each other around and drawing blood as if they were strangers.
His face was drained completely of color, and he heard Karin breathe in absolute horror the exact words he was thinking.
"My god… they're… they're tearing eachother apart."
Shisui blinked, and the next thing he knew, Naruto was holding Harime up by her throat, squeezing as if she wanted to snap it, but the Uchiha could tell she was holding back, that despite her rage, despite her despair, she was conscious enough to realize she didn't really want to hurt Harime.
"I don't want you, inside of me." Naruto gritted. "I don't want anyone in my fucking head. The only one that belongs in there is me, and no matter where you came from, or what you were, you're not me!"
Again Naruto tossed Harime away from her, but again Harime returned with a vengeance, fangs bared, shadows around her writhing with her temper.
"I KNOW THAT!" Harime roared, form blurring, appearing behind Naruto, only for her creator to whirl around and block the kick aimed at her neck with her forearm. "I became Harime. I gave you what you wanted by becoming separate from you… and still… still nothing! I GAVE YOU EVERYTHING!"
Naruto and Harime stooped down low, fighting like animals, clawing at each other faces, tearing out chunks of flesh with their teeth, slamming each others faces into the floor… just… pure brutality.
"What the hell did you give me?" Naruto snapped, holding Harime's face down into the floor.
"I gave you allies!" The child snarled, writhing so violently she forced Naruto to release her so that she could skitter away. "Karin and Yakumo are loyal to you. Yakumo hasn't even met you and she'd never betray you. That was me. I was the horrible monster that forced them to obey, so that you could have people to be with. So that you wouldn't be lonely. I spent all my time with Karin, but the only person she ever thinks about is you!"
Slowly, Harime stood on her temporary legs, red bangs shielding her expression.
"Do you… do you think that doesn't matter to me?"
Something inside Shisui panged.
Did… did this mean…?
Oh god. This whole time… had he misjudged Harime?
"Listen!" Naruto huffed, spitting a bit of blood from her mouth. "I didn't know. You're angry, but how was I supposed to know what you needed when you said nothing? You always glorified your own twisted persona, laughing up that you were evil and that everything is a game. How was I supposed to know inside that you hurt? How was I supposed to know that like me you never had anyone but yourself?"
"But that's not true anymore." Harime rasped. "You don't have only yourself. What about Shisui? Konohamaru? Karin? What about me? How can you say you have nothing when you created me to be there for you. All I've ever done is love you when no one else would and you still say that you have nothing? HOW DARE YOU! AFTER EVERYTHING I WENT THROUGH YOU HAVE NOTHING? YOU BITCH!"
"YOU NEVER LISTEN!" Naruto yelled, fists clenching at her sides. "You twist everything I say!"
"I know what you really mean!"
"No you don't." Naruto spat scathingly. "If you knew what I meant, you'd know that I'm saying that I realized I have you, and that even though you had me to lean on, you didn't think you could... and for that, I'm sorry."
"Liar!" Harime screamed. "You're a liar Naruto!"
"No, you're just scared." Naruto said, voice tired beyond her years. "You want to change, you want to be different, but you're too much of a coward to be different. I'm showing you right now that I accept you. I'm fighting with you, arguing, but instead of seeing it as what it is, you're still trying to make me the villain. You wanna change? Let me help you. That's what you want, isn't it? That's why you took this chance to tell me everything. So stop fighting me!"
Harime's lips pursed, blood seeping through them as she fought to contain a bit of her temper.
"What do you want me to say? Thank you?" Naruto laughed spitefully. "For whose sake did you do all this? Mine or yours? Because you're fighting so hard and if you wanted to die you wouldn't be. Roll over and die if you want to, but don't say anything if you don't even have enough courage to kill yourself. If you don't have enough courage to be a different version of yourself."
"I did it for you!" Harime screamed. "Everything I've done it was for you! How can you say that? How can you just tell me to die?"
"Maybe it had been for me when you were first created. After all, I only ever wanted someone to love and protect me." Naruto admitted. "And no, I'm not denying you still don't do things with the intention to be useful to me or show me that you care. I'm saying since you became your own person, you also do things for yourself. You do things for me because you want me to love you. You want me to accept you. But that's stupid because-"
Harime didn't give Naruto the chance to continue before she was launching herself at her.
Karin remembered...
Key things Harime had said that all connected the truth to this moment. This bloody confrontation.
"She was crazy you see, so in her sadness she made me, and I took all the pain for myself and moved her along when she was too sad to go on."
She started out a split personality, and somewhere along the lines became her own entity, forming her own ideals, growing above and beyond the hatred and despair that had given her life.
"Don't ask questions you don't want the answer to. I doubt you could handle my answer anyway."
It was humbling.
To know such a being actually cared for her, to know that despite all the lies she seemed to tell, she told an equal amount of truths, despite their obscurity.
"Hey, you know what 'Sui-kun?"
"I don't have a soul."
But that wasn't true. At least, it wasn't any more. Harime had chakra, and chakra's source was the soul. Though she may not be quite human, Karin was absolutely sure Harime had a soul. Something without one, could not feel things so deeply.
And though Harime's chakra was similar to Naruto's, it was undoubtedly her own. Free of the safety of her shadow, Karin could feel it. A midnight dark chord. Striking and sharp, yet sad. So so sad. She was miserable, but here, in the coffin, even fighting with such brutality she was alive.
Naruto made Harime feel alive.
"I just wanted my Naruto to have a new stronger body, so I took the opportunity to get her a new one."
Karin was sure that was the truth, but at the same time, Harime was disgusted by what she had done to Tayuya for Naruto's sake. She was conflicting with herself. The things she did without question when she had no soul, after becoming something with one, she no longer knew how to operate. She was confused and angry and in so much pain, and so now she was lashing out, even if it was on the person Karin knew for a fact that she loved the most.
'Someone with no soul, could not care that much about someone else.'
With that sobering thought, Karin found her eyes stinging as she watched the two bitter and wounded souls brawl with all their might.
Harime's hands pushed Naruto down, and she straddled her creator, hands fisting in either side of Naruto's head, lifting it up, before slamming the back of her skull into the floor.
Naruto pounded her fists into Harime's sides to force her to release her, but Harime just slammed her head harder into the floor, ignoring the way Naruto's blows caused her ribs to cave in, and her mouth to dribble blood. She slammed the back of Naruto's head into the floor again, screaming with all the pain and anger she ever felt, and at last Naruto's assault stopped, her body falling limp.
Everyone froze as Harime froze, pulling her hands away from Naruto's hair, a few of the strands coming with her, glued to the blood soaking her palms and fingertips.
'Oh my god.' Karin thought, pupils shrinking to tiny petrified pinpricks. 'Oh my god!'
"Naruto…?" Harime rasped, hands trembling as she shook the girl beneath her. "Hey… Naruto. T-That's not funny… Stop it."
She shook Naruto's shoulders harder, but her eyes remained closed. Not even a twitch.
"Stop playing." Harime whispered, lifting Naruto up by her shoulders, and shaking her violently. "Stop Naruto it's not funny! It's not!"
Tears blurred Karin's vision as she watched.
Naruto's head flopped back and forth at the abuse, red trickling out of her nose.
"Look what you made me do Naruto!" Harime sobbed, little hands cradling Naruto's bloodied face in her hands, tenderly laying her back onto the floor, removing herself from atop her creator. Harime moved on her knees, gently bringing Naruto's head to rest on her lap.
"Look at what you made me do!"
"Harime!" Karin yelled, unable to remain a bystander as she threw herself at the invisible barrier, uncaring at how it zapped her, burning at her palms as she leaned in closer.
"Let me in!" Karin demanded. "Let me in now! If you don't Naruto will die!"
Finally Harime looked away from Naruto, and before Karin could make a sound the barrier wavered and she fell through.
The redhead heard Shisui and the Yondaime dart forward, but they hadn't been able to get through the barrier before it flared back into place.
"Damnit!" Shisui cursed.
Karin stumbled to her feet, realizing that Shisui and the Yondaime were shouting something, but she couldn't bring herself to care about their protests. Harime had let her in and her alone. They simply had to accept that.
Karin rushed over to the duo, dropping to her knees, hands framing Naruto's pale face. Her fingers slid around the back of Naruto's head, feeling the stressed and split flesh there.
"Blunt force trauma to the head." Karin recited, hands beginning to warm with medical chakra. "She's got a nasty concussion, but if I take care of it now she can be up and about in a few minutes…"
"Do it." Harime whispered, allowing Karin to pull Naruto away from her trembling hands. "Please…"
"You don't even have to ask." Karin murmured, turning Naruto onto her side, pulling a small flashlight from the pouch around her waist and clicking it on, sticking it between her teeth before beginning to operate.
After several minutes of complete silence, Karin pulled back, letting the flashlight fall from her lips.
"Harime, can you please get the gauze inside my pouch?" Karin asked, wiping a bit of sweat from her brow with her forearm.
"I… is Naruto going to be okay?" Harime whispered, even as she did what Karin asked of her.
The Uzumaki wanted to be angry, to point out that Naruto would be fine if she wasn't such a violent, childish, little monster, but she couldn't.
Karin realized that Naruto and Harime both needed to do what they had. That they both had allowed too much to build up over time, and only now were they able to release it.
So, Karin was able to contain her feelings, and it surprised her… how calm she actually was.
Could it be the seal Harime had put on her emotions? Or was she simply growing as a person?
There were so many things Karin had learned about them both that she wasn't sure she would have otherwise had Harime never brought them into the coffin.
Naruto was the Jinchuuriki of the Kyuubi. Her father was the Yondaime Hokage, and she had been dealt a wealth of pain that she had been hiding for so long.
'Well, now I know…' Karin thought, accepting the bandages and tying them expertly around Naruto's head. 'I know and can take steps to heal Naruto and Harime both.'
No matter what happened, Karin was going to stand by them both, because it was the both of them that had become inseparable within her heart and life. She hadn't even realized that even though Harime terrified her beyond words, she still held a twisted sort of admiration for her.
Naruto and Harime were the people that Karin would follow until the end.
She was not ashamed of this. It was the path she'd chosen, and she was going to make the most of it.
The Uzumaki was jolted from her thoughts as Naruto groaned.
"Naruto!" Everyone exclaimed.
Harime rushed over, the shadows she had manipulated into being her legs gone, so instead she dragged herself closer, but didn't reach for her creator.
Karin helped Naruto into a sitting position, taking Naruto's hand before the girl could reach up and fiddle with her bandages.
"Karin…?" Naruto croaked, squinting in the candlelight at her fellow Uzumaki.
Karin swallowed thickly and nodded, eyes welling once more with tears.
"Yeah," She rasped. "It's me… Naruto."
"You saved me." Naruto muttered, hand squeezing Karin's. "Thank you."
Karin shook her head.
'I will always be there to put you back together Naruto.'
Naruto tore her gaze away from Karin's, eye finding Harime's.
The little girl flinched.
"You don't want to die Harime." Naruto said.
"W-what…?" The legless girl stuttered, blue-green eye wide.
"You don't want to die." Naruto repeated. "And neither do I. You just… you want me to love you."
Harime's bloodied lips trembled as her expression crumbled.
"But that's stupid to fight so hard for because I already do." Naruto continued, hand tightening around Karin's.
Karin squeezed back in silent support.
"Wh… what?" Harime breathed.
"You're a fucking idiot." Naruto growled, and Karin couldn't help the small smile forming at her lips. "A complete idiot. If I didn't want you around, you know I would've just gotten rid of you. If I didn't care, do you really think I'd just let you get away with all the stuff you just pulled? I would've killed you. But I don't want you dead. I really really don't want you to disappear."
"Naruto…" Harime sniffled.
"I'm not going to repeat myself." The teen huffed, serious as she stared into Harime's single eye with her own. "I love you. No, you're not apart of me anymore. But that's fine, because you being you is enough for me."
"Naru-chan!" Harime exclaimed, tears pouring down her face as she launched herself at her creator.
Karin blushed when Naruto wrapped her arms around her and Harime both, squeezing silent and gruff affection into them.
"I love you too!" Harime cheered. "I love you so much!"
"Yeah yeah," The teen grumbled, allowing herself to be squeezed before she reached up and pinched a nerve in Harime's neck, knocking her out.
"Why did you do that?" Karin asked, crimson eyes wide behind her glasses as she pulled back.
"Could you heal this dumbass please?" Naruto asked, moving her arm from around Karin to gently set Harime onto the floor as she stumbled to her feet.
"O-of course Naruto-chan. B-but you shouldn't be moving around so soon!" Karin protested.
"Forget that." The teen rolled her eyes. "This shit ends now."
Karin was already checking Harime's vitals, finding three of her ribs were cracked and she was bleeding internally.
Naruto ran through handseals as Karin began healing Harime with caring, green, glowing hands.
The teen slammed her palms flat onto the checkered floor.
"Kuchiyose no Jutsu!"
'I don't want her to disappear anymore… I actually… I would be happy if she could stay with me…'
There was a flare of flame before the Toy Box came into existence. It clicked open, and Ichi hopped out.
She didn't question the fact that Harime had obviously shown Naruto her true form, nor did she question why the two redheads were so beat up.
"Your orders?" She asked, slinging her chainsaw over her shoulder.
"Go to the village and bring a prisoner that is on death row. Make sure it's one soon due for execution and that there is no more information that can be tortured out of them. Bring me something with Tayuya's blood on it too."
"As you wish Naruto-sama."
"Ni, back her up." Naruto ordered.
"As you wish." Ni intoned, climbing out of the Toy Box to stand beside her rag doll masked twin.
Naruto then summoned the door to the Gallows so that they would have a way to Konoha out of the pocket dimensions.
The two masked clones made their way through the door to follow their orders.
"Naruto, what are you doing?" Her father called from behind the barrier. "Why did you order them to do such a thing?"
"I'm ending what I started the day I told Harime that I was okay with stealing Tayuya's body." Naruto explained, eyes tightening at the corners as her lips pursed.
"It was wrong for me to agree with that. And so were a lot of other things I've done before that. It took me dying and going to a place, meeting someone there who had died a long time ago to realize that the way I am is not only because of the things that have happened to me. I'm this way because I choose to be." The teen said. "Nobody said that pain had to turn me into a monster. I let it turn me into one. And maybe I'm never going to be good, but at the same time I don't have to go out of my way to be evil either."
The truth was, Naruto wanted to live. Sure at some point she'd wanted to die, but no longer was she so miserable that death was enticing.
She had things she wanted to protect, things she wanted to do. No, she didn't really have a goal… but she found herself wanting to find a purpose.
She didn't want to die anymore.
She wanted to live. She wanted to be happy.
She wasn't going to let others ruin that for her. Not anymore. Even if that person was the one that understood her the most.
So, she was going to help that person. She was going to help her Harime find her own self that she could accept as well.
Naruto didn't think they'd ever be "good", but she had said it before hadn't she?
They were screwy? So what.
"Who could've taught you that?" Her dad asked.
"Kaa-chan." Naruto murmured. "In the place between life and death, I met my mom, and though we didn't spend a lot of time together, it was enough for me to learn what I really want. And that's to just be me. A me that doesn't disgust me, someone that I'm not ashamed of. I've decided I'm going to find that version of me, and right now I'm going to take the first step towards becoming that person."
"You… you met Kushina?" Her dad rasped.
"Yeah, I did." Naruto nodded once. "And that time is something I have no intention of sharing with you, or anyone but Harime."
Her dad looked like she'd stabbed him, but she couldn't bring herself to feel too guilty about it. How many times had she given him that very same look before he turned his back on her?
She wasn't trying to hurt him, so he would just have to deal with it.
Naruto bit her hand, commanding the blood to flow out and splatter across the floor, forming a familiar seal in blood.
"Naruto…" Minato called deliberately. "Why are you forming the seal for Edo Tensei?"
Naruto looked up, just as the still standing door to the Gallows creaked open, Ichi and Ni dragging in a woman bound and gagged.
"You're about to find out." Naruto murmured, running through handseals as Ichi tossed the mad eyed and squirming woman into the center of the insignias. Ni tossed in a scalpel with flaking red staining across it, and Naruto knew it was Tayuya's blood soiling the tool.
'Perfect.' She thought.
Tiger → Snake → Dog → Dragon
The resounding clap of Naruto's hands froze everyone to their bones.
"Edo Tensei!"
I thought it was pretty obvious who she was reaninating but I'm sorry for not being clear. It's Tayuya. The question is why is she being reanimated... but even that isn't a big deal. No huge drama is coming your way with her temporary revival.