Chapter Thirty-Five: Homecoming
Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto or Trinity Blood.
Abel stopped, feeling a vaguely familiar presence skirt his skin. He turned, his gun at the ready, though something told him he wouldn't need it. She was a cloaked figure, distinguishable in sex based on her smell. And she had another scent on her: Sakura's.
"So…you saved her." He smiled.
"How can you be so sure?" She asked, stopping in front of him.
"If you'd wanted to kill her, you would have." He replied matter-of-factly.
The woman turned her head up, hazel eyes meeting his, as her red lips turned up in a smile.
"Why are you helping us?" He asked.
"To help her." Tsunade replied, throwing back the hood of her cloak.
"Is that why you found me?"
"Yes," She said, her eyes turned on the fire raging in front of them, "I have a favor to ask."
Abel nodded in quiet consent.
"Take care of her."
"Someone else made that request of me not too long ago." Abel told her.
Tsunade closed her eyes, a tired smile playing on her lips. Her mind wandered back to the silver-haired man in her arms, who had wanted nothing more than to simply rest. But he wouldn't allow himself even that until he had taken care of her…Her eyes snapped open, new determination finding root in her heart and steeling her.
"And you've done well." Tsunade responded.
"Why do I feel that's not the only reason you came here?"
"I simply intend to finish this." Tsunade said as she drew her hood back up and began to walk again.
Sakura let the shimmering helix of Methuselah blood wind around her, filling her and giving her strength to tear into the next rank. But something in the air suddenly struck her. She stopped, trying to remember where she knew it from.
Images of green forests and warm stone faces filled her mind…
"Tsunade-sama!" She cried, spinning on her heels and sprinting towards the fading energy signature.
Sasuke stood on the crumbling tower, overlooking the dark forces that continued to ravage the city beneath him. With that disgusting demon gone, he was free to take control, to cleanse the world. His red lips pulled up in a sadistic smirk, his eyes gleaming in the firelight.
He would finish it, end the damned world and craft it anew from the resultant ashes. And it would be his, and he would be its god, its very life giver. None would seek another at the risk of turning him away, because he was all they would have.
The screams of children and women did not break the silent death of the world that he now stood over. Because there was no one left to scream. No one to give final tribute to the wounded world as it bled the last, pitiful remnants of its life force out.
Caterina cried out as a shadow fell across them, long, glassy nails gleaming lethally in the moonlight. She threw herself against her body, wrapping her body around his as she waited for the pain, for the fading of her life. An explosion of color and sound flooded the tiny room as a warm spray fell across her cheek.
"Brother Orcini!" She cried in startled shock.
He just nodded, smiling gently as he pulled her and the young Pope to his feet.
"It took some time to find you." He explained as he flipped the Screamer down.
"That's okay!" Alessandro replied with a small smile.
The Inquisition member's hand came down on his shoulder, his smile widening and warming.
Sasuke's chakra focused; red and black and white mingling into a shade of concentrated gray. He spun it, molded it, forced it to conform to his will as the symbols around him began to shimmering with purple and orange fire.
He would call forth the Destroyer, the One, the Dark Harbinger of the Heavens, to finish the fight. To wipe away the filth of humanity and that blood soaked lust of the Methuselah. There would be nothing left, only his perfect will.
They were shadows among the ruins, moving in ways that were foreign and strange. That was their life, their training, their being in singular purpose. In singular fluidity. There was nothing left for them but this final battle and then…homecoming.
The decision was made freely; sacrifice was something they were used to. How often had they given before with the same intention? Only this time there was no earthly home to return to, no ties to bind them for the ultimate sacrifice that had settled and rooted in their hearts.
Death would be welcome relief; family, friends…they all waited past the veil that separated the living from the dead. And now, as they hung in that void, knowing they were running to death, they saw things their eyes had never before.
There was life still in the city, blue currents of light that shimmered and swam. That breathed. It had a will all its own, and they were separate of it, but they were seeking to merge with it, to be the instruments of its righteous judgment.
The ghosts of the dead and dying whispered to them, pushing away instinctual fear and fanning the flames of courage and resolution. They led them, a procession of manifested departed leading the physical, living shadows that would soon join them. They held the torch, they lit the way home.
Time slowed for Abel as the last row of creatures met with timely defeat and the finality of death.
That was what slowed it…the realization that even still, even there, amidst the blood and flames and bodies, there was life…but for that life to stand a chance, there was still much death, much debt, to be paid.
That was the price, he realized, the price of our stupidity, of our ignorance and our lust…
But God had provided a way, he reminded himself, a way to move forward even if they had to move back first.
Time moved forward.
Orochimaru heard the battle cry in his blood, calling him to a different kind of arms. He inhaled, smiling as he glanced up at the moon, stained red with the bloody light pouring from the city. But it was there still, and he knew it was still white beneath that veneer of crimson, that illusion.
He had been part of the despair for so long, he thought to himself, that now it was time to be part of the light that broke the clouds.
"I'm not asking you to follow me." Tsunade stated to the growing ring of shadowy figures.
"We're here of our own free will." One of them happily assured her, flashing her a thumbs-up.
"You all have a chance at other lives." She told them.
"We came here to assure that others have that chance."
"And more of you have survived?" She asked.
"Yes." A male replied.
"Then why you?"
"Lady Tsunade, haven't you learned?" The woman pulled back her hood, tossing wavy black hair back, "There isn't anything left for us."
"Sakura made something. So can you, Kurenai. What about you son?"
The kunoichi smiled sadly, shaking her head. "Shikamaru has promised to look after him. And I should like…to see my husband again."
Tsunade nodded, "If this is your choice, then follow me. And don't look back."
Sasuke stood up, smiling maniacally as insane left laughter flooded forth from his mouth. Pitch black chakra molded around him, swirling and flaring and moving as if to suggest it had a will of its own.
Far below him, Sakura stopped dead in her tracks, her head snapping up as she turned her eyes on him.
'Susanoo…' She thought in horror.
Something flickered familiarly in her peripherals and her eyes flickered to the left as a singular female leapt from a rooftop, making several bounds over the ruins of the city.
'L…Lady Tsunade!' She thought to herself as a ring of cloaked figures appeared from the shadows dancing around the tower, their hands linked.
Tsunade's arms came around Sasuke as she pulled him off of his feet. They fell, together, through the empty void of air. She smiled, pulling him close.
"Shhh…you don't have to fight anymore." She whispered.
Sakura felt the flare of chakra, felt raw power begin to pulse from the ring of figures. And now she knew them all…she knew all of their chakras…she knew them by name, face, heart…
She saw another blur twine with Tsunade…
"Orochimaru…" Tsunade trailed off as his arms came around both of them.
He smiled, "Let's go home, Tsunade. Together."
Sasuke smiled innocently in their embrace as white light began to flood the air around him. "Mom? Dad?"
Sakura cried out, running forward as the light grew, as their deaths were cemented. She felt a hand come around her wrist and yank her back with enough force to pull her completely off of her feet. Abel spun, pinning her to a marble statue and wrapping his wings around her, protecting her from the sudden shockwave of light and heat and swallowed them all.
TBC