Instant Message
By Keelah
"He sees and hears everything. There's no refuge safe enough, or hidden enough."
"She talks about him like he's God or something," the boy muttered.
But he was—in my life as of late, he was the God, the controller of my world, only instead of a heavenly being, he was a deity that had escaped from the gates of hell.
Chapter FORTY-NINE
Clandestine
Sasuke and I fell silent. Rendered uncommunicative, we stared at the brunette for some sort of a follow-up explanation, though he gave none. This lad, who was supposedly a genius, who possessed knowledge further than a regular teenager's brain, had (not proposed) but forthrightly stated an appeal to walk through danger's domain and into the open arms of death—or rather, the embodiment of it.
And he had no idea.
It was Sasuke who recovered first. "You don't know what you're asking."
"Yeah, I do." Shikamaru did not waste a beat. "I can help and you know it."
Though Sasuke's lips thinned into a firm line, something in the leniency of his jet-black pools told me he was half-convinced already. "This guy we're dealing with, he's a lunatic, but a dead serious one." He lowered his volume a notch, so Ino's parents hadn't any chance to overhear. "Suigetsu—that was his doing," he spat, the reminiscence evidently still fresh and lucid in his mind, like the ragged, detailed scar after a bloody gash that never quite mended. "...and Karin," Sasuke whispered.
A few seconds of silence pulsated in the thick air around us. "I know," Shikamaru finally answered, solemn, surprising both me and the Uchiha. "I suspected as much."
In that moment, Sasuke bobbed his head, already decided it seemed, the silent approval a matter in which I had no say—even though the circumstance directly affected me. "Fine. And you're right, we do need the help."
"I can track down who he is, or at least narrow the possibility," Shikamaru began, launching into action right then and there, out in the open within the waiting lounge abutting Ino's surgical room, as though the consequences of such negligence never crossed their minds. "Just give me a place to start."
"No."
Sasuke's head snapped towards me. "What?"
I shook my head. "We're not doing this," I told them, earning from each male a stare of perplexity and annoyance—as though I'd spoiled the fun, killed the thrill of catching the murderer. What hadn't occurred to them was that beyond the reaches of our senses, even at this very hospital, this very empty hallway, the Rogue could be listening in, eyeing our every move. The instant he discovers another trace of disobedience in my behaviour, he would, without a second's hesitation, begin to run through his sick and twisted mind a list of possible victims, picking out the ones closest to my heart. Without mercy, he would exterminate them.
Ino was his last warning. I had no intention of pushing the limits of his patience any more than I previously have.
"We can't—Sasuke, we can't drag anyone else into this."
"We need his brains," Sasuke nodded at his friend. "And even if we kept him in the dark, you think he wouldn't have figured it out anyway?"
I motioned towards Shikamaru. "What if he gets killed?"
"That's his problem."
The topic of our conversation twitched at the Uchiha's dry tone. "I'm right here, you know."
"There's no saying what the Rogue will do once he finds out," I continued.
"The Rogue?" Shikamaru questioned.
"His alias," Sasuke elucidated. Facing me, he said, "You mean if he finds out. Think about it, Sakura. Shikamaru's not exactly your closest friend—you guys barely even talk to each other. If we're careful, the Rogue will have no idea. We'll take precautions. He won't ever know."
"But he sees everything!" I persisted, "And hears everything. And is everywhere. There's no refuge safe enough, or hidden enough. Taking cover won't do any good."
"She talks about him like he's God or something." Shikamaru muttered.
But he was—in my life as of late, he was the God, the controller of my world, only instead of a heavenly being, he was a deity that had escaped from the gates of hell. He had power over my movements, whereabouts, words, decisions and even thoughts, taking away any will to think for myself. Slowly, gradually, he brought me insanity.
"He's human," Sasuke pronounced. "Even he has to blink, or close his eyes to sleep. We'll talk behind closed doors, pass notes. We'll never meet in public. We can do this without him knowing. Shikamaru, what kind of basis do you need?"
"Anything should do," Shikamaru replied, resuming their previous conversation before my interruption. "A phone number, maybe?"
I shook my head. "His calls are always blocked. But I have the e-mail that he uses on Messenger." Sasuke handed me a square piece of paper and pen (from where he acquired the writing implements, I didn't know) and I scrawled down the electronic address by memory, every letter and number hauntingly scored into the tissues of my brain. "What will you do with it?" I asked the lethargic whiz kid, somehow unable to imagine him directly messaging the Rogue for some unanswered questions.
"Dig up an IP address, then get into his inbox."
"You can do that?" I asked, incredulous, momentarily fascinated by this unfathomable extent of Googling that I thought had only existed in movies. "You'd be able to hack into his mail and read whatever's there?"
"Weaving through a back site would take too long, and firewalls, depending on their company, can be troublesome. I'll hack in, but only deep enough to reset the password." Forget I asked, I thought, but I nodded anyway, pretending to have followed every word. Shikamaru seemed not to have noticed; Sasuke, on the other hand, smirked. "Listen though, if this guy's as cunning as he sounds, I doubt he'd be reckless enough to leave anything hanging around."
"I thought everything online, stays online." I indicated, "Like, even if he deleted an email, it'd still be floating in cyberspace."
"Not if you're thorough, as the Rogue seems to be." Shikamaru remarked. "But I'll try. Seems impossible, though." How utterly negative, I thought. What did Ino ever see in him? "You wanna tell me what's this got to do with Orochimaru? You had me look him up a few days ago."
"We're thinking maybe they've worked together," Sasuke explained. "Or have some kind of connection."
Brown eyes sparked with sudden insight, a look I didn't understand but something that Sasuke obviously had. "You think so?" The Uchiha nodded.
I blinked. "What?"
"If they'd worked together," Shikamaru explained, "There's got to be a record somewhere. Some kind of transaction. Nothing underground's ever free. I'll look into it." He took the piece of paper with the Rogue's e-mail on it. "Anyway, I should... get back to Ino."
Suddenly, I took back my previous judgement of the sluggish genius. Maybe the intelligent sloth had a softer side he revealed only to my best friend. After all, the sole reason he had for helping me was for Ino, to avenge her, I supposed, or something chivalrous like so.
Nodding at Sasuke, who nodded back in the same curt manner all guys appear to master, he turned to retrieve his old green-leathered seat in the middle of the sitting area. He nodded at Ino's parents out of respect, before falling into his own void of remorse; brown eyes blanked straight ahead as he clenched and unclenched his fingers around the flimsy sheet that held the Rogue's e-mail. I watched him then as he blew out a sigh and buried his face into the clammy, nervous palms of his hands.
I glanced at the plain, round wall clock. Already three o'clock, two hours from the time Ino had been rushed here, and still there was no word from the doctors. I eyed the pallid double doors that lead to the Surgical Unit Hall and willed it to move, but it kept on the way it was, devoid of any shift or movement that indicated updates anytime soon. Despite the prayers of Ino's parents, her kind-of-not-really boyfriend's wishes and my own yearning hopes, the doors remained unopened.
A hand landed on my shoulder. I whirled about, finding Sasuke and behind him, an approaching mob of people, every one of whom possessed identical sky-blue eyes and white-blonde hair. Relatives, I presumed; the rest of the Yamanaka clan. I stepped aside to let them through, looking away as I deemed necessary when they began to console Ino's parents, exchanging embraces, with salt tears spilling here and there.
"Sakura?" I gazed into Sasuke's penetrating eyes, electric hues of black, blue and a daub of violet merging into bottomless helixes. His grip tightened on my shoulder, steadying me before I even realized I was trembling. "Calm down," he whispered to me, guiding the way to the elevator. "You gotta hold it together for the next few days. If you're too tense, the Rogue will notice that something's up."
But we would never be able to maintain the frontage, I thought. The Rogue would know. He always did. It was impossible to hide from someone all-pervading, impossible to keep secrets from someone all-knowing.
"What if he asks for another kill?" I demanded. The nurse at the information desk peered at us with an interested eye.
Sasuke pulled me into the elevator and waited until the sliding doors had shut fully before replying: "Play along."
I stared at him, uncomprehending. "What?"
"I said, play along."
I gasped, finally understanding his meaning. "You mean give him a name?" The exclamation boomed in the small cage, rattling the few chords that held us in midair. It probably didn't help that I had, in the heat of the moment, unconsciously stomped my feet. We rocked unsteadily, though the diversion was not enough to pacify my sizzling emotions. "What is wrong with you?"
"Sakura—"
"I can't believe you just—"
"For now," he cut off, "for now I need you to play along. If the Rogue gets any angrier, he might hurt you."
"But I can't... I can't give him another person to kill!"
"Don't you want to stop him?" Sasuke hissed, palpably frustrated. "Haven't you ever thought ahead, that if he kills you, he'll only prey on some other victim, and it'll go on and on unless someone does something about it? You can do that. You're saving dozens of other lives he's bound to take in the future."
"What I'm doing is taking the easy way out by giving him what he wants."
Sasuke stepped forward, cornering me into the golden railing that bordered all three sides of the winch.
"You are not a coward, Haruno." But the very beads of salt water taking shape in the corners of my eyes until his face, merely inches from mine, distorted into indiscernible blurs, was an indication that I was. I looked away from him, feeling somewhat betrayed.
Why was he forcing me to do this? I didn't want to commence on another Rogue-bound exploration, what with the failure of the past two attempts and having had caused two people serious injuries: Sasuke and Ino respectively. I couldn't bear the thought of a third casualty because I was so naive as to think I could discover his identity with a little snooping. I've tried to fight off the Rogue, and each defiant act had been rewarded by an accompanying punishment, the death or injury of someone else, owning to the Rogue but on account of my ignorance... my fear... my lack of guts.
So why was Sasuke pushing me so hard? I'd told him all this because he wanted me to, because I thought he'd help me, but why was he making it worse by telling me to give the Rogue a kill? Why was he—
A finger latched under my chin, tilting my face back to him and pinning me in place with the sharpness of his gaze. "If it were anyone else," he murmured, "they wouldn't have fought the Rogue this long. They wouldn't have survived this far. You're the bravest girl I know."
"Sacrificing others for my sake doesn't really have that heroic ring to it," I bit sarcastically.
"Is that what you think you're doing?" Sasuke demanded, "You think you're being selfish? You're not the one self-centered here, Sakura."
My back pressed into the mirror-walls of the elevator as he leaned forward and propped his chin on my head, tucking me into the warmth of his neck, my cheek against his chest. His hold tightened around me.
Lowly, delicately, he whispered:
"...I am."
Hushed tones.
Fleeting, meaningful glances.
The subtlest of gestures filled with implicit messages.
I had never been stealthy, my only experience being my failed attempt to sneak out of the house when I was six, only to be caught halfway down the stairs. I did not know how to appear normal despite being aware of something far from normal beneath the surface, but that was exactly how Sasuke wanted me to behave for the rest of the week—so as to not arise suspicion from my personal devil and risk angering him further.
Thus, for the days following the launch of our hunt for the Rogue, this time with the help of a mastermind, we conversed in the briefest meeting of eyes, whispered words and unobserved (or so we hoped) passing of written communication. We got rid of the leftover traces—turning away before stares stretched too long, shredding the notes for disposal or burying them where nobody could find—every precaution we could think of performed to be on the safe side, because we never knew just when the Rogue was watching.
Whether he knew not or was completely conscious of our covert doings, I couldn't tell. The Rogue seemed not at all mistrustful of me when we spoke online that night, conversing as though we were good old buddies, as though he wasn't leading up to the ultimate question he came to ask of me: whom he should slaughter for the night.
But when he posed the ill-fated query, I couldn't bring myself to answer him, to reply with a name of who then would be bound to their demise. Breaking my word to Sasuke, unable to prompt myself to sacrifice another person for my sake, I had opposed the question and logged off.
His terrorizing of me, now part of my routine, came every day and night in form of voice mails, telephone calls, online messages and tiny but foreboding notes stuck in my locker. I showed every one of these to Sasuke, who would first ask me how I was holding up, if I was okay; and then hand the conversation print-outs, voice mail recordings and threatening notes to Shikamaru. The slothful but gifted boy perused through each entity in detail, searching for something, anything, that would lead us somewhere, preferably a step closer to lifting the mask that concealed the Rogue's identity.
Given that the Rogue admitted to seeing me in school, Sasuke had made me list everyone I knew who went to the Hidden Leaves Academy. My hand was aching by the time I had finished enumerating names of all grades and nationalities. I had thought that being known, being talkative and friendly was advantageous, and, up until then, it had proved to be. Now, however, the large degree of people I was acquainted with made our job more difficult, the number we were attempting to narrow down even larger. Although with half the list discarded, for it was safe to assume that the Rogue was male, we were left with dozens of students, all seemingly without motive and without reason to want to have me killed.
I verbalized this to Sasuke, though he no more than dismissed my point and turned down the suggestion to take out the unlikely ones, like the frail whiz-tech who would never hurt a fly or the shy, wallpaper of a boy who never said a word. I couldn't imagine them ever plotting murder, but as Sasuke pointed out: that was something I could never be certain of. A part of me knew he was right. There was no telling of people's true intentions—and the sickest serial killers sported conventional camouflages, with shifting skins of a chameleon, blending as another face in the crowd.
"Sasuke told me about the pictures," Shikamaru said to me the following morning, when I had snuck out English to make a trip to the washroom, deliberately taking the longer route in order to happen to where the guys were: out in the gravel grounds. Shikamaru had broken way from the group and we stood behind the jutting wing of the Art rooms, concealed by its cast shadow. Out in the far field, Sasuke stared at our direction, before turning away judiciously before anyone else took notice.
"The ones of you;" Shikamaru's voice drew my attention back to him. "Do you still have them?"
"No," I replied. "I threw them away."
"What? Why would you—" He paused, and groaned exasperatedly. "Never mind. Do remember what kind of snapshots they were?"
"What do you mean? They were just like any other photographs."
"What kind?" He repeated, "Plate? Polaroid? If it had the yellow dates in the bottom corner, then it would have been taken by an older camera."
"No dates," I told him. "And not a Polaroid either. They were regular pictures, on printing paper. Like one of those one-hour developing stores—but I doubt he'd let other people see them. It's probably house-printed."
He concluded, "So it's digital."
"And that means...?"
"It means," Shikamaru explained, "that another copy, or possibly multiple copies, of those images still exist."
I pondered on that for the rest of the day, wondering where those replicas could be. The Rogue must have kept them, along with the snapshots he'd taken of his victims. It occurred to me then that I was just another addition to that anthology, my picture only a portion of his blood-splattered collage. If I didn't do something now, anything to stop the Rogue, eventually I would end up just like them.
Just another mug in his collection of lifeless, bloodied faces.
Rogue: What are you doing Sakura?
lilpinkchiq: What do you mean? I'm talking to you.
Rogue: But that's not all, is it?
lilpinkchiq: What?
Rogue: You're... calm.
lilpinkchiq: And?
Rogue: And you used to tremble every time we talk. You constantly avoided our conversations, and you always resisted. Now, all of a sudden, you're compliant?
Rogue: What are you up to, Sakura?
The following afternoon, I found myself hauled into seclusion in a quiet, echoing passage that branched off from the main hallway and coiled around the back of the Carpentry and Metalwork classrooms. Down the corridor, where the path closed in a dead-end, creating a small cul-de-sac inhabited by garbage cans and large, blue bins, Shikamaru stood, already waiting.
Sasuke dove straight to the point. "At work last night, we snuck around and found this report of an abandoned vehicle just a couple hours after Ino's accident. It was in a ditch by Highway 10. No plate number—looked like it was torn off."
"Fingerprints?" inquired Shikamaru.
"None," the Uchiha replied. "Dashboards were wiped, the clutch and wheel too; at least, according to what it said on the file."
"Make and colour?"
"Hummer H3, dark red paintjob, huge dent in the front bumper with navy blue scratches."
"Blue," the brunette echoed. "Ino's car was blue." His gaze glazed, as if remembering the incident all over again. Then, with a volume lower than that of a whisper, so quiet it slipped past Sasuke's notice and barely reached my ears, Shikamaru murmured, "...it matched her eyes at night."
At that moment, I realized with a shock that he was in love with my best friend.
Rogue: I've been waiting. Your time is about to run out again.
Rogue: Remember the last time you didn't give me a kill?
Rogue: A little girl ended up dying. Would you like that to happen again?
lilpinkchiq: No.
Rogue: Then start naming.
lilpinkchiq: I can't think of anyone
Rogue: Liar.
lilpinkchiq: Really, I can't. If I had someone in mind, I'd tell you.
Rogue: ...What's going on Sakura?
lilpinkchiq: What? Nothing.
Rogue: You've been against this game since the beginning. Now you expect me to believe you'll voluntarily tell me if you had "someone in mind"?
Rogue: Sometimes I notice you disappear from my sight, for minutes or hours at a time. What do you do when I'm not looking? Where do you go? Who do you meet?
lilpinkchiq: Nothing, nowhere and no one. You're paranoid.
Suddenly, a high-pitched trilling erupted from the telephone. The sound echoed in the room and from three other points in the house.
A part of me suspected it was the Rogue calling.
Rogue: Oh, what a pleasant surprise.
Rogue: Someone's being a little disobedient.
lilpinkchiq: I haven't done anything.
Rogue: Actually, you aren't who I'm talking about
I glanced at the flashing red dot of the receiver's base, designating the unanswered phone call. Reaching out, I seized the cordless handset instinctively, fastening my eyes on the cerulean glow of the screen and the pixels of words it displayed.
01 MISSED CALL 17:33
Gaara S.
773-9513
Rogue: I think I already know who's next on the roster
Rogue has logged off.
Nara Shikamaru
| HTTP Error 403.2 - Read access forbidden |
His fingers soared over the keyboard, eyes affixed on the screen and the wheels of his brain spinning at work as he tried to find another route, stirring around the obstruction.
| HTTP Error 407.1 - Proxy Authentication Required |
Damn it.
How many freaking decoy software did this guy have? Shikamaru tried again, searching for another way in. Everything he knew about the matter of info-tech was now applied as he wound his way through back sites, rummaging around for a flaw, a crack in the wall. Finally, he found what he was looking for. He worked his magic.
| HTTP Error 205.5 – Reset Password |
Open sesame, he thought, as he slipped inside the e-mail account by a mere press of his pinkie on the Enter key. Within a millisecond, the screen altered from the intricate, black backgrounds to a regular internet page.
Inbox (0)
Drafts (0)
Sent (0)
Deleted (0)
Just as he'd suspected.
Shikamaru probed around some more, looking into Spam, Notes, Contacts and Calendar, but to no avail he found nothing. None of these folders had anything stored in them. He checked out the Account Info, Profile details, Passwords and PINS, but columns supposedly filled on a methodical basis were blank. Convinced that the account was utterly empty, Shikamaru was just about to give up when something, a little piece of information, caught his eye.
Registered: 9 weeks ago
He frowned in thought. "Sasuke?" bellowed Shikamaru. No response. He head lolled sideways, glaring languidly at the closed bathroom door. "Sasuke!"
The rusted hinges creaked painfully at the speed with which the movable panel was swung and through the threshold stumbled out his cantankerous roommate—Sasuke, fully-dressed (thankfully), leaned against the frame with an equally cutting glare, white shaving cream still sparsely smeared across his lower jaw. "What?"
"When did the threats start?" Shikamaru inquired, disregarding the prodigy's temper. "When did Sakura start talking to the Rogue?"
Sasuke's brows creased together. "I don't exactly know. She broke down at Kin's memorial. That's when I knew something was wrong."
"So, what, about a month before?" That didn't fit the timeline.
Sasuke shook his head. "No, I think it went on before that. I began to notice after we called a truce, when we finally made up. Every time I saw her she was always jumpy."
"How long ago?"
"Couple of weeks," Sasuke answered, "She said he seemed harmless at first. Maybe eight or nine, late October."
Now that made more sense. As the Uchiha disappeared back into the washroom, he redirected his focus back on the screen of the computer. Registered nine weeks ago, it said, about the time the threats and messages had begun, according to the Uchiha. This account had been created just recently, crafted specifically, he supposed, for a sole reason: to communicate with Sakura. He doubted this address was used to perform any other function; the Rogue wouldn't be so stupid as to contact the girl through an e-mail he thoroughly utilized. There must be, however, another address he did make use of, and that was what Shikamaru needed to find.
And he had a hunch as to where it might be.
He manoeuvred again through the account, expertly clicking the right options in hopes that this would eventually lead him to what he was looking for. Accounts couldn't be created without an already existing address, and websites inquire for this information so as to send activation codes or clarifications if complications should arise. This instance would be no exception and a couple of clicks later, Shikamaru's theory was proven correct.
Under the Linked IDs section, he effortlessly uncovered his target.
Alternate e-mail address
He took this e-mail and, after signing out of the current one, performed the same magic. After a little back site route, a few activation codes and password reset links, he was in.
He moved the mouse circumspectly over each folder, eyes searching. Similar to the previous account, this one hadn't much in it. There were a few junk mails in the spam folder; the Inbox was empty, and so was Trash and Sent, but there was something about its false emptiness that told him the address was used, though very thoroughly deleted.
But even this guy, no matter how highly Sakura spoke of him, made silly mistakes.
Drafts (1)
The pointer hovered for a moment as Shikamaru silently wished to have unearthed something significant, before ultimately pressing his index finger down. The small, black device emitted a soft click as the screen modified into another window. He selected the message, now without hesitation, an excited sensation filling the nerves of his usually groggy body. The page took a second longer to load, but soon enough the lengthy, strangely colourful document materialized on the screen for his and everyone's eyes to see.
A brow raised in confusion.
Tayuya M. — 441-9682 — S4; CS; Oto.
Jirobo L. — 452-3352 — S4; CS; Oto.
Kidomaru O. — 463-7472 — S4; CS; Oto.
Sakon U. — 496-8754 — S4; CS; Oto.
Ukon U. — 496-8754 — S4; CS; Oto.
Kayuga K. — 401-0028 — CS; Oto.
Yakushi K. — 452-9688 — KGH; Kon. ; Oto.
What the hell is this?
Memo: Finally coming up for a breather from a... (not kidding) 12-hour study session for Mid-Terms. Started at 10am and it's now 9:55pm. My brain is bleeding. I figured it out. University is just hell with textbooks. -_-"
So, um, um... a review for still updating despite super-hectic-college-life?
Leave a comment as a prize for a good kid who's done studying for exams? =D
Read, Review and Thank you!
Sincerely,
Keelah (or what is left of her.)
Awesome Fanarts by equally Awesome People:
keelahthewriter. deviantart favourites/ 46144697
A million hugs to Freezing Rose, Tomatoxcherrylover & xYama-chanx!
Anyone else an artist? I'd love to see your fanart! Show me your favourite scenes! Actually, a lot of people have been drawing scary stuff...that's always fun to see. But... can anyone make a fanart of your favourite SasuSaku moment in IM? X) Because we all want to have something to squeal at?
