A/N: As my old readers may have noticed, I took down 19 chapters, and I've updated and revised them to where character development is more realistic in a way.
Chronicles of the White Fang
Chapter Four
-Refugee-
"Your life does not end when you die. It ends when you lose faith."
- Hatake Sakumo
Age 20
Dull grey eyes gazed up at the rustling green fabric that made up the tent.
The way it fluttered and flapped and quaked gave him the impression that it was storming outside. Judging by the howling wind and the fierce rain drops that splattered on the ground, he was probably accurate in his assumption.
Sakumo wondered how long it had been since the incident. The clean bandages and stitched wounds looked new, but as he took a good look at the pink scars, he knew it had been a couple of days. It probably had been days.
It didn't matter. Days, weeks, none of it mattered. He still remembered as if it had been just recently since it happened.
Blood. His mother's hands falling on his lap. Cold.
The flaps to the tent opened. In stepped a completely soaked kunoichi. She was adorning a grey flak jacket with plated shoulder blades and black underclothes that all the other leaf shinobi wore as standard uniform.
He'd seen it enough from the patrolling Konoha-nin around his village. His village. It wasn't there anymore.
The only exception to her armor however was the stitched red cross to the black fabric that covered her shoulder. The women swept back her short, damp hair as she looked to him in surprise.
She gasped and unceremoniously dropped her clipboard. "By the Shodaime Hokage," she whispered, her voice sounded mystical. "You're awake!"
He was startled at her sudden excitable happiness. She moved forward, and she ruffled his silver hair as if they were great pals and not complete strangers. Her scarlet hair, cropped to her chin, dripped cold droplets of water onto his exposed chest. He cringed away, earning a sharp intake of breath by the pain of such a movement.
"Oh, sorry!" She laughed as she practically skipped away to grab a towel off a makeshift table. She began to ruffle her hair into the towel rather unladylike and gave him a cheeky smile. "I'm just so happy that you're awake! You've been out for weeks."
He remained silent, not really caring that he'd been in a coma.
"You should've seen Hokage-sama." She looked misty eyed for a second. "He's always such a calm person. Never shows emotions, ya know? But when he just up and vanished and came back minutes later with a dying kid in his arms, he looked downright. . ." She trailed off, finally noticing Sakumo's lack of attention. She cleared her throat and moved forward, this time with more care to her actions. "Hey kid, you okay?"
No, he wasn't, he thought bitterly, but he chose not to say those words out loud. Something about the worry in her eyes, the tension in her body, reminded him of his mother. . . and he could never hurt his mother. Not voluntarily.
So instead, he cleared his throat and croaked out, "Water?"
She immediately went to retrieve his request and came back with a rush to her steps. She helped tilt his head back and aided in helping him drink. He took greedy sips until the glass was empty, and she went to retrieve more from the pitcher. This time, he took the glass from her hand and helped himself. She sat at the edge of the bed, a small smile playing on her lips.
"Where are my clothes?" He finally managed after helping himself to a third glass of water. His throat no longer felt as if it had been through vigorous torture with sand paper.
She blinked and looked over at his bare, bandaged chest and his boxers.
"Well, I was ordered to burn them by the Nidaime. We have no time or resources to wash them and it was unsanitary." Sakumo blinked before looking away, deep in thought. However, beside him he saw silver fur. It was his wolf toy. A plush little toy that he picked up with a calculative gaze.
It was unharmed.
He hugged it to his chest which earned him a smile from the medic-nin. "The Nidaime said it was okay for you to keep." She laughed. "It was the only thing in your pack. Must be important then?"
He didn't answer, and instead closed his eyes rather sluggishly. He drifted to sleep, toy hugged beside him, and he felt a faint brush of his locks before he succumbed deeper into sleep.
When he woke up again, it was to the vermilion eyed gaze of the Nidaime Hokage.
Sakumo blinked owlishly at him. For a second, he couldn't comprehend it, but then his breath stirred. It's the Nidaime Hokage-
"Calm down."
Sakumo frowned.
The Nidaime stayed where he was on the far side of the tent. His hair looked slightly damp, and Sakumo could hear the faint trickle of rain from outside. The man's arms were crossed as he stayed, leaning on the table.
"You are Hatake Suzume's son." It was not an inquiry. Merely a stated fact. The man moved forward, closer. His gaze was calculative.
Sakumo nodded. He looked to the toy wolf at his side for safety.
The Nidaime hesitated before he asked, "What is. . . your name?"
"Sakumo."
"Hatake Sakumo," he said, testing Sakumo's name before he gave a nod. "I am Senju Tobirama, Nidaime Hokage of Konohagakure no Sato. From now on, I shall be your provider. Until you reach Genin and are able to provide for yourself with mission wages, you will stay with me in the Senju compound within Konohagakure."
Sakumo's grip tightened on his toy. That was unexpected. Unwanted. He didn't. . . He didn't want to live with some stranger. He wanted his mom. He wanted to be back in Amegakure inside the safety of that small house on the hill. He wanted his father to think he was safe, whoever his father was.
"Do you have any objections or concerns with your current arrangement?" The Nidaime's gaze was narrowed, as if he wanted Sakumo to object. Somehow, Sakumo felt as if it was a trap if he answered to such an opening.
He hugged the toy wolf tighter against his chest.
"Mom died when she summoned you," Sakumo stated bluntly. Where there was pain for the loss, a numbness now replaced it. So similar to a wound in a sense, but where a wound was physical and visible, this one was not.
The Nidaime's expression didn't change, and he didn't answer. Not for a while. However, the atmosphere between them shifted.
They both stared at each other in silence. One expression was worn with apprehension and the other with a cold observation. It wasn't that difficult to guess which belonged to who.
Then the Nidaime strode forward until he was at the foot of Sakumo's bed. "Hatake Suzume was a traitor to Konohagakure no Sato," he finally spoke. "It is no secret. What she did to be named a traitor, however, is classified."
Sakumo's gaze widened.
"Before you were born, I placed the Hiraishin seal on her in order to quickly eliminate her, but your mother managed to deactivate the seal by extracting my chakra from it. It goes unsaid how she was able to do that, but nevertheless, the Hiraishin seal was a faulty seal. One that I couldn't use to transport, but apparently, it was one that had the ability to reverse summon me four years later."
Sakumo's gaze lowered as he took in the information. If his mother was a traitor to the leaf, then that would make her a missing-nin. What about him? He was her son, and she. . . she was his only family. Sakumo glanced up. "Mom said I have a clan. . . near Uzu." The implication that he was not without a legal guardian went unsaid. However, the statement and the underlying meaning was as clear as day. Sakumo wanted to know if he had a choice.
The Nidaime's gaze remained passive. "You may be four years old, child, but you are not unintelligent. You are the son of a missing-nin. One whose loyalty had been to Konohagakure no Sato and all her secrets as well as interests. What Hokage would I be to endanger such secrets by letting the son of a missing-nin live in another village? It's your choice." The Nidaime turned away, but not before he parted with cold words: "The only choice you have."
When the Nidaime Hokage left, Sakumo sunk back into his cot. Questions still clogged his throat, but he swallowed them down along with his frustration. That was it?
He closed his eyes. Just feeling. . . tired. Too tired to think about anything. He let himself fall into a deep sleep. For once, he was granted at least that simple desire.
After a while, he was pulled out of his dreams by the woman he had awoken to first. She paused in checking his IV before she smiled. "You're like a puppy, always sleeping, you know. So what's the name, kid?" He eyed her warily, and she snorted before showing him her clipboard. "I'm tired of calling you Nidaime Wannabe." At the top of the form, 'Nidaime Wannabe' was written.
He reluctantly complied when she gave him a reassuring smile. Plus, he didn't want to be associated with that rude Senju.
"Hatake Sakumo," he replied, and that smile died completely on her lips. She shakily stood, giving him an unreadable look before her eyes turned back to the flaps of the tent.
"O-Oh. . ." She forced a smile to her lips. "I'm going to alert the others that you're awake. Don't go anywhere."
He gave her a look. He could hardly sit up without feeling extremely exhausted. He would just fall flat on the floor if he even tried. When the woman hurriedly left the tent, Sakumo took his time observing his surroundings.
The tent didn't seem to be a medic's tent since there was no medicine or sick people lying around. Instead there was a desk filled with papers where the words were shadowed due to the candles a lit in the room. And there was tables filled with weapons, scrolls, explosive tags, and the particular blue armor, battle-scarred from its daily use in war.
Sakumo had a foreboding idea of whose tent this belonged to.
"Hatake, huh?"
Sakumo was startled out of his thoughts by the playful tone that echoed right beside him. He moved slightly away, wincing as he did so. The first thing Sakumo noticed about the tall shinobi was the three distinctive tomoe that surrounded both pupils in a lazy swirl within the crimson irises.
It was hypnotizing and calming, bringing a sort of warmth within Sakumo that both scared and assured him.
"What an ancient, extinct surname," the man drawled. A man because he was a shinobi, who no doubt had killed many within his youth, but he was still a boy in age due to being only in his teen years.
Sakumo's attention was diverted by a snorting woman, who stood on Sakumo's other side.
Sakumo felt like a trapped mouse as he took in the new people standing all around him, watching him like predators would their prey. He felt overwhelmed by the sight and his heart began to slowly accelerate, alerting all his senses.
A painful reminder that he was still alive.
"Not so extinct, Kagami." She stuck a senbon into her tight fitted bun, not a single blonde hair was out of place.
The red eyed teenager smiled and the tension in Sakumo melted from the warmth that radiated from it.
"Right." Sakumo flinched as the red -eyed man, Kagami, ruffled his silver, disheveled locks. "You really had us worried, kid, what with all that blood and screaming. I really thought I had to kill you in order to shut you up."
Maybe not so comforting. If it weren't for the harsh words, Sakumo would have really felt comforted by that serene, playful tone. He had an inkling that this man was as unstable as Sakumo felt at the moment.
He just showed it to the world with a sadistic, humorous perspective whereas Sakumo showed it with an impassive one.
"Like that's reassuring to the kid." Sakumo took notice of the bigger man who stood at the end of his bed. His brown eyes were abnormally large and smokey. They looked enhanced by the black smudges of exhaustion traced under his eyes.
Kagami raised a defined brow. "Torifu, my man, did I hear that correctly?" He looked to the woman. "Was he just cracking a joke right now, Koharu?" The woman, Koharu, actually gave a mischievous smile in answer. Unable to keep an indifferent attitude with Kagami's light-hearted attitude.
Kagami let out a bark of a laugh. "Whoa, that's deadly." He clasped the larger man, torifu, on the back. "One minute I finally get your cool, serious facade, and the next moment, you get outta character?" Kagami placed an arm around Torifu with a playful smile. "You're an enigma and I'm seriously gonna fan-girl right now-" Red eyes flickered to the side. "Ah, Danzo, my man! Nice of you to show up and ruin the mood," he cheerfully exclaimed as three men walked into the steadily crowding tent.
Sakumo had yet to know who these strangers were. What were they doing here?
A scowling tanned man glared at Kagami— He must be Danzo then— but Danzo didn't react when Kagami embraced him with a lazy arm.
"Danzo, guess what I've learned today-" Kagami began.
"He's a Hatake," Koharu informed rather uncaringly.
Kagami gave the woman a blank look. "You're a pain in the neck do you know that, woman. A damn pain."
"If anyone's a pain in the neck here, it's you Kagami." One of the other teenage boy's spoke. He moved to stand next to the kunoichi before he pulled off his fogging glasses and began to wipe them with his sleeve.
"Straight through the heart," Kagami placed a hand mockingly against his chest. "That one really hurt."
The glasses wearing man ignored Kagami in favor of the woman, who smiled warmly at him. "We just came back from patrol and heard that you three were here." The man gazed at Sakumo. His face was severe, but it melted in kindness. "I can't believe he's awake. It's good to have you back in the land of the living, child."
Sakumo blinked once and gave an unsteady smile, not having the heart to be mean. Sure, he felt like nothing but scum, but that didn't mean he had to spread such poison to everyone else. It wasn't who he was. . . It wasn't what he did.
"It's Sakumo," he managed to say through the darkness that suffocated him.
"Mitokado Homura," the man introduced himself as he put on his glasses and offered a hand. Sakumo took the large hand into his much smaller one and shook it.
The last man who was left to be addressed quickly stepped forward, the brightness he radiated almost put Kagami's to shame. "Sarutobi Hiruzen!" He quickly introduced before ruffling Sakumo's hair.
Why did people feel the need to do that? Seriously.
Hiruzen continue, "Sensei told us that you came from the other side of Amegakure's border." Suddenly the mood in the room dropped as all eyes landed on him. "I'm sorry for your loss," Hiruzen finished.
And no matter how common such lines were, Sakumo felt the sincerity in his words and in their eyes. They were the eyes of understanding, eyes that acknowledged his pain because they too have had their hearts bore witness to it at some point of their life.
Sakumo's gaze fluttered down to the sheets that covered his lap. He didn't want to look at them anymore. He felt his eyelashes brush across his warm skin before they became damp and cool to the touch.
There was silence.
Then chaos ensued.
"Great fucking job, Hiruzen. Seriously," Kagami deadpanned.
"I-I didn't mean to. I ?" Hiruzen stumbled over his words as he waved his hands around, unsure of what to do.
"Aw, little man, don't cry." He felt someone awkwardly pat his ankle, and his chest quaked at the sincere command in Torifu's rather awkward tone.
He really hated them all at the moment. Their talking, their worrying only made it harder to stop.
"Fuck," he heard Danzo hiss. "What do we do? Sensei will kill us."
"Koharu, you're a woman right?" Homura asked.
Koharu gave him a furious look. "No," she sarcastically drawled. "No, I'm not."
"We don't have time for your shit, woman," Kagami grumbled. "Now do your womanly touch or something!"
"Womanly touch, you say, you sexist pig?" Her voice raised a notch and Sakumo let out shuddering breaths, his vision blurring. "Fuck," she breathed. "Okay, okay!"
Her panicked hand smoothed out his ruffled hair, and it was painful. So painfully awkward and unnatural that he wanted to cry even more. Couldn't they just leave him alone? He was doing fine until they came and decided to bear his emotions for the whole world to see.
What was with the familiarity in their impressions? Why were they treating him as if he was their own? As if he was their friend, their family. It was terrible and overwhelming.
They only thing he could remember was his mother fiercely protecting him, his mother taking a deadly blow that was meant to kill him, not her, and his mother dying while embracing him.
His bleeding mother smiling as if she had died with no regrets. As if she had died smiling, knowing that somewhere, somehow, he would be living. Living because she had summoned a white-haired man to save him. Not just any man, but the Nidaime Hokage.
A man who wasn't a savior at all.
He was just a Hokage acting in the interests of the village, treating him like some traitor. As if he was someone who he needed to keep a close eye out for. Not because he felt responsible for his life as a human, but because he was the child of a missing-nin, and as the hokage, this choice was the only choice he could give that didn't involve his immediate death. What would the Nidaime do. . . If. . . If he found out who his father was?
Sakumo felt that suffocating dread crawl up his chest, feeling the strangest urge to protect his father, whoever he was. If the Nidaime found out that someone from the Land of Fire was conspiring with a missing-nin, he'd kill him. If his mom hadn't been dead by the time he was summoned, he would have surely killed her too.
He could still remember.
All of it.
Her smile, her blood, her lifeless body beneath him.
He could remember it as if it had only happened moment ago, and now here he was, with a group of Konoha-nin, who were treating him with a familiarity that warmed and tore at his soul at the same time. No. He didn't want to feel alive again.
He didn't want to feel what these people managed to bring out.
"I think you should just stick to killing," Kagami told Koharu lightly. Koharu retorted with a flying senbon, which he easily dodged.
"You pick the worse times to be cracking jokes." Danzo sighed.
"Why I never." Kagami gasped, looking completely heartbroken Kagami shook his head in betrayal, looking as if a great catastrophe had happened.
"Stop clowning around, Kagami." Torifu gave him a glare that only had Kagami chuckle in return. The red eyed man moved to sit at the edge of the bed.
Sakumo's vision cleared as Kagami began to smooth out his locks rather warmly with that sincere yet unstable smile of his. "Hey kid?" Sakumo flinched slightly at the light affectionate tap against his forehead. "Look into my eyes." Sakumo blindingly did as he was told, eyes fixating on the lazy swirl of the tomoe. "And go to sleep." His erratic heartbeat slowed, and the sobs died out as his eyes drooped closed.
"Thanks. . ." Sakumo managed to drawl out before succumbing to darkness. Kagami smirked and it was all the answer Sakumo needed to be assured that Kagami knew exactly what he thanked him for.
When his eyes cracked open for the fourth time, it was to a different surrounding. No longer was he on a cot inside some makeshift tent. Instead, he was being carried on someone's back, feeling the cool breeze lightly caressing his skin and fluttering through his clothes; they consisted of black grey shorts and a short sleeved, black shirt with the Konoha sigil printed in red on the front.
He wiggled his bare toes, and he glanced up to the thick canopy of leaves above.
"Whoa, stop tickling me!" Who was that? Right. He adjusted himself by placing his chin on Kagami's shoulder.
"M'kay," Sakumo slurred out groggily, feeling his eyelids slip closed on their own accord. He forced them open again.
Kagami glanced a him before he jumped onto another limb of a tree, pushing off and landing soundlessly on the grass into a small clearing. "Heh, you're pretty cute," he slowed to a walk. "Like a puppy," he added as an afterthought.
Sakumo yawned and rubbed his eye with a closed fist. "Where are we?"
"60 miles northeast of Konohagakure no Sato," came a new voice, but no less unfamiliar than Kagami's. Sakumo tensed, looking off to the side towards the Nidaime in his signature blue armor.
"In other words, we're in a forest heading home," Kagami lightly added in translation. He probably felt Sakumo's unease. They met each other's gaze, and Kagami smiled, as if reading his thoughts.
"Yeah, sensei's always like that. He never smiles too. I've heard a story once from Hashi-sensei of how he witnessed Tobi-sensei smiling when he was a kid. Hashi-sensei said it was a miracle, I think it was a delusion. Hashi-sensei did say he came home from a courier mission, running a whole day straight without water, and he saw Tobi-sensei smile at him before he passed out from dehydration." Kagami crinkled his nose. "If I was running a whole day straight without water, I'd probably be seeing Tobi-sensei laughing, declaring world peace or something like that. Better be careful. If you see that happen it's better to act normal and get one of us right away. It'll most definitely be an imposter. Speaking of which, are you thirsty?"
The Nidaime's gaze switched to Kagami. A raised brow the only indication that he was a little annoyed by his easy going attitude. Sakumo took the offered canteen in a daze.
"Kagami," Tobirama drawled. "Hand the boy over to Hiruzen and scout ahead. Do not go any farther from my sensory range."
"But sensei," Kagami whined. "I get tired with the sharingan active for more than 15 hours."
"Only because your control in chakra is as unstable as your persona," The Nidaime added dryly. "We will fix that when we get home, of course."
"I'm not a sensor, I'm a close-range combative-nin," Kagami muttered as he moved close to Hiruzen, who happily pulled the groggy Sakumo off Kagami's back. Sakumo held his yelp of pain when Hiruzen rolled him under his arm and over his back, adjusting his weight as if he weighed no less than some light pack. The wound on his side was throbbing. Something was wrong with it. Was it not healed right? Or did they leave it like that on purpose? Sakumo let out a shuddered breath and fisted his little hands.
"Kagami, stop moping," Hiruzen scolded. "You should trust in sensei's orders."
"You're such a teacher's pet, Hiru," Koharu called from the back.
Hiruzen blanched. "N-No, I'm not!" He cleared his throat and added in a more dignified manner, "I'm just saying that Kagami is the best out of all of us to juggle in various specialties. He should nurture such abilities," Hiruzen tried for diplomacy before he gave an unimpressed Kagami a narrowed glance. "After all," Hiruzen began smugly. "Sensei has a specialty as a sensor-nin and as a close-range combative-nin."
Kagami yawned, and Hiruzen's jaw slightly dropped in disbelief and irritation by Kagami's blatant dismissal.
"Yeah, yeah." Kagami waved lazily in Hiruzen's direction. "We all know sensei's just giving me a hard time cause I'm an U-chi-ha," Kagami sang out lightly before he waved at all of them and sunshined from the group.
Tobirama narrowed his eyes at the spot where Kagami had been before he looked to Sakumo, who was struggling in opening the canteen over Hiruzen's shoulder. Hiruzen wasn't as smooth in his run as Kagami was, so the canteen accidentally slipped from his fingers.
Tobirama caught it before Hiruzen could even react.
"Sensei!" Hiruzen stumbled slightly in his run before he adjusted, looking only slightly ruffled by the close proximity of his sensei.
"Ah," Sakumo's hands fell lazily over Hiruzen' shoulder as he watched Tobirama uncap the canteen. He closed his eyes, feeling his mind slowly slipping back to that familiar unconsciousness.
"Wake up, boy." Sakumo blinked up at the Nidaime before he took the canteen from his hand. Hiruzen slowed to a halt in order to give him a chance to take a sip without knocking the canteen off of his hands with his shoulders.
When Sakumo finished, he looked to the Nidaime with something akin to worry. "Why do I feel so sleepy all the time?"
Tobirama closed the canteen and hooked it to Hiruzen's belt in one smooth move before he eyed Sakumo. It was as if he was silently contemplating on telling him or not. It seemed there was a silent communication between Hiruzen and the Nidaime because one moment he was in Hiurzen's arm, and the next he was leaning drowsily against the soft white fur that lined the collar of the Nidaime's armor.
"The genjutsu Kagami had put you under kept your brain active in a forced induced sleep for more than 48 hours," the Nidaime said slowly, turning his head slightly to Sakumo, who snuggled deeper against the fur.
Sakumo gave a slow nod. He had learned about Genjutsu in the books that his father has sent to him in a storage seal. In fact, all the books were Academy-level books that showed the basics to Konoha's shinobi arts. He was glad his stranger of a father had made sure to prepare him to be knowledgeable on the shinobi arts.
"In other words, you've been awake for four days straight. It was unwise for Kagami to abuse his dojutsu by manipulating your mind into falsely making you believe that you were asleep," the Nidaime finished.
"So I've been asleep for four days," Sakumo mumbled.
He closed his eyes before forcing them open to stare at the metal forehead protector that guarded the Nidaime's forehead and cheeks. The scars on his chin and the side of his cheek looked deep. They may have been healed, but they were there as some sort of reminder. Sakumo vaguely wondered if he used that face protector because of those scars.
"And now that I'm actually awake, I have to sleep to recover the loss of sleep from those four days," Sakumo concluded.
From his bleary vision, he could faintly see the corner of the Nidaime's lips lifting. Was he an imposter? Sakumo didn't stay awake to find out as the Nidaime's soothing, deep voice lulled him back to a more healthier sleep: "Yes. That is a more simple way of putting it."
REVISED: 10/23/017
