The final part of the encounter with The Fates.
Chapter CII
~x~
Their words were like the sting of salt upon a gaping wound. A fuming Sasuke dragged in another ragged breath, refusing to process and accept what he was hearing.
"You lie!" he yelled, voice echoing strongly against the temple's stone walls. "You gave him Totsuka! Without it, he would not have had to make that choice!"
The sisters hissed, eyes flaring brighter, as if they found insult in his accusations.
"Insolent child, ignorant in heart."
"We will speak to thee plainly, little upstart."
The Moirae floated lower, their effortless movements bleeding fresh ripples of fog, and as they did, they grew smaller in size, less imposing in their scope. To Sasuke's great surprise, their next words were not in riddle and in rhyme, but in perfect, unsettling clarity, in single voices that were honey-sweet and melodious. Breezy, echoing sighs with sharp, icy, jagged undertones that sent discomfort crawling all over him.
Clotho began, "To thy brother was gifted Totsuka, the sealing blade, to lock away the Titans. He knew of the threat of an impending war, and the task he would be required to fulfil if all attempts to thwart it failed - and yet we had not imparted to him knowledge of the Mark, also, that Zeus bore.
"A servant to Us was the Olympian King in the first war against Cronus. The sacred kunai wielded by his hands in battle, the seals taught to him to harness the speed of lightning - both were Our gifts to him to take up arms against and foil Chaos incarnate. The Thunder God was Crown'd to restore an era of peace. Yet he knew, as we did, that peace would not last. That Cronus would continue to fester in bitterness and hatred in the shadows beneath the earth."
Naruto's father had also been a servant to The Moirae? An astounded Sasuke listened in stunned silence, his jaw clenched shut so tightly that it physically ached.
"It was thy kin, Hypnos, who approached Zeus and Hera and secured with them a covert alliance, for he sought to find a way to spare thy clan from their wretched fate. It was that very alliance that led to Cronus discovering their treachery." Lakhesis went on. "They wished to avert the war entirely, to save as many lives on both sides as possible, but when Cronus discovered their deceit, their hands became tied. For Cronus threatened to extinguish thee. He had thee marked for death on the battlefield. Thou wouldst not have survived had Hypnos not compelled every soldier in thy clan to shield thee with their own bodies."
Sasuke shook his head incredulously. "Then why did you not warn them that they would be discovered?"
"Thou hast mistaken the nature of Our Mark. It does not allow Our servant to be all-seeing, all-knowing of every possible path a soul might choose to take, for such powerful knowledge is forbidden for Us to share. In the wrong hands, it would wreak destruction upon the world. Rather, we bestow tasks for Our servants to fulfil, born of future events that we have glimpsed in the Crossroads which are certain to come to pass," Clotho expanded. "We share not with them sight of where the consequences of all their own freely-chosen actions will lead - only if those actions stand to endanger the fulfilment of their task."
"Then why have you told me the outcomes of my choices?" Sasuke countered.
"Because thou art the last of thy line. With thee, the blight of Chaos will come to an end. Thou art Our Chosen, the owner of the Rinnegan and the rightful wielder of the Adamantine; thou art the culmination of all sacrifices made by every servant we have Marked before thee, and the three kingdoms' only salvation. No other will carry Our brand after thee," Atropos' severe voice cleaved through the air like striking lightning.
"Only two paths stand before thee, Hades; both shall impact the balance we are required to uphold. To accept the Adamant and fight for life - or do nothing and condemn the world to perish. Thou hast the Rinnegan. Thou art the Underworld's King; there is no-one else Shadow-born and made who can smite Cronus. It falls to thee alone to break his cycle of hatred."
Lakhesis added, "Understand that the threads of Fate are ever unravelling, ever changing, depending on the actions that immortals choose to take. We cannot reveal knowledge of shifting destinies to any other servant except Hecate - only those destinies that appear unmoving within The Crossroads relating to a Servant's task of upholding the balance of life and death. Certainties, as was Persephone's first death, incapable of being prevented. Thy own fate, also, is set in stone. It cannot be altered."
Sasuke's eyes narrowed. He was silent.
"We gift to Our servants sacred weapons that aid them in fulfilling the task decreed upon them," Clotho continued, spinning her threads. "They are sworn only to silence; we do not control the other actions they choose to take with the knowledge that they bear. That is their free will, their own right to choose."
"Thy kin possessed the choice - to live on or to die," Lakhesis' hands glided over the threads, measuring her sister's offering. "They chose suicide. We did not intervene with their decision. We had given Our word - that no burden would fall to thee, so long as thy brother carried Our Mark, and to Our word, we held true. The actions they took were the only way to spare thee, and to keep the throne of the Underworld from falling to ruin, into the hands of Cronus' servants. Blame Us not. They could have chosen to live, to assume the throne for themselves. They chose instead to save and empower thee."
Sasuke opened his mouth to argue that they had not truly had a choice at all, but the next sister was already speaking.
"Zeus was destined to forfeit his life. He knew this from the moment he was Crown'd - his fate unchangeable. But it was not required of Thanatos to die to seal the Titans away…" Atropos hissed out the words that struck Sasuke like another physical blow. "We made no such demand of him. Yet his soul was weary, his hands stained with the blood of thy parents, and he feared that if he lived on as Totsuka's sworn Master, the risk would remain that the seal upon the Titans might someday be reversed.
"Thy kin chose to weave a death seal to stay that risk, for Totsuka's powers are forever confined once its bound Master dies. They took their own lives to keep the enemy from enslaving their souls and to bequeath the Crown and all their gifts to thee."
Sasuke struggled to comprehend what he was being told. Everything he had thought he had known about The Moirae, about destiny itself, was being flipped upside down on its head.
Clotho breathed. "Hypnos, Thanatos, Zeus and Hera knew that Cronus could not truly be stopped without his powers being absorbed by another. Yet we did not permit any of them to see that a day would come where the wards placed upon Chaos would fail. We allowed them to believe they had secured peace and a future for all, and they did - for a time."
Sasuke doubted that either his kin or Naruto's parents had truly believed the world to be safe from any further threats. It was more likely that they'd had no choice but to resign themselves to their fates and entrust the future to the immortals who had survived the war.
"Did we not bestow upon them a mercy?" Atropos flickered around Sasuke like a wisp in the wind, her scissors ever tensed at the chill that enveloped his body as she circled around him, argent eyes glowing as brightly as the sun. "As we have upon thee? Foresight we gave to them of thy woman's fate. Had they not acted to save her, the calamity would have destroyed Demeter, and with it, all life sustained on earth. A great and long famine would have befallen mortals, until a successor of their function came to be. How think thee that they were able to avert her eternal demise?"
The thundering of Sasuke's heartbeat was sickening. The Fates had not been executioners, then, were not heartless, master puppeteers who pulled at strings and caused suffering for their own entertainment - but protectors of life on earth who had sought to make the best of a very dire situation, having no direct control over the actions gods chose to take?
He realised that if they had not marked Itachi and Zeus as their servants, then Kore - Sakura - would have permanently died in the war, and Sasuke would never have found her again.
"Them?" he got out. Then Shisui, too-
"In devotion, Hypnos chose to stand with his kin until their last breaths. He pleaded with Our servant, Hecate, for an audience before Us, to bear the Mark in his cousin's stead," Lakhesis revealed. "We perceived that he would be a steadfast, loyal companion to thy brother, and as a mercy to Thanatos, permitted him to share his knowledge with his kin, so as not to carry the burden alone. He was sworn to secrecy, a seal we placed upon him, to ensure his silence. As was Hera, consort of Zeus."
No seal would have been needed. Sasuke knew for a fact that Shisui would have sooner gouged out his own eyes and consigned himself to the pits of Tartarus itself, than ever betray his closest and dearest friend. He would have suffered hell for Itachi. They had been brothers in every sense of the word. And The Fates had acquired two Uchiha pawns for the price of one, paraded under the guise of 'mercy'. The death deity was livid.
"Consider if thy kin had not laid down their lives," the thread-spinning Clotho reminded him. "Thou couldst not have awakened the Hallow'd Eye. Thou wouldst not have been Crown'd. Cronus could not have been sealed. The Titans would have ever remained a threat. It would have taken but a moment had thy brother ever become compromised or enslaved, for them to be released."
"Forget not for what thy kin fought," Lakhesis added. "For peace upon earth to be restored. For the Crown upon thy head. Thy brother offered himself freely. For such it must be, all service to Us given. We cannot compel immortals to do Our bidding. They are ever the masters of their own free-will."
It was precisely as Sasuke had suspected all along. That was why they marked deities; to do their bidding. To undertake the actions they themselves could not.
"He did it- for me." Even speaking the words out loud hurt. "His sacrifice is meaningless if I stand to lose my freedom. You manipulated him into accepting!" Sasuke seethed back.
Itachi had been so young, he would not have recognised the ensnaring, barbed-wire trap laid out before him. A fresh stab of pain shot through Sasuke's bruised heart. Had his brother not been given Totsuka, he would never have had to make such a terrible choice.
Every single time he believed that he had come to terms with his past, Sasuke came to learn it was so much worse than anything he ever could have imagined.
"Meaningless? Thou art mistaken. Thanatos was watched even then, and it was the only way we could Mark the child. He may have accepted Our Mark to save thee from it… but in the end, he sacrificed himself not only for thy sake, but to protect the balance of life and death on earth. We spoke no lie to thy brother, Hades." In a silent blink, Clotho appeared closer by his left side, hovering like a phantom. "Thou wouldst become Our Chosen - he simply offered to take thy place, to delay thy fate."
"He believed I would be spared the mark. You said nothing about delaying it! You deceived him," Sasuke snapped.
"He came to know in time that every burden would fall to thee. It was inevitable. Understand that thy brother was always to be Marked. Saved him, we did, from an untimely death in the dark. We have seen many immortals, few of which have ever been fashioned with such brilliance and cunning as Thanatos. As thou art Chosen now to smite and seal away Chaos incarnate, he was Our Chosen then, to delay the Titan's ambitions," Atropos stated.
"Why do you need any of us to deal with him?" Sasuke retorted, incensed. "Why can you not intervene? Are you not supposed to be all-knowing, all-powerful? Or have you manipulated the rest of us to believe that, too?"
"Insolence," Atropos bared feral teeth, as Clotho returned to her sisters' sides with a disapproving hiss. But Lakhesis held up a hand as if to calm them.
"It is both the bane and irony of Our existence," she mused, an element of mockery to her tone. "To hold infinite power and knowledge in Our hands… yet prisoners we are to Our lands. Permitted to venture out only to bestow Our Mark upon a worthy servant who will ensure the balance of life and death is upheld. We cannot simply extinguish a threat to Us upon a whim. There are many factors we must consider, young Hades. Overlapping timelines we must protect."
Sasuke did not envy them their role. Having to constantly watch and monitor The Crossroads seemed exhausting.
"We have already told thee, we cannot sever an immortal's thread unless their function is refused or defied." There was an element of impatience in Atropos's voice. As if she and her sisters were not accustomed to being questioned at all or having to justify their actions, and found him to be tiresome and impudent. Sasuke had the feeling they were only indulging him at all instead of expelling him back into the desert in punishment because they needed him. Because he had the distinct privilege of being their 'Chosen'.
"Perhaps he requires proof, sisters," Lakhesis suggested.
Atropos shot Sasuke a disdainful look, before nodding at Clotho.
"Behold. The thread of Cronus." With a flourish of Clotho's hand, an impossibly long coil of string appeared before the sisters. It was not silver and delicate, but thick and black. Dark particles floated away from it and it pulsed with life and ominous energy.
Atropos brandished her scissors, and in demonstration, attempted to cut it. The thread turned to smoke, then reassembled, perfectly intact.
"Behold." Clotho gestured again, and another string appeared. Bright and golden. "The thread of Apollo." Once more, Atropos lifted her scissors. The thread glowed, flaring with light, resisting all attempts to snip it.
Both threads then vanished into thin air, as Lakhesis reiterated, "We are duty-bound to remain within Our realm. It is forbidden for Us to venture out and meddle with the lives of the gods against their will. We can take only servants, and only for the purpose of protecting the balance."
"If you cannot intervene, then why did you save me?" Sasuke demanded.
"Blindness had befallen thee," Clotho answered. "Had we not chosen that moment to summon thee to Us, the Rinnegan would have fallen into Chaos' hands. It must be awakened within Our realm before thou canst accept Our Mark and the Adamant. We acted to protect it."
Anger and disgust simmered in Sasuke's eyes. Of course they had merely sought to preserve their prized asset. It had nothing to do with them particularly caring about his wellbeing at all.
"You claim our destinies are ever changing. Yet you saw that I would wield the blade from birth?" He struggled to wrap his head around the concept of how choice and certainty co-existed in an immortal's unravelling thread of life.
The sisters exchanged glances and seemed to be debating something within their own minds.
"To the Crossroads, he will go," Lakhesis whispered, prompting Sasuke to shift impatiently on his feet at their secrecy. "Of the dark clouds, he will come to know."
They nodded at each other, arriving at a mutual decision.
Then Clotho surprised him by admitting, "Our exalted Mother, Gaia, gave Us not Her full Sight. Constants in the horizon we can perceive, yet shrouds in immortal timelines along the way also exist, through which even Our eyes cannot see. They are concealing chasms of oblivion, where a path might diverge from its intended course and branch in different directions, according to the actions an immortal takes. Some of these aberrations are known to Us. Others, hidden, as the deepest secrets of the far-reaching cosmos. These voids are known as Obscurum."
Sasuke's eyebrows furrowed. Then they did not truly see everything? The thought that some events were incapable of being perceived by even The Moirae themselves was thoroughly unsettling.
"We bestow functions," Lakhesis continued. "We see what the gifts do to those who wield them. Those who rise to honourable, exalted station, and those who are damned and consumed by that which they command."
"Then Cronus fell to madness because of his gifts alone?" Sasuke scowled, refusing to accept it.
"Only in part," Clotho tilted her head. "Had he been of stronger mind, less prone to greed and hatred, mayhap he may have better controlled the impulse to devour all for himself. Yet he is responsible for every action he has taken. He is fuelled by greed and thrives off the energy he commands. He makes no effort to constrain its darkness. He can no longer distinguish between his own thoughts and those sinister whispers born of his unstable gifts that seek to feed off further chaos. They are one and the same."
"The blood of Indra flows through his veins," Atropos' gaze was searing. "As it does thine own. That blood which is capable of taint. The blood of all the Uchiha. Though thou art sounder in heart and in mind - we will not risk his corruption again. For all thy efforts, in time, it will begin to poison thee. Such is its nature, for of all the functions in this world - chaos is the most unstable. Thus, the hour will arrive that we must seal thee away."
"Then pass it to an immortal not of our line," Sasuke's words were sharp. Curt. Slicing.
The goddesses stared at him. Then the unblemished side of Atropos' lips curled.
"We have existed for aeons, Little Shade." She spoke slowly, in the manner one might to a small child who lacked the capacity to form complex thoughts. Irritation spiked within Sasuke at her utterly patronising tone. "From the days of Mother Gaia, Herself. Has it not occurred to thee, that were the solution as simple as what thy impertinent tongue dares suggest, we wouldst have already sealed his curse within another?"
The death deity glared fire back at her, unapologetic and unintimidated. They did not exactly make the rules by which they operated known amongst immortals. Everything about them was shrouded in secrecy, including the true extent of their powers and influence.
"Nay. We cannot bestow functions in such a manner, until all others in a vessel's line are spent, until there is nobody left to inherit their role. Each time a function is passed down along a new line, it grows weaker," Lakhesis stated. "And weaker, losing potency until the line extinguishes, to be replaced by another anew. These are the laws we must uphold. Our dominion is absolute over humans; yet immortals are capable of paving new fates. Destiny, for the gods, flows fluidly - as a river. Not constrained by the confines of time as mortal threads."
As Sasuke considered their words, he found himself wondering whether there was even the slightest hope that his own destiny as Madara's vessel, which the sisters had seen in his future, might, by some stroke of luck, be averted at the final moment. But even as he thought it, he knew it to be impossible. The only one capable of absorbing Cronus's powers was the Underworld's ruler - shadow born, shadow made and shadow crowned. He was the last one left.
"Yet there are paths an immortal may choose that lead to a fixed end. Such is Cronus' destiny. There is naught but ruin ahead for him, and he has neither will nor want to change it. But mayhap, for another god, we perceive whence a new path unfolds and convey the knowledge to Our servants - if it stands to risk the task we have given to them," Clotho finished. "Or mayhap we glimpse it too late, for much can change in the blink of an eye. It is not oft that paths elude Us in this manner, that an immortal's perceived end changes at the very last of moments."
Not often - yet not impossible, Sasuke noted.
"And if you do not see it…?" He eyed them warily.
"Then it likely becomes too late to share Our knowledge," Lakhesis answered. "Understand that it is Our duty to ensure that life and death exist in harmony upon the earth. Servants we choose to take up arms to protect that balance when the actions of an immortal threaten to wreak havoc upon it. We will do Our utmost to warn thee of unfavourable Obscurum that may endanger the completion of thy task - but thou must be on thy guard and prepared to encounter the unseen at any moment."
The warning was a chilling one. They, too, were tied, Sasuke realised. Just as every other deity encountered eventual limits to the scope of their abilities, so too did The Moirae. Capable of seeing a great deal and yet not immune to being blindsided by the ever-changing Obscurum - voids in pathways that unfolded at random due to immortal free-will. The glitches in timelines that they had stated rarely escaped their eyes were able to produce sudden, unexpected, branching routes that had previously been unseen. Paths The Fates only glimpsed once they spontaneously manifested.
Which meant the goddesses were capable of seeing very far off into the future - and yet their readings were not immune to error. There was no way of knowing how much of the past they had seen in time and how much they had failed to see, especially relating to Cronus. They were not as infallible as the world had been led to believe, which Sasuke supposed was no real surprise. Gaia would have restricted their abilities when it came to the gods, the scope of just how much they could see, to ensure they could never wield their powers against her. For that very same reason, she had trapped them within the confines of their own, silent realm. A lonely, wearisome existence.
Destiny, Sasuke finally understood, was a combination of chance mixed with certainty. The actions an immortal chose to take led in different directions, to different possibilities. Some consequences could be changed along the way. And some routes led to dead ends, to fixed, unavoidable outcomes as a result of other influencing factors, such as the overlapping paths of other deities and their respective actions, or other factors that could not be changed at all, like one's bloodline and inherent role.
His bleak fate was a certainty, he now comprehended. An event unshifting in the timeline due to being the last of his kin. Sasuke loathed it, every fibre of his being roared and rebelled against it, yet as much as it pained and angered him, he at last understood and accepted why the past had unfolded as it had. He recognised Itachi's true importance in the war, why he had been appointed as a servant to The Fates - though the cruel manipulation they had used to Mark him was inexcusable. Their brand had both extended his life, as well as been a death sentence in entrusting Totsuka into his hands.
But without him... without Shisui, Zeus and Hera, the world would have been damned far sooner. The Moirae had seen what would come to pass, and unable to directly intervene, had allowed the war to happen to stall Cronus, sending forth their servants to fulfil the task of entrapping him on the summit. To delay him at a time when the Rinnegan had not yet been obtained, a weapon that was clearly required to turn the tide in the battle against the mighty Titan. But they could stall him no longer. The next time Cronus set foot on the earth, it was apparent that all hell would break loose.
The cycle of destruction had to be broken.
Sasuke's eyes lowered. He knew what needed to be done, the difficult and painful road that lay before him. It wasn't right, and it wasn't fair, and yet if not him, then who else? He would not have even come into existence to begin with had it not been for Cronus. He was a part of the Titan's cursed bloodline, as much as he detested the fact. And because he was Madara's descendant, the only one capable of wielding the Adamantine blade, it was therefore his responsibility to put a stop to him, once and for all. His burden alone to bear. Just as it had been Itachi's and Shisui's before him.
There was no other way to end Madara. No other way to contain him. His warmongering would not cease until the earth and every good thing in it had been strewn to waste. And the more chaos he generated, the more he would ultimately thrive.
When Sasuke next spoke, his voice was deathly quiet. "Did he know? That the mark would fall to me after him?"
"Nay. A kindness we did Thanatos, to believe thee secure,"
"For thy life was the sole reason he did strive and endure."
It was little consolation, but Sasuke was glad, relieved that Itachi had been oblivious to that harrowing fact. He imagined it would have tortured his brother to think he had failed to protect him after all that he had sacrificed in his name. But he had not failed. His sacrifices and Shisui's had not been meaningless, even if they seemed to be in vain. They had died unsung heroes. Without them, new civilisations would not have grown. The world would not have thrived and peace would not have reigned.
His family had given him everything, every hope they had been forced to relinquish for themselves. They had given him the gift of life. A second chance with Sakura. A chance at redemption. Sasuke saw it with such clarity, now knowing that his life was forfeit.
He had lived on borrowed time, courtesy of his kin. He recalled the last time he had seen his brother alive in the flesh, standing aloofly over their parents' corpses. The guilt of being made to murder them had likely massacred Itachi inside long before he had ended his own life. Sasuke remembered, too, the last time he had briefly caught Shisui's sharp gaze across one of the palace courtyards, shortly before the war. His cousin had been standing alone upon a balcony, watching him with a small, wistful smile on his lips. A smile that Sasuke now knew had concealed a world rocked with turmoil and suffering - before he had melted away into shadows without a word, giving the young Hades no chance to call out or warp to him.
Sasuke blinked. Borrowed time, it had all been. Years wasted away on his part in ignorance. Centuries he had spent, consumed by bitterness and hatred, squandering the gifts his family had left to him. The cold, harsh reality was that Cronus had intended for him to die back in the war, and The Fates had seen that his future could not be altered, that only his hand could wield the Adamantine. Either way, he was destined not to live.
For Sakura. For his Kingdom. For his family's legacy and honour. For Kakashi, who had never stopped believing in him, and Naruto, who had been cruelly orphaned just as Sasuke had. It was time for him to step up and return the favour. To give back time to those who deserved to live. To be selfless. To sacrifice himself for the greater good - as the other servants chosen by The Moirae had before him.
The vicious threat of Chaos would end with him. And if that was what it took to ensure the world endured, that the precious few he cared for and left behind would have a future… then so be it. It was better to offer his life for a noble purpose, than to die in vain.
Bitterness swept over him. The irony of the God of the Dead being tasked to save all life on earth did not escape him. Sasuke fell grimly silent for another long minute. He would not have eternity to enjoy - but the others stood a chance at it, provided they survived the final battle. Peace would be restored to all the realms. His kingdom would survive. Sakura would live on, immortal, free of the torment of an endless cycle of rebirth - but shackled even more tightly to the Underworld. Her king would be taken from her, in a future she knew nothing about, a future Sasuke was forbidden to speak of, until the hour of his parting drew near. Just as Itachi had been forbidden to tell him anything of what had been unfolding around him.
It pained him to keep such an awful secret from her, but Sasuke realised it was likely for the best, at least until everything blew over. If Sakura knew of the truth before the upcoming war - it would shatter her. And Sasuke knew they were on the verge of walking a very dangerous line following confirmation from The Moirae that the Ten-Tails would indeed be unleashed. They had to keep their minds and wits about them in order to face Madara and his allies. There was no room for hesitation. Even the briefest display of weakness could prove to be deadly. There would be time enough afterwards to tell her - even if she never forgave him for it.
For Sakura, it would be an eternal sentence. No reprieve from the endless duties, burden and demands of the crown. The ramifications for her would be dreadful. But she would live, without fear of death, of losing herself. And that was all that Sasuke had ever wanted. Everything he had been fighting to achieve had been in the name of saving her. He had the Rinnegan. There were no more obstacles when her next attack occurred. The eye he required was free to manifest, which meant that he could restore her to goddesshood. So long as Cronus was still bound on the summit of Olympus, they had time. And time after it, if The Fates had indeed glimpsed a future for them together, albeit one that would be cut short.
Still time enough to teach her to rule, to empower her with all the knowledge she needed to succeed in the role. To make every arrangement he could to ensure her comfort and safety before it was his time to depart. It was a small comfort, to know she would not be alone. The Moirae had revealed a child born of their union. One whom The Fates would ensure inherited his gifts of Death, Sleep - and inevitably, the Crown, once they were of age. Sakura would also have Chiyo. Her friends and her mother would be free to visit her at the hours of her choosing.
He was the one who would truly be alone. Locked in eternal slumber, a vessel for Chaos and Time to continue to exist, incapable of causing harm, sealed away forevermore within the realm of The Moirae. Not dead, yet not alive, never to awaken again.
The anguish in his heart as he thought of being forced to part with Sakura, of being forced to give up a future where he would have had a new family to call his own, was crippling. It was not fair to place such expectations on her shoulders, to leave her to raise the child without him. And yet, there was no other alternative. No other way his Kingdom could survive.
The only two choices available to him both involved death. But at least one of them also contained new life. A shot at a future for everyone else. Refusing the Mark would only bring death and suffering to them all.
"How long will I have?" The question was clipped, much of it remaining unspoken. He wanted to know how much time he would have after he took Cronus's powers unto himself, until he was returned to The Moirae.
"Wards there are to delay thy decay,"
"A lifetime for thee shall pass in a day."
"Time enough bestowed to see thy heir."
"Before the blight of Chaos recalls thee here."
His gaze lowered. It was an answer, and yet no answer at all. They had reverted to speaking in riddles. He would be free long enough to tell Sakura the truth and make her his Queen. Long enough for them to have a child. He supposed he would know when the time drew near. He would inevitably feel the corruption of his unstable, inherited gifts corroding him from within, slowly changing his nature into something else entirely. Something unrecognisable. Knowing there was nothing he could do to stop it. He hoped The Fates took him long before he reached that stage. He never wanted Sakura - much less a precious son or daughter - to see him descend into a more sinister form of darkness.
He was silent for another lengthy minute.
"Give me your word," he said at last. "That Sakura will live to see a future. That she will be returned to immortality."
"It is as we have foreseen."
"Spring shall ascend to be thy Queen."
Sasuke lifted his chin. "Grant her freedom to remain on the surface, and I will accept."
The Moirae bared their teeth and hissed in displeasure.
"Pray tell, Hades, in her stead,"
"Who shall judge the mortal dead?"
"Three Archangels are bound in service to me, who may pass temporary judgement," Sasuke reminded them.
"Ah, the child speaks truth," Lakhesis remarked.
"And servants," Sasuke continued, knowing he only had one shot at convincing them, for all terms had to be agreed before he accepted the Adamantine. "By the rivers who manage souls. Cerberus guards the gates and the Hecatoncheires watch Tartarus. Hecate also dwells within my realm and has been custodian to it before in my absence. She can inform Sakura if she is required to return."
"And what of the souls to be collected?" The sisters chimed.
Without blinking, Sasuke deadpanned, "Hermes can lead the dead to the Underworld."
He had already decided that Sai would accept.
The goddesses exchanged considering looks.
"Two months," they offered.
"Three." Sasuke bargained, eyes glinting with steel.
Atropos exhaled mist and waved a dismissive hand. "Very well," she consented. "Three months a year, the girl may choose."
"Ask not for more, we shall refuse," Clotho warned.
Relief melted some of the tension in his bones. Three months a year were better than none, and Sakura would be free to decide which ones she wanted to spend on the surface. He hoped she would choose the summer, so that she could enjoy its warmth, the same way her entry into his life had thawed the ice of his own heart.
"She must die to be reborn as a deity," he said, turning his attention to the next point in his mental list. "Your word that she will survive the change."
"Her previous form shall be returned, it is seen." The Moirae confirmed. "We told thee of thy child and Queen."
"And if a new path unfolds for her that you do not yet see? If her mortal life were to be in danger before I can restore her to immortality?" he challenged, wanting to make absolutely sure that Sakura would survive to experience her divinity restored.
Lakhesis released an echoing snort, prompting a gleeful chuckle from Clotho.
"A little bargainer we have in Our midst,"
"A long set of conditions he dares to list."
But it was Atropos' answer that Sasuke awaited.
"While she remains human, I hold sway…"
"Her thread of life uncut shall stay."
"Its mortal severing I can delay,"
"Until her wounds are healed away."
Her words were enough of a guarantee for Sasuke. He was satisfied that Sakura's life would be guarded.
"You said Madara will seize all the tailed-beast hosts," he added, daring to push further. "What of Naruto?"
The sisters shook their heads.
"The fate of another cannot be shown,"
"Only those that concern thee, tied to thy own."
Sasuke's jaw clenched tightly. It was useless, then, to ask about his friend, or Kakashi, or anyone else. Everything The Moirae had told him, had indeed related to his own fate, the Underworld's succession and the consequences that would follow the choice he made.
He closed his eyes briefly. The Fates were callous - and clearly careful in the way they worded their bargains. Yet he knew with certainty that they held true to oaths given.
He allowed himself a moment to grieve everything he was about to sacrifice for the sake of peace. Just as his brother and cousin and his parents had before him. At least he would be given time to see a new dawn following Cronus's demise. At least he would have some time, however fleeting and precious it would seem, to be with Sakura, to hold his own daughter or son in his arms, before he lost it all.
But Itachi… Itachi had been robbed of any chances of a future in childhood. He had not truly lived, before he had been called upon to die. And yet, despite his horrendous circumstances, his gentle, noble and kind nature had remained unchanged. Shisui had been the same. If their sacrifices did not inspire him to take up arms, to fight for the world, then their deaths would have truly been in vain.
Sasuke's throat constricted. His eyes burned. He could mourn later. After the war, when he was afforded time to think, to rest, to come to terms with it all. After he had seen the irritating Apollo crowned as the new and rightful - and likely clueless - King of Olympus. He could worry later about how he would break the news to Sakura, for thinking about it then - about the anguish it would cause her, about the anger and disappointment in her eyes once she learned of what he had done - made him feel sick to the stomach and threatened to shake his resolve.
He could only hope that she would understand and forgive him.
Steeling himself, he walled off his emotions, cementing his decision, and chose the path that he deemed to be for the greater good.
"Give me the blade."
The Fates appeared greatly pleased.
"Thou hast chosen to serve Our will. A noble sacrifice thou shalt fulfil."
They lifted their hands, and the floating, shimmering fragments of glass around Sasuke fused together before his eyes, forming the shape of a weapon. Blinding white light flared from it, and he shielded his gaze for a moment, only to look back and find an elegant, floating sword in place of where the shards had been.
Its golden hilt was stunningly ornate, encrusted with smoky onyx and white diamonds. The slender blade was hewn from glittering, unbreakable black-adamantine rock that glistened with an underlying, lustrous sheen of deep-hued green.
"Behold - the blade to smite all dark."
"Sworn to the one that bears Our Mark."
Sasuke's heart barrelled within his chest, recognising at that moment that he stood upon a plummeting precipice. The point of no return. Once his palm touched the blade's hilt, he would be marked as the sword's rightful owner. Marked as the vessel of Chaos.
You must stop Madara. You must not suffer him to regain control of the Underworld.
You hold the power to avenge our clan in your hands, Sasuke. Mother and Father believed in you. As do I.
The words his brother had spoken to him at the shoreline resonated within his heart. Gave Sasuke the final boost of courage he needed, and the last sliver of fear that whispered through his veins was snuffed out, replaced by rock-hard, unyielding determination. There was only one way to truly avenge their clan. By ripping from Cronus the very thing, the only thing that had ever mattered to him.
His power.
The Moirae were watching him intently, almost as if they expected him to change his mind, to bolt away. Schooling his face into perfect indifference, Sasuke lifted his chin defiantly, and reached out, wrapping the fingers of his left hand around the blade's cold hilt.
A jolt of frost crackled immediately through his palm and shot jaggedly through his arm, so potent that it left him winded and breathless. It was fire and ice and lightning all at once. The Adamantine immediately disintegrated into glistening dust at his touch, and he knew it had been absorbed into him, just as he had seen Totsuka vanish within Itachi. He could sense its rippling power, and realised with a start that it had fused with his Kusanagi blade, becoming interchangeable, ready to transform into its true form at his command. Finally he had his answer for how Itachi had managed to keep his sword disguised from Cronus - the same way Sasuke would keep the Adamantine secret and hidden until it was time to call upon its use in the final battle. When he would stab it straight through Madara's empty heart.
The numbing discomfort lasted for only a second. Straightening once more, he lifted his left hand, inspecting his palm to find that the leather material of the gauntlet glove he wore had been burned through.
There, between the frayed fabric, was a barely perceptible mark that glowed luminous silver - before dulling into black. One of a crescent moon - beneath which was a smaller circle.
Sasuke blinked and lifted his gaze to the opening in the temple high above his head. The Mark matched that of the moons suspended in the midnight sky.
The Fates' eyes blazed quicksilver, blinding and brighter than they had ever been as they once again spoke in broken harmony, their words billowing like a turbulent, lashing wind around Sasuke.
"Adamantine yielded unto thy hand,"
"To smite Cronus within Our lands."
"Hewn to bestow Chaos vessel's rebirth,"
"Sworn only to the King Crown'd beneath the earth."
"Bound to Our service, thou shalt be taken."
"When the scourge of Chaos re-awakens,"
"Within Our realm, unto eternal sleep."
"Chaos vessel, Ours to keep."
"Thy tongue shall speak to none a word,"
"Of the sacred task to thee conferred,"
"Until Chaos has been sealed in thee,"
"And saved is the world from calamity."
A freezing sensation briefly singed his tongue, and Sasuke knew it was a binding seal that would ensure he revealed nothing of the great responsibility entrusted to him - until the task was fulfilled, and he had safely absorbed Madara's powers into himself. Until then, even the sword he carried had to remain a secret. Cronus could not discover that he had it.
"So it is, Our pact is made."
"No way to break the sacred trade."
The Fates lowered to float directly before him and began circling around him like luminous apparitions.
"Now away with thee, to whence thou came..." Atropos's razor-sharp claw ghosted along his left cheek in a chilling, phantom caress.
"Return to those who call thy name," Lakhesis whispered into his ear.
"Through the Crossroads thou must tread," Clotho sighed at his right shoulder.
They chorused together in warning, "Ever shifting and perilous to tread."
"Find the mirrors and passeth through,"
"The Hallow'd Eye shows the paths thereto."
"Gaze not too deeply into the glass..."
"Lest it ensnares thee in events long past..."
"And veiled to thee becomes the path to return."
"Our test of the Eye that thou hast earned."
"Delayed at the Crossroads, thy companions lost."
"Their lives the price of lingering's cost."
"Go, Our Chosen, and heed closely Our warning,"
"The shades of Obscurum - beware their coming!"
"A void in time approaches, a dark storm ahead,"
"A chasm of shadow that devours and spreads."
"Guard thy Kingdom, and guard thy throne..."
"For upon it is a veil of blood and stone..."
Sasuke's heart skipped a beat. A veil of blood and stone sounded like a bad omen. Before he could fully piece together their foreboding words, however, the sisters vanished abruptly, dispersing into fog. The temple around him began to disintegrate, breaking off into floating particles of glimmering mirror fragments that blew away in a bitingly cold, rippling wind. Sasuke shielded his eyes against the onslaught of light and the elements as a brief, weightless sensation befell him, before his feet touched upon solid ground once again.
Daring to look, he was stunned by the unnerving, surreal sight that met his disbelieving eyes.
He was standing upon a long, slender bridge hewn of black rock. Lacking any railings and support columns, it hovered suspended in a vast, fog-enshrouded void. A brisk, strong breeze blew around him, ruffling his hair and cloak, causing the thick blanket of cloud around him to ripple and roll in constant motion.
Bright flashes caught his gaze in the distance, followed by a deep rumbling sound that set bones vibrating. Lightning and thunder. As if he stood in the midst of a formidable, brewing storm. He could feel the charged static, the overwhelmingly raw elemental energy that hung suspended in the air around him. It was hostile, uncharted terrain, untouched by the spoils of humanity and deity alike. Not intended to be travelled through - only to be seen from a distance. And yet there Sasuke was, flung in the thick of it.
He released an unsteady breath, fighting against the panic that was starting to crest within him. Beneath the path, in the brief gaps between the mist, he glimpsed a bottomless, shadowy abyss that appeared to have no end. Screaming instinct told him that he could, under no circumstance, afford to lose his footing.
His eyes returned to the platform beneath his feet. Delicate veins of silver gleamed, pulsing with a mystical light that shot through the rock like a spark of electricity. Sasuke watched in astonishment as the light abruptly zig-zagged left, breaking out of the stone entirely. Where it crackled out into the air, another rotating platform identical to the one he was on rose up from the abyss with a resounding rumble, forming a new bridge that connected with his own.
His stomach lurched when his platform also shook and began to turn, changing direction. He could see the faint outlines of countless other bridges also turning in the air all around him, forming a myriad of overlapping, criss-crossing paths that were ever-shifting and changing.
It was a maze. The Crossroads of Fate, Sasuke realised, heart racing erratically against his ribcage. These were the ever-unravelling roads of time, the rising and lowering platforms symbolic of the threads of fate changing course. Never cemented in stone, but capable of branching out in so many differing directions. Just as The Moirae had informed him.
These were the sacred routes that The Fates' seer-eyes gazed out at, ever-monitoring, ever-measuring. How they were able to read destinies by gazing out into the abyss was a mystery to Sasuke. Large arcane circles of luminous silver-blue light rotated around different paths, flashing briefly as they formed in the darkness before shifting direction and appearing elsewhere.
Sasuke's eyes darted left and right. The fog was dense and the wind bitterly cold. The panic clawing at his chest intensified. He could feel that his chakra and abilities had thankfully been restored to him and yet he had never felt so completely out of his element. The Fates had left him to essentially fend for himself, to find the way out of oblivion alone. A test, he knew, a chance to use the powers the Rinnegan afforded, and yet, as he took in the dizzying routes shifting all around him, and thought of how many countless others there had to be suspended in the void, his mind blanked, unable to fathom what it was he was expected to do.
The sisters had warned him not to tarry. That it would be dangerous to do so, or risk becoming lost in time itself. And the more time he wasted, the more his companions would be at risk.
Their words reverberated in his skull, the only life-line he had, the only chance of escaping from an impossible labyrinth.
"Find the mirrors and passeth through,"
"The Hallow'd Eye shows the paths thereto."
Where were the mirrors? Apart from the strange, mystical fragments that floated all around him, glimmering silently through the mist, he could not see any. One of the glass shards aligned directly with his eye, and as he looked at it, it seemed to grow, reflecting his own wide eyes right back at him.
It gleamed, glinted, and then showed something else in its reflection.
Sasuke's breath caught in his throat. One moment he had been looking at himself. The next, his mother's face was staring back at him. Nyx was holding a bundle in her arms, her lovely features aglow with tender, besotted love. Beside her stood Sasuke's father, Erebus. The gruff expression he had always worn softened as he gazed down at his son, his dark eyes shining with pride as his wife leaned into him and smiled.
Sasuke could not drag his eyes away. The more he stared, the larger the glass fragment grew, whispering words to him he could not decipher. It pulled him in, growing in its clarity, the illusion creeping and pooling all around him, as if feeding directly off his hypnotised eyes and mind.
"Gaze not too deeply into the glass."
"Lest it ensnares thee in events long past."
The warning The Moirae had spoken to him abruptly broke the spell. Sasuke blinked, and with concentrated effort, wrenched his gaze from the fragment which immediately reverted to glass. It fractured down the middle before shattering into glistening mist.
The force of his heartbeat shook his entire body. Finally realising the very real peril he was in - that his own mind, senses and emotions could be wielded like blades against him - he turned his gaze back to the distance to track the arcane circles, trying to note if there was a pattern to their seemingly random appearances.
Without warning, the path beneath his feet began to rumble and lower. Then, to his horror, it started to fall apart before him, stone crumbling, devoured by the ravenous abyss. He flash-warped onto the nearest platform, only for it to lower in turn.
Pulse hurtling, Sasuke channelled chakra into both eyes, his desperate, seeking gaze darting frantically in all directions around him. The Rinnegan, he recalled from scriptures, had to be summoned in the same manner as the Sharingan, but once called upon, did not automatically fade if its chakra depleted as the crimson eye did. Instead, it had to be consciously de-activated and hidden again in order to recharge its abilities. As the coveted eye bled from the charcoal of his iris, everything around him grew infinitely sharper. His vision stretched out farther, and suddenly he saw all the details he had initially overlooked.
Paths. There were so many of them. Countless bridges, spanning in every direction. Which was the right way? It was impossible to know, and as he continued to warp-along, every platform he seemed to land on chose to collapse beneath him.
Terror clogged his throat. Panting, his gaze snagged onto a rotating circle that flashed to his far right.
And that was when he saw it. A glint within the arcane portal. A larger, broken piece of mirror. It appeared only for a split-second. His eyes widened as he focused onto it, recognising that it was where he needed to go-
His surroundings flickered, as if afflicted with a strange, brief static, and then fell weightlessly away in a breath-taking blur of eye-watering speed and blinding light. When Sasuke regained his bearings a second later and stumbled to a surprised stop, he was astonished to find himself crouching on another platform. Around it, the arcane circle lingered and pulsed. It did not fade, as if acknowledging his presence. As if confirming that he had chosen the correct path.
Understanding exploded within him. It was a waypoint marker. At last he understood what it was he needed to do. Why The Fates had spirited him into The Crossroads - to begin harnessing his new powers.
The motion he had just completed was one of the Rinnegan's gifts. Once locked onto a chosen target, it was capable of switching places with the object in question in a heartbeat, allowing Sasuke to cover a greater range of distance instantaneously. A gift not unlike Zeus's prized Hiraishin - except he did not need to mark anything. He merely needed to look at what it was he wished to exchange places with, to will himself in that direction - and the Rinnegan, capable of distorting space-time to warp at great speed, did the rest.
Yet more paths spiralled up from the darkness. He looked to the rotating circles, trying to glimpse another fragment of mirror within their mystical symbols. Somewhere far ahead, he saw dense, impenetrable, smokey black masses that swarmed and pulsed with their own dark energy.
Obscurum. Unpredictable, concealed gulfs in the timelines. They were terrifying to behold.
Another glimmer of light caught his eye through the mist.
There.
The world streaked by as he found the next marker, just before the bridge beneath his feet disintegrated. Onwards he continued, warping from one platform to the next, almost falling into the chasm on more than one occasion when it took him longer to find his direction. Adrenaline surged through his veins as he came to a stop upon a bridge that had just arisen from the shadowy void below.
A shard of glass once again aligned before his eyes. He dragged his gaze from it, refusing to look - but another glinted in its place, and in the split-second that he glanced at it-
He froze, caught within its reflection before he even realised, the vision bleeding around him like watery paint upon parchment.
His heart plunged to his feet. He saw two ceremonial boats, adorned with beautiful night blooms taken from his mother's gardens. Familiar, silent, ghostly waters. Two young, masked-warriors, clad in noble garb, laid to rest within the boats. He gaped, distraught, at the reflection, his stricken, stunned mind scrambling to process what it was he was looking at, what it had to mean-
The reflection grew in its strength and scope and Sasuke was suddenly standing at Lethe's riverbank. He could not rip his eyes away from his brother and Shisui's prone forms, even as the platform around him began to slowly sink, its movement entirely unnoticed to him. Aghast, he could do nothing but stare at the vision before him in muted disbelief.
No. His heart pounded, and the word drummed deafeningly through his head in time to its calamitous beat. No. Chiyo had told him that they had perished at the edge of Tartarus. He had believed that to be their final resting place, had built a monument in their honour-
The sensation of falling snapped him rudely out of his trance. Sasuke's heart almost burst from his chest as he warped at the last moment onto the safety of another platform, the breath caught in his throat. Rage roared through him, his emotions thrown into the turbulence of turmoil once again.
All the years of torment spent, wondering what had happened to them. To discover that they had been laid to rest within Lethe, crystal entombed for time eternal. All along, their corpses had been held by the river, right under Sasuke's own nose.
How many times had he patrolled Lethe's edge, oblivious to the existence of the precious captives it held prisoner, buried deep beneath its deceptively serene surface in watery graves? It was a mockery. A betrayal. A tragedy. A ruthless blow to the gut, a savage strike to the face that ripped the air from his heaving lungs, leaving him stricken and incensed.
He furiously shoved the distressing thoughts from his reeling mind. Crushed down his rioting emotions and schooled his thunderous wrath. Later. He would deal with Chiyo and her lies later. Fresh resolve coursed through his veins, the desire to get out, to tear Cronus to shreds, to steal away the only thing he had ever valued. If it meant sacrificing his own life to do it, to avenge his family, then so be it.
Onwards he continued to warp, trusting in the Rinnegan to find the correct paths just as The Moirae had claimed it would. Onwards he continued, ignoring all other attempts by the fragments around him to ensnare him again, until the paths led him at long last to an arcane circle that held within it a large, floating, circular mirror. It shone with hallowed light, its surface rippling, and he knew without hesitation, that it was what he had been searching for, the collection of all the smaller glass fragments he had teleported to through the Crossroads. The end of his test.
The voices of Clotho, Lakhesis and Atropos echoed around him as he flew forward, drawing Kusanagi from its sheath. He streaked through the dense fog, steely, determined eyes locked firmly onto their target.
"Destroy Cronus. To thee is entrusted the fate of all three kingdoms…"
Sasuke slammed into the mirror, breaking through and shattering glass as blinding white light exploded all around him.
~x~
He landed on metal, the sound of combat whistling all around him. The portal had returned him to the heart of battle.
"Sasuke?!" Naruto's voice immediately yelled, and he could hear the relief in the call of his name.
A quick surveying glance around revealed that most of the enemies had been felled by the Olympians once again. During the time that Sasuke had been in the realm of The Fates, Kankuro and Sai had been badly wounded and Lee lay lifelessly on the ground. There was no sign of Suigetsu anywhere, but to his relief, the remaining tailed-beast hosts - Gaara, Killer B and Naruto - remained present and relatively unharmed.
He read every chakra pathway thrumming inside everyone around him, and perceived the monstrous, unstable amount contained within Obito.
Orochimaru had returned, confirming Sasuke's fears - that Kakashi had indeed been spirited away into the masked Uchiha's Kamui portal and was likely being held prisoner on Olympus. His grip on Kusanagi tightened. He would gut the serpent and chain him to the pits of Tartarus, to be boiled alive over and over again.
The death deity's gaze lifted and locked onto Orochimaru with killing intent. He allowed the enemy to see the Rinnegan in his left eye. Taunting them with what he knew Cronus desired above all else. Daring them to attempt to take it from him.
"The Rinnegan!" Orochimaru rasped.
"It has manifested-" Kabuto began to point out.
Sasuke had already flickered out of sight before he could finish speaking. Reappearing behind Kabuto, he captured him in a lethal, paralysing genjutsu and ruthlessly tore both his arms off, cleaving through them with his screeching, lightning-infused blade. The doctor's mangled arms landed on the grating with sickening thuds - but Sasuke was not done. Face cold, eyes cruel, he stabbed his sword brutally through Kabuto's chest, unblinking as his blood spattered across his cheek. Before Kabuto could even draw a ragged breath, he wrenched the blade roughly out of his torso then violently slit his throat, tossing him roughly aside before setting his body alight with Amaterasu.
The Black Zetsu that remained on the platform immediately melted into sickly, oily puddles. Kabuto's shrill, pained screams filled the air as Obito lunged for him, Kamui rippling around his form. Harnessing the Rinnegan, Sasuke shifted places with the burning former human and stabbed the tip of his sword straight at Obito's Sharingan. Obito only narrowly avoided it, vanishing into a vortex just before Sasuke could set him alight in turn.
Sasuke then pointed Kusanagi's tip at Orochimaru as the snake-master began to vanish into another portal. A silent vow that he was next. The daemon wisely acknowledged that it was too dangerous to linger with the Rinnegan in play, leaving Kabuto behind to wither away and die. The doctor's anguished, piercing cries soon gurgled out, and all that was left to him were crackling dark flames.
A stunned silence filled the air as the others all gaped at Sasuke, awed by the devastating display of speed they had just witnessed, speed that had forced their enemy to retreat entirely, to relinquish victory to the Olympians.
Naruto was the one to break it. He grabbed the death deity's shoulders, peering into his face with a frantic mixture of relief and concern. "Are you alright, Sasuke?! What the hell happened?! You just disappeared! You scared the life out of me, damn it!"
Sasuke shrugged his hold off, with none of the savagery that he might once have used to shove Naruto away.
"The legendary Rinnegan," Jiraiya breathed, glimpsing the eye just before Sasuke recalled it, his iris bleeding back to obsidian. "I never imagined I would ever see it."
Sasuke ignored their gaping and cut straight to the point. "Where is Suigetsu?" he demanded.
Karin shook her head, unable to meet the death deity's gaze. "I- I tried. I couldn't save him. He was already poisoned, and it was too late." Releasing a quivering breath, she added, "He just- dissolved into water, and I couldn't..."
As her voice trailed, Hinata reached out to her, gripping her arm comfortingly.
Sasuke stared at the nymph, fresh anger and disbelief swirling like a maelstrom within his chest. Though his stoic expression betrayed nothing, on the inside, shockwaves radiated through him. Suigetsu had passed on? His unexpected demise did not bode well for anyone. What would become of the oceans? As insufferable and irritating as the mischief-loving, loud-mouthed Poseidon had always been, nobody could fault his rule over his own domain, nor his ability to retain order over it.
"This is bad!" Ino echoed Sasuke's thoughts, leaning beside a crouching Sai as she worked to heal his wound. They had lost Kakashi, Suigetsu and Lee, as well as two more tailed-beast hosts. "What do we do now? Who's going to inherit Suigetsu's powers? What if they use their freaky zombie technique to bring him back and make him flood every village on the surface?"
"Tch. That's exactly what they're going to do," Shikamaru scowled.
"We'll have to worry about that and how to get Kakashi back once we return to the surface," Tsunade muttered, frowning as she healed a shallow cut on her forehead.
"Sasuke," Naruto repeated, cerulean eyes still dark with worry. "Where'd you go?"
Another of the chains holding the badly damaged platform abruptly snapped free, rocking the foundations beneath their feet unsteadily. It was barely intact, many of its panels blown off in the fray that had ensued. The chamber was rapidly beginning to flood, Obito's portals no longer keeping the ocean water from gushing in through the damaged cracks in the walls.
"Um, guys?" Ino began nervously, eyeing the septic, steaming tanks beneath their feet.
"Later," Sasuke dismissed. The most pressing priority was to obliterate the facility and get out. His Susano'o armour glowed, manifesting around him, ready to carry the Olympians back up to the ground level of the hideout.
"We need to move," Kurenai urged.
Jiraiya nodded as Killer B carefully lifted Lee's lifeless body from the platform.
"Let's bring this place down, and regroup!"
~x~
They alighted upon Olympus, the Kamui vortexes depositing them in the ruins of a courtyard that led directly toward the royal throne room.
"Curses," Orochimaru hissed. "Suigetsu is lost. We were to return his body here."
He did not need to expand any further. They both knew that the Titan who awaited them in the throne room ahead would be greatly displeased with the outcome of their confrontation. All the Sharingan they had utilised in battle had been exhausted. They'd had an enslaved Poseidon in the palms of their hands and yet had somehow allowed him to be wrestled back from their possession. And although they had managed to acquire two further tailed-beast hosts from the enemy, three still remained free, and with the fearsome Rinnegan now in Sasuke's possession, it would prove decidedly more difficult to blindside the Olympians again, especially with the Underworld's King in their presence.
His mind raced, mapping out alternative plans that might weather the terrifying storm of Cronus' wrath. They had to time their next strike when the two were apart - soon, when the Olympians least expected another onslaught. And they would have to strike with deliberate, methodical cunning.
They had already suffered a huge blow with the loss of the research facility and its wealth of resources, but several units of ANBU had confirmed to him that they had managed to evacuate the most talented scientists, a selection of the most important equipment, the monster spheres, the stock of Achlys' venom and remaining Sharingan, and the Black Zetsu. Everything else inside the compound, everyone else, would be destroyed by the Olympians and Sasuke before they departed.
"And Kabuto?" Obito questioned, his tone devoid of all emotion.
The daemon winced. That was perhaps the biggest set-back to their plans of all. He said nothing.
Obito stared at him for a moment, then moved away and began to walk ahead, not bothering to wait.
"Stay a moment," Orochimaru rasped behind him, prompting the Uchiha to pause midstep. "Your portal transported both me and Hephaestus into itsss void. I did not encounter him on the other side. Where is he?"
It was Obito's turn to fall silent. He did not turn back to look at Orochimaru again.
"Perhapsss," the serpent pressed. "If we offer him instead-"
But the Uchiha interrupted him before he had finished his sentence.
"That is not possible," he said flatly. "Kakashi is already dead."
~x~
Author's Note
The Fates were fun to write… minus the terrible time I had with their rhymes! I hope you loved (or loved to hate) them, and all the crazy developments/reveals contained in this triple-update. Reviews would be greatly appreciated as this has been years in the making to get out to you all. Big things are coming and it's now full-steam ahead into the final war arc. Thanks for staying on the Quietus rollercoaster, have a safe and happy holiday season and see you next update.