Chapter I
[Aww, don't worry. I tried typing this as quickly as I could.
Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto.]
~
Kakashi reentered the hospital with Naruto and Sakura following him, looking worried. The silver-haired Jounin had found Sasuke unconscious in the river but that wasn't the only thing that was worrying him to an extreme extent. Sasuke had black markings on his eyes and down his cheeks, also a dragon tattoo that seemed to circle around his neck and end as his collarbone. Even though Kakashi was somewhat lazy at times, as others had said, he knew that Sasuke would never think of putting such tattoos on himself. His exposed eye narrowed slightly as he looked around for the nurse that he had spoken to earlier that day.
"Kakashi-sensei..." Sakura said quietly, looking up at him. "Is Sasuke-kun okay...?"
Kakashi remained silent as he spotted the nurse and walked up to her, signaling Naruto and Sakura to stay where they were.
"How is he doing..." Kakashi asked in a quiet tone.
The nurse held her clipboard close to her chest as she looked at the Jounin, not knowing how to explain the news. "Sasuke-kun woke up not too long ago but he is having a lot of difficulty staying awake. We think he might have hit his head a bit too hard and gotten a concussion so we're watching him as carefully as we can. You may go see him if you need to but don't let him fall asleep until the doctors have made a proper diagnostic."
"Hai..." Kakashi nodded and followed the nurse to the room Sasuke was stationed in, motioning for Naruto and Sakura to follow.
The two other teammates of team seven followed their sensei quietly as they approached one of the hospital rooms, taking a peek inside as Kakashi went in calmly. Sasuke was sitting up in the hospital bed, one of his knees bent and his arm was resting on his kneecap as he partly covered his face with one hand; on the verge of falling asleep again.
"Sasuke." Kakashi stated firmly as his voice seemed to snap Sasuke awake again.
"Eh..." Sasuke moved his tired gaze to the Jounin, watching him unfocusedly.
Sakura looked at the bandages around the teenager's forehead and she bit her lip nervously as she noticed the markings. "Sasuke-kun..."
"How are you feeling, Sasuke?" Kakashi asked, still monitoring the boy cautiously.
Sakura got more worried as she watched the teenaged boy stay silent and looking confused. 'He's not acting like himself...'
Naruto's face had a vulpine look to it as he furrowed his eyebrows. "Oi, Sasuke! Why aren't you answering?"
Sasuke looked over at Naruto, rubbing his bandaged head a bit. "I... Who... Who are you..."
Kakashi's gaze narrowed slightly. 'Maybe he has amnesia...'
The pink-haired teenager and the blonde stared in disbelief at Sasuke.
"S-Sasuke-kun...?" Sakura said quietly, taking a few steps forward into the room.
Sasuke watched the jade-eyed girl silently, drawing a total blank on who she was. After a silent moment, he could see the tears gather at the edges of her eyes and a tight fist held closely to her face.
"Sasuke-kun..." Sakura held back a sob. "Please tell us you know who we are..."
Sasuke closed his eyes for a moment, lightly rubbing his temple as he tried to think of a name from any of the three that stood in his room. He shook his head slowly and snapped his eyes open when he felt Naruto grabbing him roughly by the shoulders.
"Stop playing stupid, Sasuke-bastard!" Naruto yelled, shaking the other slightly.
"Naruto." Kakashi warned, pulling the angry blonde back. "Don't do that."
"He's just pretending he doesn't remember!" Naruto pointed accusingly but his expression was obvious, a knowing look that the other might have forgotten everything.
"Nani... Where..." Sasuke tried to get his thoughts straight as the other three watched him. "Where is this..."
Kakashi crossed his arms over his chest and watched Sasuke. "You were found outside, knocked out in the river and almost drowned, Sasuke. The doctors think you have a concussion and you shouldn't go anywhere until they give you permission."
Sasuke blinked and glanced out the window beside him, trying to think back. His mind had a few vague images... Darkness was mostly present but he couldn't put a finger on what the images represented. To the others, he looked confused.
"... I... was found...?"
~
Kakashi looked from his standing spot at the window and glanced back at Tsunade, the Fifth Hokage. "That was a week ago... We had to show him where his apartment was and even after this time, he doesn't have a clue of just about anything. He doesn't even recognize anyone, where this place is and he's already gotten lost at least once."
Tsunade crossed her arms and looked at the desk in front of her in thought. "With that said, he is not allowed to leave the village. Perhaps he just needs more time to remember what happened."
"There is another thing..." Kakashi sighed slowly. "The tattoos on his face and neck are unknown to me. I don't know how or where he could have gotten them but he didn't have them before he left for his training."
"... Could it be Orochimaru's cursed seal again?" Tsunade furrowed her eyebrows slightly.
"Iie... It's something else..." Kakashi shook his head and started leaving. "If anything else comes up, you'll be the first to know... Hokage-sama..."
Elsewhere in the village, Sasuke sat on a roof as he looked up at the sky quietly. He couldn't really do much else because he didn't know where he was. He partially knew who he was... Uchiha Sasuke and nothing more... but everyone else was just a new face. He didn't know how long he had been sitting there but he noticed that there were a few other teenagers spying on him. The ones that he saw in the hospital told him their names... but he kept forgetting them.
"Sasuke-kun...?" A quiet voice asked from the edge of the roof.
Sasuke looked back down and saw someone climb quietly onto the roof with him. "You're... you're... the one with pink hair..."
"Sakura..." The jade-eyed girl answered a bit sadly as she crawled up beside Sasuke and sat down. "Are you feeling any better?"
Sasuke looked back up at the sky, looking very distant and lost. "I... don't know..."
Sakura watched Sasuke's lost expression and lowered her eyes to her feet, tears threatening to spill down her face. 'Sasuke-kun...'
The two sat in silence, one on the verge of crying while the other continued to watch the sky with a dazed expression; not understanding what he saw.
'Why is it so far away...' Sasuke thought to himself, continuing to look up at the clouds.
Sakura was about to say something to the other but then stopped herself as their sensei appeared in a gust of smoke behind them. Sakura looked up at Kakashi and her look was the only answer he needed. The Jounin sighed and glanced at Sasuke, seeing the teenaged boy was more interested in the sky than his sudden appearance.
"Sasuke." The said person looked up at his sensei. "There's something that we have to show you."
Sasuke sat quietly for a moment before getting up onto his feet, following Kakashi and Sakura. The village was still foreign to him and the ones he saw in the hospital didn't give him such weird looks as the other teenagers that were watching him closely. What seemed to make him edgy the most was the fact that Sakura looked the most devastated by something and Sasuke didn't know what. Naruto was just angry but his eyes showed that he couldn't believe what had happened. Sasuke glanced around slightly, noticing that they were leaving the downtown area and stopped a few moments later. He looked at the graveyard in front of him while Sakura and Kakashi stayed quiet, watching the teenaged boy.
"Why... am I here..." Sasuke asked, moving his gaze across the cemetery.
"There's something you must see, Sasuke... It's very important." Kakashi explained before he started walking up a path, leading deeper into the burial grounds.
Sasuke followed Kakashi with Sakura just walking a few feet behind him. Sakura looked at her feet as they walked up to the gravesite of the slaughtered Uchiha family, staying quiet. When Kakashi moved off to the side, Sasuke walked forward a few steps, his gaze sweeping across the names that were engraved in the memorial.
"Uchiha..." He read the last name slowly and sat down, looking through the names again.
He continued to sit there and look at the engraved forenames, still not able to figure out what significance that had to him.
'This is worse than I thought...' Kakashi thought as he glanced off to the side. 'Who could have done this to him... I showed him this place not even a few days ago...'
Sasuke pulled one knee up to his chest and rested his chin on his kneecap, once again scanning over the names. 'These people... are they related to me...?'
Sakura watched the Uchiha teenager as tears started sliding down her face silently. This visit to the cemetery was the only proof that she needed that the Sasuke that was well known in team seven as cool and composed, was gone. He was reduced to a lost teenaged boy that knew next to nothing but his own name. Kakashi had informed Sakura about the death of Sasuke's family and was told not to talk about the incident to anyone. Sakura felt much worse since Sasuke couldn't even remember his own relatives and turned away, not able to take much more before she started walking off.
She kept her gaze to the ground as more tears fell freely from her eyes. 'Sasuke-kun... What happened to you... You've changed so much... Even I don't even know who you are anymore...'
"Sakura!" Someone called out to her as she looked up.
Sakura brushed her tears away with the back of her hand and continued walking up to a small group of teenagers. The group consisted of the blonde-haired Ino, the bored-looking Shikamaru and, of course, Naruto.
"Naruto told us that something's wrong with Sasuke-kun!" Ino said. "What did you do, forehead girl?!"
"Why am I suddenly involved in this..." Shikamaru muttered.
Sakura shook her head slowly, unable to stop another wave of tears. "Sasuke-kun... He... He..."
Naruto looked at Sakura expectantly, hoping that the other had recovered then the teenaged girl finally answered. "He's gone..."
"Nani? Gone? What do you mean 'gone'?" Ino's face had a look of horror.
Shikamaru moved his gaze to Sakura, his attention caught from what they were talking about.
"He..." Sakura covered her face with her hands. "He doesn't remember anything! Sasuke-kun could be gone forever!"
Shikamaru's eyebrows raised slightly as he looked between the two girls and Naruto. He didn't believe it himself until he saw Naruto clenching a fist tightly before running off. He decided to leap after Naruto, after thinking how troublesome the situation sounded, following the angry blonde- haired boy all the way towards the graveyard. He walked after Naruto as the other ran up the path, fists clenched tightly as he ran.
"Sasuke!" Naruto yelled, sliding to a stop behind the Uchiha boy. "Stop putting this damned act on! Either you're faking or you're not the real Sasuke!"
Sasuke turned and looked at Naruto, surprising the other boy completely to slide back a few feet. The Uchiha heir's eyes weren't the usual stone- cold, impenetrable blackness... Shikamaru noticed that as well as he hid behind a tombstone. Sasuke's eyes held an unbelievable confused and lost look to them, much more than they had been when he was in the hospital several days ago. His gaze also had a sad and distant look to them as he looked back at the memorial.
"I don't know... who they are..." Sasuke said quietly, hugging his knee again.
"You can come out of hiding." Kakashi said as he glanced at Shikamaru's hiding spot.
Shikamaru stood up and looked in disbelief at Sasuke, glancing at the markings on his face and neck. "You're not serious..."
"Stop lying, Sasuke!" Naruto yelled again, swinging a punch at him.
"Naruto, don't be stupid..." Kakashi grabbed the other's arm.
"But-"
Kakashi shook his head and released his arm as Naruto put his arm back to his side. Naruto looked angrily at Sasuke but kept quiet, not letting himself completely believe that the other wasn't lying.
"Do you want to head back?" Kakashi asked.
Sasuke sat silently, not answering as he felt a heart-wrenching feeling sweep over him. There was something about the names, the memorial that caused the depressing feeling. He clenched a loose fist, his hand shaking slightly as he tried to remember... tried to remember something... anything... Nothing. Something felt unfair but it was too vague for Sasuke to even know.
"Sasuke." The said person got up when Kakashi called for him again.
He turned halfway, still looking at the grave, drawing a complete blank before following the silver-haired Jounin and the other two teenaged boys back towards the village. Sasuke watched the sky as they walked back, not feeling the look of doubt that Shikamaru was giving him. There was something about the memorial... the clouds...
~
"Ani..." Ani-what?
A shadow stood in an open and unclear field as a smaller shadow ran towards it.
"What are those?" The smaller shadow pointed up.
~
"What... are they..." Sasuke said quietly, feeling something slipping away from him; the dark markings glowing a slight reddish hue before fading back.
Shikamaru folded his arms behind his head and continued to watch the Uchiha teenager out of the corner of his eye. 'This is ridiculous... He looks completely out of it... This can't be a joke, that stuck up guy doesn't seem to have a sense of humor... This is too troublesome...'
The quiet group made their way back towards where Ino and Sakura were waiting but Sasuke had stopped quite a ways back, looking at the sky. A gust of wind blew by, picking up dust on the dirt trail and blowing Sasuke's bangs out of his eyes.
"Explain... it to me..." He spoke almost inaudibly.
[Yes, this story is gonna be a little odd... but I think it'll be interesting if I can keep my mind on track. O_o; While writing this, I listened to some .hack//sign songs to make the writing more... I guess interesting. .; Long live the songs 'A Stray Child' and 'Key of The Twilight' from the hack sign series!]
[Aww, don't worry. I tried typing this as quickly as I could.
Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto.]
~
Kakashi reentered the hospital with Naruto and Sakura following him, looking worried. The silver-haired Jounin had found Sasuke unconscious in the river but that wasn't the only thing that was worrying him to an extreme extent. Sasuke had black markings on his eyes and down his cheeks, also a dragon tattoo that seemed to circle around his neck and end as his collarbone. Even though Kakashi was somewhat lazy at times, as others had said, he knew that Sasuke would never think of putting such tattoos on himself. His exposed eye narrowed slightly as he looked around for the nurse that he had spoken to earlier that day.
"Kakashi-sensei..." Sakura said quietly, looking up at him. "Is Sasuke-kun okay...?"
Kakashi remained silent as he spotted the nurse and walked up to her, signaling Naruto and Sakura to stay where they were.
"How is he doing..." Kakashi asked in a quiet tone.
The nurse held her clipboard close to her chest as she looked at the Jounin, not knowing how to explain the news. "Sasuke-kun woke up not too long ago but he is having a lot of difficulty staying awake. We think he might have hit his head a bit too hard and gotten a concussion so we're watching him as carefully as we can. You may go see him if you need to but don't let him fall asleep until the doctors have made a proper diagnostic."
"Hai..." Kakashi nodded and followed the nurse to the room Sasuke was stationed in, motioning for Naruto and Sakura to follow.
The two other teammates of team seven followed their sensei quietly as they approached one of the hospital rooms, taking a peek inside as Kakashi went in calmly. Sasuke was sitting up in the hospital bed, one of his knees bent and his arm was resting on his kneecap as he partly covered his face with one hand; on the verge of falling asleep again.
"Sasuke." Kakashi stated firmly as his voice seemed to snap Sasuke awake again.
"Eh..." Sasuke moved his tired gaze to the Jounin, watching him unfocusedly.
Sakura looked at the bandages around the teenager's forehead and she bit her lip nervously as she noticed the markings. "Sasuke-kun..."
"How are you feeling, Sasuke?" Kakashi asked, still monitoring the boy cautiously.
Sakura got more worried as she watched the teenaged boy stay silent and looking confused. 'He's not acting like himself...'
Naruto's face had a vulpine look to it as he furrowed his eyebrows. "Oi, Sasuke! Why aren't you answering?"
Sasuke looked over at Naruto, rubbing his bandaged head a bit. "I... Who... Who are you..."
Kakashi's gaze narrowed slightly. 'Maybe he has amnesia...'
The pink-haired teenager and the blonde stared in disbelief at Sasuke.
"S-Sasuke-kun...?" Sakura said quietly, taking a few steps forward into the room.
Sasuke watched the jade-eyed girl silently, drawing a total blank on who she was. After a silent moment, he could see the tears gather at the edges of her eyes and a tight fist held closely to her face.
"Sasuke-kun..." Sakura held back a sob. "Please tell us you know who we are..."
Sasuke closed his eyes for a moment, lightly rubbing his temple as he tried to think of a name from any of the three that stood in his room. He shook his head slowly and snapped his eyes open when he felt Naruto grabbing him roughly by the shoulders.
"Stop playing stupid, Sasuke-bastard!" Naruto yelled, shaking the other slightly.
"Naruto." Kakashi warned, pulling the angry blonde back. "Don't do that."
"He's just pretending he doesn't remember!" Naruto pointed accusingly but his expression was obvious, a knowing look that the other might have forgotten everything.
"Nani... Where..." Sasuke tried to get his thoughts straight as the other three watched him. "Where is this..."
Kakashi crossed his arms over his chest and watched Sasuke. "You were found outside, knocked out in the river and almost drowned, Sasuke. The doctors think you have a concussion and you shouldn't go anywhere until they give you permission."
Sasuke blinked and glanced out the window beside him, trying to think back. His mind had a few vague images... Darkness was mostly present but he couldn't put a finger on what the images represented. To the others, he looked confused.
"... I... was found...?"
~
Kakashi looked from his standing spot at the window and glanced back at Tsunade, the Fifth Hokage. "That was a week ago... We had to show him where his apartment was and even after this time, he doesn't have a clue of just about anything. He doesn't even recognize anyone, where this place is and he's already gotten lost at least once."
Tsunade crossed her arms and looked at the desk in front of her in thought. "With that said, he is not allowed to leave the village. Perhaps he just needs more time to remember what happened."
"There is another thing..." Kakashi sighed slowly. "The tattoos on his face and neck are unknown to me. I don't know how or where he could have gotten them but he didn't have them before he left for his training."
"... Could it be Orochimaru's cursed seal again?" Tsunade furrowed her eyebrows slightly.
"Iie... It's something else..." Kakashi shook his head and started leaving. "If anything else comes up, you'll be the first to know... Hokage-sama..."
Elsewhere in the village, Sasuke sat on a roof as he looked up at the sky quietly. He couldn't really do much else because he didn't know where he was. He partially knew who he was... Uchiha Sasuke and nothing more... but everyone else was just a new face. He didn't know how long he had been sitting there but he noticed that there were a few other teenagers spying on him. The ones that he saw in the hospital told him their names... but he kept forgetting them.
"Sasuke-kun...?" A quiet voice asked from the edge of the roof.
Sasuke looked back down and saw someone climb quietly onto the roof with him. "You're... you're... the one with pink hair..."
"Sakura..." The jade-eyed girl answered a bit sadly as she crawled up beside Sasuke and sat down. "Are you feeling any better?"
Sasuke looked back up at the sky, looking very distant and lost. "I... don't know..."
Sakura watched Sasuke's lost expression and lowered her eyes to her feet, tears threatening to spill down her face. 'Sasuke-kun...'
The two sat in silence, one on the verge of crying while the other continued to watch the sky with a dazed expression; not understanding what he saw.
'Why is it so far away...' Sasuke thought to himself, continuing to look up at the clouds.
Sakura was about to say something to the other but then stopped herself as their sensei appeared in a gust of smoke behind them. Sakura looked up at Kakashi and her look was the only answer he needed. The Jounin sighed and glanced at Sasuke, seeing the teenaged boy was more interested in the sky than his sudden appearance.
"Sasuke." The said person looked up at his sensei. "There's something that we have to show you."
Sasuke sat quietly for a moment before getting up onto his feet, following Kakashi and Sakura. The village was still foreign to him and the ones he saw in the hospital didn't give him such weird looks as the other teenagers that were watching him closely. What seemed to make him edgy the most was the fact that Sakura looked the most devastated by something and Sasuke didn't know what. Naruto was just angry but his eyes showed that he couldn't believe what had happened. Sasuke glanced around slightly, noticing that they were leaving the downtown area and stopped a few moments later. He looked at the graveyard in front of him while Sakura and Kakashi stayed quiet, watching the teenaged boy.
"Why... am I here..." Sasuke asked, moving his gaze across the cemetery.
"There's something you must see, Sasuke... It's very important." Kakashi explained before he started walking up a path, leading deeper into the burial grounds.
Sasuke followed Kakashi with Sakura just walking a few feet behind him. Sakura looked at her feet as they walked up to the gravesite of the slaughtered Uchiha family, staying quiet. When Kakashi moved off to the side, Sasuke walked forward a few steps, his gaze sweeping across the names that were engraved in the memorial.
"Uchiha..." He read the last name slowly and sat down, looking through the names again.
He continued to sit there and look at the engraved forenames, still not able to figure out what significance that had to him.
'This is worse than I thought...' Kakashi thought as he glanced off to the side. 'Who could have done this to him... I showed him this place not even a few days ago...'
Sasuke pulled one knee up to his chest and rested his chin on his kneecap, once again scanning over the names. 'These people... are they related to me...?'
Sakura watched the Uchiha teenager as tears started sliding down her face silently. This visit to the cemetery was the only proof that she needed that the Sasuke that was well known in team seven as cool and composed, was gone. He was reduced to a lost teenaged boy that knew next to nothing but his own name. Kakashi had informed Sakura about the death of Sasuke's family and was told not to talk about the incident to anyone. Sakura felt much worse since Sasuke couldn't even remember his own relatives and turned away, not able to take much more before she started walking off.
She kept her gaze to the ground as more tears fell freely from her eyes. 'Sasuke-kun... What happened to you... You've changed so much... Even I don't even know who you are anymore...'
"Sakura!" Someone called out to her as she looked up.
Sakura brushed her tears away with the back of her hand and continued walking up to a small group of teenagers. The group consisted of the blonde-haired Ino, the bored-looking Shikamaru and, of course, Naruto.
"Naruto told us that something's wrong with Sasuke-kun!" Ino said. "What did you do, forehead girl?!"
"Why am I suddenly involved in this..." Shikamaru muttered.
Sakura shook her head slowly, unable to stop another wave of tears. "Sasuke-kun... He... He..."
Naruto looked at Sakura expectantly, hoping that the other had recovered then the teenaged girl finally answered. "He's gone..."
"Nani? Gone? What do you mean 'gone'?" Ino's face had a look of horror.
Shikamaru moved his gaze to Sakura, his attention caught from what they were talking about.
"He..." Sakura covered her face with her hands. "He doesn't remember anything! Sasuke-kun could be gone forever!"
Shikamaru's eyebrows raised slightly as he looked between the two girls and Naruto. He didn't believe it himself until he saw Naruto clenching a fist tightly before running off. He decided to leap after Naruto, after thinking how troublesome the situation sounded, following the angry blonde- haired boy all the way towards the graveyard. He walked after Naruto as the other ran up the path, fists clenched tightly as he ran.
"Sasuke!" Naruto yelled, sliding to a stop behind the Uchiha boy. "Stop putting this damned act on! Either you're faking or you're not the real Sasuke!"
Sasuke turned and looked at Naruto, surprising the other boy completely to slide back a few feet. The Uchiha heir's eyes weren't the usual stone- cold, impenetrable blackness... Shikamaru noticed that as well as he hid behind a tombstone. Sasuke's eyes held an unbelievable confused and lost look to them, much more than they had been when he was in the hospital several days ago. His gaze also had a sad and distant look to them as he looked back at the memorial.
"I don't know... who they are..." Sasuke said quietly, hugging his knee again.
"You can come out of hiding." Kakashi said as he glanced at Shikamaru's hiding spot.
Shikamaru stood up and looked in disbelief at Sasuke, glancing at the markings on his face and neck. "You're not serious..."
"Stop lying, Sasuke!" Naruto yelled again, swinging a punch at him.
"Naruto, don't be stupid..." Kakashi grabbed the other's arm.
"But-"
Kakashi shook his head and released his arm as Naruto put his arm back to his side. Naruto looked angrily at Sasuke but kept quiet, not letting himself completely believe that the other wasn't lying.
"Do you want to head back?" Kakashi asked.
Sasuke sat silently, not answering as he felt a heart-wrenching feeling sweep over him. There was something about the names, the memorial that caused the depressing feeling. He clenched a loose fist, his hand shaking slightly as he tried to remember... tried to remember something... anything... Nothing. Something felt unfair but it was too vague for Sasuke to even know.
"Sasuke." The said person got up when Kakashi called for him again.
He turned halfway, still looking at the grave, drawing a complete blank before following the silver-haired Jounin and the other two teenaged boys back towards the village. Sasuke watched the sky as they walked back, not feeling the look of doubt that Shikamaru was giving him. There was something about the memorial... the clouds...
~
"Ani..." Ani-what?
A shadow stood in an open and unclear field as a smaller shadow ran towards it.
"What are those?" The smaller shadow pointed up.
~
"What... are they..." Sasuke said quietly, feeling something slipping away from him; the dark markings glowing a slight reddish hue before fading back.
Shikamaru folded his arms behind his head and continued to watch the Uchiha teenager out of the corner of his eye. 'This is ridiculous... He looks completely out of it... This can't be a joke, that stuck up guy doesn't seem to have a sense of humor... This is too troublesome...'
The quiet group made their way back towards where Ino and Sakura were waiting but Sasuke had stopped quite a ways back, looking at the sky. A gust of wind blew by, picking up dust on the dirt trail and blowing Sasuke's bangs out of his eyes.
"Explain... it to me..." He spoke almost inaudibly.
[Yes, this story is gonna be a little odd... but I think it'll be interesting if I can keep my mind on track. O_o; While writing this, I listened to some .hack//sign songs to make the writing more... I guess interesting. .; Long live the songs 'A Stray Child' and 'Key of The Twilight' from the hack sign series!]