Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto.


Bathing in Blood

5. Withdrawing Within

With upright body, head, and neck,

Which rest still and move not;

With inner gaze which is not restless,

But rests still between the eyebrows...

-The Bhagavad Gita

She stared blankly at her hand. It was invisible, she was invisible. Or as close to invisible as a low-level anonymity jutsu would allow.

She could see the lines her form made in the air. The bones were thin iridescent streaks of ultraviolet blue, knotted at the joints. The skin, a thin film of pink stretched over the fluorescent framework like an intricate net. She gazed through her palm, through the leaves, down to the street below the tree she was perched in. A most interesting drama was taking place below.

The brunette boy was stumbling to stand, knees quaking, a human turned to gelatin. His friends, the light-haired ones, clustered in a cramped circle around him with concerned looks scratched onto their features. Even Naruto, the 'comic' of the bunch, the clown with the near-permanent mask. Near-permanent, because the mask was off now.

Near-permanent, because in its place she saw a face unrecognizable, distorted by fear, guilt, and the many agonies of worry.

And that was all well and good, but none of this frippery of feelings answered her unasked question. Why? Why had she done it? Whatever happened to the child had no effect on her. What did she care if he got what was coming to him?

Why did she throw the stone?

She glared through her palm now, eyes tracing the patterns of the cobblestone pavement. Was it instinct?

Sakura hopped down from the tree limb, landing soundlessly in the underbrush. Her face twisted into an uncontainable grimace, a wild hybrid of the smirk and the frown. If her 'instincts' were what made her go around saving stupid, snot-nosed brats, she needed to teach these instincts something better than throwing rocks.


Sasuke reclined on the ragged, moth-eaten couch. He felt its aging springs creak in reproach at his leisure, and visualized the crumbs of crimson-brown rust that flaked onto the wooden floor like bloody metal dandruff as he shifted his weight. An unruly coil half-poked its way through the crumbling foam inside the cushions to prod his back gently, not really painful but just enough for annoyance.

He would have been comfortable, but he was not. The voice was silent today. Uneasily so. Its absence left a void where his thoughts should have resided. He had no opinions today.

With a sigh, the raven-haired boy arched his neck backwards over the worn, frayed upholstery of the armrest. From here, he could see out the dirt-streaked curtain-less windowpane, down the street and around the corner. People walked by unawares, on the ceiling of his vision. Clouds scuttled like beads of mercury over the floor.

The lack of sun didn't really bother him, of course; light only made his diminutive personal space seem worse for wear. It was like rubbing salt in one of his many wounds, over and over again with the sunrise.

Well, more like salt in a paper-cut, but it's the thought that counts, and the angst that sells...

He was the heir to the most prestigious of the Konoha ninja clans, yet he was living in a cheap three-room apartment. He should have had access to a monstrous fortune, yet he was stuck with a thrift-shop budget. 'Should' meant nothing here; for the money had disappeared with Him, and the mansion had been demolished years before, rendered unusable by the Incident.

Indeed, 'should's lacked a place in his world. Only the past mattered to him. All that made a difference was what had been.

On the sidewalk below (or was it above?), an upside-down toddler with frizzy cinnamon-colored hair sucked a swirled lollipop. Cheeks bulged to accommodate the mass of flavored sugar that outsized its owner's pudgy hands. Fingers clutching the treat tightly, sticky with artificial rainbow.

Sasuke looked away, feeling the onset of an unwanted, unnamed memory. Flopping over onto his stomach, ignoring the squeaky protests of the furniture beneath him, he reached into a pocket, fumbling for the crumpled paper. Drew it out, smoothed the creases, looking without seeing. And urging tomorrow afternoon to hurry on its way.