Chapter 24: Why Couldn't He Trust *Me*?
Kashiya paused in the doorway, her mind moving ten times faster than her body, which adamantly refused to budge an inch. Sasuke, too, seemed to be in some sort of shock, but he recovered quicker and a scowl came over his face, darkening his features.
"NARUTO!" He growled, curling his lip in disgust. Whether it was the sound of his voice or her actual name being said, she never knew, but suddenly she sprang to life and slammed the door shut before the genin in front of her could do anything about it.
"I t-told you, Sasuke!!" She called shakily through the door. "I'm not Naruto!"
"I should have kept with my suspicions from the start." He muttered to himself, glaring at the door.
"Iie!! I'm not just some jutsu!" She continued, but he'd stopped listening to her now.
"Open the door or I'll break it down!!" he yelled, turning the knob and throwing his weight against it. Kashiya yelped, startled and heaved her own weight against it to keep him out. When the door was shut again, she rushed to bolt the locks, but her nimble fingers were shaking to hard to do anything useful.
"No, go to hell!!"
"Dobe, open up!!"
"Stop calling me that TEME!!"
"There's more proof!" She smacked herself in the forehead. Even after a month in that body, it was still engrained inside of her to retort to Sasuke's favourite nickname for her. Sasuke once again threw his weight on the door and it flung open. The blond had been too busy worrying about her response to his 'dobe' remark and was thrown off balance. Stumbling backwards, Kashiya took off running towards her bedroom, but the dark- haired ninja tackled her from behind and they began to fight.
Sasuke smirked, knowing he now had an advantage knowing who the girl truly was. He no longer had to worry about hurting her; in fact, he really wanted to hurt her now. No one deceived an Uchiha and got away with it. They rolled around on the floor for a few minutes, alternately punching and kicking; Kashiya's attempts were rabid, flailing her arms in every direction, panic setting in early. Finally, the rolling ball of arms and legs came to a stop when Sasuke slammed her shoulders to the floor. They both paused for a second, chests panting in exertion, before Sasuke began glaring down at the blonde again.
"I want to know why you did this to me." He demanded, digging his nails into the girl's shoulder, painfully, to get it across that he was serious. She winced, but didn't answer. "Why did you try and lead me on like that, you sick bastard. Naruto, change back." Again the girl made no move to answer him and he got even angrier. "Why wont you change back now? Why didn't you earlier!? It's not going to work on me anymore, I can see right through it, dobe!"
"I can't." She muttered beneath him.
"Bull shit!!" He replied, earning himself a glare.
"Why the hell would I stay like this for so long? I'm sealed in this damned jutsu. If I could have turned back, I would have a very long time ago." She pushed Sasuke's body off of herself and sat up, curling her legs beneath her. "Not everything is about you. I was sealed like this on my birthday. Ebisu did it. It wasn't like I expected you to fall in love with me seriously." Sasuke scoffed.
"I'm NOT in love with you, dobe." He snarled back. "Or did you not hear me every time I told you that... Kashiya is not my type." He was still angry. He still didn't believe him. "You're a stupid little child who has nothing better to do than make up stories and pranks to ruin the lives of others. How could you do this! I trusted you!"
"How come you couldn't trust me when I was a guy?" Kashiya frowned. "Don't think I forgot about that little talk in the forest. How do you think I feel knowing you could talk to some new girl like you'd known her your entire life, but to someone you told was your closest friend, you can't say more than two words without either insulting me or challenging me."
Apparently, Sasuke could figure out when he was losing a battle and he stood up. Throwing a glare over his shoulder, he turned to leave.
"You try and play the victim here but it won't work, Naruto. Maybe they will on Iruka and Kakashi and maybe even on Tsunade-sama, but not on me. We're on the same level, and your lies will never work on me." He continued out the open door, making sure to slam it shut. With a big sigh, Kashiya fell backwards onto the floor, hitting her head on the floorboards repeatedly.
"Maybe if you didn't have your head so far up your ass, you'd see that I wasn't lying." She muttered to herself. "You're not the only victim in this village." She cursed under her breath before lifting herself up from the floor and tearing out the door, regardless of her facemask. Things were getting too complicated and she wanted answers.
***
"Open up!" She pounded on the door angrily. She didn't care who she was annoying, she didn't care who recognised her (it didn't matter now that Sasuke had figured her out); all she wanted was answers. The door opened and she received a whack to the head.
"First of all, where the hell is your mask," Iruka hissed as quietly as he could muster, dragging Kashiya inside. "Do you know how many people were looking outside to see what all the racket was?"
"I don't care about the stupid fucking mask!!" She screamed, stopping him in his rant. "Who cares if a few more people figure out who I am...? Sasuke already knows. He saw me as I am." She gestured to her attire with her hands. She could tell that an "I told you so" was right on the tip of Iruka's tongue, but she shot him a particularly nasty glare which shut him up. He sighed and sat down while Kashiya entertained herself, pacing.
"I hate Ebisu." She muttered. "I hate Konohamaru."
"Doushite?"
"If it weren't for them I wouldn't be stuck like this."
"What are you going to do now?"
"I don't know. That's why I came here; to you. I never wanted all this trouble, just a little recognition on my birthday; I didn't need all of these problems!"
"What am I going to do, Iruka-nii?" She asked softly, a pained look coming across her delicate features. The older man winced, not used to the look and shook his head slowly.
"There's really nothing we can do." Stopping in her tracks, she turned on him, her eyes narrowed to angry slits.
"That's not true!!" she yelled, pointing a finger at him. "You can turn me back! You have to!! DO IT!!! If you can't then there must be someone else who can!!" She was beginning to become hysterical. "Tsunade-baba will!! She's the goddamned Hokage after all."
"It's not that easy, Naruto-kun. A seal as powerful as that one isn't the easiest thing to remove."
"And yet it was oh-so easy to put on me."
"What's so bad about this? Sure, Sasuke-kun now knows about you, but that can't be as bad as you're making it out to be." The girl slumped to the ground, her eyes trailing to the open window where a slight breeze floated carelessly throughout the room. Her body slumped over in defeat.
"It is, Iruka-nii. First, I tried to seduce him with the jutsu." Ignoring the 'that was smart!' from Iruka, she continued. "And when that didn't work, I said some things that got him to... I don't know, open up to Kashiya. He trusted her. And now he's beyond pissed off at me because I betrayed that trust somehow." A silent, solitary sob wracked her body. "Why couldn't he have trusted me like that?" She cried softly. "I've always looked up to him, and the one time he actually has confidence in me is when I'm pretending to be something I'm not. Why'd he have to trust her and not me?"
Iruka winced, furrowing his brows, and bent down to wrap his arms around the lonely fox.
"Gomen ne, Naruto-kun." He whispered, cursing himself for not having anything else to offer.
"I wish none of this had ever happened. At least then I could have believed what Sasuke told me once... that I was truly his best friend." She sighed and straightened up in Iruka's embrace. "I've only got a few more days left, I can't let this moment ruin my life." Already, Kashiya was beginning to rebuild her walls and patch up the cracks in her mask. She couldn't afford breakdowns like these, and she vowed that Iruka would be the last person to see her this weak.
***
Unfortunately, she didn't realise that just beyond the open window, someone had been listening to the entire conversation. After leaving Naruto's apartment, Sasuke had followed her straight to Iruka's and heard the entire thing. He was perched just above the window sill, waiting to see Naruto's reaction to their argument.
"Stupid idiot." He muttered to himself, though the words lacked the conviction to make them believable. Even a cold hearted bastard like himself was slightly moved by what he heard in the room.
To find that he'd gotten through Naruto's ever present mask, deep enough to hurt him this much was quite surprising though. He never thought he'd see the day when the defences were down so far. Heaving a great sigh, he snuck a quick peak at the pair in the room before jumping onto the roof of the neighbouring apartment. Like Naruto, his face hardened once more, deciding against letting what he had heard affect his decision.
He wasn't going to let Naruto play him this way. He had every right to be angry with the blond, even though he was having a tough time convincing himself of that.
"If he wanted to be trusted, he should have trusted me first." He spat to no one in particular, trying to ignore the stinging fact that his words were coming from his bruised pride and meant nothing in the end.
~~~~~~~
Stupid piece of crap chapter (can't you tell that I just totally adore it?)... This was originally supposed to end with Sasuke leaving Naruto's apartment... but that would have made it SUPER short... as it is, it's still too short for my liking (even though it's almost the entirety of 25 with it). I'm really sorry for making you all wait another two weeks... but it's march break now so I'll be working on this story as much as humanly possible... along with cleaning the house, and making my costume for the upcoming anime convention. *grins* It's a wonder I even have time for school with my hectic schedule...
***I'd really like to thank Annachan for that wonderful review... I was actually left speechless. Thank you for telling me how the story made you feel. I thrive on long reviews like that. I think it's actually my fave review of all time. You have no idea how much I blushed while reading it. I think I had to read it three times before it sunk in.
***To Quicksilver: Actually Tsunade hasn't even been thought about in the anime yet... but in the manga she's already there. There are two instances where the analogy of Team seven comes up. One is after that fight between Sasuke and Naruto... which Kakashi intervened (damn). Jiraiya asks what the problem was between the two and Kakashi says it was like Jiraiya and Orochimaru when they were that age. So... if the rivalry was the same... and this is to be a SasuNaru story, then one would assume that the romance would be the same, ne? The second bit is from the actual story of the Gallant Jiraiya. It's an actual Japanese legend. Jiraiya is this wonderful ninja married to Tsunade and his apprentice (forget the name... it'll come to me) runs off after the dark arts or something and changes his name to Orochimaru.
If anyone wants me to find the link for the story then I'd be more than happy. It's not too long, and it's really good if you are like me and want to know all the historical facts. (Don't even start me on Okita Souji from Peacemaker Kurogane/ Kenshin).
If anyone asks for it I'll put it in the beginning of the next chapter (which will be out in a couple of days so you won't have to wait too long).
Kashiya paused in the doorway, her mind moving ten times faster than her body, which adamantly refused to budge an inch. Sasuke, too, seemed to be in some sort of shock, but he recovered quicker and a scowl came over his face, darkening his features.
"NARUTO!" He growled, curling his lip in disgust. Whether it was the sound of his voice or her actual name being said, she never knew, but suddenly she sprang to life and slammed the door shut before the genin in front of her could do anything about it.
"I t-told you, Sasuke!!" She called shakily through the door. "I'm not Naruto!"
"I should have kept with my suspicions from the start." He muttered to himself, glaring at the door.
"Iie!! I'm not just some jutsu!" She continued, but he'd stopped listening to her now.
"Open the door or I'll break it down!!" he yelled, turning the knob and throwing his weight against it. Kashiya yelped, startled and heaved her own weight against it to keep him out. When the door was shut again, she rushed to bolt the locks, but her nimble fingers were shaking to hard to do anything useful.
"No, go to hell!!"
"Dobe, open up!!"
"Stop calling me that TEME!!"
"There's more proof!" She smacked herself in the forehead. Even after a month in that body, it was still engrained inside of her to retort to Sasuke's favourite nickname for her. Sasuke once again threw his weight on the door and it flung open. The blond had been too busy worrying about her response to his 'dobe' remark and was thrown off balance. Stumbling backwards, Kashiya took off running towards her bedroom, but the dark- haired ninja tackled her from behind and they began to fight.
Sasuke smirked, knowing he now had an advantage knowing who the girl truly was. He no longer had to worry about hurting her; in fact, he really wanted to hurt her now. No one deceived an Uchiha and got away with it. They rolled around on the floor for a few minutes, alternately punching and kicking; Kashiya's attempts were rabid, flailing her arms in every direction, panic setting in early. Finally, the rolling ball of arms and legs came to a stop when Sasuke slammed her shoulders to the floor. They both paused for a second, chests panting in exertion, before Sasuke began glaring down at the blonde again.
"I want to know why you did this to me." He demanded, digging his nails into the girl's shoulder, painfully, to get it across that he was serious. She winced, but didn't answer. "Why did you try and lead me on like that, you sick bastard. Naruto, change back." Again the girl made no move to answer him and he got even angrier. "Why wont you change back now? Why didn't you earlier!? It's not going to work on me anymore, I can see right through it, dobe!"
"I can't." She muttered beneath him.
"Bull shit!!" He replied, earning himself a glare.
"Why the hell would I stay like this for so long? I'm sealed in this damned jutsu. If I could have turned back, I would have a very long time ago." She pushed Sasuke's body off of herself and sat up, curling her legs beneath her. "Not everything is about you. I was sealed like this on my birthday. Ebisu did it. It wasn't like I expected you to fall in love with me seriously." Sasuke scoffed.
"I'm NOT in love with you, dobe." He snarled back. "Or did you not hear me every time I told you that... Kashiya is not my type." He was still angry. He still didn't believe him. "You're a stupid little child who has nothing better to do than make up stories and pranks to ruin the lives of others. How could you do this! I trusted you!"
"How come you couldn't trust me when I was a guy?" Kashiya frowned. "Don't think I forgot about that little talk in the forest. How do you think I feel knowing you could talk to some new girl like you'd known her your entire life, but to someone you told was your closest friend, you can't say more than two words without either insulting me or challenging me."
Apparently, Sasuke could figure out when he was losing a battle and he stood up. Throwing a glare over his shoulder, he turned to leave.
"You try and play the victim here but it won't work, Naruto. Maybe they will on Iruka and Kakashi and maybe even on Tsunade-sama, but not on me. We're on the same level, and your lies will never work on me." He continued out the open door, making sure to slam it shut. With a big sigh, Kashiya fell backwards onto the floor, hitting her head on the floorboards repeatedly.
"Maybe if you didn't have your head so far up your ass, you'd see that I wasn't lying." She muttered to herself. "You're not the only victim in this village." She cursed under her breath before lifting herself up from the floor and tearing out the door, regardless of her facemask. Things were getting too complicated and she wanted answers.
***
"Open up!" She pounded on the door angrily. She didn't care who she was annoying, she didn't care who recognised her (it didn't matter now that Sasuke had figured her out); all she wanted was answers. The door opened and she received a whack to the head.
"First of all, where the hell is your mask," Iruka hissed as quietly as he could muster, dragging Kashiya inside. "Do you know how many people were looking outside to see what all the racket was?"
"I don't care about the stupid fucking mask!!" She screamed, stopping him in his rant. "Who cares if a few more people figure out who I am...? Sasuke already knows. He saw me as I am." She gestured to her attire with her hands. She could tell that an "I told you so" was right on the tip of Iruka's tongue, but she shot him a particularly nasty glare which shut him up. He sighed and sat down while Kashiya entertained herself, pacing.
"I hate Ebisu." She muttered. "I hate Konohamaru."
"Doushite?"
"If it weren't for them I wouldn't be stuck like this."
"What are you going to do now?"
"I don't know. That's why I came here; to you. I never wanted all this trouble, just a little recognition on my birthday; I didn't need all of these problems!"
"What am I going to do, Iruka-nii?" She asked softly, a pained look coming across her delicate features. The older man winced, not used to the look and shook his head slowly.
"There's really nothing we can do." Stopping in her tracks, she turned on him, her eyes narrowed to angry slits.
"That's not true!!" she yelled, pointing a finger at him. "You can turn me back! You have to!! DO IT!!! If you can't then there must be someone else who can!!" She was beginning to become hysterical. "Tsunade-baba will!! She's the goddamned Hokage after all."
"It's not that easy, Naruto-kun. A seal as powerful as that one isn't the easiest thing to remove."
"And yet it was oh-so easy to put on me."
"What's so bad about this? Sure, Sasuke-kun now knows about you, but that can't be as bad as you're making it out to be." The girl slumped to the ground, her eyes trailing to the open window where a slight breeze floated carelessly throughout the room. Her body slumped over in defeat.
"It is, Iruka-nii. First, I tried to seduce him with the jutsu." Ignoring the 'that was smart!' from Iruka, she continued. "And when that didn't work, I said some things that got him to... I don't know, open up to Kashiya. He trusted her. And now he's beyond pissed off at me because I betrayed that trust somehow." A silent, solitary sob wracked her body. "Why couldn't he have trusted me like that?" She cried softly. "I've always looked up to him, and the one time he actually has confidence in me is when I'm pretending to be something I'm not. Why'd he have to trust her and not me?"
Iruka winced, furrowing his brows, and bent down to wrap his arms around the lonely fox.
"Gomen ne, Naruto-kun." He whispered, cursing himself for not having anything else to offer.
"I wish none of this had ever happened. At least then I could have believed what Sasuke told me once... that I was truly his best friend." She sighed and straightened up in Iruka's embrace. "I've only got a few more days left, I can't let this moment ruin my life." Already, Kashiya was beginning to rebuild her walls and patch up the cracks in her mask. She couldn't afford breakdowns like these, and she vowed that Iruka would be the last person to see her this weak.
***
Unfortunately, she didn't realise that just beyond the open window, someone had been listening to the entire conversation. After leaving Naruto's apartment, Sasuke had followed her straight to Iruka's and heard the entire thing. He was perched just above the window sill, waiting to see Naruto's reaction to their argument.
"Stupid idiot." He muttered to himself, though the words lacked the conviction to make them believable. Even a cold hearted bastard like himself was slightly moved by what he heard in the room.
To find that he'd gotten through Naruto's ever present mask, deep enough to hurt him this much was quite surprising though. He never thought he'd see the day when the defences were down so far. Heaving a great sigh, he snuck a quick peak at the pair in the room before jumping onto the roof of the neighbouring apartment. Like Naruto, his face hardened once more, deciding against letting what he had heard affect his decision.
He wasn't going to let Naruto play him this way. He had every right to be angry with the blond, even though he was having a tough time convincing himself of that.
"If he wanted to be trusted, he should have trusted me first." He spat to no one in particular, trying to ignore the stinging fact that his words were coming from his bruised pride and meant nothing in the end.
~~~~~~~
Stupid piece of crap chapter (can't you tell that I just totally adore it?)... This was originally supposed to end with Sasuke leaving Naruto's apartment... but that would have made it SUPER short... as it is, it's still too short for my liking (even though it's almost the entirety of 25 with it). I'm really sorry for making you all wait another two weeks... but it's march break now so I'll be working on this story as much as humanly possible... along with cleaning the house, and making my costume for the upcoming anime convention. *grins* It's a wonder I even have time for school with my hectic schedule...
***I'd really like to thank Annachan for that wonderful review... I was actually left speechless. Thank you for telling me how the story made you feel. I thrive on long reviews like that. I think it's actually my fave review of all time. You have no idea how much I blushed while reading it. I think I had to read it three times before it sunk in.
***To Quicksilver: Actually Tsunade hasn't even been thought about in the anime yet... but in the manga she's already there. There are two instances where the analogy of Team seven comes up. One is after that fight between Sasuke and Naruto... which Kakashi intervened (damn). Jiraiya asks what the problem was between the two and Kakashi says it was like Jiraiya and Orochimaru when they were that age. So... if the rivalry was the same... and this is to be a SasuNaru story, then one would assume that the romance would be the same, ne? The second bit is from the actual story of the Gallant Jiraiya. It's an actual Japanese legend. Jiraiya is this wonderful ninja married to Tsunade and his apprentice (forget the name... it'll come to me) runs off after the dark arts or something and changes his name to Orochimaru.
If anyone wants me to find the link for the story then I'd be more than happy. It's not too long, and it's really good if you are like me and want to know all the historical facts. (Don't even start me on Okita Souji from Peacemaker Kurogane/ Kenshin).
If anyone asks for it I'll put it in the beginning of the next chapter (which will be out in a couple of days so you won't have to wait too long).