Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto or any of it's characters. The plot line is no longer based on the series though there may be some points in the story where it relates, I do not own any of those relating points.
Naruto
Chapter 19: Best Friend
Saga: Death and Rebirth
Sonki lay in the black abyss, her eyes looking around the solid black room lazily, her mouth hanging slightly open. Her hand lay at her side, her index finger tracing small circles on the surface bellow her.
Letting out a deep sigh she finally rolled over on her left side, tired of staring at the never ending ceiling that was above her.
"What am I doing here?" she whispered, her voice wouldn't become any louder. "I don't even want to be here…"
"Than wake up," Naruto said appearing before her, his voice sounded as though he were pleading. "Just wake up Sonki."
"I can't, it's not that easy," she answered, not turning over to face him. "Even if someone wanted me to come back, even if someone pleaded with me to come back… I couldn't. I'll I'm good for is running away."
"But I want you to come back," Naruto said, his eyes starring at the back of his head as he face twisted up in pain. "Isn't that enough? It just takes one person, doesn't it?"
"I can't and I won't," Sonki answered, pushing herself up off the ground, her who body sending a wave of tremors down it as she tried to stay standing. She dusted off her pants and then turned around to face him, pushing a lock of her hair out of her face. "You're not real Naruto. This… What is happening right now, it's not real." She smiled at him. "This is all just in my head."
Naruto smiled grimly at her, pain still on his face as he disappeared from her view, leaving her once again, alone.
"Well isn't this a sight for sore eyes," Shinkamaru said in her ear, rolling his eyes as a placed his usual laid back smile on his face.
"And what is the significance of your role here today?" Sonki asked sighing, obviously her mind was trying to clue her in on something.
"Who knows," Shinkamaru asked shrugging as he stepped back from her, his hands in his pockets as he looked up at the endless black sky above them. "After all, everything that happens from her on and now is all based on your actions or thoughts right?"
"Why not," Sonki answered smiling back at him. "But the thing is I don't need you here to tell me that."
"Suit yourself, just thank me when you get back. I wasted my time finding you, and I don't think I deserve to be left here in the dark any longer, after all… we're friends right?" He stepped back, disappearing as Naruto had done.
"Who's next in this little sick and twisted game?" Sonki asked aloud, you could hear the boredom dripping off of her voice. Obviously whatever trick her mind was trying to play out for her was not working, but the real question was… Who had planed and started all of this?
Hands clamped around her throat, pulling her backwards into the body behind her.
"You do realize I haven't forgotten, right?" Gaara hissed in her ear, her skin was beginning to burn under his touch.
"Of course not," Sonki answered, trying to keep all of her fear subsided, trying to disprove any of the thoughts of panic that seemed to be appearing all around her.
The color of the room had now changed to a red, the color of blood. That color seemed to be slowly drifting in and out of focus, just as the waves of the ocean pull in and away.
"Than why are you still breathing!" he screamed at her, his hands squeezing tighter around her throat.
"Because you don't exist."
His body exploded into thousands and thousands of fragments. Slowly drifting towards the floor and then disappearing for ever.
"If you were actually Gaara you would have never wasted your time playing around with me. Strangling? Please, a head on attack is more acquired." A grin spread across her face. "You would rather spill my blood across this floor."
The room changed once more, this time to a light shade of pink. A cherry blossom tree stood to her right, petals falling off of it and floating around the room in the wind.
Sakura stood before her now.
"Next!" Sonki screamed. "She plays no real part in my role! If you truly understood me than you would realize she is nothing more than a character I just so happened to stumble upon." Her hand curled up into fists as the shocked expression on Sakura's face vanished in front of her. "Who ever you are just show yourself and stop wasting my time. Obviously you're the only person who is stopping me from waking up. You're holding me back."
A figure dematerialized in front of her, a smile on her face as she gave her a curt wave.
"Yo," Sonki said to herself, the smile still on her face.
"So you are my alter ego than?" Sonki asked, the gril standing in front of her would have been a complete doppelganger of herself, minus the fact that she would never smile like that. Or at any point seem to be reeking of happiness.
"No, no. Of course not," she replied shacking her head, still smiling at her. "I am you…"
"And you… are me," this new voice sounded less confident that the one standing before her.
Sonki whirled her body around to come to face her own face, though this one didn't seem to have any slight ounce of confidence in her. Her eyes showed fear and she could see her trembling, as though she had thought she should have never spoken in the first place.
"After all… you just kept us at bay."
She turned her head to her side.
This was her once more, confident and the look of disgust on her face. The personality that thought she was on top of the World, that she was God.
"How many more of you are there?" Sonki asked narrowing her eyes at the confident one. "How long is this going to take?"
"As long as you want it to," she spat back at herself. "But for the moment this is enough of your personality that needs to step forth."
"Why do you keep us at bay!" the less confident one whined out, tears in her eyes. "What did we do wrong?"
Sonki frowned.
"Yes, and why do you have to be so depressed all the time? What's wrong with smiling?" Happiness asked, her hands on her hips as she let out a deep sigh she seemed to have been holding in. "It'll help you so much more in life if you would just let me at least scratch the surface of your shield."
"I keep you all locked inside of me for a good reason," Sonki hissed at them, her eyes narrowing. "If I wanted you to surface I would let you show. I'd rather not be in touch with my feelings, it's better just to keep you buried within me."
"But you don't need to…" Happiness replied. "You would be so much happier if you just-"
"GO AWAY!" Sonki shouted at them, flinging her fist at Happiness. "DID YOU NOT HEAR ME! I SAID GO AWAY!"
The three of them left. The cherry blossom tree vanished, leaving her in the same pit she had been trapped not to long ago. The darkness had returned once more.
"Don't you see?" Sonki asked, pain washing across her face. "If I let you out than others would find you. Than others would use you, betray you. You'd end up used and broken. You'd be nothing more than shattered porcelain that should have never been dealt with."
"It's not anyone's fault…" Naruto said stepping forward again. His eyes were down shifted at his feet, his face still grave. "You're just not willing to let anyone in. You're not willing to take a risk. Please… Don't blame it on others." He turned up to look at her. "You just don't want to lose everything."
"Don't tell me what I already know Naruto, you'd do the same thing." Her face was now curled up in anger. "You have no right to tell me what to do!"
He vanished.
Sasuke stood over Sonki's body, starring down at her lifeless figure, the feeding tube still strapped in through her arm.
"It's a pity that everyone focusing so much of their time on you. I don't see why you're so important… What you've done to become a part of everyone's lives," Sasuke hissed at her, his hands curling up into fists. "What is it that makes you so God damn special!"
The door behind him opened, a pink haired girl walking in through it with a vase in her hand. A single red tulip stuck of out it.
"Oh! Sasuke!" Sakura said looking at him shocked, it was entirely questionable as to why he would come here to visit Sonki. In her opinion they seemed to despise each other. "What are you doing here?"
"Leaving," Sasuke said curtly to her as he walked away from Sonki. You could still see the disgust on his face.
"Did Tsunade say when she was going to wake up?" Sakura asked as he reached out his hand to open the door behind him, they were both standing side by side.
"No. I don't see why any of you should care. She deserted us, and the only reason she came back was because of us," Sasuke answered, jerking the door open he left, slamming it shut behind him.
Why do you hate each other so? Sakura walked over to the table beside Sonki's bed and placed the vase down on it. A bundle of random weeds and wildflowers were spread across it. Obviously brought by a male who had no clue as to how to obtain flowers or what ones were flowers and not.
Naruto… A smile spread across her face. She turned back over to Sonki's pale face.
"You're lucky Sonki… To have a friend like Naruto. For someone to care about you, but not fall in love with you." She let out a sigh. "You need to wake up, wake up for Naruto. Right now he needs you more than ever. You're his only best friend."
"Will you stop it already?" Shinkamaru moaned out, crossing his arms behind his head as he laid down on the grass he was sitting on. "You're starting to make me depressed to. It's not as though it's the end of the world. She's going to wake up. Eventually."
"I guess you're right," Naruto answered. "But what if…"
"Just shut up. She's going to wake up. No matter how much your doubts pile up. It'd be unlike her to keep us in the dark forever. She'll come back when she wants too."
"Yeah…" Naruto said nodding his head. "You're right."
Shinkamaru kicked himself up, now standing on his feet. "I've got to go see Chouji at the moment… but…" he turned his head down to face him. "If you wan to talk about anything just stop by my house latter on tonight. I've got no problems listening to you talk, even if it is boring."
"Okay, thank you…" Naruto answered. "I'll think about it."
Shinkamaru left, leaving Naruto alone as he had found him.
It'd been three solid days since Sonki had stayed in her sleep. She wasn't even showing any signs of recovery, let alone would he have known what to look for.
"This sucks…"
He slammed his fist down into the earth at his feet.
Sonki stood in front of Garou, she could feel the wolf's breath flowing across her skin. His mouth stained with blood as a body lay at his feet, more specifically it was Kisei's body.
"What do you want?" Sonki asked, her face twisting up in disgust as she saw his mouth tear into the man's flesh. "Anything note able before I wake up?"
"And you actually think you deserve, let alone will wake up?" Garou asked her, blood dripping off of his snout.
"Yes. I don't believe that I should stay trapped inside of my own mind forever. Obviously whatever I am trying to tell myself isn't working… So why should I punish myself for something I don't understand?" She shrugged her shoulders at him, letting out a shallow breath as she heard a bone snap.
"You deserve nothing."
"Why is it that you feed on him of all people. That my mind would choose for you to feed on him instead of someone like Naruto… or even Gaara?" she asked ignoring his statement.
"Flesh is all the same. I feed on your emotions Sonki, and obviously he was something of importance to you. So this was brought before me, and I feed. There is no real answer to your question. He is here because he is here."
"I see…"
"Do you really?" He placed his paw down on Kisei's torso, using his mouth his ripped a piece of flesh off down aloud his ribs.
"Why aren't you digging my soul into a deeper pit that it already is. Weighing down my heart as you usually do?"
"For once you have brought me something that is actually worth eating. For once you have given me something to be pleased over. You need no more pain and suffering than what you are already enduring. I could live forever off of this feeling Sonki. Though I am growing tired of it… I do want something more. Something you will never be willing to forget, something that will pass through your mind everyday, cause you to never sleep again…"
Sonki stepped back away from him, closing her eyes as she breathed in deeply. The smell of blood and flesh was slowly disappearing. She opened her eyes, to only met a black scaled creature in front of her. It's eyes as red as the blood that had been spilled on the spot Kisei's torn flesh had once stood.
Anoyo stood before her.
"Why is it that you do not summon us? Why do you keep us sealed inside of you?" the dragon asked her, the room rumbling due to his voice. "Do not tell me you are afraid."
"Because I haven o use of you. Signing the contract was a mistake I should have never made. I should have never even put the thought into consideration. To allow you inside of my body, to allow my Chakra to dwindle in small amounts. For my soul to slowly be eaten away by demons such as yourselves. Garou was enough, but now this…?"
"It is a price you must pay in order to fulfill your goals. It is a price you pay to become stronger. Is that not you deepest desire? To become the strongest Shinobi? To prove all of those who have always shown you just how weak you are, that you are not?"
"Yes," Sonki said smiling. "It was once my dream. To become the strongest Shinobi meant that I would no long have to fear for my life. That I would no longer have to watch everyone surpass me. But now…"
"You have a new desire?"
"Yes… I no longer want to be the strongest. I just want to… live. To fit in, to find some place I can actually feel as though I fit in. Someone who's not going to betray me, someone who is going to stay by my side forever. My best friend…"
"Do you not already have a lover? This companion you seek?"
Sonki shook her head, her face twisting up in frustration. "I'm not sure… I don't know anymore. He's become something else, I've become something else. We are not as we were once before. It's not that same…"
"You should not shun us because your lust for power has died. We can only be trapped inside of you for so long. Did you not see how Kisei was aging? How tired he looked from day to day?"
Sonki down cast her eyes, giving no reply.
"If you truly wish to die, than never summon us. You can only hold out so long as you have mentioned before. Two demons trapped inside of your body, both feeding off of you. Both yearning for more satisfaction that what you are giving us. Release us and you will suffer no more, release me and I can promise pain to all of those who have hurt you."
"They've already suffered. Everyone has suffered enough, all I want to do now is live." A frown caressed her face. "If I let you out now than it would only lead to more hate and suffering. Surely I would die if I did so…"
"Remember this…" the dragons mouth twisted up into a sharp smile. "We will get out. You can not keep us in here forever, as to such you can never with hold Garou back forever. Eventually one of us will grow strong and overthrow you forever, plunging you into the deepest pit of darkness and despair. Eventually you will have to face us. You can never truly run away."
"I know this."
Sonki smiled at him, the room dematerializing in front of her.
Sonki sat up in her bed, arms draped across her knees as she starred out the window at her side. The sun was just beginning to set.
She'd been awake for a few hours, wondering when someone as going to come in and check on her once more. It was not oblivious that people had not come in, due to the flowers that had been placed on the table beside her, it was now begging to over flow.
The door finally opened, the new Hokage stepped in, looking over the papers on the clip board that were in her hand. She let out a deep sigh, not noticing Sonki who was starring back at her intently.
"So you're the new Hokage?" Sonki asked, causing her to jump. "Tsunade the Fifth Hokage?"
Tsunade blinked at her, as though she were checking to make sure that what she had heard and was seeing was actually happening.
Sonki had woken up.
"How long have you been awake?" Tsunade asked her amused, she seemed to have adjusted to her new settings.
"For a few hours, I was wondering how long it was going to take for someone to finally come in here and notice that I was no longer in what I would call a comatose symptom," Sonki answered, a smile spreading across her face.
"I see," Tsunade answered walking over to her. She sat on the end of the bed near Sonki's feet. "So you already know who I am?"
"Considerably enough." She was still smiling at her. "And you me? As to all the rumors that are going on between Kakashi's team?"
"Of course," Tsunade answered yawning. "As though I believe any of it to be true. Honestly it's the worst lie I've ever heard. As to why they would make it up I have no clue."
"So how is Orochimaru?" Sonki asked her, her smile growing wider. "Why is it exactly that you didn't follow him, even though he promised them back to you? You could have had the ones you loved most back in your arms once more."
Tsunade let in a shallow breath, her eyes growing as she let the words Sonki had spoke sink in. "How could you… How do you know this?"
"As I am sure you have heard, I am not from this World. I also seem to have the annoying habit of knowing everything that is going to happen as Sasuke and a few others have so kindly pointed out to me."
"Than… Than they are true?"
"Obviously."
"And as Kakashi also pointed out to me… You are not willing to share what is going to happen? You are not willing to share any of the information that you know of this World?"
"Yes, all it would lead to is your dependence on me. You might as well make me the Hokage as to all the knowledge that is locked up in my head." She then let out a sigh and leaned back on her hands. "Though at this point it is still to be determined what is going to happen now. My appearance in this World seems to have affected everything greatly."
"I understand," Tsunade said dully. She then stood on her feet. "I see no reason to bother you any longer, I'm sure you're friends will be stopping by shortly to see how you are doing."
"You know…" Sonki begun as Tsunade opened the door. "You're going to become a great Hokage, right? You're not going to fail."
Tsunade left the room with a quite smile on her face. Maybe this kid isn't going to be as stuck up as I was beginning to assume she was. Maybe she'll be or more use to me…
"I can't believe you're awake!" Naruto screamed out, resisting all urges to throw his arms around her in the presence of Shinkamaru, Sakura and Kakashi, Sasuke had not even taken it into consideration to coming along with them to visit her when they had been informed of her awakening by Tsunade.
"I'm sorry to have walked out on you like this," Sonki answered, letting out a sigh as she clutched the sheet on the right side of the bed. "I shouldn't have been so selfish. You were right Naruto, I didn't want to leave and I shouldn't have. I have no reason to put any of you through any pain through my loss. I shouldn't have made any of you suffer as I have done."
"No need to focus on the past anymore," Sakura said giving her a nervous smile. "Try focusing on the present, what you did is done and over with right? Everything that is happening now and in the future is important, right?"
Sonki nodded her head, a smile on her face. "Right."
Kakashi let out a deep sigh as he crossed his arms over his chest. "Are you finally ready to become a part of this team once again? To stop keeping secrets from us?"
"Yes," Sonki answered, no hesitation in her voice.
"Than start by telling me what exactly you were thinking when you walked out on this village, your friends, your team."
"I don't belong her. I can see it in everyone's eyes. Even if I do have friends and it seems that I fit in… I don't belong. As long as I stay here I just drag everyone down with me, everyone suffers because of me. So the only thing my mind was able to think of was running away." She looked up to smile at him. "After all running away is the only thing I am good at."
Kakashi chewed on his lip, never adverting his eye away from hers, waiting for her to continue.
"In my thoughts I don't want to be here any long, but I don't want to return to my own World. Either place that I reside in people are just going to suffer, I am going to suffer. For every good thing that comes for me at least twenty bad things follow. Shunning myself away from everyone, excommunicating myself from everyone is the easiest choice. The only choice I believe that will work."
"And now you believe everything is going to go back to normal?" Kakashi asked her.
"No, not at all. I don't honestly believe you or let alone anyone else is going to trust me again. I've done nothing that should prove that I am a trustworthy person. I've used you all and then run away when I decided I was done playing Ninja."
"What are you going to do?"
"Fix things I hope. I'm tired of running away, I want to stay here. This is my home, this is were my friends are. I want nothing more of what my old self spoke of. I just want to live."
Sonki stopped in front of her door, Naruto at her side.
"You really didn't have to walk me home Naruto. It's not as though I'm going to fait or something, I'm fully recovered. You know that."
"It doesn't matter," Naruto answered grinning at her. "I'm not willing to take the risk of losing a team mate again. Since you've been gone we haven't been able to go on any real missions lately. Just small work around the town, idiot things I think we are in no need of doing. But now that you're back we can go and do real things once again!"
Sonki laughed, grinning back at him. "Is that all you ever think about?"
Naruto shrugged his shoulders as she opened the door.
Sonki turned her head over her shoulder. "Well I'll see you tomorrow morning Naruto. Otherwise have a nice rest of the night."
Arms wrapped around her waist as she felt a chin being placed upon her head.
"Don't leave again Sonki. You're… You're my best friend. If anything bad were to happen to you… If you were to die… I'd go down with you. You've shown me exactly what Iruka Sensei was trying to tell me all along."
"You're a dork," Sonki replied laughing.
Hopefully everyone's glade that this came out a lot sooner than expected. A new chapter will come out next week, but I'm not so sure as to when. As to my thoughts on this chapter I liked it and to Rhythmic's thoughts I do like them a lot, though I'm not willing to give up my Gaara/Sonki pairing. But hey, you never know, but I will take your suggestion into consideration, amazingly it a Naruto/Sonki pairing never came into mind.