Konban wa, minna-san!!!!! Polly here with the next chapter of the story! Thanks everyone for the reviews last chapter!! They really brightened up my day! From what I gathered from many of the reviews was that my concept was very "interesting" and my characters very out of character-- especially Sasuke, whom seems meaner than he should be! I hadn't realized I had made Sasuke seem like a big fat meanie... TwT This and the next chapter were already written, though, so you'll have to wait that long until I can attempt to thrust them back into character...
Disclaimer: Naruto © Masashi Kishimoto and others. All rights reserved.
Warnings: SasuNaru, crappiness, AU, random pairings, and OOCness
The next day, I filed a request to the warden, a written document barely readable in my handwriting, asking to visit one of the other prisoners within the castle. Such an occasion was not rare, for it often grew lonely in such a large establishment, and companionship was sought constantly.
My request was turned down outright. The reason, I'm assuming, was for the person whom I requested to visit. And that was the fabled Gaara of the Desert. The next day, I filed another request, which was also turned down. Then another, and another. For a full week, I did nothing but spend my time writing requests to meet with Gaara of the Desert. It wasn't until the next week that my request was finally accepted out of exasperation.
A doctor arrived at my cell to guide me there. He solemnly unlocked the door with a key from his pocket, his face and body concealed by a large dark robe decorated with red clouds of seemingly oriental descent. His eyes glowed a haunting red color as he would glance up at me and cast his eyes down in a sort of eerie shyness.
"Please follow me, Naruto," he said, his voice as smooth as honey and whipped cream. His footsteps contained a strange stride to them-- as though he had no feet at all and was floating beneath that dark cloak of his. He turned to look at me with glowing red eyes once, and he looked straight ahead the rest of the trip.
Casually, I peered into other cells as we passed them. Some were gloomy, some were lively, some contained dead bodies, and still others were littered with long dead skeletons bound by metallic shackles for the rest of eternity, their wicked grins almost chanting for me to turn back. And as the dead bodies grew more and more abundant as we approached the back of the dungeon, I could only grow more and more nervous. Not even a cockroach would scurry past us anymore.
The dripping of water had halted.
It was as though I had entered a sanctuary. The walls which would normally be concealed in dark shades of blue and green was now stained with dark red and purple. Like blood. Like some sort of sideshow corridor. And pretty soon the murderer would come out-- oh wait. He's sitting in his cell.
As soon as I stepped through the door, it was shut and locked behind me, and the doctor was waiting patiently on the other side. And before me was the fabled, feared, and otherwise talked about, Gaara of the Desert.
He looked about my age. His head was a mess of deep red hair. His eyes, which were closed, were ringed with dark ovals much like a raccoon or a panda. The guy seemed to be meditating, actually, as he was sitting leisurely on a dirty cotton mattress (which was better than any of the other prisoners could afford). Cautiously, I circled around him before finally tapping him harshly on the shoulder and calling for his attention. "Oy! I came all this way just to visit you! Wake up!"
"Leave me alone," he stated quite plainly.
Confused, I lifted an eyebrow.
His eyes shot open. Two dimly jaded orbs peering from underneath the dark circles of insomnia. Their gaze was at nothing in particular, but it was icy freezing cold and empty. Yet, somehow, those eyes reflected my own.
"I know why you're here. Now leave me alone or I'll kill you," the young man added, turning his chilly jade eyes towards me. I was only slightly taken aback, but I remembered I had come for a reason, so I continued speaking.
"I came here because I wanted to ask you how the visit from Uchiha went. You know, the one from a week ago?"
"Leave me alone or I'll kill you," he repeated, the look in his eyes not making me doubt the sincerity of his words.
But I would not listen to logic.
"I've been waiting a whole week to talk to you! Come on!" I began to gesture with my hands. "Puppet boy said you were supposed to be a fairly reasonable guy after you've taken your meds!"
"Leave me alone."
"But why only me?! Tons of people visit you all the time! And I doubt you tell them all to leave you alone or you'll kill them! What? Did Uchiha say something about me and you won't talk to me because of that? Don't believe him! It's not true!"
I don't remember how I got onto the topic of Sasuke saying things about me. Perhaps his visit truly affected me more than I could have imagined... Nobody stopped by my cell very often--
"He's coming back next week."
I blinked, his sudden answer taking me by surprise. "What?"
And anyone else would have gotten annoyed with my slow reaction, but for some reason, his man did nothing but elaborate for me. Was he truly insane? Or was it simply courtesy? The dead look in Gaara's eyes opted for the former. "Uchiha Sasuke will be returning to this castle next week. He wants to see you again."
Uchiha Sasuke? Me? Not Gaara? "Huh? Why?"
"He likes you," was the blunt answer.
Well, that certainly caught me by surprise. Suddenly, I found myself looking down at my feet, for I was certain that my face had again turned a ravishing shade of red. "How-- Why the hell would he--"
"He says you're 'adorable.'"
I paused, suddenly noticing the dirt that had collected itself upon my toes with a foreign self-disgust. I had never noticed that before now.
'You'd make an adorable little girl.'
The one with panda eyes then made a gesture for me to sit down next to him on the bed. Nervously scrambling towards him, I urgently sat a safe distance from him, my legs closed together and my hands in my lap, a wide-eyed virgin girl at the stakes. At least the virgin part was true for me.
"D-did you talk to him about this stuff or what?" I asked, the dust collecting about my toes seeming more and more noticeable to me.
"Yes."
"What?!"
"He came and asked me about you. I said I knew nothing, and so he began to question me about what it was like to live here. When he was about to leave, I asked him what business he had with you, and he said your whiskers had caught his eye."
Digesting the information slowly, I looked down again. I felt myself color darkly, and I had no idea why.
"Probably likes kittens or something...The snot..."
'He likes you.' I blushed even harder upon the thought.
Gaara did not speak. He would be the type to only speak if asked to do so. The kind of person without his own mind to share. A guy who only thought of himself and what he would do next. Alas, my assumption was not the case, for Gaara of the Desert was the one who spoke and broke the silence first. I almost jumped at the sound of his voice.
"Do you know who I am, Uzumaki Naruto?" he quietly said, his gaze upon me less intense than before as he slightly turned his head from me.
I gave him a quizzical look. I did not understand what he meant at the time. "You're Gaara of the Desert, right?"
He gave me a profound stare in return.
"...Is that all that I am?"
"A man who killed sixty hundred people, then shrugged it off as saying he was bored. The oldest prisoner in his whole goddamned castle and the most well-known in all the world." At least, that was what I had heard about the guy.
"...So you don't remember," he finally said, disappointed.
Was I supposed to remember something? Was I doing something wrong? I tried to correct my mistake by waving my hands in front of me in a display of innocence. I smiled nervously. "It's probably the shots they give me..." That would do. "...Didn't they wipe your memory clear?"
"No. I still remember everything."
His eyes had flashed a deeper shade of green, but perhaps it was only my imagination.
"How? I thought everyone was supposed to have their memory wiped..."
"No. Memory loss is only used to solve extreme..." He paused, "... Problems. I haven't been given the medicine that strong." And then I was confused. The infamous Gaara of the Desert was less of a problem than I?
"Then why have I taken it?"
Gaara paused, his ringed eyes nervously flicking away in favor of the more pleasant sight of reddened walls and floor.
"...I can't tell you why."
"I heard they're out of love."
"Uchiha and his mistress? Whatever for?"
"That must be a mistake! Lord Uchiha refusing that fine young woman? What on earth could he be thinking?"
"He's got every woman in town chasing after his heels, is what he could be thinking."
"Goodness gracious, sometimes that man frustrates me so. And I haven't even spoken to him yet!"
"He's probably a reasonable man in person."
"Actually, I heard, this Lord Uchiha is actually a heavy writer. And that he's already married to someone. But he left her to travel the world. And he's slept with countless women ever since!"
"Oh dear! How dreadful!"
"Actually..."
"Huh? What is it?"
"...I heard that Uchiha's mistress was the one who ended the relationship."
Days passed.
Each day became more difficult to bear than the last.
Perhaps it was the voice in my head so irritatingly insistent that it should threaten to drive me, ironically, insane. For so long, I could think of absolutely nothing but that one upcoming day-- Monday, September 8th, one week from my visit with Gaara of the Desert-- the chilling speculation of the day literally tearing away at my tendons and slicing my every thumping nerve. It bothered me when I was awake, when I ate, when I took my shots and pills, when I made my bed, when I looked myself in the mirror, when I slept, and in my miserably pitiful dreams.
Uchiha Sasuke, grand lord of the mansion seven blocks from this castle and most handsome man to ever walk the face of the earth (or at least this town), was going to visit me.
Oh, how I wished to tear my very head apart, rip my brain right from my skull and stomp it guttural until it were nothing but slimy fragments of pasta, when that thought had deviously thought itself inside my head. Did I not sound a bit too desperate for company of the rich folk? Angrily, I told myself that this wasn't a bloody popularity contest and that I should clamp my thought-hole up before even odder thoughts could infect it.
But when Sunday arrived, the day before the Uchiha heir would finally visit me, I was so anxious and nervous that I should put white-tailed deer to shame.
It was around time for another shot. And the dripping which so characterized the castle had sped up a bit, I had noticed.
The nurse hadn't come.
Instead, the doctor barged into the hallway, seemingly hovering underneath his dark cloak, large red clouds decorating the fine black material. His eyes glowed a strange red glow at me as he hastily walked in front of my cell to unlock it.
Swinging the door open, he commanded sternly, "You're coming with me, little one."
I puffed my cheeks out angrily at the name and jumped out of the cell. I shoved my hands in my pockets, looking around me should I chance to find the source of the dripping noise, but could only follow the doctor in my meaningless search.
The doctor walked with small, quick steps, so small that they were almost undetectable.
The dripping sped up even further, like the constant drumming of fingers on an invisible desk, but I seemed to be the only one to notice. Perhaps it was only my own heartbeat so plaguing these halls and corridors for the reason that I had not yet taken my medicine. An insanity that reached far from what I could comprehend.
My vision was also gradually becoming more vivid.
And I found myself more impulsive. "What's your name?" I asked, the doctor unnoticeably flinching at the sound of my voice. I always knew my voice was annoying. Like a blaring foghorn on a cool autumn morning. Droning.
The doctor glanced back at me. And, with a voice as smooth as cream upon a cherub's skin, replied hesitantly, "...Itachi."
I grinned at the name. "Weasel? That's cool. So where're we going?"
"We're going to escape."
I almost stumbled and tripped and choked upon the air. "Wh-what?!" The castle was my home, my life; it was the only place I knew and to leave it would certainly be suicide. It fed me, kept me warm and safe, regulated my nerves and fluids... "And, may I ask, how the hell we're going to escape?!"
Itachi looked from side to side, as though searching for something, and paused to quickly unlock the door leading out of the prison halls. Gracefully leaping down from the doorstep, he gave me his soft reply.
"My brother."
DOKON DOKON DOKON!! Don't hate me for saying this, but I think chapters 220 and 221 have been boring!! >o Kishimoto is doing that "insert vast amounts of past cuteness so all readers will sympathize and fall in love" like he did with Neji, Hinata, and Gaara, but... ARGH. I can't bring myself to like Sasuke! He's so stupid!! Please, Kishimoto-sama, let Naruto kick some sense into Sasuke's ass...
Disclaimer: Naruto © Masashi Kishimoto and others. All rights reserved.
Warnings: SasuNaru, crappiness, AU, random pairings, and OOCness
The next day, I filed a request to the warden, a written document barely readable in my handwriting, asking to visit one of the other prisoners within the castle. Such an occasion was not rare, for it often grew lonely in such a large establishment, and companionship was sought constantly.
My request was turned down outright. The reason, I'm assuming, was for the person whom I requested to visit. And that was the fabled Gaara of the Desert. The next day, I filed another request, which was also turned down. Then another, and another. For a full week, I did nothing but spend my time writing requests to meet with Gaara of the Desert. It wasn't until the next week that my request was finally accepted out of exasperation.
A doctor arrived at my cell to guide me there. He solemnly unlocked the door with a key from his pocket, his face and body concealed by a large dark robe decorated with red clouds of seemingly oriental descent. His eyes glowed a haunting red color as he would glance up at me and cast his eyes down in a sort of eerie shyness.
"Please follow me, Naruto," he said, his voice as smooth as honey and whipped cream. His footsteps contained a strange stride to them-- as though he had no feet at all and was floating beneath that dark cloak of his. He turned to look at me with glowing red eyes once, and he looked straight ahead the rest of the trip.
Casually, I peered into other cells as we passed them. Some were gloomy, some were lively, some contained dead bodies, and still others were littered with long dead skeletons bound by metallic shackles for the rest of eternity, their wicked grins almost chanting for me to turn back. And as the dead bodies grew more and more abundant as we approached the back of the dungeon, I could only grow more and more nervous. Not even a cockroach would scurry past us anymore.
The dripping of water had halted.
It was as though I had entered a sanctuary. The walls which would normally be concealed in dark shades of blue and green was now stained with dark red and purple. Like blood. Like some sort of sideshow corridor. And pretty soon the murderer would come out-- oh wait. He's sitting in his cell.
As soon as I stepped through the door, it was shut and locked behind me, and the doctor was waiting patiently on the other side. And before me was the fabled, feared, and otherwise talked about, Gaara of the Desert.
He looked about my age. His head was a mess of deep red hair. His eyes, which were closed, were ringed with dark ovals much like a raccoon or a panda. The guy seemed to be meditating, actually, as he was sitting leisurely on a dirty cotton mattress (which was better than any of the other prisoners could afford). Cautiously, I circled around him before finally tapping him harshly on the shoulder and calling for his attention. "Oy! I came all this way just to visit you! Wake up!"
"Leave me alone," he stated quite plainly.
Confused, I lifted an eyebrow.
His eyes shot open. Two dimly jaded orbs peering from underneath the dark circles of insomnia. Their gaze was at nothing in particular, but it was icy freezing cold and empty. Yet, somehow, those eyes reflected my own.
"I know why you're here. Now leave me alone or I'll kill you," the young man added, turning his chilly jade eyes towards me. I was only slightly taken aback, but I remembered I had come for a reason, so I continued speaking.
"I came here because I wanted to ask you how the visit from Uchiha went. You know, the one from a week ago?"
"Leave me alone or I'll kill you," he repeated, the look in his eyes not making me doubt the sincerity of his words.
But I would not listen to logic.
"I've been waiting a whole week to talk to you! Come on!" I began to gesture with my hands. "Puppet boy said you were supposed to be a fairly reasonable guy after you've taken your meds!"
"Leave me alone."
"But why only me?! Tons of people visit you all the time! And I doubt you tell them all to leave you alone or you'll kill them! What? Did Uchiha say something about me and you won't talk to me because of that? Don't believe him! It's not true!"
I don't remember how I got onto the topic of Sasuke saying things about me. Perhaps his visit truly affected me more than I could have imagined... Nobody stopped by my cell very often--
"He's coming back next week."
I blinked, his sudden answer taking me by surprise. "What?"
And anyone else would have gotten annoyed with my slow reaction, but for some reason, his man did nothing but elaborate for me. Was he truly insane? Or was it simply courtesy? The dead look in Gaara's eyes opted for the former. "Uchiha Sasuke will be returning to this castle next week. He wants to see you again."
Uchiha Sasuke? Me? Not Gaara? "Huh? Why?"
"He likes you," was the blunt answer.
Well, that certainly caught me by surprise. Suddenly, I found myself looking down at my feet, for I was certain that my face had again turned a ravishing shade of red. "How-- Why the hell would he--"
"He says you're 'adorable.'"
I paused, suddenly noticing the dirt that had collected itself upon my toes with a foreign self-disgust. I had never noticed that before now.
'You'd make an adorable little girl.'
The one with panda eyes then made a gesture for me to sit down next to him on the bed. Nervously scrambling towards him, I urgently sat a safe distance from him, my legs closed together and my hands in my lap, a wide-eyed virgin girl at the stakes. At least the virgin part was true for me.
"D-did you talk to him about this stuff or what?" I asked, the dust collecting about my toes seeming more and more noticeable to me.
"Yes."
"What?!"
"He came and asked me about you. I said I knew nothing, and so he began to question me about what it was like to live here. When he was about to leave, I asked him what business he had with you, and he said your whiskers had caught his eye."
Digesting the information slowly, I looked down again. I felt myself color darkly, and I had no idea why.
"Probably likes kittens or something...The snot..."
'He likes you.' I blushed even harder upon the thought.
Gaara did not speak. He would be the type to only speak if asked to do so. The kind of person without his own mind to share. A guy who only thought of himself and what he would do next. Alas, my assumption was not the case, for Gaara of the Desert was the one who spoke and broke the silence first. I almost jumped at the sound of his voice.
"Do you know who I am, Uzumaki Naruto?" he quietly said, his gaze upon me less intense than before as he slightly turned his head from me.
I gave him a quizzical look. I did not understand what he meant at the time. "You're Gaara of the Desert, right?"
He gave me a profound stare in return.
"...Is that all that I am?"
"A man who killed sixty hundred people, then shrugged it off as saying he was bored. The oldest prisoner in his whole goddamned castle and the most well-known in all the world." At least, that was what I had heard about the guy.
"...So you don't remember," he finally said, disappointed.
Was I supposed to remember something? Was I doing something wrong? I tried to correct my mistake by waving my hands in front of me in a display of innocence. I smiled nervously. "It's probably the shots they give me..." That would do. "...Didn't they wipe your memory clear?"
"No. I still remember everything."
His eyes had flashed a deeper shade of green, but perhaps it was only my imagination.
"How? I thought everyone was supposed to have their memory wiped..."
"No. Memory loss is only used to solve extreme..." He paused, "... Problems. I haven't been given the medicine that strong." And then I was confused. The infamous Gaara of the Desert was less of a problem than I?
"Then why have I taken it?"
Gaara paused, his ringed eyes nervously flicking away in favor of the more pleasant sight of reddened walls and floor.
"...I can't tell you why."
"I heard they're out of love."
"Uchiha and his mistress? Whatever for?"
"That must be a mistake! Lord Uchiha refusing that fine young woman? What on earth could he be thinking?"
"He's got every woman in town chasing after his heels, is what he could be thinking."
"Goodness gracious, sometimes that man frustrates me so. And I haven't even spoken to him yet!"
"He's probably a reasonable man in person."
"Actually, I heard, this Lord Uchiha is actually a heavy writer. And that he's already married to someone. But he left her to travel the world. And he's slept with countless women ever since!"
"Oh dear! How dreadful!"
"Actually..."
"Huh? What is it?"
"...I heard that Uchiha's mistress was the one who ended the relationship."
Days passed.
Each day became more difficult to bear than the last.
Perhaps it was the voice in my head so irritatingly insistent that it should threaten to drive me, ironically, insane. For so long, I could think of absolutely nothing but that one upcoming day-- Monday, September 8th, one week from my visit with Gaara of the Desert-- the chilling speculation of the day literally tearing away at my tendons and slicing my every thumping nerve. It bothered me when I was awake, when I ate, when I took my shots and pills, when I made my bed, when I looked myself in the mirror, when I slept, and in my miserably pitiful dreams.
Uchiha Sasuke, grand lord of the mansion seven blocks from this castle and most handsome man to ever walk the face of the earth (or at least this town), was going to visit me.
Oh, how I wished to tear my very head apart, rip my brain right from my skull and stomp it guttural until it were nothing but slimy fragments of pasta, when that thought had deviously thought itself inside my head. Did I not sound a bit too desperate for company of the rich folk? Angrily, I told myself that this wasn't a bloody popularity contest and that I should clamp my thought-hole up before even odder thoughts could infect it.
But when Sunday arrived, the day before the Uchiha heir would finally visit me, I was so anxious and nervous that I should put white-tailed deer to shame.
It was around time for another shot. And the dripping which so characterized the castle had sped up a bit, I had noticed.
The nurse hadn't come.
Instead, the doctor barged into the hallway, seemingly hovering underneath his dark cloak, large red clouds decorating the fine black material. His eyes glowed a strange red glow at me as he hastily walked in front of my cell to unlock it.
Swinging the door open, he commanded sternly, "You're coming with me, little one."
I puffed my cheeks out angrily at the name and jumped out of the cell. I shoved my hands in my pockets, looking around me should I chance to find the source of the dripping noise, but could only follow the doctor in my meaningless search.
The doctor walked with small, quick steps, so small that they were almost undetectable.
The dripping sped up even further, like the constant drumming of fingers on an invisible desk, but I seemed to be the only one to notice. Perhaps it was only my own heartbeat so plaguing these halls and corridors for the reason that I had not yet taken my medicine. An insanity that reached far from what I could comprehend.
My vision was also gradually becoming more vivid.
And I found myself more impulsive. "What's your name?" I asked, the doctor unnoticeably flinching at the sound of my voice. I always knew my voice was annoying. Like a blaring foghorn on a cool autumn morning. Droning.
The doctor glanced back at me. And, with a voice as smooth as cream upon a cherub's skin, replied hesitantly, "...Itachi."
I grinned at the name. "Weasel? That's cool. So where're we going?"
"We're going to escape."
I almost stumbled and tripped and choked upon the air. "Wh-what?!" The castle was my home, my life; it was the only place I knew and to leave it would certainly be suicide. It fed me, kept me warm and safe, regulated my nerves and fluids... "And, may I ask, how the hell we're going to escape?!"
Itachi looked from side to side, as though searching for something, and paused to quickly unlock the door leading out of the prison halls. Gracefully leaping down from the doorstep, he gave me his soft reply.
"My brother."
DOKON DOKON DOKON!! Don't hate me for saying this, but I think chapters 220 and 221 have been boring!! >o Kishimoto is doing that "insert vast amounts of past cuteness so all readers will sympathize and fall in love" like he did with Neji, Hinata, and Gaara, but... ARGH. I can't bring myself to like Sasuke! He's so stupid!! Please, Kishimoto-sama, let Naruto kick some sense into Sasuke's ass...