REQUESTED ONESHOT: Sasuke and Hikari, Slapshipping
Milestones
(Note: This is an AU in which Sasuke doesn't leave for Orochimaru)
-O-O-O-O-
The first time he kisses her at age 12, she slaps him across the face before silently walking away.
He remembers the look in her eyes clearly: quiet fury smoldering in depths of reflective blue. What he doesn't understand is: why did she slap him? He liked her, and she liked him. Right?
They had experienced the Massacre together; they had laughed together, trained together, and attacked Shisui together. When he recalls his childhood, his happy memories, he recalls her.
So why was it that she didn't seem to feel the same way?
-O-O-O-O-
The next time he kisses her at age 14, she slaps him on the shoulder and shoots him a frown.
I'm already dating someone, she says. Don't kiss me.
He knows already, of course. It was the idiot Inuzuka that she had saved during the invasion of Konoha. She should have just let him stay asleep in the genjutsu and get impaled by the kunai.
Does it matter? he asks. I like you either way.
Her eyes narrow (annoyance and offense clashing into a whirl of anger) and she coldly retorts, Oh, and I suppose it doesn't matter if I don't like you back.
She storms off again, probably to meet up with the mutt.
Tch.
-O-O-O-O-
He kisses her again at age 16, and she slaps his hand away from her face.
This time, he sees no issue with anything. She knew he liked her. He knew she broke up with Kiba months ago. They both knew that he was going to kiss her, and they both knew that she had let him before jerking away.
What now? Sasuke asks as he angrily runs a hand through his hair.
I can't, she responds. Not with you.
Why? Why not me?
Because you're going to kill Itachi.
And everything suddenly crashes down around him.
Unbelievable, he whispers. She steps towards him, but he steps away.
So you're telling me to not go after the man who killed my family? The man who took everything away from me? You know what he did. You saw it, like me.
Sasuk— she tries.
You saw the blood everywhere. You saw my parents, you saw Fumiko! You saw how he had stabbed her through the heart, how he stabbed his fiancée, and the way the blood mixed with her hair. You saw her laying there, eyes clouded. You saw all that, and you want me to let Itachi live?
He knows that he's gone too far. Her face closes off and she stops trying to reach him.
I do. I do want you to let him live. You don't know everything that happened that night, Sasuke, and I refuse to believe that Itachi, who loved you and Fumiko and his parents beyond reason, would just mindlessly slaughter his entire clan to "test his strength".
She leaves him glaring at her chakra residue as she disappears.
-O-O-O-O-
After he learns, he kisses her.
Please.
She doesn't slap him.
He recalls how Itachi poked him in the forehead before falling. Sorry, Sasuke. Tell Hikari I'm sorry, again. I love you, Otouto. Maybe another time.
Then he was dead and everything was swirling around him in a vortex of confusion because Itachi shouldn't love him, he shouldn't be sorry, and his entire world is crumbling apart.
Until Danzo approaches him and tears his world down even more.
So he kills him, takes the arm that's implanted with Sharingan, and burns it before heading back to Konoha on autopilot, even though his chakra is almost gone and his injuries are causing him to lose blood at an alarming rate.
And when he makes it back, he immediately goes to her apartment, because he needs someone who will understand.
Sasuke!
He startles her when she's making smoke tags, and she hurries him towards her bathroom before pulling out the first aid kit.
I killed Itachi.
Her hand still, and he can imagine the betrayal flickering across her face, and the words she'll say hanging in the air. He raises his eyes to hers with a weary acceptance, ready to take anything she does, even if it means losing contact with her forever.
Something changes when his eyes meet hers, and she stares back for a moment before slowly beginning to tend to his wounds.
I see, she murmurs. The silence stretches until she's done bandaging him, and he blurts, I know why. I know everything. Danzo told me. I killed him too. Itachi says he's sorry.
He spills everything, burying his face in his hands, and she's horribly still again, mouth dropped.
Then he kisses her while she's still registering his words.
Please.
She lets him kiss her one more time before gently leading him to the kitchen.
You need to eat and rest.
She gives him plenty of water and food, but he can barely keep down a mouthful, so she makes him change into some of Naruto's clothes and go to bed, You can stay the night, and when she turns to leave the room, he chokes out, Don't go. Not now.
She faces him, but he can't meet her eyes again, and instead twists his hands in the covers, seeing Itachi's blood on them even though it had been washed off. He hears her sigh, and the bed sags under their combined weight.
She doesn't comment when he holds her tightly as if he would lose her too.
-O-O-O-O-
He wakes up to a hand stroking his hair.
Sasuke, you need to get up.
He confuses Hikari for his mother at first, but remembers everything, and can't move.
Itachi, gone. His father, a traitor.
Hikari.
He wraps his arms around her and buries his face into her shoulder, but she pushes him off. No, Sasuke. You won't heal like this. And he knows that she's not talking about his injuries.
She urges him to go through the motions, that it'll keep him sane, and he placidly allows her to direct him around, wondering how she knows what to do.
Then he realizes that she was speaking from experience, and muses blankly about who she must have lost to be able to know.
She brings him along for team training, and he tags after her with a vacant expression on his face. Sakura freaks from his wounds and heals him, and Naruto yells nonsense at him like he always does, and Kakashi evaluates him with a keen eye, but Sasuke doesn't do anything except keep red hair in his vision.
He stays the night again.
-O-O-O-O-
The war starts, and he refuses to leave Hikari alone at any time, because he's already lost so many that he won't lose her, but the dead begin to rise and Itachi is there smiling at him, and he's fighting with them against the enemy, and Sasuke feels anger and hope and bittersweetness at seeing him again, but when he begins to glow and disappear, Sasuke panics, because Itachi is leaving him again.
Then Hikari is beside him and he can feel her chakra pulsing in the air, and Itachi pokes him, I love you, he closes his eyes and accepts that his family is gone.
Sasuke enters the war again with a new motivation, to revolutionize the world so that others won't have to lose everything they hold dear, and he's hopeful, even optimistic of their chances when Kaguya appears.
I'm going to lose everything again.
But Naruto is dazzling and strong, and Sakura and Kakashi and Hikari are waiting for him, and they beat Kaguya somehow, against all odds, and they won the war.
And everyone's hugging each other, and Sasuke sees Naruto glomp Hinata and smirks, before feeling the steady chakra next to him, and turns to Hikari and sweeps her into his arms and kisses her.
Naruto is yelling and Sakura lets out a scandalized shriek and Kakashi just sighs and the others are surprised, but it doesn't matter because the war is over, and he's kissing Hikari, and she's kissing him back.
He can feel her smiling against his lips, and he knows that even though his blood family is gone, he still has friends that are family, and the future is in his arms, smiling up at him with a shining smile.
-O-O-O-O-
They marry at age 21.
When he moves to kiss her, she grabs his collar and pulls him forward, and she's the one that kisses him.
-O-O-O-O-
A/N: Well, I'm satisfied with how that turned out.
This was requested by a guest reviewer. CutieMochi00, I'm sorry I couldn't do your request, but if I did, that would reveal spoilers, and we wouldn't want that, right?
Thanks to everyone who reviewed the last time!
Look toward the close future for the next official chapter of Reaching!