Chapter 17
(Alternatively, two and a half weeks in snapshots)
He returned when the sky was still the sun's sepulcher and the rubescent hour of dawning a distant prospect. He returned to silence, dejected and dead on his feet. He plodded into his room and tossed away his jacket before tumbling face first into bed, where the salve of sleep embalmed him.
And then he dreamt of dreadful things.
His dreams at first lacked clarity. He was canoeing in a vast viscous sea and there reverberated within his mind the trickle of disjointed notions. These fermented themselves into coherent thought, revelatory and dazzling, each a voyager from realms undiscovered. He sought to salvage these contemplations for morning, so he could scrutinize them; but in the midst of this there arose a wave which capsized the canoe. Then thought was lost. Gleaning was lost. Meaning was lost. Down he went, down, down, the viscous substance warping him until he was no longer human but a shrinking feathery entity sinking into an abyss— stripped of identity, stripped of sadness, stripped even of soul and free now to sink forevermore. Downwards he drifted, till the sea bottomed out in bedrock.
There still remained the sensation of weightlessness, which clung to him like a lament. He floated about, forgetful, searching he knew not for what, but searching nonetheless; and as if in answer to his vague pinings there appeared in the seabed the stone mouth of a strange cavity.
Through this opening he drifted. The air thrummed with a discombobulated drone. The sense of somnolence increased, as did the forgetfulness; soon the stone mouth engorged into a network of pathways. It was a catacomb, and each unvisited path spoke of woe; each twisted into darkness unending, save one, where a solitary gleam played off shimmering stalactites. It was this path he ventured into, the sense of sadness returning, forever mounting, mounting forevermore. Onward he floated, leaving behind the stonemouth and the stream of sound and now wandering into an eldritch hush, the ground giving way to slush that soon turned into a mournful gush, as if of drain water. And the pathway was forever narrowing, so that he could trace on either side a set of circular murals and inscriptions spangled with slashes. A seal . . .
Naruto woke in a cold sweat, caustic laughter ringing in his ears. He instinctively knew where that path ended.
Sunlight streamed in through slatted windows and gave the room a greenish glow. The events of the night bygone streaked through the opalescent mire of his fogged over mind: the kunoichi's death was superimposed over the weightless dread of his dream. This left him heaving for a second— and so he would have remained, perhaps for the next five minutes, if a glass of water had not been shoved into his hand. Gladly he brought it to his lips. Gladly he drank. Dread slowly seeped away. Sense crept in. And with it there returned the power to observe things; so it was with some consternation that he noticed her standing by his bedside, a jug of water in one hand.
"Wha…"
She took the glass from him and tipped the jug over. Refilled and shoved the glass into his hand again.
"Drink."
"The fuck are you doin' here?" Naruto gasped.
"Drink, then talk." She made a shushing motion, and gestured towards the glass.
He gripped the tumbler and glared at it for a second, then did as asked. Gulped down the liquid and tossed her the glass. She caught it one handed and stepped away. Set the jug and the glass on the study table and perched next to it.
Naruto stared glassily at a shimmering spot that danced around the fringes of his vision. Rubbed his red-rimmed eyes twice. Drew in a deep breath, then looked at her. She had done nothing to rupture the silence.
"What time is it?" He grumbled.
"Eleven."
"You didn't wake me."
Satsuki dipped her head in acknowledgement.
"You looked worn out."
Naruto squinted at her suspiciously.
"That's never stopped ya before."
She offered him a sage nod.
"I'm a benevolent teacher, and your sad plight tugged at my heart strings."
"Bullshit."
She smirked.
"Rest is necessary," she murmured. "I ran you into the ground yesterday."
"So ya decided to give me beauty sleep?"
"Maybe." She gave him a critical once over. "You look cute when you're asleep."
That floored him for a second— but only for a second.
"I look cute all the time. Runs in the family."
Satsuki raised an eyebrow.
"I thought you wished to have nothing to do with your family?"
"Hey, man was a piece of shit." Naruto yawned. "But ya ever seen him? Prettiest face they ever carved into a monument."
His heart rate was starting to steady, and he focused more on this rhythmic restoration of normality than what she was saying. He was only half listening. His thoughts were elsewhere. That sea, that stone mouth, that unending womb of darkness, that cavernous catacomb, that pathway, those inscriptions . . .
"Indeed." Her voice was dry.
"Ya take the good with the bad," Naruto mumbled, making an impatient gesture. "Thanks, dad, for the hair and the eyes, I guess. Hope your suffering in hell is slightly lessened for it."
He scratched his back. Turned his attention towards her. "Not that I mind or somethin', by the way, but ain't it improper for a chick to be in a dude's room when he's sleeping?"
"Ah, yes." Satsuki slapped her forehead. Her palm connected with her headband in a metallic thump. "How could I forget? Naruto Uzumaki. Lover of protocol. Epitome of propriety."
Naruto shrugged.
"I follow rules."
"And I set them. So we'll overlook them this one time, all right?"
"Said it last evening too." He tossed away his blanket and hobbled out of his mattress. Fetched his jacket. Turned away and took a peek into a mirror. "You're the boss." Threaded a hand through his hair, then turned and offered her an ironic two fingered salute. "What you say, goes."
It was not until much later that a thought occurred to him— in the disconcerting nature of the moment, he had taken her non-answer at face value. Satsuki never told him why she was in his room.
Naruto spent the day stricken by a sense of tension and muddlement. His thoughts kept going astray, and his performance in the short training spar they had was inconsistent. Satsuki halted the session halfway through, after he had walked into the most basic of her combinations for the third time in a row. She raised an eyebrow, but asked for no explanations: instead, she gave him the day off. He was grateful for this liberty; grateful too for the little pat on the shoulder she gave him before she walked away.
But the sickness persisted. He went and met Shiho; spent the day trudging through Wave with her, sharing stories and trying to sell some flowers on a whim. He turned out to be hopeless at this, and felt a lightening in mood when Shiho told him as much, calling him stupid big brother and giggling all the while. Come evening, she invited him for dinner: she lived in a one bedroom shanty that was rundown on the outside but spick and span on the inside. He hesitantly followed her in, and took in the trinkets that adorned the walls: a pair of ripped fans, a dirt-tipped mask, a crude painting, and a cracked portrait of a smiling family. Shiho snapped him out of the glumness that momentarily threatened to draw him under: she led him to the table, and her chatter set him at ease. The sense of agitation returned with a vengeance, however, when Shiho's mother served them food— she stared at him with a reverence reserved for gods. She would not sit; she would not address him— instead, she hovered about and served a second helping, her manner subservient. Throughout dinner there remained in place that look of star struck wonderment and infinite gratitude. She only spoke as he was about to leave: bowed, and begged him to return everyday.
It was already late by the time Naruto got back to his residence: he went straight to bed, but could not sleep; and, after tossing and turning awhile, he gave up and worked his way to the terrace.
Fresh air hit his face like a blessing. So did the awareness that he was not alone.
Satsuki was perched atop the roof. She stared at the starlit sky, the tip of her chin touching the crook of her knees. Naruto hesitated; considered creeping away. The limited time he had spent around her, he had spent walking on eggshells, dreading discovery and anticipating a change in her mannerisms; but neither through word nor gesture had she indicated an awareness of his actions. She remained as acerbic as ever, her demeanour detached, her tone tinted with sarcasm, her tutelage severe but fair; and so, after much consideration, he concluded that he had successfully pulled wool over her eyes.
For how long, though? He wondered. Kaiza said they needed more trips— five, six, seven of them. With each trip the risk of detection increased exponentially. Exposure would entail dire consequences. But he had to risk it. He had to—
"Are you going to stand there and stare at me all night?"
He started. She had not taken her gaze off the sky.
"Stuffy." He gestured in the general direction of his room. "Came up for air."
"Join me." Satsuki languidly unfurled an arm and patted the space next to her. "I could use some company."
He trundled forward and seated himself next to her. But even as he sat there, his mind presented him with a phantasmagoric edition of events from the night past: the leprous carcass of the town he had scrimmaged through, and the sense of emaciation which permeated even the emulsified walls of its shanties. The world, Kaiza had said, was a wasteland, a doddering thrall that swayed in captivity to the whims and megrims of a higher power. Of this power Satsuki too was a willing participant. This made it difficult to be around her— yet it was equally difficult to not suffer from constant whiplash, because a part of him adored her. Wanted her. Sitting like this, shoulder to shoulder; tracing the intricate needlework her hair was crowned in; smelling the sweetness of her perfume, and coveting through the corners of his eyes the arch of her back, the suppleness of her frame, the slight swell of her breasts, the frost fringed comeliness of her starlight stippled cheeks— these were pleasurable things that stirred up alien sensations and quickened his heartbeat.
A disciplinarian. A pretty one. The prettiest girl he had seen, no doubt. But he did not trust her. No, he did not trust her at all.
He broke the silence that had settled over them, though.
"Hey."
"Hm?"
"You've been round the world, right?"
She pondered over it for a second.
"Every major city," she affirmed.
"What's it like?"
"What's what like?"
"The places. The people."
"Want a bookish response?"
"There's a bookish response?"
"Mm-hm." The corners of her lips twitched. "It's for foreigners who feel the urge to inquire into a country's affairs. The answer is always the same: the towns are civilized and the people are happy."
"And what's the truth?"
"The truth," she replied, staring at the sky, "is that I don't know. And I don't care."
He found himself perturbed by the brazenness of this answer.
"Shit thing to say."
"It's also honest. I don't visit these places as a tourist."
"You don't look around?'
"Not unless the mission demands it. I get in, I do as I'm asked, and I leave. Anything else is a waste of my time."
She cocked her head to one side. Paused. Considered.
"If I can get some sleep in between," she admitted, "then that's good."
Naruto found himself laughing at the forthrightness of her indifference.
"You're heartless, y'know?"
"I've been told."
"Points for being truthful about your moral bankruptcy, tho."
"There's a world outside your little island of morals," Satsuki said softly, not looking at him, "and it is inhumane. Don't look too deeply into these things— you'll lose your mind."
"Speaking from experience?" Sarcasm tinted his tone.
"Yes."
". . ."
She turned to face him.
"You're very sweet, Naruto."
"What's that got to do with—"
"Innocent," she went on. "Ignorant. Pure. If it were up to me, then you would stay that way forever, because I see a tenderness in you that I've never had. But the world is not like that . . ."
She trailed off. A note of melancholy crept into her voice.
"It is not like that," she insisted again.
"Not to be rude or anything, but you're kinda rambling."
"True." She gave him a level look. "Hatake Kakashi. Ever heard of him?"
It rang the vaguest of bells. He remembered a time of tumult last year. Whispered references to that name in malodorous alleyways. An air of lingering dread in every whisper, as if talking about a deity gone rogue. But Naruto had not paid attention. New rumours floated around Konoha every fortnight, and having himself been the subject of some of them, he did not care for them.
"You mentioned him."
"I did. Best operative I've worked with, and one of the few I would trust with my life. Cryptic, detached, efficient and professional. The perfect shinobi on paper."
Satsuki paused. Sighed.
"Institutionalised last year," she murmured. "Suspended from service, apparently due to a fraying sanity."
"What happened?"
"I don't know. I was posted elsewhere at the time. They say he snapped on a mission and slaughtered half a town. It took Maito Gai to stop him." She was shaking her head— she was talking to herself. "I still don't believe it. Hatake-senpai was always so composed. Nothing ever moved him, nothing rattled him. But he had this tendency to think too much — he was, he said, always looking underneath the underneath."
She stopped. There was no discernible change in her expression, but Naruto got the sense she was mourning her colleague.
"He was infuriating," she said haltingly. "I could not stand him in the beginning. He treated me like a child, not an equal. I hated that. Hated him." Her voice dropped an octave— he had to strain to hear her. "But that's just who he was. Hatake-senpai was that way with everyone."
Her countenance was inscrutable. She had forgotten his presence— had meandered off into some formerly unexplored corner of her mind.
"We never talked much. He and I exchanged maybe twenty, thirty words every mission, and once it was done we went our separate ways. But I worked with him for years, and he had a way of showing that he cared. He was . . . the closest thing I had to a brother."
She stared into the distance and chewed the inside of her cheek.
"I miss working with him."
Satsuki fiddled about with her sleeve. To the casual observer it would seem as if she were taking cursory stock of the smudges on the velvet fabric— but Naruto saw more; saw the hesitation, sensed the self abasement, felt somehow the shadow of loss that engulfed her. Yet through this all her expression had not altered.
"I tried visiting him after it happened." Her fingers kept plucking away at an errant thread. "But he would not let me in. He talks to no one. He has cut off everyone."
Another prolonged spell of silence.
"I'd have broken in," Naruto said.
Satsuki let go of the thread. Her brow furrowed in confusion.
"I beg your pardon?"
"If someone I cared for was stuck in a hospital ward, and they refused to see me, I'd have broken in, consequences be damned."
There was gentleness in the glance she gave him.
"You're an idiot," she sighed. "I'd never do that."
"Because you're a professional?" His hatred for that word intensified with every passing day.
"Because sometimes," she said, "people don't want to be seen when they are at their lowest."
Satsuki patted his hand.
"You are well intentioned. But you have much to learn."
"Dunno. I'd just wanna see my friend." Naruto ignored the shivers the gesture sent up his spine. "I don't see what's wrong with that. I'd sit by their side forever if I had to. I'd bring 'em back to life myself."
"The pity in your eyes would kill them."
"Who said I'd pity 'em?"
"You would. You've not seen the things I have."
"I don't care what I see." His tone brooked no argument."I ain't got a lotta people I care for, so I ain't letting someone close to me just rot away thinking everyone's given up on 'em. I'd stay by their side— I'd fight for 'em, even if no one else did."
She tilted her head. Cupped her cheek with a palm. The corner of her lip inched upwards.
"That's what a dreamer would say," she pointed out.
"That's what a friend would do."
There was something very intense in the gaze she gave him, something bewitching about the slight curl of her lips. Naruto returned the look, though the tips of his ears turned red— held eye contact and dared her to deny the truth in his statement.
Her expression softened. There was something there that he had never seen before. It might have been some diabolical trick of the dark— but in that moment he thought he saw a glimmer of admiration in her eyes.
It was she who broke eye contact.
"I resented being assigned a student."
She said it as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.
"I thought you would get in the way— I thought I'd spend day after day fixing your mess ups."
She tangled and untangled her fingers a few times.
"I was wrong. I no longer resent it. Mentoring you is the best thing to have happened to me in years."
" . . ."
Satsuki gave him a sideways glance. The softness had fizzled out. She was once more her stoic self. Composed. Inscrutable.
"When we return to the village," she said, "I'll visit senpai again. I don't think he'll take too kindly to it . . . but there's no harm in trying."
The next day she introduced him to an exercise that was the antithesis of all her speed and range training: she drew a circle in the mud and made him stand there. It was small enough that it only allowed half a step in any direction. This done, she unsheathed a thin bamboo rod and conjured a set of wooden shuriken that were blunted at the edges. She put them to one side, then began to stretch. Cracked her neck, squatted a few times, rotated her arms; this done, she grasped the stick and turned to him.
"Block this time." She smirked. "Don't dodge."
"What the fu—"
"You made this shit up just to have a go at me."
Welts. Welts the size of bee stings. And puce shaded bamboo imprints branded into skin. It was hard enough to defend while on the move; but with even that taken away, he found himself floundering.
"I created it, yes."
"Knew it."
"But it is a productive exercise."
"I don't believe you."
"Improves defensive technique. Teaches you how to fight in confined spaces. Gives you a finer appreciation for freedom of movement, and how to cope when it is no longer possible."
The pain dimmed. He was somewhat mollified.
"At least you got a valid reason."
"It also warms my heart when I watch you squirm."
"You're a sadistic psychopath."
"Manners," she said primly, balancing the bamboo with one finger. "That is no way to talk to a lady."
"I see no lady here, you deranged freak."
"Pain, pain, forever pain."
"Right."
"My brain's fried, my body's pulp, my blood's ash, my bones are paste. I'm ten seconds away from rigor mortis."
"Stop being melodramatic."
"Melodramatic? Swap places with me then, ya whackjob. Come now— don't stand there all smug. Stand in this damn circle and try it out for yourself."
"I've done it."
"What, standing under the mid morning sun and getting pelted with shit while dehydrating to death?"
"Metaphorically, yes." Then, after a considered pause: "I suppose I should thank you."
"Gimme the day off as thanks," Naruto groaned. "Can't even feel my arms no more." And then, as if impelled by the barest of curiosities: "thanks for what?"
"You got me out of guard duty this year."
"The hell is guard duty?"
"Every year, around this time, the Hokage spends three months traveling. First to the Damiyo's court, then the land of Iron, then Suna and whichever other minor villages we have peace treaties with. He exempted me this year before leaving; but prior to that I was forced to accompany him every year, as a part of his personal guard. We too were made to stand in the sun for hours on end."
"Doing what?"
"Hosting dignitaries, discussing budgetary allocations, participating in festivities, hashing out treaties— it's a drawn out process."
"Sounds boring as hell."
"It is dull. You stand there dying of hate and boredom while listening to some pompous braggart toot their own horn."
"Relatable."
Satsuki ignored the jibe. Looked around, as if to ensure no one was eavesdropping, then leant in conspiratorially. "I fell asleep during one of our budgetary discussions."
She said it as if she were confessing to a cardinal sin.
Naruto gaped at her in open mouthed wonderment, the pain forgotten.
"Wicked," he whispered.
Her eyes were full of laughter as she leant away.
"Don't tell anyone." She put a finger to her lips and made a shushing gesture.
"I won't— if ya gimme a break for the rest of the day."
"... are you trying to blackmail me?"
"If that's what it takes. Never give out compromising info. Shinobi 101, sensei."
The next day was better. Satsuki flipped their roles. She asked him to demonstrate all ninjutsu he knew; this done, she asked him to pressure her with everything he had. The result was a productive three hour session, where he pressured and she evaded. Once he worked up a rhythm, his combinations got cleaner: he used wind techniques to force movement; pushed her towards solid surfaces, then cut the distance and pressed with rasengan. And though he could not touch her, she seemed pleased with the initiative he was taking, the progress he was making.
Afterwards, she was full of praise.
"You're further along than I thought," she said. "You would cause most chunin severe difficulties."
Naruto thought about the Kunoichi whose death he was responsible for. Grimaced.
"Yeah, probably."
"Still not good enough, however. Your repertoire of techniques is very limited. We can fix that in the coming weeks— but I cannot shake off the sense that you aren't trying hard enough. Are you holding back?"
"Ain't."
She went and fetched a canteen and the two lunches Waraji had packed. They sat under a knotted oak whose bark his rasengan had cleaved through.
"If you say so."
Her expression adequately conveyed her lack of faith in his declaration.
Truly, he was not holding back. Not consciously, anyway. But ever since that kunoichi's death, there was a ponderousness, a subconscious sluggishness, a hesitancy to pull the trigger. He felt it too— he did not wish to hurt anyone, Satsuki least of all. It was silly, since even he could sense that the gap in skill between them was a chasm; but everytime he cornered her, his heart was in his mouth, and he slowed down just a fraction, so he would not inadvertently connect.
Naruto did not know how to fix this. Nor was he going to ask. The hesitance, in his eyes, was a good thing— it meant he still retained his humanity, still strived to not be anything like them.
One thought led to another, though. The idea of causing injury transmuted into Kaiza and his career ending injury, and there flashed before his eyes the wooden stump the man lumbered on. There flashed too, the man's tragedy in snapshots: foot crushed, blood pooling into a pothole; the agony, the gurney, the hallucinatory journey to the medbay; the surgical sawing away of not just limb, but of ability and identity. Agony coalescing into absence, till what was once a man became a shadow of a man— a mere cripple.
"If I ask you something—" his throat constricted, as if scraped against sandpaper, "will you be honest?"
Satsuki shot him a quizzical look. She had noticed the tremor in tone.
"Depends on the question."
Naruto reached for the canteen.
"Ever think of a life after this?"
He put the rim to his mouth. The water cooled his throat. Restored some composure.
"After?" She cocked her head to one side. "There's no after, not for us— there's only today, this day, this moment."
Naruto nearly choked on his canteen.
"You told me grand shit about how I'd live to see my seventieth birthday if I buy into the crap you're selling."
Satsuki crossed her arms.
"That is for you. I don't need those things. I've never looked beyond the present."
"How 'bout ya do it just this once? Where do you see yourself in ten years?"
She thought about it.
"Irrelevant."
"Evading the question."
"Perhaps. But also irrelevant."
"I'll rephrase, then. Say they don't let ya continue. Say they do away with ya, because you've lost, I dunno, a limb or three."
She smirked at him.
"You're thinking about that fisherman."
"Something like that, yeah."
"He's a loser."
"You don't even know him."
"I've read his file. There's fodder, there's bottom of the barrel trash— then there's Kaiza from Kumo."
"Sure. Still ain't answering the question. What if you lose a limb? What if Konoha forces you to retire?"
"I won't. And they won't."
"Uh-huh. Pass me the crystal ball, will ya?"
"There's something you do not understand, dear student of mine." Satsuki extended an arm around his shoulder and mussed up his hair, then nimbly withdrew it when he squawked in outrage and batted at the outstretched appendage.
"I write my own destiny," she said. "I'm indispensable. If I were whimsical, the world would tremble; if I were vengeful, it would be smoke and ash. That's security. The village can't replace me, because no one can do what I can."
"You—" Naruto patted his hair back into place. "—are the humblest person I know."
"Scoff all you want. It's about quality. That fisherman has none. He would be trash, even with both his legs. I can fight on one. I could be paralyzed from the waist down, yet kill a man in a hundred different ways."
"Meh, whatever." He gave a theatrical shrug. "There's worse injuries, though."
"I will not suffer them."
"But say you do."
"Won't happen, Naruto."
"But what if?"
"Your desire to see me in a wheelchair is deeply concerning."
"Hey." He barked out a laugh. "Hey. Come on now. Don't be like that. I'm just curious, that's all. Tickles me there's this one thing even Satsuki Uchiha ain't planned for."
"I'm not omniscient."
"Coulda fooled me."
She sighed and squinted at the sunlit blanket of blue that stretched over them.
"To humour you," she murmured, "if I do end up in a situation where I have to pick between certain death and an invalid's life, then I'd rather die on my feet than live as a cripple. Even the thought of it isn't…"
She gave the sky a lingering look.
"My death will be on the battlefield," she said firmly. "And it will be in defense of what I love. It may be in a blaze of glory, or it may be one last attempt at thwarting the impossible; but it will never be in ignominy. I'll never be irrelevant. That's all there is to it. To think beyond that is to be spooked by what ifs."
She looked at him pointedly.
"Does that answer your question?"
"See? That's all ya had to say. Ain't that hard, eh?"
One evening, after a particularly brutal sparring session, he thirsted for solitude and retreated to the forest— found therein a little glade where he could rest awhile and lick his wounds. But even in this endeavour he was interrupted, for she found him before the sky started to purple. Disturbed his repose and handed him a slender notebook.
"Notes."
"What for?"
"Chakra theory. Elemental exercises. Repertoire of wind techniques as well. I went through half a dozen tomes and put that together." She gave him a sardonic smile. "Keep it. It's free of charge."
He flipped through it. She had penned the work in her own hand— she had pieced it together with precision and care. He was familiar with one of the books she had borrowed from, and so he noticed that in several instances she had whittled down fifty pages of theory into a page or two, often avoiding jargon, and often with her own suggestions and shortcuts added in the margins.
It must have taken weeks to put together.
"Thank you," Naruto said, and hoped that the way he said it conveyed the genuine nature of his gratitude. He did not care for the work, but he could appreciate the gesture and the effort that went into it.
"You don't strike me as the bookish type." She shrugged. "I thought I'd save you some time."
"I do read stuff, y'know. I'm not as dumb as I look."
Her lip quivered.
"Lies," she murmured. "You're illiterate. Everyone knows this."
"Imma use that as an excuse to not read this."
"I'll test you on it. Regularly."
"Ah, hell," he sighed. "Was worth a shot."
There was a fluttering in his chest, though. One that rippled through his frame and disturbed his external facade of indifference, manifesting in a nervous twining together of fingers, a frenetic shaking of the legs.
"I got a question," Naruto mumbled.
"What is it?"
"Is everyone like ya?"
"I beg your pardon?"
"Teachers, I mean." He rubbed the back of his head. "Detailed. Thorough. This ain't how they trained us at the academy."
"I don't know how the others are, and I don't care. My job is to prepare you for every situation and turn you into what I know you can be." She smirked. "If I have to drag you there kicking and screaming, then so be it."
"Huh." Naruto yawned. Tucked the book into his track jacket. It was a treasured possession now. "Keep at it, then. Fair warning, though— break your back for me this way, and someday I might become better than ya."
Something in her expression shifted.
"Naruto?" Her tone was solemn.
"Yeah?"
"It would be a matter of great personal pride for me if you were to surpass me."
She said it in such a heartfelt manner that he felt himself grow hot around the neck.
"Jeez." He looked away. "I was just joking."
"I was not."
"You've got great talent at making things awkward, ya know."
Her lip quivered.
"What kind of teacher would I be, if I did not want the best for my student?"
"The usual kind." Naruto felt the urge to elaborate. "No one at the academy cared. No one's ever . . . wanted the best for me."
"There you go. They were, as you say, run of the mill." She pointed to herself. "I am exceptional."
"And humble. Very humble. Humility is your best quality." He scratched his neck. "So- uh, you want the best for me?"
"As your teacher, and as your friend— yes."
Embarrassment tinted his cheeks again. A silence settled over them. She looked away— went back to staring at the sky.
"Hey."
"What is it now, Naruto?"
"Thanks."
Midnight brought disquietude. So it was with purpose he pulled aside the paneling of his front door and ambled upwards, hoping against hope she would be up. He undid the latch and stepped out— the terrace yawned upon a fragrant star specked hollow. Noctuid moths floated in the night sky; from the street across there echoed the staccato squelch of tires. His eyes adjusted to the dark; and he breathed a sigh of relief, for he could see her in outline, perched atop the gable roof, her chin tucked in, her eyes on the amethystine aether that swelled above.
"Staying up past midnight is a bad habit," Satsuki murmured.
"Back at ya." Once more Naruto trundled over; once more he settled down next to her. Studied her with a sideways glance— she seemed uncharacteristically gloomy.
He stayed silent for a few minutes. Then the urge to know overpowered him.
"Hey."
"Hm?"
"What do you see?"
"I beg your pardon?"
"Ya got this real sad look when you're star gazing."
"Sad?"
She swiveled about and met his eyes. She had pretty eyes, and there lurked in their obsidian depths a mixture of naivety and curiosity — seen this way there was nothing cynical about her. Something disarmingly genuine instead. The randomness of this observation momentarily knocked him off balance.
Naruto cleared his throat.
"Yeah. Like . . . maybe that's not the best word? Wistful, I guess?
"You mean to tell me," she raised an eyebrow, "that all this time, while I was looking at the sky, you were looking at me?"
"Yeah." He did not bat an eye. "I've been studying you— as a good Shinobi ought to. Looking for weaknesses in . . . posture and facial structure." He met her stare with a look of confused innocence. "Why, what did ya think?"
"I've encountered corpses with better wit."
"That hurt, y'know."
"You'll survive."
"My wit may not."
"I'd miss it."
"Star gazing," Naruto repeated, grinning and turning away. "Why the long face?"
"I've seen you do it too. What do you see?"
There was genuine curiosity in her tone.
"I asked first."
"I can pull rank."
"That ain't even fair."
"We're Shinobi. We cheat. Get used to it."
"Way to tell me you're a shitbag without saying you're a shitbag."
"Naruto."
"Right, right."
He lapsed into a lugubrious silence. Scrutinized the sky with ponderous intensity and a singularity of purpose, as if manipulating the stars and their motions.
All at once he drew in a sharp breath.
"Dots," Naruto swore solemnly, recoiling, throwing a hand over his heart. "Black, black sky. Twinkly lil' dots."
"Outstanding depth of perception."
"I'm well known for it."
"I can tell."
"Ain't no dojutsu in the world that can do better."
"I can tell."
"You're fun to be around when you play along, y'know?"
There was warmth in her expression.
"The truth this time," she said. "What do you see?"
He did not have to look. His impressions when he thought about the cosmos had largely remained consistent. Over the last two weeks, however, there was an alteration. His erstwhile self satisfaction had muddied over; the rebellion predominated his visions to such a degree, that the thought of passivity impelled nothing beyond vague stirrings of inadequacy.
But he could not tell her that.
"I feel like I'm nobody. I feel like— there's a world out there. A world far from all this sadness, and I'm just a lil' speck of dust under it. Maybe I do something, maybe I change something. But there's no weight of expectation. I feel like . . . I can be what I wanna be."
"You dislike your family, don't you?"
That was out of the blue.
"What's that gotta do with anything?"
"Answer my question."
"Only my father."
"I loved mine." And there it was, that wistful look again. "He was a busy man. He rarely had the time for me. But sometimes, when I was sad, and when my brother was away, father would scoop me up and carry me to the rooftop. We'd sit there and watch the stars. He never said a word. I'd fall asleep against him. The next day I'd wake up in my bed, tucked in."
"Huh."
"I understand him better now," she sighed. "Second child. Daughter. Different expectations. I was not even the spare. I was never meant to take responsibility, so he went out of his way to never pressure me into anything."
"Sounds like a good man."
"He was. He was the best of men."
There was a brief silence.
"You asked me where I see myself in ten years."
"Yeah."
"If my clan were still alive, I'd serve for a while with distinction, then drop out and start a family, never to be heard from again."
The wistfulness transmuted into a gentle smile.
"That was to be my fate," she said. "And you know what? I'd be okay with that. I'd do it for my family. I'd do anything for my family. But they're not here; they're all gone; and so it falls on my shoulders to return their memory to its erstwhile glory. It falls on me, you see, to serve my village the way they would have. It falls on me, the daughter, the second child, to carry forward their legacy— and I will."
The wistfulness morphed into determination.
"When I look at the stars," she said, "I remember my father, and I remember being that child who clung to his arm. I look at the stars, Naruto, and I remind myself of how far I've come. I'm very good at what I do. Someday I will be the best. Someday the stars themselves will bow to me."
A week later, Satsuki woke him at dawn. She asked him to pack whatsoever he needed for a two day journey. She said she had a surprise for him. And so, after packing in a tracksuit and a week's worth of toiletries, he made his way to the entrance, where she awaited. She was dressed in an indigo hakama; she nodded a greeting, then left behind a clone.
They trekked shoreward and stepped into the sea. She did not lead him towards Fire Country. They went northwards instead, the low tide keeping them company. The sun crested the clouds and turned them into fire tailed vistas, glimmering marigolds. They sped through a smattering of saline eddies, her refusing to answer questions but looking very pleased with herself.
Eventually, with the sun poised right above their heads, and the mid morning heat scalding their skin, the first signs of vegetative land became apparent. The eddies had grown more frequent, stronger and more monstrous; through the sun's spell and the placid spray of sea foam they raged, churning gyre-like and producing a cacophony of sounds, as if of two boulders clashing. Broken islets lined his sight; these Satsuki ignored, and continued onward; but by now Naruto had started to suspect what this place was, and where she was taking him, so it came as no surprise when she led him past the omnivorous gyrations of one final whirlpool and gained a silted shore, the soil red.
The wrecks of a vanished civilization tottered before them.
"This is . . ."
"Uzushiogakure," she confirmed.
Her satisfaction was pronounced.
" . . . why?"
"There is a lot of significance in knowing what legacy you must strive to uphold." Satsuki threw her arms outward, encompassing everything that lay before them. "I thought you might appreciate this place, even though it is no longer what it once used to be"
This was just her way of communicating the necessity for ambition, Naruto realized. Satsuki derived meaning from grandiosity; she had brought him here, to this seat of his ancestors, to show him their erstwhile glory and boil his blood with their downfall. Family was her impetus; family kept her going— she hoped it would be the same for him.
It was not.
"I'm just Naruto," he said softly.
"I beg your pardon?"
"You said uphold things for these people." He gestured about. "I can't. And I won't. I did not know 'em. Their past means nothing to me. I'm just Naruto."
"You're an Uzumaki too."
"They had to give me a surname," Naruto said wryly. "They gave me my mother's. That's all there is to it."
She seemed disappointed.
"You would reject a storied historical connection on the basis of a whim?"
"Not whim." Naruto shrugged. "I can't be attached to people I don't know. I have Uzumaki in my name, sure; but I'm Naruto first, and I'll write my own story. I'll do it for me, not for anyone else. The Uzumaki clan? They're gone. They've lived out their lives. I'll live mine. No one can take that away from me."
Her eyes widened fractionally. The corners of her mouth underwent a downturn. She did not, however, deem it worth her time to contend the point.
"As you will, then." She turned away. "It was a waste of a trip."
"Never said that either." He looked around. "Musta been a beautiful place before they burnt it down. I'd like to spend some time here."
He ventured through pathways paved with porphyry. Ventured past decrepit arcades and crumbling colonnades that gleamed golden in the midday sun. Reached out and ran his fingers over a shattered peristyle, drawing comfort from its weathered coarseness, warming to the idea of this being the seat of his ancestors.
On impulse he rested his head against it awhile and traced in his mind's eye the rustle of his mother's footsteps. His mother, trueborn daughter of this sacred land, gliding through fronds, skittering over wet sand, prancing hand in hand with a friend or three. Warbling with the babbling brooks and rushes. Mounting up vertiginous cliffsides; clambering atop aery abeles and perched at the cusp of clouds, offering from there the limning sun her lilting laugh. The mother he had never known— free to float, free to love, free to live. Radiant and innocent, alive and alit with joy. Far removed from the ruin of her homeland and far yet from the grisly end which awaited her.
He stood still, eyes closed, head resting against that shattered spoke of a once great civilization; stood still, and immortalized her in his mind's eye. To him she was forever a pine scented sprite frolicking through the shadowed over meadows of this necropolis. Eternal and unchanging, uncorrupted and incorruptible. Hers the womb that fostered him, hers the cradle he sought, hers the love worth life and limb; and of this he was deprived, for she was a wisp exhumed from the sarcophagus of his imagination. Lost! Lost! Forever lost! She had survived the wreckage wrought here, only to perish on foreign soil. And she had not left a trace— not a touch, not a sigh, not a whispered goodbye. No redolent records to remember her by. Not even a solitary strand of hair. For hours he had pored over official documents, for days he had attempted to recreate her; but there was nothing, nothing at all bar one hazed over photograph; and so he associated with her a fictive history, and so pretended that these vivid imaginations of his were a paltry tribute to this woman whom he had never known but would forever cherish.
Would you be proud, mother, he thought, if you saw me now?
Would you ask why I am the way I am?
Would you understand?
Would you . . . even care?
Naruto had grown sentimental— he had grown morose. He had not expected this louring, this gloaming; but now as he threaded past upended minarets and sunken houses with the doors sawed off and the roofs scrunched away, his only companion was that overarching gloom. It seemed to arc out of his crushed soul, like a waning crescent, and work its way up into the sky, which bled black. Thus he dragged himself back to her. Satsuki had not followed him around; he had seen her atop a boulder before he left, her legs crossed, her sketchbook out. Now she vaulted off and approached him, a sheet in hand.
"For you."
She passed it to him— he took it, and found himself entranced.
The necropolis he had meandered through had been alchemized into a metropolis. Magenta flags fluttered. Decrepitude was shed like snakeskin— entablatures adorned the skein of youth. Alabaster towers embossed with ancient engravings saluted the skies. Charcoal hued houses, rescued from their ruin, populated the plains; alit hearths shimmered through their translucent panes, like cave fires in the dark. Her daedal craft had turned the dockyards he wandered through into a splendiferous sanctuary for warships. The town hall— its entire structure shrouded in defeat, a dirge to dismemberment — had been revitalized in a flurry of brush strokes; and at the center of it all, as if presiding over this glorious civilization, was Naruto himself— Naruto in profile, back turned but blond hair gleaming; and, standing next to him, an arm linked with his, her hair a cascade of red, was . . .
There was something scraping at the back of his throat.
Something in his eyes too.
The world had smudged over— and it was so very odd.
"That's my . . ."
"Your mother." Satsuki shifted from foot to foot. "I did not wish to presume, but you said nothing the other night about disliking your mother. So I thought—"
Naruto dropped all pretense of propriety and flung himself at her. His arms latched around her waist— he buried his head against her shoulder. Satsuki stiffened and let out a sharp gasp; but she did not shrug him off. Instead, as the seconds crept by, she slowly relaxed: her breathing evened out, and she melted into his embrace.
"Are you all right?"
A conciliatory palm roved about his back.
He nodded and tightened his grip. His mind was a mess: sensations, associations and visions all cavorted about, a rowdy herd. And through their chaos there came a note of clarity: he loved this girl more than life itself, and he was loath to let go.
But let go he did. He let go and stepped back, and saw her with stunning clarity, as if for the first time: the sardonic smile, the cryptic eyes, the ethereal beauty; but surmounting them all, the candle-light of this mesmeric humanity that she hid from the world; hid from them, but revealed to him alone, a benign luminosity, a star cinctured radiance: and he loved her for that, he loved her, he loved her . . .
"Are you crying?"
"Ain't." Naruto dipped his head and scrubbed his face with his sleeve.
"Are, too."
He wiped his nose vigorously and looked at the painting again. It was perfect, but—
"Mother and I are facing away." His voice was thick with emotion.
"You said I can't draw faces." She offered him an apologetic shrug. "I didn't want to ruin this for you."
"Why?" He asked. "Why did you—"
"Because if the cards had fallen differently, then Uzushio would have been your home."
There was something very empathetic about the look she gave him. It was a moment of shared understanding— both orphans, both with lost lineages behind them; and in the space of a glance she communicated this.
"I want you to remember that you'll always have this place," Satsuki said. "This clan will be yours forever, no matter where you go or what you do. It is the same with your mother— she'll always watch over you, and she'll be proud."
"If I hug you again—" Naruto's voice was hoarse, the tears were once again in freefall; but he did not care; "Will you be angry?"
"No," she laughed. "But you'll ruin the painting."
He hugged her— it was less awkward this time, and the painting remained unruined.
"Satsuki?" He stepped away. Rediscovered his manners. His voice was shy. "Thanks."
"It's all right, idiot." She rolled her eyes. "Anything for you."
They pitched their tents around a mossy cove, and now they sat around a crackling campfire, listening to the reverberating roundelay of far off eddies. They had brought with them mushrooms and marshmallows, rice and sushi, but Naruto nonetheless made a detour to the proximal sea for a type of fish which was a rarity peculiar to this place. This done, he fetched from a sealing scroll the requisite apparatus to flavour and fry it. Now its fragrant aroma spilled across their sequestered camp. Satsuki took one bite; her face altered; wordlessly she raised her chopsticks and demanded more; then with each subsequent bite, pleasure melted her expression and turned it tender.
"You're the best cook in the elemental nations," she declared.
"That's a bit much."
"That—," she swore, taking another bite, "— is the truth. If you decide to start up that restaurant someday, then I'll fund it."
There was not a hint of sarcasm in her tone.
"We'll see," Naruto laughed. "If I live long enough, I guess."
She chucked a chopstick at his forehead in response. The suddenness of this action caught him off guard, so he sat there stunned when it connected with his headband and bounced off.
"Don't talk like that." Satsuki rummaged about her in satchel for a replacement. "You'll live."
"It's ok if I don't, you know."
"It is not." The rummaging had become more violent. "Now stop spouting nonsense before I come over and smack you on the head."
"Ain't ever been a Jinchuuriki that hasn't seen the frontlines."
"So?"
"Ain't ever been a kage who hasn't led from the front." Naruto shrugged. "Our mortality rate is high for a reason."
Satsuki tilted the satchel upside down. The contents spilled out. She tore through the chaotic heap with a savagery that surprised him, crumpling a book, breaking two bowls, and snapping half a dozen hairpins before she found what she was looking for.
"They won't deploy you alone." Her voice was even. She went back to her meal, replacement in hand. "I'd be with you."
"How many kage have you faced, sensei?" Naruto asked softly.
For the first time he sensed uncertainty. Her lips thinned, her nostrils flared, her jaw tightened; her chopsticks hovered momentarily; then, after a second's indecision, she rose and handed him the bowl. Tucked away the chopsticks.
"Thank you for the meal."
"I didn't mean to—"
"You are right." She knelt and began to sweep the mess she had made back into her satchel. "I cannot guarantee your life. But if it ever comes to that, then you will outlive me." She buckled the satchel and stood. "Now stop thinking about such rubbish, and go to sleep."
She marched off without so much as a backwards glance.
Red carnations and red spider lilies intertwined in a never ending array that webbed the thicket and extended beyond its rim— stretched in a single file to the edge of the forest, the edge of the world. She was hidden amidst that fragrant couch, yet she knew no respite: there was only a dulled pricking at the back of her brain.
She rested her chin between the crook of her knees and huffed out a sigh.
Her best kept secret was that she could no longer remember the faces of the family she fought for.
At times they were faded blurs, shimmering just out of reach; at times they teased and tantalized, as if the flimsiest of thrusts would rent the veil that cloaked them; but no matter how she sifted through the sands of her past, she could not do so. Could not compose her parents in flesh and blood. Could not look beyond their profile or recall the features . . .
It had not been like that after the massacre.
But something had altered in the space of a year. Perhaps a part of her wanted to forget. By the end, though, they were gone; and though she associated with her clan an eternal love, their faces were vandalized busts with the expressions evanescent. Sometimes she gazed at a mirror and ran her fingers over her face, attempting to recreate her parents in her likeness.
But to no avail.
That had recently changed. Things were starting to emerge— things she thought she had lost forever in the sleepy hollows of forgetfulness.
Now a memory welled from the lethean stream where it tossed and turned: she closed her eyes and welcomed it, tears threatening the fringes of her lashes. It was her father, her father at the naka shrine with her in tow; and though the event was well remembered, this time she saw form and feature, recognized tone and tenor. He spoke at length about their history; he took her through the shrine and indicated towards a subterranean vault, where there lay a stone tablet that he prayed she would never have the misfortune of deciphering. Then he took her back to the entrance and spoke about honour. His harmonious words rang in her ears. His severe visage imprinted itself upon her irises. The lifelike warmth of his hand curled around her shoulder. Drew her in.
We are nothing without our honour, he thundered. Our word is our pride, and when all else is lost, honour is all that will be left of us.
She clung to him. Strove to enshrine every utterance. There was more, she knew. There was much more. But with every word the distance between them grew. The strength stole away from his voice. The face faded. The warmth perished— the coolness of the clearing was once more her solitary companion.
She opened her eyes.
They had all dropped into that abyss from which none returned. They had bequeathed her with a smattering of memories and a legacy of numbness and loss. And when Naruto had spoken about the eventuality of his own demise, that sense of loss had streamed back in. No. He would never be another faded memory. She would never again bury a person she had come to care for.
A languid hissing interrupted her thoughts. There wound through the panoply of flowers a peat shaded water snake; it sensed her distress and wove its way up her arm; stretched out and consoled her by gliding across her neck, where it finally rested, head pressed against the side of her face. Its flickering tongue brushed against her ear.
They stayed that way for a minute, neither saying anything.
"What is that fisherman up to?" Satsuki asked.
"That bridge will be finished before the month is out. The resistance has gathered momentum."
"Hm."
"You know how it happened, of course."
"Naruto."
There was no note of surprise in her voice.
"That boy has surpassed every expectation of yours."
"He is noble," she sighed. "Too noble for his own good."
The snake affirmed this impression with its involutions around her throat.
"Bringing him to Wave was a mistake," Satsuki said.
"I told you as much when you first asked me to spy on him."
"Hm."
"This charade was a bad idea. You should have left that boy in Konoha and killed the fisherman yourself, as the client demanded."
"I thought I saw . . . an opportunity. I wanted to disabuse him— I wanted to turn him into something he and I could be proud of."
"And now?"
She chewed the inside of her cheek.
"I don't want that."
She stared sightlessly into the distance. Spider lilies; that never ending brocade of spider lilies, their stems shuddering, their petals twisted like curved claws— beckoning. She looked away. Stroked the serpent. Death meant nothing to her; but to him it would be definitive: an end to innocence, an emergence into a world of woe, a breaking free from his cocoon of naivety.
It was what duty impelled.
But for once, the cry of duty was not quite as compelling. For once she would be . . . selfish.
"I decided a while ago to let them win."
"Is that wise?"
The sound that she made was half a scoff and half a laugh.
"Have you ever known me to be wise?"
The snake loosened its wringing and dropped into her lap. Its beaded eyes were solemn.
"You will lose a major client," it said.
"Mm-hm."
"It would be a stain on your record."
"Perhaps."
"The Hokage will be furious."
"The Hokage," she sighed, "when he returns, and when he gets to know the truth, will be furious, no matter what I do. I knew that before I set out. But now I understand what he meant when he said that the boy is soft. Soft, but brave. He is not gutless, as I first thought he was. He has defied me at every turn; he has risked insubordination and death . . ."
She let the thought hang unfinished.
"You care for him," the serpent hissed.
"I do." She traced a slender finger over the intricate patterns engraved across its spine. "I want him to stay the way he is. He is innocent, but he is also different. What they did to me— what I had intended— it would never work."
"You will be disgraced."
"So be it."
"The Hokage might hand him over to someone else."
"He is better off without me."
"You don't want to lose him."
There was a note of sympathy in the serpent's hiss.
Memories rose unbidden. Sun-kissed hair. A face framed in naivety. An entrancing sincerity that manifested itself in every word and action. The flush of satisfaction which permeated every pore when he thought he had defied her. The uncorrupted joy, the unbridled force of will in adversity, the unconditional trust. The ardor. The resistance. The rage. And, at the end, even the tears. A fount of tears which sprang forth from those azure eyes, all for a people forsaken. He could hurt no one.
"It doesn't matter."
What she would take away from this— what she would always carry with her, even after they parted ways— was the warmth. That is what she associated with him. When he had embraced her, there had been a wellspring of warmth in his touch, and as if in answer there had arisen a corresponding warmth in her heart. She felt safe in his arms. It was an ironic thought, an ironic feeling, because safety was forever the last thing on her mind.
"These last three months," Satsuki sighed, "they were different. Pleasant."
There was something in him that remained untainted despite everything she had put him through. Something that surmounted even the cynicism of her endeavours. Sustaining that purity would be impossible: someday his goodwill would curdle, his delusions shatter. But it would not be today, and it would not be by her hand. She would not break him— she would not turn him into what she had become. On this matter, at least, her mind was made. She would ask the Hokage to find someone else.
"But it is not for me. This sensei thing is not for me. All I bring is grief and death."
"I saw you teach. You were good at it."
"He has learnt nothing of value— and perhaps he is better off for it."
The formal letter of resignation she had penned this evening burnt a hole in the breastpocket of her hakama.
"You and I, we live and die by the sword," she murmured. "This teaching, this scheming, this sitting about and doing nothing— it isn't for us." She gave the serpent an amused look. "Naivety isn't for us."
"If that boy gets to know…"
"He won't get to know. Not a soul will know, other than the Hokage. I will tell him the truth and accept whatever punishment he deems fit."
She stared at the flowers. Red carnations. Red spider-lilies. One meant more than the other. But spider lilies suited her more. That was all she had— that was all there would be, for now and forever.
"The choice of this mission is my fault," she sighed. "The shame of failure will be mine alone. Let Naruto savour the sweetness of his triumph— he deserves it. And I will make it happen, for his sake."
Naruto had let her leave. He had waited for her; but when she had not returned, he had obeyed her and drifted off to sleep.
Now there returned the same dream: the wooden canoe, the viscous sea, the sense of sinking, the sandy spherical opening in the seabed. Cavernous network of catacombs. A solitary path that called out to him. Yet this time as he ventured into it, he retained conscious thought; he was no longer a drifting entity, but himself, and so it was with some trepidation that he noted the guttering columns of green flames on either side, and the unending runnel of drain water. Laughter beckoned. Ghastly laughter, rattling about the rotund walls— beckoning, forever beckoning. The path was narrowing; the walls were closing in; the space behind him was suddenly sealed off. Panic trilled through his soul. In a rush he sprinted forward; sprinted right through the collapsing tunnel, towards the molten light that spilled through an aperture ahead. Dived in. There was a great twisting behind him, a great wrench, a gravelly crunch, as of bone being powdered. His stomach lurched, his head spun. He looked up— the panic reached a crescendo.
For he was in a cave, and he was standing at the source of that drain water. Blue black carvings twisted on the walls and thrummed with life, a diabolical circuitry of monstrous veins. And before him, separated only by the flimsiest of barriers— a set of steel bars— there reclined a mammoth misshapen vulpine form, its eyes burning with hellfire, its canines exposed in a mocking leer.
"Hello, jailor."
Each syllable was a cacodaemoniacal rumble that sent shockwaves through the cave.
"Welcome to your mind."
A/N:
Tell me you expected that.
The maze of pathways is a slightly more complicated metaphor than the simple drain which canon used. A lot of my imagery, both in this chapter and elsewhere, is symbolic/ metaphoric/ carries some themes and ideas. It might be imperfectly done, but the prose isn't an optional skippable. You can skip it, for sure, but you'll always be missing out on a few things. This may or may not take away from your enjoyment of the work.
It is an AU. I make zero claims for canonical accuracy at any point. I also make zero claims about being a decent writer, or this being a decent fic.
I wrote four training montages worth 5k words, but cut them out from the final draft, because that's not what the fic is about.
Extended explanatory notes (last long one, I promise):
You can skip these notes if you wish to— it just doubles up as a Satsuki character analysis, plus addresses several potential complaints. It reveals what really happens in Wave. It is a long read, so read at your own convenience. I highly recommend reading it, though, since what happens beyond this point won't be all that clear to you without this endnote.
Nothing in this chapter is retcon. I am just a little disappointed no one noticed it before I ended up writing it out. But that second last scene this chapter is the first Satsuki pov since chapter 8. Her povs tend to be noticeable: they disappeared for about 50k words. This was done with a specific intention in mind.
Her pov here also answers two of the most obvious 'plot holes' the fic had:
1) How do you evade a Jonin's notice for so long while pulling off stuff like this? (you don't)
2) How does Hiruzen allow Satsuki to take Naruto to Wave, when he knows just how damaging it would be for Naruto? (he doesn't)
I think her pov here is pretty revealing. I will add a few things to it:
A good place to start decoding some of her decisions, actions and behaviours, would be to consider what themes she covers.
In this arc, she covers the debilitating effects of indoctrination and formative trauma. She is meant to demonstrate why enlisting child soldiers at the tender age of eight, after putting them through a training regime that would drive most adults insane, is a horrible idea; and how it forever stunts them on a psychological and an emotional level. It is a deconstruction of the "hokage level intellect at the age of five" trope. My assertion is the opposite: people who are put through a system this extreme, end up impaired in several fundamental ways. They are often lacking in basic humanity, and their decision making is horribly skewed. Satsuki here is an amoral recluse with an exterior of hardnosed cynicism, but a far more nuanced interior. Basically, she has a repressed sense of self, and very little sense of right and wrong. I have written her as Naruto's polar opposite in more ways than one.
She also poses a very interesting problem, namely: if you question the methods in which you were indoctrinated; if you can see the patterns of brainwashing, see every one of the links in the chain, and follow it every step of the way, then you are thinking for yourself, and your indoctrination loses some of its potency. You step outside its prison and recognize the horrors that were inflicted on you. You are never free, mind, but you are in a much better position to thwart it. In other words, the second you start asking the right questions, there is a chance you are moving away from what you were turned into.
Satsuki doesn't do any of this— therefore we must accept at face value that she cannot trace the exact procedures through which she was indoctrinated, nor can she list every single step in what must have been a very long, very intricate sequence of brain washing. Instead, she latches on to what hurt the worst, what had the most intensity, what remains etched in memory.
What she, in other words, erronously credits with her meteoric rise in power.
The final step of the ROOT indoctrination chain: a sequence of attachment, then disillusionment.
That is what she meant for Wave to be (for all of two and a half chapters, anyway).
Some other highlights:
Naruto decides he will help Kaiza in chapter 13. Satsuki correctly guesses what he will do as early as chapter 7.
Wave falls in a grey area between the professional and the personal for her.
It is an official mission. But Satsuki's rationale behind taking Naruto to Wave is personal.
She wishes to try and recreate what Danzo did to her, since she credits it with both her own loyalty, and her meteoric increase in power.
It is a rare paradox: a malicious action undertaken without any apparent malice in intent. She is simply trying to blindly mimic what was done to her, because in her own twisted mind, that is what good teaching looks like. It is what she has been taught— it is all she knows.
It is also a catastrophic blunder. This is objectively the worst decision made by a character in this fic. It never works when divorced from specific circumstances; what worked for her would never, ever work for a fourteen year old who has reservations about the entire Shinobi system. Her recklessness here has a domino effect later on.
Events in this fiction do not happen in a vacuum.
She first wavers on Wave in chapter 10 (Shiho healing scene), or three full chapters before Naruto has even decided that he will side with Kaiza.
Why?
Because Satsuki has two primary prisms of motivation (a third in the form of concern for Naruto is added from chapter 13 onwards, but two at that point in time). Her loyalty towards Konoha, which is overt; and her past, which is submerged. These two form the bedrock of all her decision making. They often overlap, but at times they don't. In that moment, they do not.
What happens is this: When she follows Naruto around and sees his tears for Wave; when she sees him weep over Shiho; when he begs her to heal the girl, it is not just Naruto or Wave Satsuki is seeing, but herself. Her past rushes back with a vengeance. She is haunted by memories of her eight year old self pleading with Danzo to spare Sai; she recalls herself breaking down and refusing to go through with it, despite dire consequences being threatened. All the grief and all the trauma of her own training and the "attachment-disillusionment" sequence she herself was put through come flooding back in; and in that moment, her hand is frozen. She cannot bring herself to do it— she has overestimated her cruelty and underestimated her repressed past's ability to freeze her hand. What felt like a great idea in theory turns out to be something she cannot do, because she recollects how badly it scarred her.
This is the point where she summons the snake and asks him to spy on Naruto, because she is done. She no longer wants to follow him around; she no longer wishes to remember, because the pain for her is too great.
She decides against going through with Wave midway through chapter 11. She writes it off, and gives up her original idea as a lost cause.
This is why her attitude towards Naruto from chapter 11 onwards is a lot warmer. She starts opening up, because the pressure and the urgency have evaporated, and because she thinks there is no conceivable way this mission can go wrong, no matter what Naruto does. Wave for her, at that point, is a write off: she has made a mistake; she is willing to accept the consequences and the censure it brings; and if she can at least break Naruto out of his passivity prior doing so, and leave him with a sense of accomplishment, then that's a good thing in her eyes.
Thus she tries making the best out of a bad situation and getting him to at least be active in the wake of a background threat, so that he gains something from the entire experience.
The result of this is that she ends up caring for him more than she expects to. There is a dawning awareness, even for her, of her own issues, and how she would end up damaging someone she values if she stays around them for too long. Instead of accomplishing what she set out to do, she has ironically grown attached, to the point: "I would do almost anything for you". Her pov this chapter is rare moment of self reflection, and it gives you a glimpse into what is, by all accounts, a very damaged mind.
If you are wondering why she grows so attached so quickly, then consider this:
Satsuki covers the problems of being a prodigiously talented child in a world of killers. The adults don't socialize with her, since they have their own groups that she is too young for; and those of her own age group pretty much live in a different world. They are either too intimidated or too immature. As a result, she has no support system (even Itachi had Shisui and Sasuke; Kakashi had Minato, Obito, Gai and Rin). She is an orphan who has lived in total social seclusion from the age of eight, with no one she can befriend and no one that treats her normally. She is a celebrity— this paradoxically also makes her an outcast. No one bar Kakashi treats her as a living, breathing human being— for most people, she is an object: either a village hero you admire from a distance, or that creepy young girl with weird eyes who probably eats bugs for breakfast and strangles kittens in her spare time, but that you are forced to go out on missions with, because she is insanely talented. Satsuki grows accustomed to the treatment, so she does not seek out company even as she matures. Naruto, as a result, is a refreshing change of pace. He does not pedestalize her. He does not give a shit she is the military equivalent of a celebrity. He isn't intimidated; he actively seeks her out on occasion and talks to her. He cares for her, in a way no one has, post her family and Sai's deaths.
On a subconscious level, this is a relief for her. It is a friendship she needs— one she has craved for all her life. She resents him initially, but is fiercely protective of him from chapter 13-ish onwards. It also helps that there is no 'he is my rival' dynamic, as there was in canon. As a result, once she comes to the conclusion she has made a mistake, and admits to herself that she cares for him, she bends over backwards to try and keep him happy, even when the personal cost to her would be significant.
There's still just the slight matter of her greater loyalty towards Konoha.
If I had to sum up her actions this arc, 'self-sabotage' would be the expression I go for. I have written her in a manner that facilitates every interpretation, from 'victim of her own circumstances', to 'budding sociopath', to 'some combination of the two'. The remorse, and her flawed idea of self atonement when she realizes she has made a mistake, make the out and out sociopath idea a hard sell, though.
List of scattered hints you (probably) missed:
1) The biggest one, obviously, is the disappearance of her pov from chapters 9-17. You see Satsuki through Naruto's eyes, not her own. I believe I made a point as early as chapter 2 about some of the restrictions of the pov format, and how the world is seen through the prism of our biases.
2) It is Satsuki who shows Naruto the mission scroll in chapter 7. I skipped the traditional taking of the scroll from the Hokage office scene.
3) Entire guilt contemplation in chapter 8, which is her last pov prior to this.
4) Waraji's first words to Satsuki in chapter 9, when they hit Wave, are: "we asked for you; just you, nobody else."
5) In chapter 11, after Zori's death, Waraji once again starts to say something about a delay; Satsuki shuts him up before he can finish the thought.
6) The snake, which shows up for the first time in chapter 12, when Kaiza takes Naruto inside Shiho's former home. It is very briefly mentioned. You are told in chapter 13 that Satsuki has a snake summoning contract.
7) The "bizzare coincidence" of Satsuki talking about finding a purpose in chapter 13, right after Kaiza approaches Naruto in chapter 12 and potentially gives him one. The absolute disappearance of any urgency in her tone. She pushes him towards the rebellion. I believe a couple of readers noticed this in real time.
8) The snake, which shows up for the second time in the last chapter, and this time has an entire para dedicated to it. A couple of readers noticed this one in real time too. The 'Iwa kunoichi', which is Satsuki under the cover of genjutsu. Naruto notices a "reddish glimmer in a puddle" a few paras before she appears. This is a reflection of the sharingan. He turns away from Kaiza just prior to that, which is when she puts Kaiza under genjutsu. Kaiza tells you twice that there should be no one near the warehouse, first somewhere near the beginning of the chapter, and second time just before the fight starts. She spars with Naruto to test his ability to handle himself in a life or death scenario; when she is satisfied, she slips away, giving you the kunoichi death ending, which is pure genjutsu. She inadvertently ends up traumatizing Naruto— the fact that this may be traumatizing is not something that even occurs to her in real time. But this chapter, when she discerns that he is having issues with it, she gives him time off. It is what starts her down the resignation route, since she realizes that her idea of normality is extremely damaging for someone she cares about.
9) Satsuki tells you at the beginning of this chapter that Hiruzen was out of the village when the mission was taken. It is the final piece in the puzzle. If you spotted that, then congratulations.
10) And all this is notwithstanding the reader's own awareness of her past, her ROOT training, the Sai death scene, and so on— things Naruto has no awareness of.
There is probably more that I am missing. But these are just off the top of my head.
That was . . . a brief summary of events. If you have any questions, or would like a more detailed character study, then feel free to ask.
It is important to note that her mindset hasn't changed. Her belief system hasn't changed. She simply doesn't wish to put Naruto through what she originally intended, because she cherishes him, and she remembers what the pain of disillusionment felt like for her. She remembers the agony it brought; and she is loath to put him through it.
But she does not question her own training. She still credits what Danzo did to her for her own rise in power. And if a figure of authority outright asked her to do it, she still would, as she did with Sai.
This ends up being a relevant detail.
I am aware that I have written a character whom a lot of people would consider twisted and repulsive: this is faithful to my original intention. This is the character I wanted to write. I personally believe that if you are writing a fem! Sasuke, then you ought to at least make an attempt at capturing both the best and the worst of Sasuke. Some of the complexities, rather. I've tried adhering to that.
That is not the arc ending
(even though I did consider making Satsuki's change in heart the arc ending and leaving it that way, because at the end of the day I am a degenerate shipper).
This is not a happy work.
Ultimately, though her remorse is genuine, and though she is sincere about her 'atonement', she has put herself in a very bad position, where it would not take much for her ideas to go horrifically wrong.
That is what happens.
Everything that can go wrong, does go wrong.