'How can I say this without breaking?
How can I say this without taking over?
How can I put it down into words?
When it's almost too much for my soul alone
I loved, and I loved and I lost you
I loved, and I loved and I lost you
I loved, and I loved and I lost you
And it hurts like hell
Yeah, it hurts like hell'
~Hurts Like Hell
Fleurie
Consciousness returned to her slowly. She woke up on the ground. 'Why am I on the ground?' She thought, incredibly confused.
Slowly pushing herself up into a sitting position, she saw that her clothing was ripped and stained; and that she was covered in scrapes, bruises and dried blood. Who's blood, she didn't know, and she wasn't very keen on finding out.
Using a nearby wall to push herself up on to her feet, she took in the area around her. 'Wow... what a dump.' She thought, grimacing.
True to her thoughts, the area around her, a village if her foggy memory can correctly recall, looked terrible.
What once possibly were magnificent, tall structures were presently nothing but a pile of rubble. As far as she could see, which was surprisingly far, there was only rubble and destruction. The path, made of stone slabs, was filled with craters and cracks. Slowly, she started moving forward, using the remains of a wall as support.
'Jeez, it looks like this place got hit by a hurricane.' She squinted her eyes and titled her head to the side as another thought entered her mind, 'What's a hurricane? Or better yet: where am I? What happened? Who-'
She stopped moving. Her eyes widened and she collapsed onto her knees, vision going blurry, 'Who am I? Why... why don't I know who I am?' She thought hysterically. Her breathing was becoming more haggard. Her hands unconsciously moved up to her head and gripped at her hair.
Suddenly stopping, she slowly loosened the death grip she had on her hair and took a deep breath. Her eyes slid shut as she placed her hands against her chest, gradually getting her breathing under control. It came to her naturally, almost like it was instinctual. Like she's done it before.
"Focus." She told herself, "Now isn't the time to panic. Take in your surroundings, assess the situation, figure out what you can, and don't give up. Ever."
She blinked, looking down at her palms, which were covered in blood, "Well that was something." She said, before frowning, "First thing's first, wash off the blood."
Looking around, she saw a stream a couple of rubble piles away. Getting up on shaking legs, she slowly walked towards it, nearly falling on her face a couple of times.
Finally, she reached what she first thought was just a simple stream. Kneeling down, she could see that the small stream actually came from a massive body of water just beyond the rubble.
"Whoa." She muttered, "Guess I'm on an island." She then bent down and quickly washed her hands. After washing most of the blood off of her hands, she took notice of her reflection in the water. The girl that looked back at her seemed to be a young adult, with waist-length, fiery red hair. She made eye contact with her reflection, and took note of her bright blue eyes. She had fair skin and, weirdly enough, three whisker-like marks on each cheek. The whisker marks were quite prominent as well.
'I'm pretty sure those aren't normal.' She thought, bringing a hand up and tracing the marks. 'Still, I kinda like them. They suit me. Also damn, they're nearly as thick is my finger.'
She stood up from the water and looked around, trying to decide in which direction to go.
A sudden explosion in the distance answered her query, 'Guess I'm going that way.' She thought. She turned and gave the water one last look, before heading towards the smoke that was slowly rising in the distance. If she were to look in the water for just a moment longer, she would have noticed that her pupils were more slitted than round.
"That... took a lot longer than I thought it would." She huffed out, finally reaching the origin of the explosion and subsequent smoke nearly 20 minutes later.
The trek took a lot longer mainly because she had to navigate around the rubble, and kept running into dead ends.
Strangely enough, she had the urge to jump on top of one of the still standing buildings and travel that way, but that stupid. Who'd use the roofs of buildings to travel? They could get seriously hurt.
After catching her breath, the redhead looked up to find the source of the smoke. The sight that greeted her very nearly made throw up.
Bodies. There was nothing but dead bodies. Horribly mutilated bodies. Her entire form shook because of the gruesome sight in front of her.
Steeling herself, she approached the body closest to her. She couldn't see the person's face, but they had beautifully long blonde hair. She knelt down next to the corpse and cautiously checked for a pulse.
Nothing.
'Poor soul.' She thought, moving to flip them around to see what they looked like, 'May they rest in peace.'
The face that greeted her was that of a young adult female. She couldn't have been older than 30. Her lips were chapped and parted. Dull dark eyes stared up at nothing.
The redhead had to turn away suddenly, blinking away tears. She took a shuddering breath before slowly lifting one hand go gently close the woman's eyes.
"Narumi! Get back here!" The blonde haired woman yelled, running on top of the water surrounding Uzushio, being careful to avoid the whirlpools.
"You're never gonna catch me!" Narumi, approximately 8 years old, yelled back, running a short distance ahead of her.
"You're old age is making you slow, Yugito-nee!" Narumi continued, craning her head back to look at the blonde.
"Oi!" Yugito shouted, a frown forming on her face. Nevertheless, her eyes twinkled in amusement, "I'm 21, Gaki. I'm far from - Look out!" Halfway through her sentence, Yugito's eyes widened in horror and she sped up.
Twisting her head back around, Narumi saw that she was about to run straight into a whirlpool, "Oh shi-" The rest of her sentence got cut off when she stepped into the whirlpool. Said whirlpool reacted immediately and started pulling the child towards its center.
"Narumi!" Yugito called, stopping at the edge of the whirlpool. Her eyes roamed over the dangerous water, desperately searching for the young redhead.
A sudden force collided with her back, and it was only due to years on ninja training that she didn't tumble into the whirlpool.
"Did I scare ya, Yugito-nee?" Whipping her head around, Yugito found herself face-to-face with an unharmed Narumi, "You should know by now that the whirlpools don't hurt Uzumakis." Narumi continued.
"Gaki!" Yugito yelled, plucking Narumi off of her back and holding her against her chest, ignoring the indignant yelp Narumi made, "Don't do stuff like that. My heart can't take it."
Narumi chuckled, "See, Yugito-nee, you are old."
"Shut up." Yugito mumbled, continuing to cuddle the child. "C'mon." She said after a while, "Let's go track down your brother and get some ramen." Yugito then started walking back to the village, still being cautious of the whirlpools.
"Yay, ramen!" Narumi yelled, before snuggling further into Yugito's arms, "Arigatō, Yugito-nee."
Yugito smiled down at Narumi and said, "Dōitashimashite, Imouto."
She stumbled away from the blonde's corpse. Her eyes screwed shut as more memories of her and the woman, Yugito, flooded her mind.
"Yugito-nee..." She, no not she, Narumi, mumbled, staring at her apparent sister's body with tears forming in her eyes.
Narumi brought a hand up to muffle her sobs and took a step back, away from Yugito's body. She stepped on uneven ground and lost her balance, falling backwards and rolling down a hill.
Narumi caught herself just in time, saving her head from a nasty bruise. Ignoring the stinging scrapes now on her hands and knees, she looked up to see where she landed. Her eyes widened and all the blood immediately drained from her face.
In front of her was a sea of corpses. The ground was stained red from the massive amount of blood on it, and the majority of the corpses were horribly mutilated.
Narumi got up on shaking knees and cautiously walked towards on of the corpses. Using her foot, she nudged it so that she could see the face.
"Oji-san! Oji-san! Look!" A short man turned towards the direction of the voice. He had dark blonde hair and bright, pupilless pink eyes. There was a jagged scar running from below his left eye to the bottom of his chin. On his back was a massive black hook-like weapon.
A red blur ran into him, nearly toppling him over. He grunted but managed to keep his balance. The orange and yellow blur that ran into him a moment later was what caused him to topple over.
"Yagura-san!" The man, now identified as Yagura, looked up at the two energetic children sitting on top of him. Two sets of bright blue eyes looked right back at him. Both has whisker marks on their cheeks. The two would be identical if it weren't for their hair colour. One had bright red hair, while the other had yellow hair that was somehow brighter.
"Yeah, Gaki's?" Yagura grunted out, trying and failing to push the twins off of him.
"Oji-san, look!" The blonde exclaimed, jumping off him, shortly followed by the redhead, and pulling Yagura to his feet, "We're almost as tall as you now, Yagura-san." The redhead said, grinning up at him.
Only, it wasn't really up anymore. Yagura finally took notice of their height, and a frown quickly formed on his face.
"That's not fair." Yagura said, crossing his arms and pouting like a child, despite being in his 20's.
"It is too fair." The blonde boy said, grinning, "We're 11 years old, Oji-san. You knew we would eventually outgrow you."
"Doesn't mean I have to like it, Naruto." Yagura muttered, still pouting.
The redhead reached up and, with little difficulty, patted Yagura on the head, "There, there, Yagura-san. Just because you're gonna be the shortest Jinchūriki again doesn't mean any of us are gonna love ya any less."
"Stop petting me, Narumi!" Yagura yelled, slapping Narumi's hand away from his head. He then reached behind him and grabbed his hook, "And I am not short!"
Naruto grabbed Narumi's hand and quickly ran away from the angry man, a bright grin on his face, "Uh oh, run Nee-san! We made Oji-san mad."
Narumi grinned back at Naruto and said, "It's not my fault he can't accept the truth, Otouto."
An angry yell came from behind them, and they both giggled before running faster.
"Yagura." Narumi mumbled, sorrowfully staring at the man in front of her. 'Who was the blond boy with me in the memory?' She thought, 'If I remember correctly his name was... Naruto?'
The name, as soon as it entered her thoughts, acted as a catalyst. Hundreds upon hundreds of memories flooded Narumi's mind at once, overwhelming her.
Narumi fell to her knees, clutching her head in pain. She squeezed her eyes shut and cried out.
Finally, after what felt like an eternity, the influx of memories subsided. Narumi was on all fours on the dirty floor, fat tears pouring down her face.
'I remember now.' She thought, sniffling. 'I should definitely be dead.'
Narumi lifted a hand up and placed it against her abdomen, where her seal used to be, 'Kurama. Thank you for your sacrifice. I'd be dead if it weren't for you. I'll never forget you.' She thought, before slowly pushing herself up.
Her legs, now more sure than ever, carried her to where she remembered the final battle took place. There, she found both her closure and her worst nightmare. Because there, among the rubble and various corpses, was the corpse of her younger twin brother, Uzumaki Naruto.
She knelt down next to his corpse, tears once again leaking out of her eyes.
"Hey, Otouto." Narumi said, weakly smiling down at the man. "I'd just like to say thank you. To both you and Kurama, wherever that fluffy bastard may be. Probably with the rest of his siblings again."
Narumi gave a weak chuckle, reaching up to wipe her tears away, "Sorry, I've always been such a crybaby, haven't I? And you can't even respond like how you usually would."
Narumi's eyes softened as she reached to gently run her fingers through Naruto's hair, "How's heaven? I imagine that it's nice. I have no doubt that that's where you ended up. Right up there with Kaa-san, Tou-san, and all the other Jinchūriki. Sasuke's probably up there too. He must be happy to see you again, I know I'd be."
Narumi released a shaky sigh, before focusing back on Naruto's face, "I'm gonna miss you, dattebane. Your tendency to yell instead of talk normally. Your love of ramen: who am I gonna share that with now? I'm definitely gonna miss my 'datte-' buddy. Hell, I'm pretty sure I'm even gonna miss how much you complain to me about how hot Sasuke is. That was annoying, by the way. Just so you know. You cannot believe how happy I was when the two of you finally got together. And now I'm not even gonna become an auntie. At least you can be happy with him up top."
Sighing, Narumi stood upright again and stared off into the distance, "I should probably be a lot sadder about this. I think I've lost and cried a bit too much in this war to have any tears left. I'll probably just break down one day in the future and mourn the lot of you. But right now, I'm actually kinda glad I can stay level-headed. There's no way a sobbing mess is gonna be able to bury you all."
"Well isn't that sweet." A very familiar voice hissed out behind her.
Whipping around, Narumi didn't notice her fingernails elongating into claws, nor her vision sharpening.
There, a couple of feet away from her, lay the bane of her existence. The one who started the Fourth Great Ninja War. The leader of the Akatsuki. The one who personally caused the fall of Konoha and Uzushio. Black and red cloak and all. Even without his mask, he was easily recognisable.
There lay Uchiha Obito.
He... honestly he looked like he was hanging on to the living world by a thread. He looked bad. Narumi cautiously lost her fighting stance and approached the dying man in front of her.
"How the mighty have fallen, right?" Obito asked, glaring at her, "Go ahead, laugh it up."
"As terrible as you are," Narumi began, "I'm not going to laugh at a dying man, Obito. That's more up your alley."
"So, who dealt the finishing blow?" Narumi asked, kneeling down next to the man. She could clearly see that he was in no condition to do her any harm, and she was curious.
"I wasn't really here to witness it. Since, you know, you threw me across the island." She deadpanned. Obito had the audacity to laugh at that, though the chuckle quickly turned into a coughing fit. If Narumi looked closely, she could see blood dribble down his chin.
"...Naruto did it." Obito said after a moment. "He got really mad after I impaled you and tossed you off into the distance."
Obito slowly and painfully turned his head to peer at Narumi's torso, "The Kyuubi healed that up nicely, didn't it? There's not even a scratch left. What did end up happening to it? Did it di-"
Whatever Obito wanted to say was cut off by Narumi's hand whipping forward and wrapping around his throat.
"Don't you dare insult Kurama." Narumi hissed out, ignoring how Obito began gasping for breath, "He practically raised me. He got me and my otouto out of that hellhole that was Konoha. He sacrificed himself to save my life. He was my best friend, and you have no right to disrespect him you worthless worm."
Throughout her speech, Obito's face became a nice shade of blue. Almost regretfully, Narumi let go and allowed the murderer to take in gulps of air.
Obito, after regaining his breath, let out an insane laugh. Narumi looked on in poorly hidden disgust. She's not usually one to despise people, but she despised and feared Obito with her entire being and then some.
"Y-you," he stuttered, still giggling like the dying maniac he was, "You really care about that demon, don't you? Tell me, how'd it feel when you realised he was giving up his life so you, a pathetic empathiser, could live?"
If looks could kill, Obito would be dead twice over by now. But Obito either didn't know or didn't care about Narumi's stare. He just kept going, practically rambling at this point.
"Just in case you didn't know, I was the one who orchestrated your parents' death. But you probably already knew that, didn't you? I was also the one that killed your brother. We hit each other at the same time. My blow was just closer to the heart than his. I liked watching the live drain out of his. Your parents too. That's the one thing that I particularly enjoyed about killing your family. Watching the life drain out of their-"
Whatever Obito wanted to continue rambling about was cut off by Narumi. She moved without thinking, overwhelming rage clouding her mind. The next thing she knew: Obito was dead, and a part of his throat was between her teeth. Blood dripping down her chin and neck.
Narumi spit the flesh out of her mouth, collapsed onto the ground, and cried.
Yugito-nee = Big Sister Yugito
Gaki = Kid/Brat
Arigatō = Thank you
Dōitashimashite = You're welcome
Imouto = Little sister
Oji-san = Uncle
Nee-san = Sister
Otouto = Little brother
Kaa-san = Mom
Tou-san = Dad
Jinchūriki = (Power of) Human Sacrifice