Author: Snow Tigra
Pairings: Naruto and Sasuke, yes NaruSasu
Warnings: This is the sequel to the challenge fic "Recognize Me" that I posted a while ago. ANGST warning. The last one was angsty, this one's even worse.
You still live in the same room.
Bed in the corner, tucked close to the wall and blankets scattered across the floor from fevered dreams and quick mornings. A small semblance to a kitchen is tucked into the opposite corner, looking to have never been used. I wonder if you ever learned how to cook in these years, but the piles and piles of instant ramen cups stacked in and around the garbage can speak to the contrary. You even have a carton of expired milk sitting out on the counter, near the sink. Some habits just die hard, don't they? You never remember to check.
The table in the center of the room is the only real change. There isn't food there, nor plates or bowls or ramen cups. Rather you have a small map with a pad of scribbled notes, laying across the table. It looks like teaching supplies, showing that you have changed a little, in that you do apply yourself to learning things and keeping ahead, but only when others aren't looking or wondering about your image.
Hanging on the wall, above your headboard is my old headband, complete with the scratched line across the leaf symbol.
I wonder, does it make you dream of me?
You're quiet as you go about your after class routine. The chuunin vest comes off, resting across the chair, and the black shirt underneath is untucked. Shoes come off and the window is closed to keep out the chilly night air. Your eyes flicker to the headband on the wall and then back to me and I can tell you still don't believe your own instincts.
I don't blame you.
"Sasuke..." Your expression changes, frowning with age and worry as your matured mind comprehends what me standing here means. It could be any number of things and I can see the questions dance across your face, aiming for your tongue in the chance of being spoken. The trained chunnin mind would turn me in, I'm a traitor to everything. The trained chuunin before me is fighting with the frighten gennin I knew, the one who wanted me back so badly.
I watch as one question wins, the logical one, which you ask as you sit down in the single chair by the table. "Orochimaru?"
"Is dead. I killed him." The words are simple to say. You don't need to know the details of what happened. The blood on me, the scared eyes of the boy who's body I took. Oh, and of course, the look of anger and hatred on Kabuto's face. I killed him too, finally taking out my revenge for all the annoyance and pain he caused me. He never really liked me anyway... so I let him take his own hatred to the grave. Let him, his snake and my brother all burn in hell together, having to deal with each other rather then me having to deal with any of them.
"Why are you here, Sasuke?"
And there was the question for the gennin Naruto I used to know so well. Maybe, once upon a time, that question would have made me smile. But now that it's been asked... I don't know if I can answer.
After all what do I say to you?
That I came back to see you? That I came back to apologize? That I came back to take my revenge on the village and kill them all, just like Orochimaru tried to do? What do I say to you after all these years? And honestly, what exactly do I want? Because I don't know, it isn't something I'd thought of completely. Seems my old habits haven't stopped, have they? I still don't completely think things through.
Your face is warring again, a fury of emotions as I don't answer your question, searching for my own answer.
"You shouldn't stay, Sasuke. I can't... let you stay. You... you're a rouge shinobi... the Anbu will hunt you down and kill you. You can't stay. And I... can't go with you." You look away from me, out the window where the wind has picked up, making the trees dance. "I don't want to make Neiji and Chouji fight me or us."
I give you a nod, at the logical explanation, watching your eyes. I can see the younger you screaming, yelling that you want to strangle me and shove me against the wall and at the same time you want to come with me. Somewhere... go anywhere...
You'd still throw away your dream of being Hokage just for me. And for the first time... that thought makes me hurt.
"One night." I manage to say softly. I want more. I want nights, days, months, years... I want you following me like an incessant puppy dog, yelling about how much you hate Sasuke and how you don't want to be saved. I want you to fight me and kick my ass and beat me into the ground, screaming about how I'm a fool an idiot...
I'm kneeling on the ground. I think I fell there, bathed in my own thoughts. Your room seems small and cold, closing in like the caves I'd spent so many years of my life in living with that snake. I feel cold. I feel dead. I feel as if I'm crumbling, falling apart... dying.
Then you move, wrapping your arms around me. How can you do that? How can you stand to be this close to me, after everything I've done? How can you trust me? How can you even touch me, try to comfort me or just let me fall apart? This isn't the Sasuke you know, I'm not him. I'm completely different. I'm someone else. I'm a demon who's possessed this boy's body, stolen it from him along with his life in the vain hope that I could try and recover what I'd so foolishly thrown away. But you would never take me back, not in a million years. And even if you did, this village certainly wouldn't. There's no reason for them to.
You're moving me now. Your arms are stronger and you've picked me up, carrying me to the bed. You lay me down and in the next moments the lights are off and you're next to me. I can't move, I can't respond. I can barely feel your arms move around me and your lips across my neck. Goose pimples move down my spine and somewhere in my head my panic starts to fade.
I've wanted this for how long? I've wanted you like this reversed. I've wanted you to crumble against me forever. I used to think it was the same wish to prove I was the better of us, the stronger. But now, with you holding me, I know that wasn't the reason. It's because I wanted someone close.
"Sasuke..."
Your words cross my ears and I curl against you, my body shaking. I don't protest as you take off my clothes and look over my new, younger body. And then you touch me, pressing your older warm body against mine, smothering me in your scent. You smell too good...
"Sasuke..."
Bury me Naruto.
"Sasuke..."
Smother me.
"Sasuke..."
Choke me.
"Sasuke..."
Crush me.
"Sasuke..."
Destroy me.
"Sasuke..."
I'm not Sasuke! I don't know who I am. I don't want to live like this any more. I want you to kill me. "Kill me."
You stop in your movements and I watch your eyes close, tears threatening. I just ruined it all, whatever image you had in your mind of us. You expected something completely different from this, you wanted me to crumble and come back to you. And once again, as always, I messed it up.
"Why did you come back? Why?!" Now you're yelling, just like the Naruto I used to know. I'm sorry... but I like you this way better. No matter how much it hurts both of us.
"For you."
Silence fills the room. Then, suddenly, you're moving inside me. You're angry and I can barely stop screaming against you. You're crying too... but somehow this feels better then crumbling.
I'm watching you now, while the sun is rising. I've already left your room, your bed and soon your life. But I just want to make sure you aren't in trouble for my lapse of judgment and momentary loss of courage.
She looks so much older now. Her hair is long again, pulled back into a braid to keep it from her eyes in her studies. She makes trips for the Hokage everywhere so she doesn't have to be bothered. Her headband still crosses her hair like it always did, hinting back to the girl who hated you and worshiped me. Another red dress and fishnet up the arms and long legs create a strange hybrid of the girls we knew and the future sixth. I see the light in your eyes die just a little more when you see her and I wonder if there's a single person in this village who doesn't remind you of the dreams you've lost.
She's asking you about me, demanding with her hands on her hips. She wants to know why I was here, what I wanted and why you didn't tell her. You don't tell her anything. In fact you two just start yelling like you used to, and finally she smiles sadly, obviously reminded that you will never grow up and that you will always be the same.
"He's gone!" You yell at her once more before the anger fades and you let her hold you. I suppose that was the way you wanted me to hold you last night.
Yes Naruto. I'm gone. Completely gone now. You won't see me in your classes. The Anbu won't run across me in a mission. And I won't show up at your door in the middle of the night. I'm gone forever and not coming back.
Go with her Naruto, you don't need to remember me anymore.