Author's note:
This story is set in Sasori's time, that means the Second-Third Shinobi War. In a time of war, even children are educated (or corrupted) in warfare.
link to what Hatsue looks like (yes, i'm pathetic haha) art/Hatsue-696925082 (just google it, it's in deviantart)
This chapter is dedicated to Anoni, your review made my heart pound, I might be in love with you (-winks-), I fear the day I'll write something out of whim and break your heart.
Around the shadows creep, like friends, they cover me.
If Sasori thought a friend is someone you talk to in your own convenience, he'd be wrong. So, so wrong. Hatsue would frequently pester him, or talk his ears off, or pawed at him because she was adamant to prove that everyone has a tickle spot, even him. His tickle spot was his feet, but he wasn't planning on telling her that. He learned that a friend is someone inconvenient. You must not leave your friend behind, you must invite that friend whenever you do stuff and you must share things with each other. The last one was emphasized by Hatsue. She lent him his paint brush which he has no use for it since he was not a painter.
What really bothered him however, was Hatsue's minor friends (they're minor because Sasori doesn't like them). They would take up her time so much to mediate between them to make up with each other that she had always little time to spend with him or he became a second priority. Then, he got fed up with the treatment that he says something to her.
"I don't like your friends." He confronted, casually saying it as if he was just describing the weather which is always hot. She shook her head but with a smile on her face.
"I can't change how you feel." She said so matter-of-factly.
At this, he was miffed. "Do something about it."
"I can't. Why?"
"I don't like them."
"They don't like you either." She replied, no big deal.
"Well, stop being friends with them!" He snapped, glaring at her. This boy didn't know the intricacies of friendship since it was also very vague for him. He thought it was only a matter of having common interests at the moment which gave him a pause because they were not similar. Similar or not, who cares? A child prodigy is still a child and children hates to share something they own especially those things they think they rightfully own, be it familial affection or their favorite toy. Children learn to share if they are taught how to share and why they must share, but who was there to teach this poor, poor boy whose dainty little hands gives form to wood as he waits in vain for his parents to come home?
"I can't just stop being friends because friends don't just stop being friends!" She reasoned. Oh how naïve this little girl was. Idealistic. Something only in a perfect world would exist.
"You're stupid, stupid!" An angry expression on his face, his hair matching his expression, curled in all sorts of direction as if ready to spring in mad action as he rattles off. "You're my friend so you can't be someone else's friend! I don't like them playing with you, taking up your time! I don't like how they think I'm weird and how they don't like me too and I think you forget about me when you play with them and I think you'll change your mind and stop being friends with me because you're having more fun with them than with me!"
She didn't mind the insult because she wasn't really stupid. She's proven him wrong when she says,
"I will not stop being friends with you." She promises, in a way that it almost makes it easy to uphold. "And I will not stop being friends with them."
Sasori knew he wouldn't be able to change her mind, or maybe he could but they were not close yet. That did not stop him to try something though. She was playing at a store with her other friends, eating happily at a snacks shop. A thin thread of chakra. A jerk of a hand. Hatsue spilled her noodles on her friend; she immediately apologized, wiping and helping her friend and children are children. The friend cried, humiliated, ran shouting that she was telling her mom about what Hatsue did. With the incident, the following days ensured that he had Hatsue's time all to himself which is such a wicked treat for him.
"Morning, Sasori." She jumped, waving at him.
"Morning." He mumbled his reply, ducking his head, a tad bit shy. He wasn't used to this yet, that is why grandma Chiyo wanted to invite Hatsue for a whole day which the girl enthusiastically accepted.
"I brought snacks." Lifting a bag filled with sweet, sticky dumplings called dango. His eyes lit up, such a child, affected by the sight of the sweet confections. Taking the bag from her and leading her towards his house, the boy noticed something different about her today… or maybe there wasn't anything different. Who was he to say? They haven't been friends for long.
"Ayahh." Grandma Chiyo made a sound like she was pleasantly surprised. "Hatsue, take off your poncho and I'll hang it here and Sasori, let me fix the snacks, take her upstairs and play both of you." The elderly took the piece of cloth from Hatsue's hands and pinched the girls' cheeks. (Old people really can't keep their hands to themselves, can they? The red head thought.) He handed the snacks and turned to face the girl.
Should he grab her hand?
Before he could mull over that question, the girl was already climbing the stairs and stared at him impatiently. He shook his head and a tiny curl of a smile came as soon as it left. He followed three steps behind her, giving her directions to his room. Its window overlooks the main road so he'd be the first one to see his parents come home if ever he was at home and awake. It had four corners and was almost bare if not for the closet, the bedside table and the bed too large of a single child to sleep on. Hatsue continued standing up even long after Sasori sat on the bed. At this, he gave her a puzzled look.
"I don't think I should sit down." She said, looking at him pointedly as though what she said was a sufficient explanation.
"Why?" The way he asked was so innocent and harmless, there was a slight tilt of his head as he stared at her.
"Because…" she started.
He waited. His grey eyes wonder why she was turning red, her cheeks are beginning to resemble his hair.
"I'm shy!" She blurted out with flushing cheeks.
A moment of silence. His voice quietly shook, a strange moment, he laughs at her silliness, the sound free, not forced, surprising her and because of this she was vexed. It took the boy a minute before he calmed down. By then, she already sat down on the bed because her feet were starting to ache.
"You'd think that you should be shy sitting on my bed when you already led me to my own room, walking as if you own the house!" His tone incredulous at her bizarreness, a tiny, boyish (he likes to think it sounded boyish, since he is a boy) giggle escaped, although short-lived.
"Sorry?" She offered, but she was not really sorry when she got to make him laugh. It wasn't on purpose but hey, she'd take credit in any way she gets to make him laugh.
"Hatsue…" He flopped down, lying on his bed. He wonders how he should say this. "You said I'm your friend, right?"
"Yes." She answered, there was no hesitation.
"For how long?" He asked, glancing at her while she was staring at a picture on the bedside table.
"For eternity." She replied simply as if the words she says are easy things to keep. Perhaps. Perhaps it is easy for a child but how easy would it be when they grow up? Not to mention, the talks of war are frequently circulating. Why was it so easy for her to say such things? Wasn't she scared?
"Even when I'm not like you?" He wondered out loud; He hadn't meant for it to be asked. She slowly turned to face him and stared at his steely eyes and what he saw was deep compassion, a care so great he was startled because things like that are as addictive as sweets to his sweet tooth. She is addictive to someone as empty as him.
"No, you're not like me." She didn't assure him that they were alike because that would be a lie. "You look like you're going somewhere far."
He gave her a surprised look because he didn't think he looked anything like that. He thought he looked snobbish. He heard the other kids talk. He didn't care.
"Even now, I think you're not really here with me." She raises her hands, hung them in the air probably trying to catch words to say. "You look like you're meant for something great. And things that are something great are never meant to be kept hidden, especially not in this village, sooner or later you'll go to places I can only imagine. You'll be great."
"You'll be great too." He told her. She smiled a smile not quite reaching her eyes.
"I'm not amazing, I barely pass as a ninja, all I can do is fancy tricks and basic stuff. All I can be proud of is painting."
"That's why you're great! You create art." Her paintings weren't pretentious; they had meaning.
"And where would that take me?" She voiced her fears now that the Chunin exams are approaching. "Great ninjas get to have cool missions in places far away from this village, maybe to a place where things in my book exist while I'm… stuck here because I'm not great, so no, you're not like me at all."
"Then train harder." He said. It was the obvious thing to do so why is she acting like it wasn't an option.
"I don't want to be a ninja." She whispered, afraid that if she didn't, her words would be heard by everyone and she was ashamed because being a ninja is everything in this world. This was a secret she never shared until now. "It must be a shock for you but all my life, as much as I admire them and hail them as heroes for the protecting the village… I don't want to become one."
"Why?" He stared at her wide brown eyes that looked like chocolate, they almost made him want to eat them up.
"I can't go to war. I don't think I can kill. I don't see what's the point of people from different villages to fight over a land. I know we badly need a land where we can farm but can't we just share? Divide the land in equal sides between Konoha and Suna? Maybe I'm a coward and maybe this is just an excuse but I'm scared of dying. What's even scarier, when you're in a battlefield you shouldn't think that everyone is just killing because they want to live because if you do think about it then your drive to kill them might be affected because all of us are just the same. We are all just trying to keep ourselves alive. Once I step into my first battlefield, I'll experience horrors I can never imagine." She paused, swallowing a starlight of words that express idealism. "And I'll become a different me, the guilt will plague me like a bitter disease, and I know I'll never get to paint the same way again."
Silence visited them again, sat with them like it was invited for tea.
They were indeed different. She can never be great, not in the way this world revered wars he thought. She was not great but she was good. This girl didn't belong in this era of wars. She belonged where she can travel freely, the sun shining brightly above her as she visits places she could only dream of and those sights will take her breath away that she'll sit there, an itch on her right hand because she had to immortalize the beauty around her. He knew everyone had no choice but to become a ninja, even his parents. This war will make both villages bleed.
He tugs her down and now they lay side by side and he felt like he had to confess what he had done because she shared something he knew she would never share to her other friends.
"I attached chakra strings on you to make you spill those noodles on your friend."
She stilled, a flare of anger licked her heart but she sees him and knows his ignorance in friendship.
"We'll be okay. I'll just apologize again." She won't tell on him and that was probably a test from him because they were both secretive and they jealously guard their secrets like a bear does with honey.
"What if you stop being a ninja? Just be a painter." He suggested.
"Who would buy my paintings in a time of war? At most, I'd be lucky if they were looked at." And she smiled at him, reading his thoughts. "No, you don't count. The paintings I give you is free."
"I forgot to answer your question." She took his hand and said, "Even when your hands stop being yours, even if they become an instrument to be used by the Kazakage, even if it becomes a puppet by the council, even if you're not like me at all, we'll be friends."
Her eyes were twinkling, it really tempted him to eat them up.
"Also, as long as you keep your heart, no matter how it becomes when we go into war, as long as it's there, we are friends for eternity." She smiled, her cheeks still had a little baby fat and it was simply adorable for him, like there's a squeeze in his heart.
When she smiled like that, it's like she is asking him to bite her cheeks.
The next day she left him another paper crane, it was the second time, this time it was simpler drawing of an endless knot with her name on the left and his to right. There were written words on the back, a detailed explanation that read:
endless knot was also known as mystic dragons, two Nagas or serpents intertwined, battling for the fate of the world, we are like the serpents, locked in a struggle forever but we are not the good and evil, there's no evil, only choices that we think is better, I am the good (presumptuous of me but humor me) serpent and you are the great (because you are) serpent intertwined to struggle against the world. I hope our lives will be intertwined forever. We'll be eternal. We are eternal.
Sasori was left with a daze after he read it, because he swore he could almost hear her voice saying those last words. We are eternal. When he is old enough, he should ink her words on his skin.
Just want to lay me down and finally try to get some sleep
Chunin exams are only three months away. (A's note: In Naruto's time, the age of graduating from academy is 12 but I think Sasori's batch would have to graduate early because the Sand is at war with the Leaf, as you can see at Sasori's profile in narutopedia, he graduated at the age of 7 and was promoted at the age of 8)
It had become a reality for Hatsue that she was going to war and that was unavoidable, Sasori feared for her safety so he asked grandma Chiyo if he could learn poisons with the girl. They were inside elder Chiyo's workshop, a dark basement with only a lamp as their light, it flickered casting shadows of them, it was all but quiet because of the sandstorm raging outside. Elder Chiyo, with her grey hair and wrinkles that came with knowledge and experience, noted the girl's aptitude for memorizing, she remembers everything word for word straight from the text book.
"Hemlock or Conium has a purple-spotted stem, fernlike leaves, small white flowers, and a distinct unpleasant smell. Highly toxic. For an adult, the ingestion of 100mg of conium or about 8 leaves of the plant is fatal - death comes in the form of paralysis, the victim's mind will be wide awake but the body will not respond and eventually the respiratory system shuts down." An unnerving thing to hear a child, barely eight, an age of her grandson recite words of knowledge on poison. For a moment, the old woman's hand shook. She grew up living in a war, thought of it as natural and now, she thinks there is nothing reasonable for children to go to war. But they had made their bed and they must sleep on it.
"If I wanted to poison someone fast and remain undetected in a crowd, what poison should I use?" Elder Chiyo asked. How effective is the poison
"Aconite. Poisoning can occur even after touching the leaves of the plant without wearing gloves as it is easily absorbed in a rapid pace. It is untraceable in nature that is why it is primarily used in assassinations." Sasori answered.
"What are the symptoms? Hatsue."
The girl nodded and replied, "The symptoms of poisoning are tingling and numbness of tongue and mouth and a sensation of ants crawling over the body, nausea and vomiting with epigastric pain (a name for pain or discomfort below ribs in the area of the upper abdomen), labored breathing, pulse irregular and weak, skin cold and clammy, features bloodless, giddiness, staggering, mind remains clear."
"How effective is the poison? Sasori."
"All the species contain an active poison Aconitine, one of the most formidable poisons which have yet been discovered: it exists in all parts of the plant, but especially in the root. The smallest portion of either root or leaves, when first put into the mouth, occasions are burning and tingling, and a sense of numbness immediately follows its continuance." He paused for a breath. "One-fiftieth grain of Aconitine will kill a sparrow in a few seconds; one-tenth grain a rabbit in five minutes. It is more powerful than prussic acid (hydrogen cyanide) and acts with tremendous rapidity. One hundredth grain will act locally, so as to produce a well-marked sensation in any part of the body for a whole day. So acrid is the poison, that the juice applied to a wounded finger affects the whole system, not only causing pains in the limbs, but a sense of suffocation and syncope (fainting)."
"What is the antidote for this poison? Hatsue."
"There is no immediate antidote but the symptoms can be counteracted by anti-arrythmic drugs or agents that are found in various herbs that slows the heart down." Hatsue wore a blank face. "This poison is effective to coat weapons."
Elder Chiyo looked at both children, the boy lost his parents before he could even know them, making him hollow but she sees that Hatsue is a companion much needed by her grandson, especially now that Sasori had begun to smile. And the girl, the old woman knows, the girl is too soft for war; those wide brown eyes gives her softness away. She stood up, patted their heads, pinched their cheeks. She told them she was going upstairs to fix dinner. Now that grandma Chiyo was gone, they could talk how she was feeling.
"You don't like this." He knows her well enough now.
She shook her head and gave a vain laugh. "I don't have a choice."
"'There hath beene little heretofore set down concerning the virtues of the Aconite,
but much might be saide of the hurts that have come thereby.'"
She stared at him, gaping.
"'I have heard that Aconite
Being timely taken hath a healing might
Against the scorpion's stroke.'"
"You're a poet?" She thought it was absurd. He laughed because he wasn't.
"Granduncle Ebizo recited those when he drops by and watched me memorize poison with grandma." He looked at her. She had a far away look in her eyes. "You're worried about the exam?"
"Yes." She nodded and she saw his furrowed eyebrows making her laugh. She knew he was trying to find words to comfort her. "I don't think I'll pass."
"Don't say that." He gave her a stern stare.
"I know you'll pass though." She smiled at him, already proud.
He crossed his arms. "I won't pass without you."
"You can, if I do pass, we'll go to war together but if I fail, I'll still have to take the exam again."
"I like being around you. I don't think I'll like it without you."
"I don't think I'll like it too."
3 months later. Sasori passed the exam.