Forgive me for taking long AGAIN for this. Life as usual and me feeling like crap while working hard here.
Now we are back to the present day, the group has just graduated high school and are on the way to their futures - Tsunade is also missing, so a year has gone by now - and that is all I am going to spoil for you guys so that there is no further confusion. Just read and see what will happen. ;D
Oh, yeah there is a warning for the end of the chapter, where "White Zetsu Metamorphosis" fifth chapter inspiration REALLY comes in. Proceed with caution, those of you who are fainthearted. Don't flame, please!
Chapter Five
Voices of the Angels
Present day
The college graduates were lucky to experience the cherry blossoms on their graduation day, though for the high schoolers, they were just disappointed in a way, but at least at the end of the month, they would have their chance as they did all their lives.
High school years came and went for them, the time being good, the group sticking together...but on a beyond downer note.
Tsunade had been missing for a year now. To this day, no one knew what happened to her; all they knew was that her vehicle was found abandoned near the site of a place that had been told throughout the ages, and Sasuke remembered his father telling him and Itachi when they were younger. That place - the God Tree - was forbidden, but even that got teenagers excited about the forbidden, often getting caught in a heartbeat because the security was damned tight...
...except if that were true, Naru and her two remaining guardians had the right to know if something happened to Tsunade, since there was no trace of her left. When she didn't come home at all that night, himself being with them, a call the next morning was in order by Jiraiya himself.
Why are authorities often so incompetent in terms of our safety?
It was extremely difficult, since Naru, Jiraiya and Orochimaru couldn't eat or sleep for days since then, but love kept them together and from lashing at each other - but Sasuke knew what it was like to be eaten away.
They were told to not have their hopes too high if they could never find anything of Tsunade, since there was clearly no evidence of foul play, much less a solid lead, and it just so happened that on the night the so-called "earthquake" transpired, security footage of the Shinju Tree site had caused static and knocked out the energy temporarily, so nothing captured Tsunade's activities other than her bringing her jeep to a halt at the cliff's base.
Naru apparently knew nothing of what her godparents did for a living besides working for the government, even now - just like he knew nothing of what Itachi did, since his brother was purposefully vague much to his irritation, which made him wonder how the hell Naru could tolerate such lack of detail about her loved ones.
Though, a year went by, and the world all but gave up much to the despair of Naru, though Sasuke also noticed that a heartbroken Jiraiya succumbed to his wife's disappearance, losing motivation in his novels. Orochimaru buried himself into his research, whatever the hell that was. Someone needs to know, but curiosity kills the cat when the government strictly keeps ordinary citizens out. But a woman vanishing and her family left to suffer for probably the rest of their lives...!
He bitterly, along with his best friend - the girl he fell in love with - accepted that there was nothing they could do, since hunches weren't ever enough.
How did life go on, while keeping faith Tsunade could be alive somewhere for the sake of their sanity, and since there was still so much ahead of them? He, Naru and their friends - Gaara joining them not long after year one of high school began - not only had each other, helping each other advance through the next three years, but they started their own music group after months of practicing, and called themselves the "Fab Five".
They were well-received, and might as well make a record someday, so in the meantime, they were gonna devote themselves to their studies in college now. But it also means big guns and the profit controlling, with us answering to them when things get desperate. We'll find someone who answers to us if we have anything to say about it.
There was indeed one person, though he had his reservations about her even now. It was only last fall that they ran into HER one day in town, on a Saturday, and when the four of them - yeah, he was doing something like THIS with them, which wasn't the first time - had a day out just to get out of the house altogether, and that was when Jiraiya was the first to notice despite the fact the woman he loved was still missing, though it was nothing like that.
~o~
Grocery shopping together they'd been, and then Jiraiya's cart came running into someone else's. His eyes had bulged at the sight of the other person, sputtering.
"Oh, excuse me, gorgeous lady! I didn't even see you!"
The person was quite thin, but her hips had amazing curves, and her - damn it, why did he look at her chest?! It's just an observation, nothing more. He had to admit it was kind of like Naru and Hinata. Her body was outlined by the washed-out rosy tee, the front studded into a pair of angel wings, and black clung to her lithe legs. Going back up to her face, Sasuke noted the delicacy of her features as well as the bright red of her lips. Her white-gray hair was cropped to flow around her ears, and her eyes -
They look just like Neji and Hinata's - wait, how the hell? It's said that only the Hyuuga family have those eyes. Could this woman be a possible...distant relative? And she's so pale...
"I wonder what you have to apologize for," the woman replied, staring hard and without an expression at Jiraiya who clearly was red-cheeked and threatening to have a nosebleed - a sign that he immediately was becoming his old self again. "I know that I saw you coming, but you clearly appear to be elsewhere."
"Yeah, Jiraiya -" Naru had stopped calling him that "special" nickname ever since Tsunade disappeared. "- you should have seen where you were going, and I told you someone was there."
He scowled at her, though the faint twinkle was in his eyes. "Oh, shut up, kid. And yeah, she's right," he said to the woman who blinked, still not showing a reaction. "Shoulda seen you coming, whatever your name is."
There was a pregnant pause before she finally answered, even locking eyes with Orochimaru who raised a curious eyebrow. "I'm Kaguya. Just plain and simple Kaguya. I came from a province in Kawa only recently." The way she said it sounded like she was superior, or that she came from a different time. Sasuke had never heard of a manner of speaking like that, except in the movies and stories.
He found himself looking into her shopping cart: ready-to-go packages of different sushi, sans the spicy ones, as well as a box of green tea bags, some shrimp for a cocktail, and the ingredients for a hot pot meal - such as clams, scallops, beef balls, octopus, and crawfish. Her choices were no different than their selections, but it was common in their country.
Shocker: she had a selection of pufferfish pieces! Was she being careful to not get POISONED?! Sasuke had to give her credit for having the balls to eat a fish that took a few years to be prepared, to train as a chef to not kill someone by mistake...except about six people a year died from consuming the wrong pieces.
"Forgive my friend, madam," Orochimaru said, ever the polite gentleman compared to Jiraiya's antics, though his face softened if remaining on alert. "Let's start over. I'm Orochimaru, this is Jiraiya - and these are Naru and Sasuke."
When she looked at him and Naru, there was a flicker: a flash across those eyes, and then it was calm again, but with a distant mist, as if she...recognized something out of them. Sasuke felt his spine creep as he was determined to find out more about her without getting himself into trouble, and knowing Naru, she would want to join in.
Apparently, this woman had already begun mysteriously cementing herself into their lives.
~o~
Since that day, "Kaguya" - he still wondered if that was who she really was, if she were named after the legendary Princess of the Moon - had been a part of their lives, though nothing set in stone overnight. You could say she was a comfort because of Tsunade, without directly replacing her.
She gave the story that she had two children whom she lost back in Kawa before arriving here in Konoha, due to the fact that there were too many memories as well as an unsympathetic family she wasn't close with. Basically, no one left...and then she ran into THEM.
Sasuke was willing to buy her tale, though it also seemed too good to be true in terms of her asking the men - Orochimaru and Jiraiya - if she could get to know them, before directing her attention back to him and Naru. Maybe I'm thinking too much into this, but she doesn't show it, yet she must be...instantly attached to the first people she meets. It's nothing to be taken lightly. And the way she looked at us - maybe she sees her dead kids in us.
It was confirmed when she said it outright, and there was the shine in her eyes, threatening tears she blinked many times to hold back.
Kaguya then revealed another reason she was here: a passion for music, but wasn't settled on what she wanted to do exactly.
It was Jiraiya who proudly said that "these two are gonna try to be musicians with their friends, but it's gonna take a while." And that pride was evident when he added their dedication, and that he could take up being their manager - to which he still hadn't picked up his pen for a new novel - and had to ask her if she'd consider joining in, much to the stun of Orochimaru who would later privately voice his protests. Sasuke knew because he caught them one day when Kaguya was gone.
"Jiraiya, you honestly think that a strange woman we hardly know could suddenly come into our lives and be implemented while your wife and my dearest friend is still -"
"Orochimaru, I know about that. You can think I'm cold and heartless now, but it's NOT true! She's not going to replace Tsunade; she's just gonna help us heal a little until she comes back, which I still believe is a possibility, and she just needs people in her life. Remember Tsunade and I were the first people you met as a kid, then being the first real friends you ever had?"
"Of course, I remember. But I still won't trust her until she proves it. I've seen how Sasuke looks at her, too. Just like I know I do."
At least someone agreed with him...until the months passed, and Kaguya actually showed she wasn't what they all thought she was. Nothing incriminating, actually. Never caused any real trouble.
It was thanks to both her and Jiraiya that Sasuke and Naru, Hinata and Neji as well as Gaara were dubbed the Fab Five, and their debut was on graduation day, in front of their fellow graduates and after the day ended, all of them finally out of their uniforms which was a fantastic change for them - Kakashi-sensei, their homeroom teacher, having been in a fine kimono of his choosing that day - and this was the call to go all out without being overtly scandalous like animation sexualization.
But Tsunade...she should have been here. She's been gone for a year; she deserved to see us among our fellow homeroom students, accepting the diplomas, and now this.
Even the strain returned in the form of the goddamned police still telling them that there still were no leads, and as much as it "pained" them, perhaps it was time to accept the fact they might never see her again. It was just as common in this country as it was for children, ancient myths being tied to modern standards, such as the Kappa and certain spirits. But Sasuke never believed in that crap, not since he was a kid, though Itachi did drill in the importance of heading straight home or always being with a group.
Speaking of Itachi, his aniki had the time to finally make it here for him, having a smile he used to love seeing when they were children. He was proud of him and told him to keep doing what he was doing. He was even happy with the friends he made...and also gave him advice on a certain girl.
A certain girl who was now with him officially as his girlfriend. They started off as friends, and both her guardians and his brother thought they suited each other well.
The flute sounded in the air along with the drum that Gaara did the honor of playing, Neji the biwa - the equivalent of the guitar - and the flute player was none other than Hinata, though all three of them would have singing parts of their own, beginning with this after he and Naru joined, collectively:
"Subete ni wakare, ā - ikō chiheisen e!"
Neji was the first to introduce, while still playing the biwa to his line as he sang of how high school education had ended, but there was still more to come. Just as learning something new in life never ended. "Gakushū-sha no ue ni, owaride wa arimasen." It was obvious enough to hear the girls in the audience swoon over him, with his long brunette hair still in its tie, his getup being a crisp white shirt and dark brown slacks, which was his daily preference.
His cousin was just like a wisteria in a spring evening, with lavender vines and flowers growing across her chest and down her flowing skirt, her hair now cut to bob around her ears; in them and around her neck were lavender glass drops framed with silver leaves. "Mawari no amai, rakka no hana." The cherry blossoms weren't in bloom yet, but by the time the month ended, they would. And not only that, but she appeared as sweet as spring flora personified.
And Naru...I can't take my eyes off her. As a result, he nearly forgot his time right after Gaara's. Being different from Hinata with her bold sense of fashion, she had a sheer corset decorated with golden beaded lace which swirled at the chest and the bottom, also at the end of the opalescent blue satin skirt. Around her neck was the crystal she still wore, being a gift from Jiraiya, Orochimaru and Tsunade, but now joined by golden metal blooms without an embellishment in her ear lobes...and her hair had grown out a little past her shoulders in waves.
"Seikatsu no tame no tomodachi," she sang with her signature, beaming grin, as she declared that no matter what the future held, they were all friends for life, and nothing could take that.
Gaara, in maroon and black with the drum, intoned that there were still more obstacles on the road ahead for all of them: "Dōro-saki ni motto chōsen."
Finally was Sasuke himself, relieved to be done with the long years of trying to be somewhere else, and now it was finally happening. What was in the past would stay there, and that was the point, because it was something he knew all too well when he gained these friends and the woman he loved. "Anata no ushiro ni kako o okimasu."
From the way the audience erupted with applause by the time the song ended with the closing line which was book-ended with the beginning - "Subete ni wakare, ā - ikō chiheisen e!" - this was guaranteed to be a record hit.
~o~
Humanity had evolved, as predicted. Black Zetsu helped immensely, and to experience it herself was...surreal to say the least. Everything around her was far more advanced than her time.
The buildings were high enough to extend to the heavens, while others were smaller and more modest if bearing enough of the same things to sell to buyers. Banners and signs told what they were called. She was impressed with what these simple pleasures had to offer, but it disgusted her that humans took advantage of the ones that destroyed their bodies from the inside, whether because they simply loved how it made them feel or to escape from their sorrows, believing it to be their numbing medicines from the harshness of life.
History of humanity since she'd been sealed away enraged her to her core, especially when she learned of the horrors of the two world wars, and how this country lost its identity - save for some cultural keeps - following the defeat of World War II.
Times were now peaceful, but there were people who caused trouble when they could.
In other words, no matter that technology had evolved, things were no different than back then. All the more reason she would act.
Kaguya planned to mingle among them rather than remain confined to the God Tree and Black Zetsu alone. She had patience, but it often wore off. But before she ventured out, her will child filled her in on modernized women, and none of them had their hair as long as she had. Not only did it mean putting on the henge of shortening her hair to ear length, even closing the slit in the middle of her forehead so that it didn't give her away as an "alien", but she had to dress up like these people. And these clothes were far too...fitting for her taste. However, she found herself relaxed, strangely at the same time.
She was careful to avoid running into anyone, even while at the grocery store - just the endless selection of food, joined with others which clearly had to be from a foreign country - and then she found herself confronted by a certain group of people she never thought she'd encounter. While she didn't show it, she was indeed shocked.
The man with the white hair was Jiraiya - husband of Tsunade, the woman she ensnared and who was declared missing to the world, but these people never gave up hope and thus kept praying for a safe return even if it was unhealthy. She wasn't a fool to not see that look in the man's eyes, despite missing his wife whom he said he loved with every fiber of his being.
The other man with long black hair and somewhat resembled a snake was Orochimaru. He regarded her with chilled politeness, keeping his guard up.
That left the two with them - a young man with raven hair spiked like a bird's tail and a girl with sunlit hair and bright blue eyes, cheeks whiskered subtly. She sensed it even if they might not be aware...
These two...they're Asura and Indra's reincarnates. The girl is Asura, the boy Indra.
These were Tsunade's family, from that thing called a photograph, capturing and freezing the moment. It was quite fascinating and easy compared to painting a portrait in her time. The young pair looked at her with a suspicious eye just like Orochimaru, notably because of her pallid complexion, since no one had that the way she did.
She decided to stick with them, to fill in that void of suffering from the woman's absence. She swore she wouldn't get emotionally attached to them until the time to launch the jutsu would come. But the two in particular - as much as she loathed to admit it, they in a way substituted as her own children whom she loved, but they turned on her when they rebelled against her reign.
When all were bound to the Shinju, so would these two. Their chakra would be hers, and no one would stop her.
She wasn't lying to them when she told them her passion among things was also music and culture; Jiraiya who just couldn't keep his glittering eyes off her boasted with pride that Sasuke and Naru were starting a group with their friends, and that they could use a manager. He even volunteered to share that post with her.
Kaguya had several millennia of picking up on how life functioned, but she was a fast learner. She didn't have credentials, as they called it, but she had an ear for fantastic music...and the first masterpiece created was what Naru, Sasuke and their friends - two of whom were cousins and possessed HER eyes, and she sensed her own chakra within them as a result, namely Hamura's - performed in front of their student body after finishing the day which was the end of their teenage learning, before moving onward to young adult learning and then the harsh real world.
Young people still thought life was so easy until reality struck them in the face. Just as my sons did at one time.
She watched them along with Jiraiya and Orochimaru that night, wearing a shimmering silver dress which draped over her chest and curves, feeling a surge of immense pride as she unwittingly developed an unwarranted attachment to these two as well as the children who bowed before the audience. She was just considering the alternative: perhaps she could erase their memories after giving them what they wanted in their fantasy worlds, along with enough of the others so that humanity didn't completely die off, which was her intention in the past.
Sasuke and Naru she came to see as her own children, but should they find out as did Hagoromo and Hamura, Kaguya would rectify her mistake again.
Jiraiya and Orochimaru asked her to come celebrate with them while the kids were off doing whatever they wanted, as long as they were safe and remained together, and called if something happened. She declined, saying that she was too tired but promised to make it up to them tomorrow instead, since it was a Friday which was better.
She needed to return to the tree, where another time had come. After a year in the making.
A hundred thousand from the past time are at the ready, now this one coming - but will be apart from the others for now.
"I trust it went well once more, Mother."
"Yes," she answered curtly, striding while still in the silver dress from the concert. She looked upon the cocoon within this shrine called her precious nursery, out of pity moreso. The one she came to see, which had once showed curved outlines of femininity, having been wrapped with the matter that came out from the roots of the tree, as it had done to thousands of women and men before this one. It's a shame that no one will ever know what happened to you; it's what they called a necessary evil.
Within a year did the stage of the transformation begin. The body's physical energy was suctioned out as well as certain features erased. This left behind a mummy-like husk of what used to be a human being. The hair was stringy and in fragile clumps. You couldn't even tell who the person was anymore, and her breasts sagged to resemble hanging flags.
Those notoriously massive breasts were next to go as the body structure began to regain shape, though becoming more of a man's, and the woman's chest sucked in to replace physical beauty with power. Kaguya saw all of this with her Byakugan, Black Zetsu beside her and giddy with excitement as both continued to watch as the reformed cocoon which by now became the second skin of the subject within snapped from the root and landed upright on both feet, the bandage-like matter withering like dried leaves to reveal what was in the place of the woman...
The white skin had jagged lines about if keeping the structure in place. The hair was very short and mossy green, the yellow eyes dull as the dying sun. The features were human-like, if not for the fact the teeth - if exposed - were unusually rounded. The body was extremely muscular in the chest, abdomen and limbs, but devoid of genitalia, since this being was created for one purpose and one purpose only.
"Do you know who I am?" Kaguya intoned, now no longer feeling any form of remorse - not even a hint of sorrow at changing the buxom woman into this thing like the others before her.
The being blinked "his" yellow eyes once or twice, then split out into a broad, toothy smile. "...my creator. My princess I was made to serve."
"That is correct. From now on, you will be my right hand. Now, answer me this: do you know who YOU are?"
A slight frown formed on the face as "he" contemplated her question, before it softened when she was answered. "No, but what will you call me, Princess Kaguya?" She finally allowed a smile of her own to grace her features. Good, this one did not remember their former identity, and that was the purpose: all sense of self and independence erased to be restarted fresh.
"You belong to no one in particular," Kaguya said at last, "but you will be known as, like your sleeping brethren...Zetsu. White Zetsu."
"White Zetsu!" A vile tongue wagged within that mouth. "Has a nice ring to it!"
She ignored the being's enthusiasm and returned her attention to her loyal child. "This is Black Zetsu. You two will join together and act as one. Be my eyes and ears for the world you are about to enter...for a greater purpose than those seedlings out there."
The blowfish is a delicacy in Japan (also known as fugu), and it contains one of the deadliest poisons in the world if not prepared properly. It's said to kill up to six people a year, and within two hours of eating the wrong pieces. Though, a trained chef would know to not endanger your life.
"Fab Five", the name of the group for their music - couldn't think of anything better, but still proud anyways. And their song is inspired by "Sive" performed by Celtic Woman (take a look at their concert video on YouTube, and each artist's moves also are included in here). Though, I couldn't find an English translation to that song, doing my best to create my own song befitting these circumstances, and the translation and each part for each member goes like this, as the whole song not seen:
"All five: Subete ni wakare, ā - ikō chiheisen e (Oh, farewell to all - onward to the horizon)
Neji: Gakushū-sha no ue ni, owaride wa arimasen (Learning's over, not the end)
All five: Subete ni wakare, ā (Oh, farewell to all)
Neji: Ikō chiheisen e (Onward to the horizon)
Hinata: Mawari no amai, rakka no hana (The sweet, falling blossoms around)
All five: Subete ni wakare, ā ( Oh, farewell to all)
Hinata: Ikō chiheisen e (Onward to the horizon)
Naru: Seikatsu no tame no tomodachi (Friends for life)
All five: Subete ni wakare, ā ( Oh, farewell to all)
Naru: Ikō chiheisen e (Onward to the horizon)
Gaara: Dōro-saki ni motto chōsen (More challenges on the road ahead)
All five: Subete ni wakare, ā (Oh, farewell to all)
Gaara: Ikō chiheisen e (Onward to the horizon)
Sasuke: Anata no ushiro ni kako o okimasu (Put the past behind you)
All five: Subete ni wakare, ā (Oh, farewell to all)
Sasuke: Ikō chiheisen e (Onward to the horizon)
All five: Subete ni wakare, ā (Oh, farewell to all)
Neji: Ikō chiheisen e (Onward to the horizon)
All five: Subete ni wakare, ā (Oh, farewell to all)
Hinata: Ikō chiheisen e (Onward to the horizon)
All five: Subete ni wakare, ā (Oh, farewell to all)
Naru: Ikō chiheisen e (Onward to the horizon)
All five: Subete ni wakare, ā (Oh, farewell to all)
Gaara: Ikō chiheisen e (Onward to the horizon)
All five: Subete ni wakare, ā (Oh, farewell to all)
Sasuke: Ikō chiheisen e (Onward to the horizon)
All five: Subete ni wakare, ā - ikō chiheisen e (Oh, farewell to all - onward to the horizon)"
I feel like I wrote a masterpiece and am not afraid to brag about it. XD The effort was worth it. :3
REVIEW, PLEASE! :3