FLUUUUUUUFF AAAAAAAAH

I might decide to post these in increments of two. Just remember to say something about the non-flashback chapters in reviews as well. Because, honestly, I love the fluff, but I really wanna know what you think about what's happening in present-story-time. I want to know I'm not the only one gushing over it, lol.

You know. If that's not too much to request. e.e''

Enjoy!

Promises Not Made are Promises Never Kept

Flashback Twelve – Animals

"Why does he have to go alone?"

"Sasuke, don't argue. This is how we do it. Haku is better at sneaking into villages to get supplies."

"But how am I ever going to learn how to be subtle if I don't go? Besides, I don't want him to go by himself!"

"He can handle himself, Sasuke. Why are you being such a whiny little brat about this?"

"I'm not being a brat! And because I want to go too!"

"No, Sasuke. That's final."

Haku laughed, brushing through the hair he had let out of the bun as he donned the flowery kimono. Sasuke blinked as he gazed at his older companion, unaware that his cheeks were getting slightly red.

"I don't get it. How come I've never thought you looked good in a kimono before now? Weirdo."

Haku blinked at him in surprise before giggling behind a hand. The first time Sasuke had seem him put on a dress, the boy had flipped out (well, as much as he could flip out while still considering himself a prisoner) and didn't speak to Haku for a week due to humiliation and sheer shock. But really, after the fifteenth time, Sasuke was over it and now he was beginning to… well, maybe even enjoy it.

Okay. Weird. So weird. This is Haku.

Yeah. And?

Sasuke scowled at his inner voice, frowning at Haku as he ruffled the younger one's hair.

"You heard the man, dearheart," Haku stated in amusement. "Maybe next time, okay?"

The other frowned, but said nothing in response as he leaned forward and put his forehead into Haku's chest, a silent command for the older boy to play with Sasuke's hair. Smiling, Haku gladly did for a few minutes before ruffling the other's hair.

"I'm going to go now, okay?" He stated as Sasuke looked up at him, the frown back on his face. Haku smiled at him. "I'll be back soon, I promise." Lifting his eyes, he nodded at Zabuza. "Be safe, please. Both of you." And with that, he was gone for the nearest town, Sasuke pouting after him.

Zabuza and Sasuke spent most of the afternoon practicing with Sasuke's Sharingan. Zabuza would get paper and a pen and draw something that Sasuke couldn't see. Sasuke would use his bloodline to mimic the movements of the pen and draw whatever Zabuza was drawing. Other times Zabuza would fake drawing lines, and Sasuke would have to recognize what kind of ticks Zabuza had that gave that falseness away and edit his movements accordingly, all the while trying to get the same picture Zabuza drew. Other times Sasuke would just watch the movements, map them out in his head, and then guess what Zabuza was drawing.

"You know, it would be a lot harder if you could draw anything else but stick figures," Sasuke teased him while they broke for toast and tea. Zabuza rolled his eyes.

"Shut up, brat," he replied simply, taking a drink from his cup. "I was trained to be a killer, not a fucking hippie."

Setting down his cup, Sasuke looked up at him curiously.

"I always used to hear stories about you," he admitted simply, making Zabuza raise an eyebrow at him. "How you became a ninja. The horror you had to go through. Did it haunt you at all? What you did to those other kids?"

Zabuza gazed at him with a blank expression for a moment before sighing and shifting on the couch in front of Sasuke, switching positions and relaxing again.

"They don't do that anymore, from what I've heard," he replied. "Shame too. Sure, they got rid of hundreds of candidates, but in return they got the best. Either that or the absurdly lucky. In my case, it was the best. The fiercest. The most 'demonic'." He shrugged. "I should've felt bad, I guess. For a while I thought I did. But it was either killed or be killed that day. If I didn't kill them they would've killed me, and the gods knew they weren't fucking better than me. Those whiny little bitches. They didn't deserve the honor of killing me. And I wasn't about to give it to them. Put a bunch of fucking normal people who've never harmed a single person in their life in a single room, hand them a bunch of weapons and tell them 'if there isn't one left standing out of the lot of you in half an hour, all of you are gonna die', then there's going to be a mass fuckton of bloodshed. And that's just involving normal people. Civilians. We weren't normal people. We were training to be killers. We knew it was coming. Kinda. The school was just more successful at doing it than most places." Pausing, he looked away, and Sasuke raised an eyebrow, not having expected this long of a response. What did I do to deserve this? "I did what I had to. And I don't feel bad." He looked back over to Sasuke after a moment, whose gaze had lowered to stare into his teacup. "You shouldn't either. We do what we have to in order to survive. That is everyone's purpose for existence. Survival. Survival and reproduction. That's it."

Sasuke raised an eyebrow at him.

"If that's the case, why didn't you just bang every hooker you could find until one told you she was pregnant and then kill yourself?" He asked incredulously, a soft scowl on his face. Zabuza laughed.

"I was built to survive, not to reproduce," he replied in amusement. "I was brought into this world to become a killer. My parents knew it, my teacher knew it, I knew it. Killing those kids was just a tribute to what I was made for. It solidified my purpose. It made me feel alive. I was just doing what the Gods bade me."

Sasuke's lips pressed into a fine, pale line as he listened to Zabuza, eyes stony and cold.

"I am not a killer," he stated simply, coolly. Zabuza looked over at him with a laughing eye and grinned.

"Sasuke, you've killed. You're a killer," he replied plainly. "Everyone's a killer. They just don't know it yet."

"Or maybe they do know it," Sasuke breathed in thought, staring at the table in between them. "Maybe they do know it and just refuse to admit it."

"That's more like it," his teacher replied, taking another swig of his tea like it was ale. "Everyone's capable of murder. The only ones that aren't have no arms and no legs and no brain. It's civilization. Society. Roads. Television. Sliced bread. Those are the things that fool people into thinking that they're better than murderers. But they're not. No one is. And all it takes is one well-placed disaster for mothers and fathers to start eating the children that they looooooved so much." Zabuza made a mock-pouty face, making Sasuke smile lightly, before he dropped the expression and shrugged. "We're animals. Only animals. Someone does something horrible like kills a man… or seventeen, and the world thinks he's crazy." He grinned with those pointed teeth of his, and Sasuke raised an eyebrow at him, wondering if this is what he had really asked for when he had asked the initial question. "But really they're the crazy ones. He's just more in tune with himself and his nature than they ever could be. Everyone thinks we're better than the dogs we chain up because we have opposable thumbs and can open doors, and speak languages. Because we can invent stuff with our 'highly evolved brains'. Because we're 'better than instinct'. We're not top of the food chain because of our ability to do calculus. We're there because instinct made us the most vicious creature on the face of the fucking planet. The instinct to conquer and impose our might upon others-"

"The instinct to kill all joy, destroy all hope," Sasuke murmured softly, his eyes flickering back up to Zabuza as the older man stopped speaking, finally seeming to realize that he had been ranting. "Yeah," he breathed softly, eyes deep with something unspoken. "I know what you mean."

Zabuza pursed his lips as he saw the look in Sasuke's eyes and looked away, remaining silent.

"We're just animals," Sasuke continued breathlessly, barely audible. "Regardless of how many fancy castles we build, they're still just caves to hide in."

He understood what Zabuza spoke of. All of it. It didn't make him sad, per say. At least not for himself. He knew the truth. He had seen that cruel truth with his own eyes. He heard it and understood it. At least the best he could.

His teacher's gaze became solemn, and nodded.

"Yeah," he replied simply.

There was long silence between them as they both contemplated the discussion they just had, both of them wondering if it had been too much.

"Sasuke," Zabuza finally spoke softly, making the younger boy look up at him. The man looked at him with an even gaze. "I believe you can make the right choice. I believe you have the power, that if you were one of those normal people to get shoved into that room, you wouldn't kill the people inside. You would tell everyone to hang on, bust a Sasuke-sized hole in the wall and kill all of the twisted fucks who put those people there in that room in the first place."

"I'd kill the guys with the torches…" Sasuke realized with a smile, that smile turning into a beam of pride and pleasure at Zabuza's words. Zabuza smiled and nodded at him.

"Yeah, the guys with the torches," he replied in agreement, not really understanding the reference before continuing. "Sasuke. I enjoyed killing all of those kids. You wouldn't. Your heart is in the right place. Mine isn't."

Sasuke was grown-up to recognize what a serious admission this was, even though Zabuza spoke of it plainly. The amusement died from his eyes at the words and he simply gazed at the older man for a moment before replying.

"It can be," he murmured, voice so soft it was barely above a whisper. Zabuza blinked in mild confusion at him as Sasuke continued. "People… can't change, don't change, but you have." He shrugged. "I don't know if it's because of Haku, or me, or what's been going on lately, or all of the above, but I do know that you're different from before. Your spikes seem... a little more rounded at the tips compared to when we first met. I don't feel like you're going to pierce me in the heart if I get too close anymore. I feel like they're going to reach behind me, over my shoulder and stab whoever's been chasing me. I feel like if I ever got in over my head with something I couldn't handle, you would be there to help me. Maybe even save me." He gave Zabuza a soft, sincere, sad smile. "I wish my father had been more like you."

One great admission deserved another. Sasuke knew that this was a legendarily rare chance to make Zabuza a little less icy, a little more caring, than he had been before. And it was the truth. He felt safe, beneath this roof, which an infamous rogue serial-killer insane ninja sleeping in the room next to him. The only time he felt anything close to this level of safety were those nights when it was raining, thunder crashing outside, when he would crawl into his big brother's bed, and Itachi would stroke his hair and reassure him quietly until he fell asleep again.

That seemed like such a long time ago.

Zabuza could only stare at him in shock for a moment, unable to answer right away. He knew perfectly well who Sasuke's father was, what kind of man. Chief of Konoha's police force – and an Uchiha with a prodigal son at that – was a famous man in all the ninja countries. He knew what kind of man Sasuke's father was.

And yet…

Sasuke, you can't know how much I care about you. You can't.

Zabuza slowly swallowed as Sasuke gazed at him, drinking in Zabuza's subtle responses.

It might scare you, how much I care. How much I worry. But I can't help it.

His Sharingan wasn't even activated, and he could tell.

Not even Haku can look at me the way you do. Even with his big damned dole eyes.

Sasuke's smile widened a little bit in reassurance as the silence seemed to stretch longer and longer.

He almost looks like…

Zabuza closed his eyes.

he's about to cry…

Then Zabuza smirked and chuckled, pulling himself back together as the moment of stillness between them broke.

"Yeah, I get that a lot," he replied mock arrogance, flexing the muscles in a single arm dramatically and making Sasuke laugh, leaning back against the loveseat. "Yeah, you wish your dad was as amazing as me."

"Mmhm," Sasuke murmured in amusement as he drank more tea, smiling over the rim of the cup.

"Oh, and tell Haku to quit giving you so many books to read," Zabuza added, making Sasuke's smile widen. "Your vocabulary's getting way too advanced for your age."

"I can't help it if you don't know how to read, Zabuza."

"Yes I do!"

It was such an interesting situation he found himself in, Sasuke realized as they sat there, the serious discussion for the day over. An abandoned boy that never knew his family, a kidnapped boy with some serious family issues, and a deranged psychopath with a REALLY big fucking sword finding happiness together under one roof, running from the law and enjoying every moment together; it was certainly, certainly interesting. If sitcoms existed in this world, their situation would definitely make a good one.

And as Haku returned from a successful shopping trip to see Zabuza and Sasuke sitting in front of the fire playing Go, Sasuke found he didn't mind one bit.

I bet no one in the world is as happy as we are.

"Well don't just sit there; help me unpack! We're having onigiri!"

"Sweet! I love onigiri!"

"Haha, I know Sasuke. That's why I got it."

What was it about being related by blood that just felt the need to fuck with things? There they were, three people completely unrelated, and yet they were all willing to die for each other. Sasuke could tell the way Haku massaged Zabuza's sore back after dinner, the way Zabuza continued to play board games with the youngest male even though he insisted that he hated them, and what Sasuke felt in his own heart. How loving Fate was, to bring three people together that completed each other so perfectly? How compassionate it was to make a whole, solid being out of broken, shattered parts?

"We're going to need to move from here soon. Now that winter is gone and the ice has melted they'll be looking for us again."

"Yeah, I know, Haku. We'll start making plans tomorrow."

He loved his mother. He loved his father. He even loved his brother. He knew that. And yet… he loved them nothing like he loved Haku and Zabuza.

"Okay, that's enough! I quit! I hate this game!"

"Haha, would you rather play cards instead, Zabuza?"

In his parents' insistence on perfection, there grew seeds of hatred and misery. And yet here, in the mists of imperfection, broken dreams and screwed up lives, happiness hid itself away in a tiny little shack nestled between the trees in the deepest part of a forest no one dared venture in during the winter, its small windows alight with the flames crackling inside.

"Where are we going to go from here?"

"I don't know, dearheart. The ocean maybe? The port cities? Maybe we can hop aboard a ship and sail to the far side of the world, away from everything. To a new land. Would you like that?"

Sasuke laid his head on Haku's lap as the darkness of the night began to beat its chilly fists on the outside walls of the cabin, smiling contently and closing his eyes as Haku began playing with his hair, Zabuza sitting on the sofa next to them where they sat on the wooden floor.

"I've never been to the ocean before," he murmured sleepily, still with that slight smile. "Sounds like an adventure."

And as Sasuke fell asleep in his lap, Haku could only smile down at him.

"Yes," he breathed softly, eyes shining as Zabuza looked on in silence. "Yes it does."

End Flashback Twelve – Animals

WAAAAAH! 8_D Yeah, I figured Zabuza deserved to get some bonding time in with our favorite dark-haired wonder.

Okay, so a couple of things.

If someone realizes where that obscure 'guys with the torches' reference comes from, omg, I will adore you forever and a half. For a few lifetimes. Seriously.

Also, I understand that in the actual cannon Sasuke does go to the ocean. Kinda sorta. But in this particular case, Team Seven's first interaction with Zabuza happens before they reach the shore, while they're still a little bit inland, so Sasuke never got a chance.

Did you enjoy? Well, please let me know! Review! Pretty pweaaaase? :3

Much love!

DDB