Disclaimer: Don't own Naruto, Sasuke, or any of the characters. Please don't sue. Though if we own the series, Karin would be the first one to die.
Warnings: Shounen ai, yaoi, ooc-ness, bad grammar, bad writing style, and a little bit of shota.
Ages:
Itachi- 218 years old, looks like about 20-21.
Kakashi- 263 years old, looks like about 25-26.
Sai- 162 years old, which means he's allowed to hunt humans. He looks about 16.
Sasuke- 153 years old, looks about 15.
Naruto- 8 years old.
Iruka- 25 years old.
"Talking."
Thinking.
His ocean-blue eyes had slowly filled with insecurity, and as soon as Sasuke had noticed the dark bruising under said eyes, he couldn't just say no.
The child-like expression of Naruto's face had been vulnerable and hopeful at the same time, waiting for the other to give an answer. An answer that he was so eager to hear, and hopefully Sasuke would give. And though the Uchiha would've been lying if he didn't find the boy's face just a tad adorable, he was still surprised and maybe a little embarrassed at the previous question.
That's why he was currently sitting, quite awkwardly, at the very edge of the child's bed, uncomfortable because his black dress pants weren't suitable for easy, casual meetings like these. He made a mental note to get more adequate clothes later.
And also because, the last time he 'played' a game was over seventy years ago. Those kinds of games however, were either tracking lynxes in the rain or performing difficult flying maneuvers during the night with a cloud filled sky. Sasuke had a feeling that the human infant would never find those games appealing.
But to be honest, he could remember farther back when Itachi would play hide-and-seek with him in the Uchiha Manor. That's how Sasuke managed to find all the fake doors, maze-like corridors, and forbidden passages by getting lost in them.
"What would you like to play?" Naruto asked from inside his closet, interrupting his wandering thoughts. The sound of shuffling was heard as the small human rummaged through in the dark. He carelessly moved aside things and fumbled around for something the two of them could have fun with.
It would be embarrassing if Naruto chose something too childish or stupid and ended up with Sasuke laughing at how much of a little kid he was.
The elder snorted. "I never agreed to play."
The blond turned to look at the vampire with a pout in his face. "Yes you did. You said you would!"
"I did no such thing."
"Did too!" the child retorted.
Sasuke shut his eyes tightly. "Alright, fine. We'll play, dobe."
Naruto's face brightened, ignoring the insult and went back to dig inside his belongings in the closet.
"I can't see anything!" he whispered, frustrated that he couldn't do something as simple as seeing with his hands. Naruto winced when he accidentally dug his palm into what it seemed like a cheap, plastic army guy. The blond picked it up angrily and threw it behind him.
Sasuke raised an eyebrow at the frustrated vibes coming from the small human, but made no move to help him. He could see perfectly fine in the dark. Frankly, he could well enough to see all the clutter and untidiness inside the same closet. It seems like the kid's definition of cleaning up his room is shoving all the stuff inside and closing the door. "Then turn the lights on."
A muffled, annoyed sigh sounded off inside the closet from the boy as he stopped his hunt. "But that'll wake Iruka, and then he'll get up to check up on me."
The dark-haired vampire ran a hand through his hair, suppressing an exasperated sigh. He moved his gaze from the silhouette of the child and looked beside him where he could see something that caught his attention.
"Oi, bring that here." He pointed a few inches away from his leg.
Naruto shifted. "Eh? You mean this?" he grabbed the small, white rectangle from the floor. Taking his new friend's silence as an affirmative, he backed away from the closet and quickly jumped on the bed with the chosen object in his hand.
Sasuke immediately tensed at the invasion of his personal space. Not to mention, Naruto's sudden jump brought a huge wave of his enthralling scent and much to his embarrassment, he noticed his hands shaking. He leaned back a bit, hopping that the child could take that as a hint to not get any closer. Of course he should've known that that was just wishful thinking on his part.
Naruto enthusiastically waved the white rectangle in front of the other's face. "What are we playing?" he inquired softly, barely containing his excitement.
The Uchiha struggled a moment for control before taking the small object and opening it, revealing a deck of cards. "Have you ever played with these?"
The blond boy hesitated before nodding. "A little, Iruka taught me a few games that he used to play with my grandma."
Sasuke nodded once and split the deck in half, shuffling it quickly. "It's been a while since I played and I hardly remember the rules." That wasn't necessarily true. The last time he played a few years ago was with his cousins from the Hyuuga clan and with his brother. "But since you gave me the choice to play whatever I wanted, we'll try blackjack, have you ever heard of it?"
"O-of course I have!" Naruto said without conviction, though Sasuke either didn't notice or he chose to ignore it. Instead, Naruto watched as the older boy's pale hands swiftly shuffled over and over. It was sort of mesmerizing seeing the way the elegant hands moved to split the deck in half and shuffled them, making a soft gust of wind every time he did so.
Naruto snapped his eyes up, only to look away quickly when the owner of those hands had his eyes set on his own, staring blankly. The young boy frowned, not sure he liked the silence that befallen on them.
"So uhm, are your parents okay with you staying here?"
Maybe it was the lack of sleep or it was his excitement that made his imagination run wild, but Naruto could have sworn he heard the other hiss, his eyes turning a scarlet color briefly before turning back to onyx.
"You know, I think we should tell Iruka. He's my adoptive dad, but he can keep a secret!"
Sasuke ignored the rambling human.
"He's a good guy and he would never tell anyone if we don't want him too. It's just that he worries about me a lot and I don't know what to tell him."
"I see," Sasuke said, not really paying attention.
"Maybe if we tell him that you just moved recently in the neighborhood. No wait, then he'll want to meet your parents." Naruto frowned again.
"Naturally." Too bad though, his parents were six feet under paying company to maggots and dirt.
Naruto perked up. "Hey, what if I go over to your house next time!"
"Not happening."
"Eh? But why? Friends invite each other to their houses all the time!" the child said, a little too loudly.
"Lower your voice, unless you want to get caught. In fact, why don't you just stay quiet?"
Naruto pouted, but obeyed. They stayed in a comfortable silence for a while; the only sound they heard was the cards, still in Sasuke's hands.
"Ne, Sasuke?"
Sasuke's eyebrow twitched.
Naruto waited until the black-covered boy in front of him finished shuffling. "I just remembered something. Why did you say that other night that you were far from being an angel?" Naruto asked, leaning over and cupping his right hand next to his mouth, as if whispering a secret.
Sasuke dealt two cards face down at the child then at himself. "That's exactly what I meant. I'm far from being an angel." Quickly changing the subject, he spoke again. "Now, because there's only two of us, instead of beating the dealer, we will try to beat each other, who ever has the highest number without passing twenty-one wins. Do you understand?"
Naruto nodded slowly, not really understanding. "Uhh, not passing twenty-one got it, I think." He scratched his head, narrowing his eyes into slits. Sasuke turned away; the boy was looking cuter by the second and it was making the vampire abhor himself more to the point he really wanted to leave and provoke Itachi into putting him in the Tsukuyomi.
Before he could add another card, he tensed. The Uchiha sat still. There was a quickening of another heartbeat and very soft padding footsteps were coming towards them.
"Someone's coming!" he hissed softly.
Naruto looked up in alarm.
He jumped away from the bed and grabbed Sasuke's cold hand, pulling him towards the same closet he was just fumbling through a few minutes ago. "You need to hide! If Iruka finds you-" he knew that he didn't need to finish the sentence; they both knew the troubles Iruka finding out would cause.
Naruto nearly tripped in surprise when the icy, pale hand squeezed his own warm one, sending a small ticklish, pricking feeling through his arm and his whole body. However, Naruto blamed it in the fact that his friend was squeezing too hard and was cutting his circulation.
The child shoved the older boy inside the dark closet, nearly erupting in giggles when the taller one accidentally hit his head with the metal pole for his clothes, but the glare from the raven-haired was enough to make his mouth fall shut.
"Go back to the bed and pretend to be asleep," he ordered through gritted teeth.
Naruto hesitated, which made Sasuke growl as if reading his mind. "Don't be an idiot; you can't hide in here with me."
"No need to be such a jerk!" the child hissed back.
He himself couldn't hear anything other than his quickening heart and rapid breaths along with soft noises in the closet as he could guess that Sasuke was shifting to get comfortable.
Moving faster than what he usually moved, he jumped on his bed and slipped through the covers just in time to see the door handle twist and the door opening.
Naruto squeezed his eyes shut, more than a normal sleeping person should have. His heart felt like it was trying to get out of his chest. It thundered inside his ribcage, as if it demanded for more room. With a small bit of effort, he slowed his breathing to just a little closer to a normal pace. However, it probably sounded fake at first, since he had to take long deep breaths to calm down.
The child could have sworn he heard Sasuke click his tongue disappointedly at his lack of acting. And Naruto was sure he would get a quick piece of his mind shortly.
As the door opened wider, Iruka slowly poked his head inside. With the faint amount of silver light coming from the balcony, the school teacher could see a few strands of hair -now turned pale white in the moonlight- showing behind the covers.
Seeing that his son was obviously pretending to be asleep, Iruka promptly but carefully made his way to the bed, avoiding and side-stepping the various toys that lingered on the wooden floor. I seriously need to remind him to clean his room, the brunet thought, displeased.
Naruto nearly yelled in surprise when the bed dipped slightly from the weight of the man sitting next to him.
"Naruto? Did you have a nightmare?" he heard, a little muffled since the covers were still on his head.
Sighing, the eight year-old pulled the covers a few inches until a small blue eye was peeking at his father.
The man had his usually-grabbed-hair down, reaching a little past his shoulders. His expression, full of worry and exhaustion, made Naruto wince. Deep down – very, very deep down, mind you- Naruto regretted having such a caring adoptive father; he didn't know exactly what he did to deserve him.
Not knowing what the child was thinking, Iruka said, "I thought I heard noises coming from here."
"It's okay Iruka, it was just a dream," Naruto replied.
The man nodded sympathetically. "Oh, then would you like me to stay until you go to sleep. Or how about I sleep here. I can get the old mattress out if you want."
Blue eyes widened visibly, though Iruka took no notice since he had already gotten up and headed towards the closet. The same closet that Sasuke was hiding.
"W-wait Iruka!"
"Hm?"
Oh no, the man wasn't stopping.
"I'm not a little kid anymore! I can sleep alone fine!" he said, sitting up. His heart accelerated once more, beating unhappily against his ribcage.
Iruka had a hand on the closet's doorknob already, though he did stop to look at the nervous boy. "You're still a child Naruto; you need to sleep to grow healthy. That won't happen if you keep staying up all night."
"B-But Iruka!"
The teacher looked into the gleaming blue eyes of his son for a few seconds - which felt like hours to Naruto - and sighed. "Fine." Naruto breathed in relief. "But at least let me give you an extra blanket. Temperature influences dreams too, you know," he said, sounding a lot like he did at school.
The poor boy nearly shouted in frustration when the man turned towards the closet and pulled it open. He waited for the screams to come, for his father to drag Sasuke out and demand with a horrified voice to explain why he was there.
But the screams never came. Naruto opened his eyes - he had closed them sometime when the brunet had said something about dreams- and noticed a soft, fluffy blanket on top of him.
"Sleep well, Naruto," he whispered, patting the boy's crown. And the next thing he knew, he was alone again.
Wha? What did just happened? Where did Sasuke go? I saw him, he… he went inside the closet, but Iruka didn't…?
The confused boy practically threw the heavy blankets off of him, and sped to the still silent closet on the opposite side of his room.
He hesitantly ripped the poor door open and gasped.
There was nothing there.
Well, besides the clothes that were neatly hanged over his head, the toys that littered the floor, and his school bag that was slumped in a corner with the occasional socks here and there, it was absolutely empty. There was no sign of Sasuke. There weren't even any signs that Sasuke was just there a few seconds ago. The smell of his cologne was not even noticeable. It was like he disappeared through a hidden window on the wall or a trap door on the floor.
"Ne, Sasuke?"
He slipped inside, trying to come up with a possible way the older boy could've disappeared.
"Psst, Sasuke! Iruka's gone, where did you go? You can come out!" he said under his breath.
Not hearing an answer, Naruto visibly slumped. Did he imagine that Sasuke was here a few minutes ago? Perhaps he did have a dream and Iruka had just woken him up from it. Was he really so desperate for companionship that he essentially dreamt of a pale boy who arrived through his window in the middle of the night and played a card game with him? Considering the fact that all that sounded a little too strange, the child's eyes filled with warm tears in the corner of his eyes upon realizing it.
"This isn't fair. All I wanted was to play with him. Don't I at least deserve to have fun in my dreams?"
Dejectedly, Naruto stepped outside the darkness of the small closet, fully prepared to go back to bed. Feeling a deep hole in his chest as well as a knot in his throat, he wretchedly turned back around.
"Heh, if I hurry, I might be able to continue where that dream left of," he mused and cleared his watery eyes with a fist. Turning around back to his bed, blue eyes widened at the sight of cards on his bed.
Wait a minute, how-
He nearly yelped in fright when he heard a soft click behind him.
Naruto turned quickly, stopping all movement including his breathing to see if he just heard correctly.
Click-click-click
Naruto gulped. "I knew it! There's a monster in my closet!" he heard the click-click noise again, except this time more frantically. "And he just ate Sasuke!"
He blinked and approached the dangerous, gloomy closet. Bravely, he used his hands to pat the clothes, hanging over his head, aside. The small squeaks became louder; coming straight out of his favorite orange coat.
Black, shiny eyes stared right at him from the coat's pocket.
Naruto frowned and reached out for the small creature. When his finger touched feather-light fur of the creature's head, the little animal's nose twitched and sniffed attentively at the tan skin.
Naruto grinned at the small creature's unintentional effort to comfort him. Shakily, he pulled the lithe body out of the coat pocket and slid his left hand gently around it. The small creature chirped and gripped his hand with two hook-like arms.
Naruto turned to the direction of the balcony window, allowing the moonlight to shine on the animal in his hand before gasping.
It's a bat! he thought as soon as he noticed the black folded wings which were attached to the hooks.
He opened his hand wide, making the small bat fall on all fours on his palm. It was covered thoroughly with dark blue- almost black- fur, excluding his wings which were rough and leathery. Its black, sparkly eyes stared right at his own blue ones, cocking his head to the side.
"How you get up here?" Naruto asked while petting the bat's mane with his index finger. Of course he didn't answer, but he did open his mouth wide, revealing white fangs.
Naruto smiled back cheerfully.
If that wasn't enough surprises for one day, the small bat flew away from the child's palm and landed on all fours on his bed. The poor boy bit his tongue to keep himself from squealing loudly when the bat disappeared in a soft pop and a poof of smoke. There, it was replaced by a large figure, which stood upright as soon as the smoke dispersed.
"Sasuke! B-but… how did you… but you were-"
Dark eyes narrowed dangerously.
"Listen, dobe, you better not tell anyone about this, if you do you'll-"
The vampire didn't even get the chance to finish his threat, for the little blond smiled in awe.
"That was amazing! How did you do that?" he stopped, seemingly looking like he was in a mental debate with himself. "Wait! You lied to me. You said you weren't an angel!"
"I'm not. I'm a vampire." At the child's confused face he elaborated. "They are the exact opposite of angels. An angel cherishes and protects the human race, while we," he said, letting his eyes turn a fiery crimson color and allowing his fangs to grow. "We feed of mankind."
Naruto took a step back, then another. Taking more until his back finally hit the wall of his bedroom with a thump. He's wouldn't… would he?
Noticing the speeding heart, Sasuke licked his lips as the boy's face paled. The delicious blood pumped in rapid torrents inside the child's veins, its pace only increasing by the second. It would be the perfect time to attack, now that I've got him cornered.
Strangely though, he knew it would be impossible to kill the child now, he wouldn't be able to do it, not after failing twice. There was just something about him that made Sasuke's mind shut down whenever he so much as to thought about hurting him. Besides, there was no need to get rid of him, the child wouldn't tell anyone.
Sasuke turned away and conjured his wings allowing the child to get a good look at what he was, not caring that he was supposed to be inconspicuous tonight.
"Wait! Why are you leaving? We didn't even get the chance to play…hmm… blackchack!" he said incorrectly.
The Uchiha tensed, the comment nearly snapped the small thread of his patience. "Don't you understand? The only reason I came here was to feed off of your blood."
That seemed to have left the boy speechless as well with angry, wet eyes. "Y-you said you would be my friend! You are just like everyone else. You're a jerk! A big jerk that- that hates people even though they're trying to be polite and want to be your friend."
The vampire narrowed his eyes. "You speak as if you know me, yet you do not," he said bitterly and turned back to the window.
Realizing what he was about to do, Naruto launched himself away from the wall and threw himself in front of the other male.
"Then let me get to know you! Let's get to know each other, that way I can have a reason to call you an asshole!"
Surprise and genuine confusion were evident in the teen's face as he was insulted and cursed. Not many people got the chance to do such thing since he never allowed them to live afterwards.
It was all erased though, when Naruto grinned widely and he could've just sworn that he had just seen the sun right before his eyes. There have been times were he has seen the bright star before, but they were short intervals. If he spent too much time looking at it in broad daylight, he would be overcome by migraines and awful headaches and his sensitive eyes would eventually bleed.
But he could look at him as much as he wanted. There was nothing stopping him from gazing at his own sun for as long as he wanted. There were no pains, no headaches, no bleeding, just pure warm bliss.
Naruto suddenly yelped in surprise as he was grabbed roughly from under his arms and was picked up. Instinctively, he wrapped his small arms around the pale neck that he suddenly had a good view of and hid a small smile. He felt the other embrace him tighter. While still holding each other close, he was carried over to the small bed where he was dropped quickly, but gently with Sasuke on top of him.
The child was about to say something as the other was getting comfortable on his small bed, but stopped when he suddenly felt Sasuke breathe cold air to the sensitive skin of his neck as he nuzzled the spot. Sasuke tousled his golden hair, tickling himself.
"Wait, wait! What are you doing? Stop, you're cold and it tickles!" he whispered hurriedly, trying not to laugh.
With a sigh, the older boy backed away. Where did that come from? Turning back to the boy, he managed to regain back his own control and not pay attention to the scent of the whiskered boy."Ask then."
"Ask what?"
Sasuke smirked. "You want to get to know me, no? Ask a question then." He said, not bothering to whisper, since he could hear rather well the father's steady heartbeat and even breaths. It was obvious he won't be coming back for the rest of the night.
Naruto smiled. "Yeah! Yeah! I want to know… I want to know." He thought for a second. "Um, I want to know how you turned into a bat! Can all you vampires do it? How do you do it?
The dark-haired frowned; this was going to be a long night. Sasuke turned towards the window.
He groaned. Erase that, it was already close to sunrise. Brittle sunrays were beginning to trespass the window curtains. Some of them even dared to kiss the boy's soft unruly hair. "Vampires have two forms besides its human original. One of them is a bat while the other is a type of bird, it varies in everyone. How do I do it? Well, it's easy as long as I have plenty of chakra, which is all life form's energy."
Naruto nodded. "I get it. So what's your bird form?"
"A black falcon."
The child snorted. "And here I was thinking it was something more like a rooster!" He yawned.
"You're tired," he observed, ignoring the comment from the child. He touched Naruto's forehead with his finger, just like he had done to Sasuke when he was a bat.
Naruto smacked his hand away, though it was more like soft pat. "Stop that! You're going to make me fall asleep!" he protested.
But the caresses came back, this time ruffling his hair gently, making the boy's blue eyes drop heavily, begging for a break. Although, he knew very well that as soon as he closed his eyes and fell into a deep slumber, the vampire would leave his side. Still, Naruto couldn't help but allow himself to relax with the soft touches by the older boy.
"Tell me more," the boy whispered drowsily.
The raven-haired sighed. "What would you like to know?"
Naruto opened one of his eyes. "Can holy water and garlic kill you?"
The older boy just about laughed at the question but stopped himself in time. "No, I don't know where you humans came up with that; we are no less sensitive to those things than you people are."
"What about a crucifix?"
"Not at all."
"Can you see your own reflection in a mirror?"
"Yes, we don't have any problem with that."
Naruto sat up to look at the vampire closely. "Do you have any super talents? I mean besides turning into a bat?"
Sasuke thought for a minute. "Talents? Such as?"
The human child pouted and then took a deep breath. "I mean like super strength, fast abilities, invisibility, mind-reading, the ability to move and control objects, fast healing, see the future, control the elements, travel through time, or transport to another dimen-"
"Alright, dobe, I get it!"
The boy smiled and laid his head on his pillow again.
The raven-haired sighed again, this time in frustration. "I do not posses any of those things you mention except perhaps the one like mind-reading. I come from an old race of vampires who are born with a special ability called the Sharingan. It allows us to predict our opponents or preys movements and copy their own abilities." The teen paused to look carefully the child's astonished face. "Now that I think about, we can also control some elements, such as fire and lighting."
"That's pretty cool! Could you show me sometime?" Naruto look at the vampire's onyx eyes with deep admiration.
Feeling somewhat awkward from the praises and compliments, the pale boy just nodded.
Eventually, the child's breathing evened out. Noticing this, Sasuke Uchiha moved out of the bed slowly and pulled the covers around the child, who didn't even stir. After being awake for at least two hours, the boy beat the urge to close his eyes and sleep.
Pale fingers brushed over a warm, scarred cheek one last time. They traced each whisker-like mark lightly without damaging the soft skin with his fingernails. The difference in temperature made Naruto lean towards the touch.
Lips twitching into a semi-smile, the fingers retreated from the infant's moonlit contour and all signs of the cold caressing touches vanished as the vampire made his way back to the Uchiha manor.
You all must have noticed that we are going with the old school type of vampires, right? Actually no, we are not.
Well, the way I see it, there are two types of vampires:
The vampires that are afraid of mirrors, garlic, and can't stand crosses. They are capable of been killed with a stake on the heart and can't stand the sun. We didn't go with this one because it poses too many problems, not to mention they are kind of hard to be portrayed as terrifying.
The second type of vampires is the type you read in romance novels like Twilight (not mine). They are indestructible and do not fear neither their reflection nor the sun. They pretty much don't have any weaknesses, which makes whatever you're reading a little boring. That's why we didn't go for this type either.
We sort of made Sasuke, and the rest of the vampires, be in between these two types. We didn't want him to be a pussy, but we didn't want him to be an indestructible machine with no weaknesses, that would be a little boring.
--
Anyways, happy holidays everybody! We hope you are having a wonderful Christmas break. And for those who are still working in part time jobs or something, we want to say we feel so sorry for you, but keep up the hard work!
Anyways, thank you everybody for all the wonderful reviews for not only this fic but for the others as well. We absolutely appreciate and take them to heart, thank you all!
Especial thanks to Lady La-Sara, Spoon10488, KitsuneNaru for supporting our stories with their awesome reviews.
bb-s: Thank you for the comment, indeed twenty years from now, Naruto will in fact look older than Sasuke, but Sasuke is still technically older. Makes sense?
PandaApprovedxx: We are very pleased to know you liked it! Thank you very much for the comment. It makes us happy to know you're happy. Congratulations by the way, sorry we didn't get the chance to contact you on time.
Resuna: This chapter is just for you, my dear! We promise there will be more neck-licking on the next chapters.
roboguy45: Why yes, we know that line will be actually interpreted in a different way than what he actually means, that's why it's there. Thank you for the review!
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My secret Darkness: Oh no, there's no reason to pity Naruto. He is having (and will have) too much fun with Sasuke! Right now Sasuke is a little reluctant to be his new playmate but… that's why he is such an inconsistent bastard :D And we mean that in the nicest way.
Ilamay: Thanks for reviewing! We know you are looking forward to a time skip but unfortunately that won't happen for at least another chapter, sorry! Umm… sorry for disappointing you yet again D: We'll try to update as soon as possible, we promise!
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Thank you all for the nice reviews. We hope you enjoy this chapter as well. Let us know if you have any questions. And hope everybody is having a fantastic time!
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