&#&#&#&#&#&#&#&#&#&#
Author's Note 1: I am SO sorry for the delay! I didn't think it would be this much of a problem, but some of you have been even worrying for my health considering my usually prompt updates. xD Recently I have hit a slump in my writing where everything, even the things I WANT to write, feels like a chore. It's annoying me so much, so I'm trying to force myself to write what I can, when I can. As soon as I have a chapter worthy of showing you I will post it I promise. I just started school on the 3rd of september, and have fairly easy classes this year, I just have to get back into the habit of school. I HAVE been trying to write Fate's Garden, I have like four different drafts of the first chapter of part 4. I've really been trying my hardest, and I feel bad for leaving you hanging. I'm not going to promise a chapter soon because I don't want to get your hopes up and I honestly don't know. But the wait will definitely not be months long, so no worries there. I am not discontinuing this story. I mean, why would I? The end is in sight! One part left, 8 chapters? Do not lose faith!
I love you guys all so much, and I am perfectly fine, not dead, not ill. Just a little stress.
Author's Note 2: I have my own forums now! And they have a topic for Fate's Garden for you all to post in and chat away! Please do, I would love to see you guys talking in there. I might even pop in and talk to ya. It would amuse me to no end, please do!
&#&#&#&#&#&#&#&#&#&#
Fate's Garden
Part 4 - Hysteria
Chapter 1 - Gloucester
"I have no way, and therefore want no eyes, I stumbled when I saw." Gloucester, King Lear.
The air was sterile, the room silent. Naruto felt guilty for breathing, with how loud it sounded in this noiseless cocoon of whiteness. Everything in the room was white: the walls, the ceiling, the linoleum tile, the sheets and blankets on the bed, Sasuke's hospital gown, the cloth that had recently replaced his bandages. All of it, Naruto felt as though he were slowly fading away. It had been two weeks now and he'd remained in the room with Sasuke. There was a bathroom connected, and they brought food up for him. Sasuke had woken only once since then. It had been horrifying.
"What? What's going on? Naruto is that you? Where are the others? Kakashi-sensei and Sakura? Are they alright?! Where's Zabuza? Haku? Where are we?" Sasuke's words were logical at first, coherent, and yet urgent. He was a nin on a mission after all. But then they grew in a ferocious crescendo that had Naruto calling for the nurse.
"Nurse? We're in the hospital? Why are we in the hospital? Why can't I see anything?!"
Sasuke lifted his hands up to his eyes and pressed against the bandage. He frowned and then screamed, scratching at the gauze in a panic. He clawed and pulled every last bit of cloth off, yanking off scabs until his empty eye sockets were pouring blood. His nimble fingers felt the blood on his face and reached up into the gaping holes left where his eyes had been. He looked like a skeleton from a horror film, blood weeping from the sightless maws left amidst ashen flesh. Feeling no eyes where they should be, the most heart wrenching scream sliced through the air. The nurse had arrived by that time and called for help. She tried to hold him down but he struggled, scared, confused, and disgusted.
Naruto had gagged and nearly thrown up at the site of Sasuke reaching into his empty eye sockets, with blood all over his face. Eventually after some timeless stretch of mayhem, the congregation of security, nurses, and doctors sedated Sasuke. After that it was the nurses' job to clean up the wounds, and bandage him back up.
Learning their lesson the doctors added a sedative drip to Sasuke's charts. Now, even if he woke up, he wouldn't fly into hysteria as he had before. The door behind him opened and Naruto turned in his seat, finding his muscles complaining at the sudden change in posture. It was Kakashi-sensei, appearing haggard and withdrawn. He closed the door. His feet made no sound on the awkward tile as he approached, pulling a chair away from an empty bed and making use of it. He sat. Naruto returned to his slouch, once again made of stone.
"So…" Kakashi said.
"So…" Naruto croaked. He hadn't been talking much.
"The council has decided that due to the nature of the injury and the circumstances surrounding it, the two of you will have your qualifications as ninja removed."
"The nature of the injury?" Naruto scoffed.
"Have you ever met a blind ninja, Naruto?"
He was silent.
"And…Naruto, you know why they're disqualifying you…?"
"I went a little crazy," Naruto shrugged, not enjoying that particular memory gained, "I'll live. Sasuke needs somebody."
Kakashi didn't reply. He probably didn't care if Sasuke needed somebody, nor did he care that Naruto had gone crazy and he would be fine. Naruto had forgotten how emotionally constipated his sensei had been. He hadn't realized that back then, the man found them to be an annoyance more than anything. It had taken him years to acknowledge them with fondness.
Though there was the consistent beep of Sasuke's heart monitor, the silence in the room was so thick that it felt awful to whisper let alone speak. He felt like he was ruining something.
"What will happen to Sakura then?"
"For now I will train her as a special case and prepare her for the chuunin exams. Once she is ready she will be paired with other genins like her, who have lost team mates."
"She didn't lose us."
"…whose teams have also been disbanded due to extenuating situations."
Neither of them did well with pleasantries or tact. The air between them was heavy and awkward. Boy and man at a stalemate, neither caring for the other's feelings, biting out words for the sake of communicating vital information and that was it.
Kakashi stood. He pushed the chair back over to the bed on the other half of the room. Then he left. Long strides took him to the door which he opened and shut without a word of goodbye. Naruto stared at the other bed, unoccupied and having been that way since he'd woken up in this life. The chair had always been with it and they seemed together a comical empty reflection of Naruto and Sasuke's arrangement. He didn't like noticing them. Something in his head told him that one day he'd look over and there would be a person lying in that bed with disease ridden gaze fixed upon him. Naruto wasn't sure where he'd first gotten the feeling but it was there and wouldn't leave him alone.
He was beginning to hope that Sasuke wouldn't wake up and that they would both miraculously pass away in their sleep. Even if his Sasuke got a move on and occupied this Sasuke's body, he'd still react badly. Sasuke didn't like not being in control, and blindness did not lend itself to such an attitude. On the other hand, the traumatized Sasuke of this life wouldn't exactly be easy to handle either. Naruto slouched just a little bit more in his seat. He willed Sasuke to stay asleep for just a few more days. I don't want to deal with this just yet…
Sasuke appeared in the hallway of the universe feeling somewhat cheated. He hadn't expected this consequence life and he had no want of it. But it was not his decision so within a minute or so he settled into the circumstance quite readily. He let no more than a grumble escape his lips and Yuuta, who now stood before him, nodded approvingly.
"Follow me, little godling," Yuuta called, gesturing over his shoulder that Sasuke should hurry up.
Sasuke did as instructed, though he couldn't help that his feet moved just a tad slow. His eyes were affixed to the walls. Upon them were drawings like those of a child. They were floor to ceiling but none too wide. Simply portraits of himself, walking. He grew younger as he progressed down the hall until eventually he was nothing more than a child in the womb. Then that very womb was in flames and all was left was ashes. From those ashes crawled a weary faced old man. He shook himself free from ash and continued on as if such occurrences were perfectly usual.
Yuuta stopped him at a door they'd just arrived at, on the right side of the hallway. Sasuke found this interesting as all the previous lives' doors had been on the left. He noticed that the old man kept walking in pictures down the hall, and if he squinted well enough he saw him join up with another old man, or another old person at the least. Sasuke wanted to go down there and take a look but Yuuta stopped him.
"This is your door, childe."
"But there's a picture on the wall down there…I can go in just a minute, can't I?"
"It is understandable that you question until you come fully into your divinity and have the answers, but I still manage to find it annoying."
Sasuke scowled at him.
Yuuta held the door open for him and Sasuke begrudgingly walked through it, falling into the abyss.
TBC...