A/N: This chapter was betaed by AisCrim. Also, to comply with Terms of Service, the NC-17 portion of the i chapter has been cut out. You can find the a link to the full version in my profile.
Naruto sat cross-legged on the couch, restlessly flipping through the channels. 'Don't think. Don't anticipate.' He blocked his thoughts, his plan, because if he let them through then he would lose all courage, all strength and stubbornness, and the fox would have truly won.
It would have really broken him.
A groan escaped his clenched teeth as the remote fell from nerveless fingers, while he curled his body around the seal on his stomach, the seal that now burned like Kabuto was carving it into his flesh with a red-hot scalpel.
"Ahh…" the pained breath was loud in the silence. A trickle of sand appeared beside him and reformed into an eye. He grimaced and waved his free hand, pressing the other to his stomach, which burned under his touch.
"He's calling." The sand whirled away, and Gaara came down the stairs, his cold fingers catching him by the wrists, stroking over the pounding veins beneath the skin. Naruto shuddered under the touch, something so gentle from someone so feared.
"Let me help you." Naruto glanced up, and seeing no condemnation, nodded in resignation. Gaara looped an arm around his waist and pulled him to his feet, brushing his knuckles across Naruto's cheek. The other vessel's voice was serious,
"If I could bear this pain for you, I would." Naruto smiled painfully, coughing. Blood sprayed in a fine mist from his mouth and spattered the carpet. "I need to go," he rasped, turning away. Gaara went with him, sending a tendril of sand to wake Kakashi.
The jounin appeared beside them, his visible eye dark with sadness and grief. He took in the situation with a glance, sighed, and scooped Naruto up, letting him lay his head against Kakashi's shoulder.
"I can walk, you know," he mumbled, stiffening as another spasm raced through him. The fox was getting impatient.
"True," Kakashi said, "but why should you have to?" Naruto closed his eyes and relaxed against Kakashi's muscled chest. If Kakashi would take the burden of walking, all the better.
He would need this strength to face the Kyuubi.
Naruto turned his head and looked up at Kakashi and Gaara, both high up in the branches of one of the trees that circled the clearing. One side of his mouth lifted in a crooked grin. Gaara spoke finally,
"I do not want to watch this again." Kakashi looped an arm around the frail shoulders and drew the younger man close, more for his own comfort then anything else.
"Neither do I, but we must bear witness." There was silence in the clearing, and the tsunami of fire came, the thundering fading away finally and leaving the red figure standing, still and proud, in the center of a circle of scorched earth.
"Naruto," the fox's voice rumbled low in his chest, "Come here." Naruto raised his head, and the reply was so small, so quiet, strange for something so monumental.
"No." The fox stepped forward, gliding across the clearing to stand in front of Naruto's wiry, scarred form. Lips peeled back, exposing reddened teeth.
The Kyuubi's fingers flared wide, and bladed claws of red chakra sprang from them, sizzling in the cold air of the evening. Naruto's lips curled into a smirk, but he said nothing, and the silence was the Kyuubi's answer. The fox's tongue lolled in a terrible attempt at a grin, inhuman, unfeeling. The Kyuubi reached forward, the claws closing around Naruto's head in a grotesque parody of affection, of a lover's caress.
Kakashi could smell the stench of burning flesh.
"Is that all?" The Kyuubi's voice was amused, the soft tone somehow carrying the rage of a thousand years, the crashing of tsunamis and the crackle of lightning. Naruto said nothing. The Kyuubi sighed, and the claws tightened, cutting into skin and tearing.
The fox pulled his hand back and slashed the air, claws whipping through skin and shoving Naruto to the ground, where he lay unmoving, the blood a dark stain in the moonlight. Naruto got up and spat in the fox's face. The Kyuubi reached up wonderingly and touched the phlegm, then grinned.
"It has been a long time since anyone dared to stand up to me." Naruto's breaths were harsh and ragged in the stillness, but he didn't attack. Because now, here, he had finally accepted-
That there was nothing he could do.
The fox snarled and shoved him down again, planting a hard foot in his belly. Naruto staggered to his feet again, with blood staining his hair brown and torn skin hanging from his cheekbone, and spat in the Kyuubi's face. The fox roared and slashed the air, red chakra claws burning as they passed over Naruto's grimly smiling face.
Kakashi closed his eyes against the sight of Naruto getting back up again, again and again only to be slapped down, not because he wanted to, but because it was his duty.
Because it was the only thing he could do.
'Just stay down. Don't get back up to be humiliated, don't-' and Naruto didn't listen, but only stood and bled and stared into blood-red eyes with a defiant grin on his lips and pale face wild in the moonlight. Kakashi had never felt so proud or so sad in his life.
"Why do you defy me? Have you forgotten the contract?" The fox's voice was puzzled, and it was all Kakashi could do to control his hate for this animal, this beast that wounded without even realizing just what terrible harm it was doing. Naruto's voice bubbled in his chest,
"As long as you have me before the sun rises, the contract holds, and I'm going to choose the time."
'Punctured lungs,' Kakashi thought numbly, staring down with Gaara's twisted spine cradled in his arms and cold pride in Naruto like a blade through his chest.
'Like a butterfly beating its wings against the dark…' the strange thought drifted slowly through his head. And as he watched with Gaara's thin back pressing into his chest, as if in affirmation that there was good in the world, in the human heart, he looked away from the doomed battle in front of him, and for the first time in over twenty years, asked the gods to help the world.rld
Gaara leaped from the tree as the demon disappeared, just in time to keep Naruto from hitting the scorched earth. There was blood everywhere, slick on his hands and somehow cold, so cold, even in the midst of flame. Naruto coughed again, and Gaara could feel each solitary, curving rib, fragile as glass, press against his hands.
They shuddered, and he turned his gaze to see that Naruto was laughing, tears in his eyes and blood running from his torn face.
"I did it, Gaara," he slurred, "Made him think twice, huh?" Gaara lifted a hand to Naruto's chin and cupped it, brushing a tentative thumb across the sweep of his bottom lip.
"Yes, Naruto. I am…" he paused, unsure if this was right to say, if he should be proud of the fact that Naruto stood up, and received only more pain, "happy for you." Shredded muscles contorted Naruto's bloody lips into a half-smile.
Hatake came up beside him, reaching down to accept Naruto's drugged weight from him. Gaara turned him over, but looked up at Hatake, watching the way the moonlight turned his silver hair and the eye that saw only the past- and Obito, as Hatake had told him over coffee and crumbled toast in the middle of the night- into molten mercury.
He was a beautiful man. Gaara wondered if one could only love one other person, if love was something parceled out to them at birth, and giving some of it away meant that you would never get it back. That had been his father's way; to give all of his love to Temari, and none for anyone else.
"We should return to the house, Hatake-san." A long-fingered hand landed on his shoulder, making him shiver at this touch, still so new, so frightening that anyone would.
"You can call me Kakashi, Gaara." Gaara blinked, looking up at the dark gray eye. Kakashi's lips curved into a sad smile underneath the mask, and somehow, even though Gaara had sworn when he was younger that no one would ever be able to-
Kakashi understood.
"Let's go clean Naruto up," Kakashi said, turning. Gaara turned with him, and towards their distant rest began to trudge.
Naruto stared up at the ceiling, feeling heavy, dull, and dumb, rolled up like a mummy in bandages on the couch in his room. ' Is this what Kakashi feels like all the time?' he thought, sticking an experimental tongue out to lick the bandages.
There was nothing but the taste of blood. He turned his head slowly and gazed at the doorway, watching Gaara and Kakashi move around each other in the upstairs hallway. A tendril of sand came, bearing a cup of numbing tea for his throat.
He reached out and wrapped stiff fingers around the cup, bringing it to his lips. It burned. Bright stars burst behind his eyelids, and he set it aside, turning his head to stare at them. His pelvis hurt; it was broken.
"Kakashi?" he said into the darkness. The older man looked up and crossed the room to him, bending over him, his eyes heavy-lidded and almost tender. He was amazing in the dawning light.
"Yes?"
Naruto let himself relax into the couch, and slurred out his question,
"Is it always supposed to be like this?"
Kakashi's face froze into a terrible mask of sadness.
"Oh, Naruto. No. It was never supposed to be like this."
Gaara came into the living room too, his eyes wide and luminous in the dim light.
"What is it supposed to be like?" Gaara said, Kakashi's shoulders slumped, and he brought a hand to his face, sighing. "I can't explain. These things can't be expressed in words, you know. It's something you have to experience for yourself." Naruto ached, somewhere deep inside him, for Kakashi to show him, for a chance to show Gaara. Gaara's long-fingered hand drifted up to touch Kakashi's face, the former vessel's face serious.
"Show me."
Kakashi stilled like Naruto's breath. His voice was stifled and hoarse in the silence, one hand coming up to trap Gaara's hand beneath it, fingers curling around Gaara's palm.
"I can't."
"Why not?"
Kakashi looked down, silver hair drooping into his face. "Because you don't really want me. You're not old enough to really know what you want-"
"Bullshit," Naruto croaked. The spell broken, he shrank back into the covers as Kakashi's lone eye bored into him, but he plunged on,
"Gaara and I- we were never really children in the first place. I know what I want, and he knows what he wants, and he wants you. And if you don't like him the same way, that's fine, but don't treat us like we're five fucking years old!" He coughed, ribs grating against each other. Kakashi stared at him. "But- I'm fifteen years older then him."
"Tsunade's fifty years older then Shizune, but I don't see them complaining." Gaara turned to him, his thin face grave and green eyes glowing in the light.
"Is this all right with you, Naruto?" He smiled underneath the bandages, and nodded feebly. 'Kakashi's a good man. Hot, too. He'll treat you right.'
"Now wait just a minute-" Kakashi protested, only to be cut off by Gaara stepping closer and bringing his other hand up to cup his face, the dark head tilted.
Kakashi stared into the mesmerizing green eyes, paralyzed. 'I shouldn't do this. I shouldn't. He's damaged, he's broken, he doesn't know what he wants-' but he was so beautiful, so wanting and terrible in his allure. Gaara's slow voice, deep and soft, cut through the silence like a knife.
"I would rather have you show me then anyone else."
Kakashi tilted his head back and felt sorrow and a sort of lost, saddened love well in his chest. Such uncompromising trust, given from a man who had never been trusted, never been loved, such a gift. To refuse such a gift… it seemed like sacrilege.
"Are you certain?" he murmured. Gaara, holding his eyes, drowning him in green like new life, nodded. He turned to Naruto, unsure of what to say, but his former student, always so perceptive, so knowing, said,
"I want to watch. I want to see…" he paused, the heartbeat of silence hanging between them, "what it should be like." Kakashi closed his eyes. 'And this is the end.' He disentangled his hand from Gaara's and brought them up to his mask, curling them around the lip of the cloth.
With a soft rustle, he drew the mask down, exposing the long scar that curled over his Sharingan eye and down to bisect his lower lip. A cool finger traced the line, and he opened both of his eyes to see Gaara's face, serious and concentrating, close to his own.
He was really a beautiful man.
"I'd like to kiss you now," he said, catching Gaara's hands in his own and feeling the blood thrum through them. "Is that okay?" He waited, breath frozen in his lungs. He'd had many lovers before, some of them virgins, but never anyone so completely new to any form of affection. Gaara nodded. He stooped and cupped Gaara's thin face in his hands, and sealed his mouth over the younger man's.
Gaara stiffened for a moment, surprised, and then he melted into him, boneless and limp. 'He's… sweet,' Kakashi thought, feeling warmth unfurl inside his chest.
He traced Gaara's lips with his tongue, asking for entrance, and took it as soon as Gaara opened his mouth, tasting the green tea Gaara had drank last, rain and cold and mist, the kiss slow and thorough.
His hands slid down Gaara's arms and dipped beneath the hem of his shirt, rising upward and tracing the bumps of his spine. Gaara shuddered against him, the younger man's arms locking around his waist, pale in the dim light, his head falling back in abandon. He left Gaara's mouth and trailed a path down to his neck, tasting sweat and earth and skin, fingers smoothing down the former Sand-nin's sides to rest on the jarringly sharp hipbones. He bit down for a moment, sucking until he felt the blood vessels pop, loving Gaara's high whine in his ear, and laved the area in apology, pulling himself away from the rapidly bruising area to run a curious hand through Gaara's hair.
"Did I go too fast? I'm sorry."
Gaara snorted, his hands coming up to catch Kakashi's shoulder and tug him back down.
"I liked it. Do it again, please?"
Kakashi smiled, slid an arm around Gaara's waist, and lifted him, carrying him to the bed in the corner. Gaara sat up as he laid him down and reached out for his gray shirt.
"Can I…?"
Kakashi shrugged out of it easily and dropped it on the floor, stretching out on the bed full-length beside Gaara's much smaller form. Gaara studied him for a moment, bottom lip caught between his teeth, and for a moment Kakashi wanted to laugh at him, always so serious, treating everything as a matter of life or death. Unskilled fingers brushed down the center of his chest, tracing the myriad of old scars, leaving goosebumps in their wake. Banked fire bloomed wherever Gaara touched, slowly moving downward, coiling like a living thing.
"You're amazing," Gaara said wonderingly. Kakashi closed his eyes, reminded all over again of just how terribly this man had been hurt, how long he had lived in sorrow and solitude, and he wondered again if he had the strength or the skill to ease even a fraction of that pain.
He could try.
Gaara stretched languidly, pale and luminous in the dim light, and laid his head on Kakashi's shoulder, breath fanning out over his chest and making his skin shudder in its wake. Kakashi let his hand rest on the back of Gaara's head, cupping his skull and feeling the strange fragility there.
"You all right?" Gaara sighed, peering out from under his lashes. He smiled, and it was just as heartbreaking the second time as the first.
"I'm fine. I feel very good, actually. But you didn't…" he gestured helplessly. Kakashi traced a few seals on Gaara's shoulder, unable to abandon the warmth and slip-sleekness of his skin, closing the Sharingan eye.
"No; I didn't want to. This was only for you, not for me."
There was a rustle from the corner, and he looked over to see Naruto's blue eyes gazing out from a bloody, bandaged face. A cracked, shuddering sob split the air like a bolt of lightning, as Naruto finally, finally understood just what it was he had lost those long, long seven years in darkness.
'And towards their distant rest began to trudge.' - A line from Dulce Et Decorum Est.