Author's Note: To all my readers-
Thanks so much for reading. It really does mean a lot to me. Also, I can't thank you enough for being so patient and apologize for my absence. I've spent most of my time in hospitals and going through lots stuff that's out of the norm. I only recently started feeling well enough to write again. Expect rapid updates for a good while. ;)
-GS18
After leaving the building, the group found themselves outside in the rain. Kate hid under the eaves of the doorway in the hopes that her new, beautiful kimono wouldn't get soiled. But then Jugo calmly walked over and picked her up bridal style, startling her into yelping.
"Wha?"
"Don't worry. I'll hide you in my cloak till it stops. Plus you'll be warmer."
Kate couldn't help but blush being so close to Jugo. He was so calm and and warm. And to top it all off they hadn't found a shirt big enough, so she was pressed up against his warm, bare chest! She figured she looked like a tomato, clinging to him under the rain proof cloak. He adjusted her so her head popped out next to his where the hood was so that the hood covered her head as well. She could see the others waiting for them in the rain- Suigetsu smiling like a kid because of all the water, Karin sulking and shooting glances at Sasuke, and Sasuke... glaring at her. Or was he glaring a Jugo? Kate couldn't be sure, but he definitely didn't look happy.
"Let's go. We need to get to the inn in the next city by nightfall and the rain will only slow us down." Sasuke barked out, ordering them to move. And move they did. Kate felt like a wallaby clinging to a tree as she clung desperately to Jugo's body and they ran at a pace she never could imagine. Was this what running with chakra felt like? Was it really this fast? She was broken from her thoughts as Jugo's arms came up to hold her tighter to him. It was comforting and she leaned into him more, and felt herself nodding off. Maybe this was what it felt like to be rescued damsel she thought to herself...and then she was asleep.
When Kate woke up, she was in a japanese style room. The rain was still pattering outside and she could hear it on the roof above her head. There were open windows which showed the city outside was bustling although wet. Where... had they reached the inn already? She quickly sat up and patted her body. She still had her kimono on, so she figured that Jugo had just "tucked" her into bed and then let her sleep. Were they gone? Had they left her for good? Abandoned her? Or were they just next door? Outside?
She leapt up off of the floor (it was a Japanese style cot) and hurried to the door. It was wooden and easily slid to the right allowing her to see out into the hallway. She looked to the left, then the right. No one. All the other doors were closed. Should she knock on them? She shook her head and ventured towards what appeared to be the end of the hall. A dark stairwell lead to a lower floor that was also empty. Was this really an inn? Weren't there usually a lot of people in inns? Suddenly a door flew open and in came the group, carrying a heavily injured Sasuke.
"Guys? Sasuke? Are you-is he okay?"
Jugo looked up and roughly shook his head and then proceeded to help the limping dark-haired teen up the steps. Karin followed, looking nervous and ignoring her, while Suigetsu traveled back out the door into the rain. They continued up the stairs back to where she'd left the door open and roughly pulled it farther. The group seemed to tumble into the room and soon, Sasuke was in tucked into the cot that Kate had just gotten up from.
Kate couldn't fathom for a second what happened. And then it all clicked. Had Sasuke just fought Deidara? That had to be an explanation.
That's right! She thought, in the manga, they took refuge in a motel after the battle because Sasuke was injured!
"So you won against Deidara! Which means you've met Ma-I mean, Tobi!" Kate said out loud.
Karin who was in the middle of healing Sasuke (by means of biting and the like) turned to Kate with a scowl.
"Just what are you going on about? Can't you see we're trying to help Sasuke? And what are you doing other than standing there?" She spat out.
Kate couldn't help but scowl herself.
"If you hadn't of left me here in the first place, I could have saved him the trouble of fighting at all. He didn't have to kill Deidara, let alone fight him! When Itachi wants to be found, he'll come find Sasuke himself."
"The hell does that mean?" Karin shot back. She stood up and began to walk towards Kate menacingly, but Jugo held her back. Karin swiftly turned around and pointed a finger at him.
"And you! You're always protecting her? Why? Sasuke didn't want her around anymore! No one wants her around! She's nothing but baggage! But you, you're so adamant about keeping her! Got yourself a little crush? Hmph, why don't you freaks stick together?"
Jugo's face seemed flitter between being shocked to angry to looking lost. That's what spurred Kate to action.
"Hey!" Kate shouted out, walking towards Karin and pulling her hair gently so she'd stop holding Jugo, "leave him alone! This is between you and me!"
"Why you! I ought'a-"
"ENOUGH!" Sasuke's voice rang out through the room. "Karin, leave the room. I'm sick of your envious fighting. Jugo, come help me wrap the bandage around my back. Keito, sit. I have a lot of questions for you."
Kate shivered. That did not sound good. Karin glared at her and heavily walked out of the small room, slamming the sliding door behind her. Jugo calmly moved to kneel beside Sasuke and proceeded to wrap the last of the bandages around him. When he was finished, the three of them sat quietly and waited for Sasuke to begin.
After what seemed like an awkward, tense quiet, Sasuke began.
"You fell asleep while we were traveling. We deposited you here and then proceeded normally; picking up odd jobs to earn money for supplies and rooms while we travel. We were hired to find leftover bombs in a forge not far from here. One exploded under my watch."
"Oh." Kate said, feeling stupid. Not only had she assumed wrongly, she'd given away a possibly deadly secret.
"Now, firstly. Ever since we picked you up, you've acted strangely. You knew us. How?"
Kate froze. How... how was she supposed to explain this? How could she possibly explain a manga and anime from a foreign world? She had to think quick, and wisely. She began to act hesitant and worried on purpose, while inside she thought desperately for "answers".
"I... I..."
"You what?" Sasuke asked in a deadpan voice.
"I'm able to watch things from a distance... like, when I was in my own world, I could see things of this world and..." she hesitated, " see the events of the future happen." She finished lamely.
"And by your world you mean the tank?" Jugo asked.
"Yes." She answered, sounding resolute. "The thing is, I know about most everyone of importance in the interweaves of this world's fate. I saw many things that are going to happen, as far as I know, and a lot of it has already happened. It's how I knew about Grandmother Cat, even before we went there. I could tell you all about your childhoods if you wanted, even things you may have not told anyone, things you thought or felt. But see, it's all messed up now, I think. Well, at least I'm worried about it. In my world, I was an omnipotent presence. I didn't affect anything or interact with any of you. But now... I'm here. Talking. Does that change the course of fate I saw? Has it already? Or will that only happen if I tell you of things I saw in your possible futures? I'm sorry. I'm so so sorry... I don't... I..."
"Stop." Sasuke asked quietly. For the first time, he sounded unsure to her. "I'm..." He continued, "Unsure as to what to do with you, or of what use you could be. Jugo and I have talked about it alone. He agrees with me that there's a reason Orochimaru kept you in there. After what you told us, I can only assume he used you as some sort of viewing glass into the future and past. However, if what you say is true, then your supposed foresight was only accurate when you were in captivity. Now, you're just like us; lots of ideas and possibilities but no concretes." He sighed deeply and then his brows furrowed in thought.
Jugo looked at him with a concerned, yet compassionate look on his face before he spoke. "Sasuke, stop. You can't omit her like you said, and I'm not saying that because I don't like throwing people away. Remember Orochimaru's notes? The dimensional slip? We haven't asked-"
"Dimensional slip?" Kate interrupted softly, "Um, I may know something about that... I think..."
Both heads shot up and the two men stared intently at her.
"I didn't want to have to talk about this, because I didn't know how to explain it and I was nervous around you." she sighed, "I don't know where I'm from. Like which land I hail from. I have faint memories of that place, and certain people, but I don't know where that place is in relation to here. Perhaps he considered that place, where it was, another dimension?" She finished hesitantly.
She honestly didn't remember a lot about her home. She remembered odd, random things like how her car sounded when it didn't want to turn on, or random TV episodes, and even what her cat looked like when she was bathed, but the people and places were hazy, and foreign sounding. It was as if she'd somehow had all of the important things erased. And it scared her. But she couldn't explain the complexity of everything that had happened to these people. As much as she liked them, both from what she'd read of them and what she'd seen of them here, how could she possibly explain the horrible feeling of remembering a car, but not what it did, or why there weren't any here?
They all sat thinking hard and the room was filled with quiet. Suddenly Kate was struck with a feeling of bravery and asked the question she'd been meaning to ask since they'd left Grandmother Cat's.
"Sasuke," he looked up at her, "Why are you angry with me? I know I haven't been useful, but did I do something wrong?"
A small moment of shock seemed to hit his face before it passed quickly and was replaced by furrowed brows.
"I'm not angry." He stated calmly. "I'm frustrated."
Jugo and Kate looked at him, waiting. After a few long moments, he continued.
"It's been a long, hard time since I last saw that kimono, let alone the Uchiha fan on another person other than me and... him." he sighed deeply before looking at her with a deep look, "You also look remarkably like her. She had similar childish features at your age and acted just as bubbly. It's unnerving for me at times because..." he trailed off into murmuring, but neither listener corrected him. Both knew the depth of how hard talking openly was, let alone about his "feelings" and "opinions".
Kate moved to kneel closely beside him and gently placed herself to the left of him. She calmly leaned towards him, even when he stared at her and gave her a shocked look. And then she hugged him.
Later, everyone came back and they all settled into their bedding and nodded off to sleep... All except Sasuke. He lay there on his side, looking over at the softly sleeping Keito. Sasuke wasn't really sure what to think anymore. He'd always believed that his point in life was straight forward: avenge the clan. However, now things didn't seem that way. Something, or more specifically someone, had changed it.
He sighed deeply as he sat up in his futon his elbows resting on his knees, his hands holding his jaw while his fingers felt like clawing into his temples from the stress of it all. He'd taken off his arm bandages and some of his chest ones (merging with the Snake Sanin had proved useful with healing). His white cotton shirt that he'd been wearing hung limply off his shoulders and he'd left his sandals at the door to the room. He glanced towards them, only to see a smaller, second pair laid out beside them. It made him sigh and his whole body tense, reminding him of the small body on the bed that was next to him.
He turned back to look at the scratchy white sheets, to see the small, delicate hand wrapped up in the linen as if it was a stuffed animal. He mentally growled at himself for even thinking of holding it in his own hand, but then fell silent, thinking of why he would think that way to begin with.
He felt like growling again. Since when had he grown soft? What had happened to the hatred and cool exterior he'd striven for ever since leaving that god forsaken village? The village...
His thoughts strayed to the village, walking beside Itachi when he was little, his father's face, his mother... his gentle mother, staring out at the flowers in the garden, her face passive but smiling, her dark hair swaying with the slight Spring breeze... and then his mind conjured up the image of his mother, so happy on festival day wearing that same beautiful kimono, his father smiling the only smile Sasuke had ever witnessed... and finally, Sasuke thought of the dark girl with the gentle blue eyes, staring out at him with the same gentle, childish face as his mother, smiling that same soft smile his mother had worn on every day...
And now here was the same girl. Sasuke looked at her, memorizing her appearance: Pale in the moonlight against the stiff white sheets, long dark hair spread out over the pillows like ocean waves and vine tendrils, eyes closed, long lashes sweeping across her childlike face, her dainty lips dry and pink. She looked beautiful. Eerie, in the window's light, but beautiful.
Sasuke (begrudgingly) had to admit that he'd watched her ever since they'd found her. At first, she'd looked like a lost child, and acted like one, acting giddy, talkative, and, loud... but then, after the initial shock of what had apparently happened to her blew over... she grew quiet, passive, appeared highly intelligent,and watchful. She seemed to practically be the definition of natural beauty and childlike innocence, although she was obviously a woman. She wasn't attention seeking. She wasn't obvious like Karin, or abrasive like Sakura had been when he was younger. She radiated comfort, and she had affected change in everyone she'd encountered so far, even during the short time she'd been out of her prison-like tank. Juugo had begun to talk more often, and he had become less prone to solitude. Suigetsu had seemed to complain less and to listen more (usually an impossibility). And lastly, Karin had become less bossy, easier to be around, even if the two were bound to quarrel. Overall, she'd been an excellent addition to their team, even though she had no special skills to speak of.
Out of all the women Sasuke had ever encountered, there was only one woman she seemed similar to: his mother.
Before, when he'd first made the connection, seen the resemblance, he'd been flustered and angry. Her presence brought up thoughts of his mother, and all he'd lost thanks to Itachi. It made him remember how she'd looked dead, her blood spilled over the wooden floors, his father's eyes empty, suspended in a look of horror.
It also made him question what he really thought of her.
The conflicting thoughts between finding her attractive and comparing her to his mother bothered him. Did that mean he found his mother attractive in that way? No. So why was he somehow combining the two? It was overly complex and he wasn't one prone to thinking about interpersonal relationships unless they related to himself and Itachi (and killing him).
Sasuke continued to stare at her, and think back to what had made her end up like this. And the more Sasuke thought about it, the more he realized that he was angry with himself more than Orochimaru or even Karin. A few weeks ago he would have been able to brush off his irritations and keep his interactions and feelings terse and cold. But now, after all that had happened, after the way they'd spoken and the quiet understanding she'd shown, he couldn't.
When he thought about it, no matter how harshly he'd spoken to her, no matter how irritating Karin was to her... she'd only ever had the same reactions.
Pity. Compassion. Forgiveness.
It shocked him into a stunned state. How could she do that? And then Sasuke made the connection.
His mind flashed him the image of his mother in the same kimono, the smile on her face, the image overlapping with Keito's own face as she whirled around in the same clothes. The image of his mother's face as she lay on the floor, a corpse... it hadn't been a face of horror like his father...
Suddenly, clearer than he'd ever seen it, his mind remembered that night. He remembered his mother's face frozen in an image of compassion and sadness, her eyes glazed over, wet tracks of fresh tears left along her cold skin...
She'd forgiven him. His mother had forgiven Itachi. Sasuke couldn't help but begin crying quietly, his face in his hands, his mouth open in a silent scream of anguish. How? Why? So many things passed through his mind.
But in that moment Sasuke knew.
This girl was just like his mother: beautiful and childlike, a strong, gentle woman with a small figure, who stared at the world around her with a calm face and an open mind... He'd never been able to protect his mother... his beautiful, gentle mother...
But fate had found him this girl. This reincarnation of her...
And he would protect her, he swore silently, he would protect her. He sniffed lightly and wiped the moisture off of his face with his arm. He glanced back at Keito, still sleeping softly nearby.
Sasuke finally stopped denying himself and let his left hand travel to hold her small one. She was so fragile it seemed, no matter how strong and happy she appeared to be. And he swore to himself he'd make sure she'd never break.
For once, Sasuke Uchiha understood what it felt like to protect something other than the dead.
And it left him silent, sitting watchfully over her as she slept.
