What It's Like---Chapter Three
The gods must have really hated him.
No windows.
No mirrors.
No convenient line of string strong enough to support his dead weight from the light fixtures.
No glass or hard plastic around the lights.
Nothing.
Naruto scanned the room for the twenty-second time, trying to find anything he might have missed. Anything that could help him end his life. There was still nothing. The walls, ceiling, floor, and door were pillow soft, much to his dismay, and his hands were bound by soft, disgustingly fuzzy cuffs that didn't even allow him to scratch his ass if he needed to.
They intended to torture him.
He wanted to be angry but with no way to vent, he just sat on the floor, staring blankly at the powder blue and white walls. He wished he could hurt the old man for locking him away to rot in misery but he honestly wasn't sure that the bastard was ever going to return.
He wondered why he couldn't go back to the place with the nice people, and hadn't bothered to ask the old guy why. Somehow he knew that if something weren't wrong, he would have. But something was wrong. With him. He knew what it was. He had known for seven months but didn't understand why.
Why couldn't people see how human he was? Why couldn't people see that he was just like them? Why couldn't they tell that they were hurting him? Why couldn't they get that he just didn't want to live anymore?
"WHY AM I HERE?!" He screamed. Of course, no one answered him. The room was so empty, and he would have welcomed an echo, but there was none. No one had come to the room since he had been left there, and he didn't think anyone would.
'So that's how it is? They're just going to leave me to die here.'
They were going to leave him to suffer. He wanted to die, but he didn't want to suffer.
"Who does," he scoffed to himself.
He was born suffering, lived suffering, and would die suffering. Nobody cared what he wanted. Nobody cared that he wanted his death to be quick and gruesome. They wanted him to go insane before he starved, that was why they tied him up, drained his energy, and still padded the walls and put him in a room with nothing that could be used to harm him, so that he would lose his mind. They had left his feet loose, but what could he do with those, kick himself to death?
Nobody had been in to feed him, or give him a glass of water his parched throat so desperately needed. He doubted he would ever see another person again. He would never see the nice kids and adults again. He would never go back to that place. Those strange people he had been with, he would probably never see them again either.
But just who were they?
He had wracked his brain trying to think about how those people got near him and where he was, but couldn't figure it out. He felt like he should have known who they were, like he was supposed to be there, but the thought kept slipping away. They had called him names and insulted him. It hurt, but he didn't know why. People he didn't know insulted him all the time, but something about that time was different. It was almost like they were insulting him….on a personal level. Like they knew him.
And the silver-haired man with them…why had it hurt the most when that man shunned him? Who the hell was he anyway?
He knew that he could ask himself questions until he was blue in the face but nobody was coming to answer them. So he wasn't completely alone then. He had a little mystery to keep him company.
He wasn't completely lost however. Even he was smart enough to know that something was missing. He couldn't have just gone from that place with the nice people, to being with a different group of people he didn't know. Something happened in between, but he didn't know, or couldn't remember what.
That old man had done something to him! He was sure it had something to do with him. But what? Why couldn't he remember what happened? Why did it happen?
Naruto feel asleep on the cushioned floor and dreamed in clips and fog. He hadn't noticed at all that three people had come and gone while he slept. One of them was a doctor, the other the Hokage. And of course, Kakashi.
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Naruto was curled up in a ball when he walked in and it was obvious that he was cold. It was oddly drafty for a room with no windows. He had hoped the blonde would be awake and ready to talk. He stayed a while anyway, crouching next to the Genin to try and get a look at his face but Naruto had it buried in his arms and Kakashi couldn't see if he looked as different as he thought.
He talked to Ibiki, but to say that he left frustrated was being nice. The bastard had smiled at him for six whole minutes while he tried to explain why his team shouldn't be subjected to the mind probing of an evil man such as he. He eventually got pissed and left, wishing, but knowing that it would be less than wise, to hit the asshole.
He tried to find Iruka to see if the effects of whatever stimulant the medic-nins gave him had worn off and he could talk without that infernal smile on his face but hadn't been able to find the Chuunin anywhere. He finally went to Sandaime and demanded that he see Naruto. Much to his surprise, the old man granted his request and had him led to the basement of the hospital where they kept Konoha's less stable shinobi. Kakashi had been there before, briefly, but wondered why someone as young as Naruto would be contained there.
He had asked, but the medic-nin he was following mumbled something about 'demon scum' and he decided to leave it alone for the time being. It wouldn't do any good to make the man swallow his own teeth after all.
He was given strict orders not to touch his student. He couldn't talk to him either, but that was easier done when Naruto was asleep. One medic-nin explained to him that they were too afraid to go in while he was awake. Kakashi nearly scoffed at their stupidity but didn't so as not to lose his visiting privilege. As he stared solemnly at the boy, he wondered if Iruka had been by to see him first. The Chuunin knew an awful lot about Naruto and it made him a bit envious that he hadn't known as well.
The things that Iruka had told them all about Naruto had been horrific. Kakashi would have never imagined that the boy had been raped and drugged, especially not on various occasions. None of it made any sense. How could Naruto just lose his mind in the blink of an eye? How could he live in two separate realities, and not know it? Was the blonde really crazy? Or was it a side-effect of the jutsu Iruka spoke of? What made the jutsu go wrong? Was it just a single spark in Naruto's mind, or did something trigger it? Iruka had asked him if he knew what it was. How could he know? He didn't even know who his hyperactive student really was, how could he possibly know why he lost his mind?
Suddenly he thought of his sensei, and his entire body tensed. Minato would be beyond horrified at what his village had done to his only son, and what was worse, he'd hang Kakashi for letting them do it. But…was it really his own fault? Could it have been something he did? Could it have been what Iruka said? Was something he said or did the straw that broke the camel's back? He tried to think back on all he had said and did in relevance to the boy that day, but couldn't think of anything out of the ordinary that would have such a drastic effect.
'The straw that broke the camel's back…'
He squinted and wracked his brain to remember and when it finally popped into his head, he actually stumbled back two steps. A nauseating weight settled in his stomach as he ran by the memory again.
He looked at Naruto behind his shoulder with a somewhat disapproving glint in his eye.
"There would be a lot less frustration on the team if you just kept quite like Sakura and Sasuke, Naruto."
The acidic feeling of oncoming sickness pervaded his chest and snuck its way to his throat and he swallowed it down dryly. It had been the last thing he said to Naruto. It wasn't a nice thing to say, and it must not have been a nice thing to hear. Kakashi put a hand over his masked mouth to stifle the gasp, even though nobody was there to hear it. It was his fault.
But would he tell the Hokage?
He had to. It was the only way they could…fix Naruto. If they knew the problem then maybe they could---
But what if they couldn't? What would Iruka do? He wasn't afraid of the Chuunin, but hate could bring a ninja a long way, even as far as destruction and he didn't want to be responsible for any of that, he just wanted….he just wanted Naruto to be back the way he was.
Wait, no, not the way he was, not like that. Not like…not like it had always been, even without his knowledge, because now he knew, and he would never want Naruto to go back to that. He just wanted Naruto to be as happy and as carefree as he always looked. Why did it have to turn out this way?
He stared down at the lightly shivering boy on the floor, then looked away in shame. He did this. He should be hanged. He deserved his sensei's hatred, which he swore he could feel from the Otherworld. He would go to the Hokage with his confession and hope for the very worst. Because he deserved it, and Naruto didn't.
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For once in his life, for all the years he had been living on his own, Sasuke didn't want to be alone. So he asked Sakura to come to his house and half expected the kunoichi to squeal like a rat and cling to him like polyethylene plastic but she solemnly accepted and met with him in the silence of his home.
They had sat together on his couch and said nothing for the past forty-five minutes. Finally he was unable to keep it to himself anymore. Without looking at her, he spoke.
"Do you think…do you think it was something one of use said, or did it him that day?"
Sakura shook her head sadly. The same question had been running through her mind all morning. Was Iruka-sensei right? Did something trigger what happened to their teammate? Did they do that to him? But if that was the case, then how and why did the memory of the time Naruto spent with them end up on a milk carton?(1)
"I…" For a moment she was unable to say anything, trying to smoothen out the crack in her voice. How could she tell him that maybe it was something they had said? That would be confirming it and she didn't want to do that. Yet it was that, or let the guilt eat them alive.
"Maybe I was too harsh on him that day. I did say some pretty mean things to him." She admitted. Sasuke didn't say anything.
After a long silence, she began to get frustrated.
"Say something!" She yelled, her high-pitched voice cutting through the air like a hot knife through butter. Her voice reverberated through the empty room like a shout in space.
Sasuke looked over at her, but he wasn't surprised. He knew what she wanted to hear.
"Don't just sit there and act like you didn't say anything too! Like you didn't do anything!"
He turned on her, having had enough. "And what's sharing the blame going to do?! We all say mean things to him, he's Naruto! Why did it have an effect now?! Why not before, when we were at the Academy, why not when we were in the Chuunin Exams?! Why not…why not before we became a team?" He finished, and he knew his voice broke, but didn't care.
Why not then?
She stared at him with sad green eyes and couldn't find a thing to say. He was right. Why now?
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Iruka didn't have to search to know that there were ANBU hanging around his apartment.
One was actually inside. One on his roof. One by his windows. The Hokage had no faith in him, and rightly so. He would have murdered Kakashi Hatake if given the chance, Sarutobi knew that.
Iruka knew he'd be on constant supervision until the whole thing blew over, if it ever did. He had been 'excused' from his classes and Aoba had taken over so now he had nowhere to go but to work in the mission room. They allowed him at least that, though he couldn't say he was grateful. He would be a loose canon and would likely make many an enemy with a lot of ninja, when the ninja he really wanted to kill was out and about, with no ANBU guarding him no doubt.
The hovering presence was a bit unnerving but did not dissuade his routine, which was certainly not his usual one. He had slept in most of the day because he didn't want to wake up and face reality. He knew it was a foolish reason, especially in the profession he was in, but he couldn't stand thinking about the boy he had looked to as a younger brother. He couldn't stop thinking about the way Naruto had grabbed his kunai and hurt himself severely with it. Iruka's own weapon. He couldn't forget how Naruto screamed and pleaded to die, his voice so filled with pain and misery that at one moment Iruka wondered how people could force the child to live when he felt that way.
When the drugs wore off after he met with Kakashi's team, he hadn't made it home before he collapsed to his knees and heaved up all he had consumed in the day. He had spent an extra five minutes dry heaving on top of a building.
Now there were ANBU everywhere and he wasn't allowed to see Naruto. He had argued with the old man that if he couldn't see him, then Kakashi shouldn't be able to either. The bastard just looked at him as he was escorted out by a Jounin and didn't say a word and he knew that Kakashi would be allowed to see him. He was incensed beyond words but could do nothing about it because ANBU had followed him home.
He lay in bed thinking about the first time the Hokage had told him about Naruto. He hadn't believed a single word the old goat was saying and had laughed about it. None of it could be true.
Until he had heard.
One can gather a lot hanging around in a bar, and drunken ninja gossiped like crazy, especially when drunk.
There were a group of them sitting around and he had been sitting adjacent to them on a barstool, minding his own business when one of them said something that made his blood turn to ice.
"You want to come with me tonight? Tonight me and the guys are going to get some of that demon tail again, you've gotta try it, that kid's got the tightest ass ever!"
Iruka instantly knew whom they were talking about.
Looking back on it now, he was surprised that he didn't attack them in a blood red rage. Instead, he had gone to the Hokage's office and demanded that the old man explain to him why he was letting his ninja rape a six year-old boy.
"What can I do?" Sandaime had said. "If I punish them, then I will have less loyal ninja to protect the village. At these times we need all the manpower we have. I will have next to no ANBU if I punished them all. It's for the village, Iruka."
For the village? Naruto was getting raped, beaten, and drugged for the village? Wasn't he doing enough by holding back the Kyuubi?! Without him, there would be no fucking village! Iruka had voiced his opinion and the Hokage closed his eyes and casually puffed his pipe.
"But there is," was all he said.
If attacking the Hokage wouldn't end in certain death, Iruka would have lunged over the table and shoved that pipe down the sick fucker's throat.
That day, he had lost all respect he ever had the leader of his village.
Then there was the matter of Kakashi and his team. Whatever little bit of reverence he had for the copy-nin dissolved like ash in the wind. As for Sakura and Sasuke, he knew their cruelty played a factor in Naruto's breakdown, but he didn't know which of the three of them it was that did it.
But he would find out. Because if there was one man in the village who didn't care for Kakashi or the Uchiha clan, it was Ibiki Morino. And just for that reason, the interrogation specialist would question the girl and her teammate. There was no need to question Kakashi, Iruka already knew he was guilty. Not that Ibiki was really doing it for him, he didn't have that much power, but the Hokage was curious too so it was going to happen on Sandaime's orders. Knowing that he would get some answers no matter who didn't like it made Iruka's spirits lift a little.
Tomorrow, he would go back after noon and see Team Seven. Though Ibiki and he were partial to each other, the man wouldn't be at liberty to explain what he had done or how he had done it, so he would look for the obvious proof and confront Sasuke and Sakura. That way, he'd be much closer to the truth. Then he could plan his revenge.
He clenched his hands in frustrated anticipation and winced at the burning discomfort. Though Naruto had cut his hands up, he still couldn't be angry at the boy for that. Naruto was not in his right mind, so it was easy to forgive him for something that wasn't his fault. It was that same feeling Iruka had that made him befriend the younger one in the first place. Kyuubi's presence was not Naruto's fault, so how could he hate him for that?
What was worse, was that people that didn't know about the fox still found ways to criticize him about his performance as a ninja and his intelligence. Yet they forget the fact that improper treatment could result in deprivation and such was the case for their fellow comrade. Naruto hadn't been given the proper tools to become a ninja as good as his mates, but not for Iruka's own lack of trying. A schoolteacher simply wasn't enough to make him as efficient as he needed to be. He hadn't been taught how to read by anyone but Iruka, and even then, being a ninja was not based mostly on reading, so the Chuunin didn't have the luxury of teaching him very well. He had to even buy Naruto his weapons because the vendors didn't allow him to buy his own.
It was a cruel world all around Naruto, any number of things could have gone wrong, but the one thing that had him so pegged on Team Seven, was the timing. Naruto could have snapped at any other time, but to do so when he was in their presence was not a mere coincidence. Iruka would get to the bottom of it, and somebody would pay. Even if it weren't him dealing the dish of revenge, he was sure that the good force of karma was on his side.
Despite his closest person being in the state and place that he was, it was thoughts like these that helped Iruka Umino sleep at night.
One day, those who had wronged Naruto would pay.
TBC….
Yes, it's a bit short, but you know how I do it, lol. Review away! And yes, I will explain the blood, but I have to admit, I may forget, so try and remind me. Though it should come in handy soon enough. Sorry about any typos, I never edit, it's too troublesome.
(1) Missing. I'm sure you'll get it soon. I didn't make that up either.