Important Author's Note - Please read:

Hey everyone! It's been a long time since we've met, hasn't it? Good news is that...well, VELVET is now officially off hiatus as is Just One Night. I've finished A Pretty Still Doll, so now I have time to work on this story, Just One Night, and Enervis, a new and sweet/dark story (Can I even have a story with these two specific traits...?).

I apologize for having this story on hiatus as well as my others, but I really didn't have the time or the ideas in my head to continue them until now. Now that VELVET has been updated, expect an update for Just One Night very soon!

Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto, and nor do I own the copyrights of the song, VELVET by Alice Nine., but this story really has nothing to do with the song, so maybe I'll just stop with the disclaimer for the song. The title is theirs, but the plot is mine. :D

Please enjoy reading and then review! ;)

Chapter 4 - VELVET

- Konohagakure

Lone teardrops blemished her pale complexion and dripped into the tiny pond below, creating ripples in the once calm waters. Her body hitched up and down as she tried to stifle her sobs with her hand. The soft rays and the presence of the moon seemed much too cruel at this moment. A yellow-white orb that looked down on them, its warm light forever casting over everything.

Sakura looked at it with blurry eyes, her pink hair brushing the nape of her neck. The midnight blue sky twinkled with numerous stars, mocking her, telling her that they will always be there but out of her reach. No matter what happens, they will forever be there in that same arrangement for years to come.

The moon will keep glowing until the end of time. How unfair this is. How is it fair that after so many things they've been through, that this must happen to him? Why did this have to happen?

Sasuke can no longer see anything, not even the tiniest of light. Those piercing black orbs he has can no longer see anything. They'll look at her, but not see her. His eyes, for a time his best asset had become his worst, his handicap. Ironic.

The small smiles that used to grace his face have now turned to mere lines. Anger and frustration could only be felt and seen from him. He refused to step away from the house or leave their room. He would only stay in their bed, only getting off to go to the bathroom and eat the food that she so carefully brings to him. He wouldn't eat while she was in the room; he would only eat when she left, and he did not eat very much. Food was always left on his plate. She was told to leave him alone from Sasuke himself, but she just couldn't do it. Not when he's like this.

Sasuke's skin was still pale and flawless, but his not eating enough has affected him. His cheeks have become slightly hollow, looking much thinner than before. Beneath his eyes were huge shadows, making his face look gaunt and unhealthy. His blue-black spikes were not tended to and even they seemed to have lost their once prideful aura.

No one was permitted to see him, not even Naruto. Her presence alone was only merely accepted. If she did not leave after she left his food, he would push her out and lock the door behind him. She had long ceased crying in front of him, because that would only bring a look of anger and annoyance across his once statuesque face.

Tsunade was brought in two weeks after his eyesight had finally failed him. It took Sakura the first week to coerce him to let herself look at him, but to no avail. It took her another week to allow Sasuke further treatment from her medic mentor, but also nothing resulted from this. When Tsunade had told him that there was nothing she could do, all he did was close his eyes and harshly said in a cold tone to leave him alone. Tsunade left, unhappy, upset about the fact Sakura was taking it harsher than Sasuke himself was.

She was told to have some rest and leave him alone for now. How could she bear to leave him alone let alone rest?

Kakashi had come in and looked at both of them later on, also discontent about the situation on hands. His Mangekyou Sharingan had almost fully deteriorated as well, and he, too, was succumbing to the blindness that Sasuke was enveloped in. However, he still had his good right eye to see the world with. When Kakashi tried to console him, Sasuke told him he knew nothing, because he did not know what true blindness was. He couldn't understand the feeling of opening both your eyes but only being met with eternal darkness instead of at least some sort of light.

Sakura had run out of the room at such a sight and out of the compounds, only to collide with Naruto at the gate. Her best friend looked at her sadly and gave her a much needed hug. What else could he do? The vibrant pink-haired teammate he had always loved was in distress. She wasn't his damsel in distress anymore but a sister to him. Just from the shock of Sasuke's newfound darkness, his change in behaviour, and the neglect itself had changed her significantly.

Sakura's usual bright green orbs had dulled, barely containing any sparkle in them anymore. Her pink hair was still swept up and clasped to the back of her head with a clip, but wisps of hair framed her much thinned face and only emphasized how much paler she looked than before this had happened. Her once perfectly fitted clothes hung somewhat loose on her, making her seem smaller than ever. She still had her curves, but the apparent weight loss was noticeable.

Naruto wondered how long it would take for Sasuke to accept his loss of sight, if ever, and if Sakura would ever be happy with him like this. He had once told Sakura to take a vacation, but she had gasped and asked why he would have thought of such a thing. Her excuse was that Sasuke needed her and he refused to admit it. Naruto's argument was if he needed her that badly, then he wouldn't have shoved her away. She could only shake her head at him as tears leaked out of her already swollen eyes.

It's been a month after he's gone blind.

X-i-o-n

"Sasuke, I prepared some food for you." Sakura lightly said as she entered their – his – room. She hasn't slept there for well over a month.

His room was dark and the curtains were drawn as to not reveal any light. A few plates on a tray were left beside the door and they were half full. Crying inwardly, she placed a new tray of food on his bedside table and looked at the figure hidden under the sheets on the bed. Tufts of blue-black hair were visible underneath the blankets. Sitting down on the bed, she gently placed a hand on his covered shoulder and spoke in a soft voice.

"Sasuke, I need to change the sheets for you, do you mind getting up for a second, please?"

The rustling of the sheets could be heard and Sasuke poked his head out. "There's no need, you only changed them two days ago. Leave now." He ordered. His eyes were closed.

Sakura replied with a quiet, "Okay," and sat there for a second, busying herself with the tray of food. "Your food's here, Sasuke, so if you're hungry, all you need to do is ––"

"I know what to do, leave." He harshly said a second time.

She looked at him for a few seconds and bent over his bent form and kissed him lightly on the lips before she got up from the bed and shut the door behind her.

As soon as her footsteps faded, Sasuke bit his lip. After how he's treated her, she still doesn't want to leave? What must it take for him to hurt her enough to make her leave? He had already tried breaking the dishes she had brought the food up in but she only returned with more. His hand reached out for the tray on the bedside table and his fingers grazed a sandwich, a bottle of juice and a small bowl of cherry tomatoes. Things easy enough for him to eat.

He bit his lip and flipped to the other side, away from the food and the door. The sweet taste of her lingered on his lips, and he cursed himself for not having foreseen this haunting condition. He wouldn't hurt her if he could help it. If he knew he was becoming blind, then he never would have sought her help in the first place and broke her and Kakashi apart. Maybe it was because he did just that, that now he is getting his so-called just rewards.

She deserves a much worthier man than he; someone who has all his functions working correctly, not a blind man who is literally lost without his sight. Sasuke doesn't want her to waste her life away by taking care of him forever until he or she dies. She has so many things to do in life, so many things to live for, not take care of a man who is distraught over his being blind. Just thinking about this for the past month has tired him out.

More sleep is in order.

X-i-o-n

"Sakura, I know this is difficult for you, but please try to understand that it is better for you to leave than be by his side right now." Tsunade sighed, leaning back in her chair. "Sasuke refuses to accept any physiotherapy or rehabilitation treatments, and even that is the most we can do for him. All of us can see that he's given up on himself, and do you think he wants you to see him at his worst? With you around, that might be the reason why he's not willing to accept his blindness; you're simply helping him too much."

"I've never seen him this lost before, not even at the Valley of the End when we fought. It's not that you can't accept him being blind; it's himself that he can't get over. He doesn't think he's worthy of you when he is in such a dismal state." Naruto joined in, his eyes tired and sad. "Even if you say it's all right for him to being a handicap, and that you'll love him just as he is, that isn't something he wants to hear. He thinks you're taking pity on him."

"Which you are, if the reason you are staying by his side is because he is blind." Kakashi's soft-spoken voice was strong in the tiny room as he casually leaned against the wall opposite of Naruto and her, crossing his arms in front of his chest.

They looked at her sadly, their gazes sympathetic, all of them hoping that she would at least heed their words.

"Maybe we just haven't found a cure for it yet, Tsunade-sama. T-There's got to be something in the medical books to inform us of a treatment for Sasuke's ailment. There's no medical condition that you and I haven't been able to solve yet, Shishou." Sakura pleadingly looked at the older woman and then at the other two, her expression falling as they avoided eye contact.

The room was silent at the pinkette's plea, all of them having difficulty facing the situation just as she was. Tsunade clasped her hands together on her desk, the top clear of any sake for the first time. She closed her brown eyes for a minute, contemplating on what more could be said to push her former apprentice to following their advice. It wasn't that she didn't want to help Sasuke, but it was just that he couldn't be helped any more. It was too late. The nerves have been damaged too extensively, and the retina had been completely scarred. Even after a surgery to fix it, he'd be too blind from cataracts, making no difference in whether he was to undergo surgery or not.

"We can't repair the central nerves, Sakura. You know that better than I do, and we also know that his eyes are part of the central nervous system. Even if we take out his eyes and put in a donor's, the nerves won't repair themselves and reattach to the eyes and miraculously make him be able to see again!" Tsunade slammed her hands onto the desk and stood, a stack of papers on the desk wobbling dangerously before spilling onto the green tiled floor. "You're not the only one who wants to save him, Sakura, we all do! You're being selfish here, worrying us with your health and your mental stability!"

"Baa-chan, that's enough." Naruto stepped forward and wrapped a comforting arm around Sakura's trembling shoulders.

"I will tell you when I've said enough, Naruto! You will not interrupt me when I am speaking even if you are going to be inaugurated as the Sixth Hokage very soon! If no one tells this foolish apprentice of mine that there's no cure, she will continue to destroy herself with grief!"

"Because I think that this is all my fault, Shishou! If I had started even the smallest of treatments, then nothing like this would've happened!" Sakura cried out as she sank to the floor, her hands clutched tightly into fists on her thighs, her tears staining her clothes with dark splotches.

Naruto knelt beside her, his arm still around her shoulders in a one-arm hug. He looked pained at her outburst. "Sakura-chan…"

"He's been back for almost a year, and I didn't even decide to give him a check up at all! I could've assumed that from him using Amaterasu that it would've damaged his eyes. But I didn't even bother, because I was so happy that he returned home to care about anything else!" She continued to cry, the top of her shorts damp with her tears. "I'm a fucking poor excuse to be a medic!"

"It's not a sin to be happy, Sakura." Kakashi cut in as he got off from the wall to walk towards her and Naruto. "We make mistakes all the time, and one mistake is no reason to kill yourself over it."

"This one mistake cost Sasuke his eyesight, and it should've been found out earlier to avoid this!"

"As your Sensei, I've made many more mistakes that have cost the lives of numerous shinobi. It weighs me down to this very day, but because of that, I've learned to be more cautious and aware of how my actions will affect others." He commented. "You're still young, Sakura. You have years to make up for what you've done and are doing, but Sasuke's blindness is not your fault. Having lost his sight is Sasuke's atonement for the things he's done even if it is involuntary on his behalf."

"The amount of tears you are shedding, and the way you are crying, is more fitting in honour of the deceased, Sakura, so please do not cry like that." Tsunade once again spoke and turned to look out the window of the office and placed a hand on the window, her back facing the other three. The sky was a moody grey colour. "You are crying for the living and not for the dead; when you spill tears so easily and so often, there is no real meaning for tears when time does call for it. Even if Sasuke can no longer see, he is still a person worthy of being a shinobi."

"If he can see his own worth that is." Naruto muttered.

"That will all depend on his own judgment of what a person worthy of being a shinobi is, and his own resolve. No one can help him with that but himself." The older woman snapped. "That is all I have to say, Sakura, and if you intend to continue doing what you are to yourself, I will not hesitate to send you to Suna for an unknown period of time."

"Shishou!" The pinkette threw the blond off of her and straightened, slamming her hands into the desk, her watery green eyes wide as she stared at Tsunade.

"Sakura! You can't even think straight right now because of your emotions! Do you think I want to send you away?" Tsunade turned and glared at her former apprentice, her brow creased in frustration. Then her voice softened. "You're just like a daughter to me, and seeing you like this is hurting me – us. Sending you away is a last resort, and no one wants you to leave the village. We don't want you to suffer, please try to understand that."

"We know you love him, Sakura-chan. We love you, too. That's why we're doing everything we can to help the two of you." Naruto spoke up and turned to leave the room, the doorknob tight in his hand. "I need to head home, Sakura-chan. I told Hinata I'll be home early today; we'll come visit you later tonight."

She didn't respond and continued to cry as she sunk to the floor, her legs giving out once more. It disheartened him to see his past love and best friend in such pain. Sakura didn't deserve to be suffering, and neither did Sasuke. This grief and newfound discovery of Sasuke's blindness was tearing them apart – all of them, not just Sakura and Sasuke. He was helpless in the matters of Sasuke's being unable to see, and powerless to cheer up the two of his friends. Why is it that even though he's a hero to this village that he is a failure as a friend?

He stepped out into the streets from the Hokage building, the dirt ground suddenly darkened by a few splashes of water. A flash of lightning spread out across the entire sky, the rain preceding the thunder as it hammered noisily onto the deserted streets. The blond suddenly jumped onto the roof of one building and hazardously started his way home, uncaring if he was a target for the streaks of lightning flashing unrelentingly in the early evening.

X-i-o-n

Sasuke rolled around restlessly in his sheets, the thunder making it difficult for him to even try to fall asleep. It angered and surprised him how much he had relied on his eyes when he was still able to see with them. Every resounding boom of thunder made him uneasy, made him…insecure. What if someone was suppressing their chakra so well that he couldn't even sense it, and then assassinate him while he was helplessly writhing in his own bed wallowing in self-pity at his inability to see? It wouldn't be a surprise that someone would want to kill him after all that had happened in the past few years.

Another rumble of thunder that seemed to crack right above his bedroom made him straighten in frustration. He tore the sheets away from his lower half and threw them against the wall opposite of him. It hit the wall with a dull fwp before flapping to land on the bedroom floor…or what he presumed to be the floor. The tinkling of a spoon in an empty bowl notified him that he had either knocked over a tray into the blanket or it had brushed very close to it. His brow knotted in annoyance at how he wasn't able to determine if it was the former or the latter option, or if it was another outcome that he had not thought of.

A quick burst of chakra made him turn his head towards the direction of the bedroom door. He recognized the chakra, but before he could utter so much as a word, the door was thrown open with so much force that Sasuke thought the hinges must've unhinged from the wall itself. The next thing he knew, he was grabbed by the collar of his shirt with two shaking fists and thrust into the dresser beside the bed with the handles digging into his lower back.

"What the—" He spat out, his hands instinctively reaching up to grip the hands choking him. "Naruto, let go."

His best friend did indeed let go, but Sasuke felt his jaw almost dislocate at the punch the blond threw him. If not for Naruto keeping one hand on his shirt, he would've flown through the walls of his home and most likely into the tree outside in the garden. The raven shook his head to try to clear it and immediately got another punch to the face by the same person.

"Stop." He seethed, and sensed the blond's fist coming his way again, his hand quickly coming up to stop it from completely knocking him out. "Knocking me out isn't going to solve any fucking problems."

Again, the other hand joined the first to keep holding him to the dresser. He could swear there was going to be internal bleeding if Naruto didn't move him from the God damned handles any time soon. He swung his leg upwards to try to free himself, and was rewarded with a grunt as his knee collided with something solid, and the hands restricting his airway dropped him down onto the floor.

"I'm blind, and now you want to kill me?" Sasuke coughed out after ungracefully falling to the floor. He brushed a hand over his left cheek and inwardly flinched at the instant pain.

"Killing you would probably be better off for all of us, Teme." Naruto growled, standing in front of the fallen man.

"Oh? Then why don't you stop talking and kill me like everyone else wants to!" He shouted at him. "Don't spout your friends shit nonsense at me now, Naruto!"

A foot connected with his ribs, ramming him into the bedside table, his forehead brutally hitting the corner of the stand, blood trickling into his shirt. He crawled onto all fours, coughing, before standing up again, only to be pinned to the bed with shaking hands.

"You think I don't want to, Sasuke? You think I don't fucking want to? If killing you meant closure for Sakura-chan, then I would gladly do so!" Naruto yelled, the water from his clothes dripping onto the blind man struggling beneath him. "It's all because of you that she's a fucking wreck!"

Sasuke snapped, his blindness still being a touchy subject to him as he thinks of it as a handicap; a brutal handicap that made him incapable of staying with the mentioned pinkette. He punched Naruto square in the face and into the dresser, the splintering wood a satisfaction to the raging demon in Sasuke's chest. He stood on the bed and angled his head down towards the mess. "You think I want to be blind? Have you ever thought of waking up one day, not being able to see when your eyes have been your best asset for your entire life? I'm a fucking cripple!"

Naruto stood up from the remnants of the drawer and wiped the trickle of blood from his mouth with a dirty sleeve. "And Sakura-chan still loves you even though you think that, Sasuke! She loves you for who you are inside; she's not going to stop loving you because you're blind, Teme!"

"I know she doesn't care, but I do, Naruto! I can't give her what she deserves when I can't fucking see anything! I don't want to be taken care of in everything I do for my entire life!"

"But she's willing to do it! You can stand up again, Sasuke! You just need—"

"Right." The raven sarcastically laughed. "I couldn't even protect myself from you when your chakra should've been so easy to sense. I feel insecure all the time, not knowing if there will be people coming to assassinate me in my sleep. How can I be who she loves if I'm not even myself." He bitterly finished.

"You just need training, Sasuke!" Naruto flung his arm out in emphasis, droplets of water flying into his friend's face. "You can't give up hope—"

"No, Naruto. This is my redemption for all the wrong things I've done, can't you see? All the things I've done, all the people I've killed, those are the reasons why I'm blind." Sasuke calmly said, the anger from earlier seemingly gone. "Tsunade and Sakura have already said there is no cure for my eyes. There's no reason to keep looking for one anymore if the two best medics in the world say there's no hope."

"Then can't you accept it, Sasuke? Accept it and step forward! I know it's not as easy as it sounds, but if you get accustomed to it over time, things will work out!" Naruto pleaded.

"Nothing has ever worked out for the Uchiha line, Naruto. This time will be no different." He turned and slowly crept off the bed, making sure he wouldn't clumsily slip off. He stretched his arms out in front of him as he walked, his fingertips brushing the bedroom door frame, his feet slowly inching to step out of the chaotic room.

"You can't do this to Sakura-chan, Teme! You can't do this!" Naruto yelled after his retreating back, slamming his fist into the debris of the drawer as Sasuke did not bother turning back to look at him or stop in his tracks. "Kuso!" Tears fell onto the carpet and intermingled with the blood on his hands from the wood imbedded into the bottom of his hand.

.

He sat on the edge of the bathtub with his head in his hands, the light turned off, the door locked. A few tears slipped past his fingers and onto his bare feet, the hot liquid seeming defiant on telling him that this was no nightmare but indeed reality. The current reality was something he could never get out of, and he would prefer to be stuck in his late brother's Tsukiyomi than being blind.

What he had told Naruto was the truth; there was no future for a blind man and a capable young woman. She could do so much better and have so much more with another. Being together with her would cause her grief as time passed by; each day would bring her more tangible sadness, and then it would lead to bitterness. He didn't want her to have to take care of him until he died or she died. He wanted her to live her life to the fullest and not trap her within the confines of his own selfishness by wanting her by his side.

He stood and took three steps forward, knowing that he was in front of the big bathroom mirror. It cracked and fell around him as he punched it, blood flowing from his scraped knuckles and onto the countertop. He stepped back into the wall and slid down until he was sitting with his knees apart, his head hanging between them, his arms propped up on his knees.

Death seemed welcoming if it meant ridding him from all the pain and guilt.

So, what do you guys think about Sasuke's spiralling-into-darkness blindness? Please review. :)

- Kanryu 8:18pm 04/06/11

P.S. Please check out A Pretty Still Doll and Enervis while you wait for my updates! It'll make time pass by faster ;)