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Last time:

"Hey." Sasuke muttered in her ear again. His voice was husky, soft, muted in the quiet intimacy of the falling snow. "It'll be okay."

If he felt the tears falling drop by drop onto his neck, he gave no indication. None at all.

Burial

When it was all over, Naruto... he didn't know what to feel.

Haku was gone. Dead. He... he had sacrificed himself for Zabuza and thinking back to that encounter in the clearing, to what he had said when Naruto had prepared himself to kill the enemy he thought had taken away his two precious teammates, Naruto freely admitted that he admired the shinobi Haku had been.

He wouldn't forget what Haku had said, what he had taught Naruto.

Zabuza was dead, too. Naruto wouldn't say that he was happy the bastard was dead, because Haku had loved the man and he had died for him and Zabuza, in the end, after some scolding and screaming from Naruto, had died for Haku. The blonde couldn't say that he was happy that Zabuza was dead.

But he could say that he was relieved, because if Zabuza had just continued on like he had pretended he was going to, all unaffected and smirking and shit, Naruto would be furious. Well, he had been furious, but he would have been more furious. Plus, the guy had almost killed his teammates and had hurt his sensei and that seriously wasn't allowed.

The bastard that was an even bigger bastard than Zabuza, Gato, was dead. Zabuza had slit his throat and Naruto approved whole-heartedly. Gato had planned to betray Zabuza and Haku all along and he was why Inari's father was dead and that guy didn't deserve to live.

Inari though... he was really proud of that brat! He had finally stopped crying and even rounded up all of the villagers and actually did something! Naruto had the feeling the crybaby would grow up to be something great! He had even managed to scare off all the thugs that Gato had bought along with them.

Staggering to his feet, Naruto dragged himself to the bodies of Zabuza and Haku, side by side as they should be. He looked down at them, with the snow all around them, pure and pretty. And he thought it really suited Haku and that the devoted ninja he might have called friend in another world would have liked to see the falling snow.

"Oi, Kakashi-sensei." He called out, voice softer than usual in respect for the two proud shinobi at his feet.

His awesome but wounded sensei walked over, one hand still pressed to the injury at his side. "What is it, Naruto?"

"We need to give Zabuza and Haku a decent burial." Naruto stated firmly. "They deserve that much."

Kakashi looked thoughtfully, the way Kasumi sometimes did when she was thinking about a really hard problem that made Naruto's head hurt. "Yes, I suppose you're right." He said, glancing at the pair.

A soft footstep behind them had Naruto glancing back to see Kasumi and Sasuke approaching. He grinned wildly, still stunned by the realization that both of his teammates were alright and alive and looking just fine! But Naruto wasn't so caught up in his joy that he didn't see how pale his female teammate's face was and the way her eyes were a little red and how her shoulders drooped.

He saw how the teme, normally so distant and detached and cool, was shooting looks that Naruto would swear were concerned at Kasumi, how he walked a little behind her like he was afraid she would fall or something, the way he was almost hovering over their smart, capable kunoichi.

As far as the blonde knew, Sasuke didn't hover. Ever. It was practically making his world tilt upside down.

Grin turning into a worried frown, Naruto hesitantly called, "Kasumi-chan?" He didn't know what had happened that had made Kasumi look so sad and Sasuke to look so troubled, but his pretty teammate had already been so upset these past few days and he had thought that she was getting better and Naruto wanted Kasumi to be happy, because she was his friend and his teammate, and she should be happy.

Kasumi looked at him, those warm brown eyes unnaturally dull. "I'm fine, Naruto-san." She said like she knew that he was worried and sometimes, Naruto wondered if Kasumi could read his mind because she did that a lot. But the blonde was pretty sure that she was lying because Sasuke frowned at her and his female teammate's eyes weren't supposed to look like that.

She brushed by him before he could say anything more, though and looked at Zabuza and Haku. "Naruto-san, what was it that you said before?"

Naruto's frown deepened and he glanced questioningly at the teme when he stepped up to stand beside him, was met with a shrug that he could tell was a sign for 'I'll-tell-you-later' and wasn't that weird, that he knew what that shrug meant, that he could talk to his rival when before they had done nothing but argue?

But that was because of Kasumi, too.

"I-I said that we should give Zabuza and Haku a decent burial." Naruto said gingerly, not quite sure how to talk to his teammate when she was so sorrowful and distant and far away even though she was right there.

She was quiet for a few heartbeats and then, she said, "No."

The Uzumaki's cerulean blue eyes went wide and he stiffened in surprise, because of all the people in his team, he had never expected Kasumi to be the one to say no. She was the kind one, the nice one, the one that always listened patiently to his ideas and either persuaded Sasuke to go along with them if they were good or calmly explain to him why they were bad.

She had never just said plain out 'no' to him before.

Hurt and confused, he was about to shout at her "why not?" when the teme poked him sharply with a pointy elbow. Turning on the teme for interfering, Naruto was met with a look and a subtle shake of the head. He had been around Sasuke long enough that he knew this meant 'leave-it'.

What Naruto couldn't understand was why?!

"Kasumi." Sasuke spoke up into the thick silence that had fallen. "What do you think we should do then?"

Naruto glanced back at his teammate to see how she was reacting and instantly felt horribly guilty. The way she was looking at Zabuza and Haku was so incredibly sad and regretful and pained that he couldn't imagine why she had said they shouldn't be buried. And he couldn't imagine why he had almost been about to shout at her when she was so obviously upset already.

"Cremate them." She whispered softly. "And then throw the ashes in the water."

Kakashi, soundless until that point, shifted slightly so that everyone focused on him. Their sensei's one eye was steadily fixed on Kasumi and his voice, when he spoke, was gentle and understanding, "Isn't that what the Hidden Mist does with their fallen ninja as a gesture of honor and respect?"

Naruto didn't understand why Kakashi was asking Kasumi, he was the sensei not her, but maybe it was because she read so many books? Lost, he suddenly remembered what Haku had said, towards the end.

"Please..." A glance towards Kasumi, where he had gotten her to safety before the fighting had restarted, "tell Kasumi-san that I'm sorry."

The blonde was pretty sure that his female teammate and Haku hadn't met before the fight at the bridge, so why...? And then, there was what Haku had called Kasumi before he had knocked her out. What had it been again?

Fumei. Kasumi Fumei.

What was that? Was it her surname? Kasumi, his prepared, smart, strong teammate, had froze when Haku had said that, her face pure white, brown eyes alight with terror and fear, so much of it that Naruto had wanted to punch Haku into the ground just for that. Haku had knocked her out with senbon, except Naruto hadn't known that she was knocked out and Sasuke hadn't known and they had both thought she was dead.

And they had been enraged, livid, and desolate.

It didn't make sense, nothing made sense. Naruto didn't know what was going on here and Kasumi had drilled it into his head to always be aware of his surroundings, to pay attention and listen, even when it was boring and nothing was happening - because information was important and it might help save the lives of his precious people one day.

"Yes." Kasumi breathed softly, her breath visible in the cold air.

Beside him, the teme shifted slightly, but he didn't fidget and so, Naruto glanced at him. Sasuke was watching the interaction between their sensei and their teammate with a faint frown that told Naruto that something was wrong and his rival didn't like it and that meant he should pay really, really close attention to what was going on.

"Are you sure?" Kakashi asked and absently, Naruto thought that was a stupid question. Kasumi was always sure. She had told him once that that was really important cause if she wasn't sure then she might make stupid decisions and since she was their team's strategist, that might get them all killed and that would be horrible and awful and sad.

"I'm sure." She said and paused for a moment. "It's what they would have wanted."

Naruto didn't know how Kasumi would know that and from the way Sasuke's brow wrinkled a little, he didn't know either, but their sensei only nodded.

"Then, that's what we'll do."

Ashes

Kasumi held the urn filled with Haku and Zabuza's remains, their ashes, together in the end, with the utmost care as she made her way down to the flowing river, fresh with the recent snow.

She paid no attention to the concerned stares of Naruto and Sasuke and the piercingly observant way Kakashi watched her. Oh, she was aware, but she shoved it to the back of her mind where the shadows and nightmares and blood and violence lived and breathed.

God, she needed to get her head checked out, but the person who suggested a Yamanaka to her was going to get Naruto and Sasuke set upon them. Like rabid dogs.

Kneeling beside the fast moving stream and carefully suppressing her growing hysteria - control, control - Kasumi gently tilted the urn and watched as the water carried the ashes away.

The dark ashes swirled with the water, strangely artistic, unwittingly beautiful. She watched them go until they were out of sight and then she stayed for a few more hours, simply listening to the calming roar of the water, so familiar, so unfamiliar.

When Sasuke lightly placed a hand on her shoulder and Naruto knelt in front of her, Kasumi let them lead her back without protest.

It had been a long day.

Explanations

The next day saw Kasumi sitting in front of the 'graves' of Zabuza and Haku as she had consented to have built when Sasuke pointed out that they needed a place to place the missing nin's sword and Haku's obi and where they could properly pay their respects.

He hadn't been looking at her, hadn't even glanced at her, but she had known nevertheless that the last part had been for her. She was grateful and pensive both.

Knees bent and arms wrapped around them, the kunoichi was staring quietly at the simple crosses that they had erected, long cream hair blowing in the wind, the dainty white dress that she had packed only because she was paranoid and knew the value of looking innocence fluttering lightly, when her teammates found her.

"Kasumi-chan?" Naruto sat down on her left, Sasuke settling down on her right. The blonde's cerulean blue eyes were wide and perturbed. "Are you okay?"

She managed to dig up a smile from somewhere, strained and small, but there, nonetheless. "I'll be okay, Naruto-san."

To her dim amusement, naive, optimistic Naruto gave her a thoroughly disbelieving look. Maybe Sasuke and her were rubbing off on him?

Sasuke said nothing, but then again, he didn't need to. They both knew that the only reason he hadn't cornered her and dragged answers out of her yet was because he was the only one who had witnessed her breakdown at the bridge and he didn't want to push her too hard, too soon.

Kasumi could have told him that he didn't have to bother, that she was stronger than that, that she was terribly used to people she knew and loved dying on her, but she didn't. That would have bought up far too many questions and she wasn't in any state to fend off the Uchiha at his most persistent.

"What happened after I was out?" She asked softly into the stilted quiet.

"Oh!" Naruto brightened slightly before launching into a highly dramatized version of the battle, Sasuke occasionally jumping in to curb the exaggerations and add in details the blonde had forgotten and between the two of them, Kasumi gradually got an image of what had truly occurred.

As soon as she had been knocked out, Haku had pulled the same trick he would later pull on Sasuke and created a fake death state, leading her teammates to believe that she had been dead.

Doing so had caused both of them to be really, really, really angry - Naruto's words, Sasuke's deadpan disdain obvious - and without her there to plan out strategies for them, they had just rushed in and started attacking Haku, no tactics at all.

Kasumi made a note to herself to hammer some simple strategies into her teammates' heads. As well as some lessons about keeping a cool head. And not letting a death affect them so - the life of a ninja was no fairytale.

Following that, sometime in the confusion and red and pain and desperation, Sasuke had gained the second tomoe of his Sharingan and started directing Naruto, so much that he had become enough of a threat that Haku had chose to go after him.

At this, she turned to the Uchiha, whose face was stoically blank, and gently touched a finger to the edge of his eye. Without a word, he closed his eyes and activated his Sharingan, letting her examine the valued bloodline. Satisfied, she drew back and nodded at Naruto, who had watched the scene with wide, curious eyes, to continue.

Looking a bit puzzled, he did as she had asked, using perhaps the one scrap of tact he had. Haku proceeded to aim for Naruto, Sasuke had jumped in the way, and the blonde had ended up with two 'dead' teammates.

"And then I beat him." He said, drawing circles in the ground with a stick he had picked up from somewhere.

"Hn. Dobe. How?" Sasuke quirked an eyebrow.

Naruto shrugged, not looking at either of them. "I was really mad and I just kept on punching, I guess."

Kasumi took in the muted guilt on her teammate's face, the way his hand came up to unconsciously clutch his stomach, and shook her head minutely at Sasuke, telling him to drop it. He gave her a strange look, but subsided and listened as Naruto described shattering Haku's mirrors and getting both of them far away from the battlefield.

"And... yeah." Naruto scratched his head, blue eyes subdued. "You guys know what happened after that."

"Yes." Kasumi said, staring at the green, green grass in front of her, leaning in the wind.

"You know, Haku said something to me before." Naruto added, voice unusually tentative. They all heard the unspoken words, 'before he died.' She fought back the flinch through sheer will.

Instead, she tilted her head up to look at the sky, so blue, so clear. "Oh?"

"Yeah. He said to tell you that he was sorry." At once, she could feel Sasuke's absolute attention on her, Naruto's already unwavering focus sharpening at the change in the Uchiha.

For a long time, Kasumi was silent. The capricious wind blew her hair around her face, fanned it out behind her so the tresses danced in the air. She saw her teammates' eyes flicker to the horribly impractical strands. It was the first time they had ever seen her hair unbound, she knew. Not the bane of her existence as it was for most girls, but still a pain, nonetheless, as it went everywhere when not up in a bun and was a wonderful hand-hold for enemies.

Loose, Kasumi's hair, locks of cream and platinum and white blonde, reached the small of her back and caught in the gentle breeze, blew around her face, obscuring her features teasingly, revealing them seconds later.

She listened to the song of the nearby birds, basked in the warm sunlight, thought about the boy-turned-man who was dead after having the nerve to apologize to her before heading off to his death.

"I see." She breathed at last and then, to her teammates' surprise, her lips quirked into a small, bitter smile, anger darting into her eyes, turning them into blazing burnt sienna and she hissed, "Bastard."

None of the boys had ever heard her curse anyone before and she felt them exchange a startled look above her head. To their internal thanks, Kasumi's animosity seemed to pass as quickly as it had appeared and she sighed, slumping slightly.

"You knew him." Sasuke ventured softly and she felt his clothed arm press mildly against her bare arm. She appreciated the sentiment, however awkward it was.

Her smile this time was a little more genuine, more bittersweet than just bitter. "Yes."

Naruto and Sasuke waited quietly, patiently, and she thought, 'Yes. I do owe them an explanation, don't I?'

"Haku," She began, "was my first friend."

Recounting

At both sides, she felt them stiffen in surprise, clearly prepared for anything but that, but she forced her way forward despite that because if she didn't get this out soon, she would break and she couldn't break.

"I first met him in a Kirigakure orphanage. As you guys saw, Haku has a bloodline and... Bloody Mist isn't kind to clans with bloodlines." She said, laying the truth out in the open like the blood-soaked thing it was.

"Is that why you're in Konoha?" Sasuke asked gently and of course, the genius Ice Prince had already figured out. Unsurprising, since she had given them so many hints unwillingly.

Naruto started by her side and fondly, she noted that the blonde hadn't known. But, it was Naruto and she didn't mind him keeping his innocence and his naivety and his simple mind for a little bit longer.

"Yes." Kasumi murmured, seeing blood and tears and screams flash before her eyes. "Yes, but I'll get to that later. I... when we met, Haku had already lost his family, his clan. We became friends quickly and I visited him in that orphanage for some months... years."

"You said he was your first friend." Naruto piped up, a question hidden in the statement, and she nodded slowly.

"Even at that time, Kirigakure was already wrought with turmoil. There were rumors, gossip, whispers in the air that were dangerous and my family... my clan, the Fumei clan, knew that change was coming, might sweep us all away. So, they kept my childhood life up until then sheltered and the other children... well, they knew better than to play with clan kids." Her voice was even, composed, betrayed none of the loneliness and anguish inherent in that remark.

Naruto scowled, cerulean eyes darkening and she observed without surprise that her tale was bringing up unwanted memories for the blonde. Sasuke didn't look all that happy either, although he hid it better than Naruto did.

"I visited Haku every few days and we would talk, sharing cookies or cake or some other snack. The orphanage there... it wasn't kind to children like him and sometimes, I think that my visits were the only thing that kept him from starving or being beaten to death. The other kids bullied him and he always had some sort of bruise on him when I came. It was during one of these talks that the topic of death came up."

"That's how you knew what he would want done to his corpse after he died." Sasuke said, onyx eyes lighting up with abrupt understanding.

"Yes. We were... close friends. I don't think he had any friends at that time either and I certainly didn't. We clung to each other as much as we could in the catastrophic political climate." She paused and laughed humorlessly, Naruto cringing at the sound and Sasuke flinching minutely. "And then... around the time I was seven, things changed."

Plain words. Clean words. Words that held an entire lifetime's pain and regret and tears.

"What happened?" Naruto asked quietly, eyes full of dread and sympathy and the kindness that was so rare in the world.

Her smile was heart-breaking. "The Bloody Mist finally decided that my clan was too powerful, too perilous, too unpredictable, too something or another, and they hunted us down and massacred all but three of us."

The shock, the disbelief, the pure horror was tangible in the air and she could hear Sasuke gritting his teeth. She didn't look at either of her teammates, but stared straight ahead at the crosses that signified Zabuza and Haku's graves.

"As expected, after that, I didn't have any contact with Haku. I might even have completely forgotten about him. Until that day I saw him walking out of the forest, of course."

"So." Kasumi leaned back and looked at her teammates, eyes endless pools of dark, dark chocolate churning with pain and sorrow and remorse, her smile a painful, painful thing. "Questions, boys?"

Next time:

It was graceful and magnificent and he felt an acute thrill of regret for he knew that the butterfly would live for less than a month.

Me: And Kasumi's past is explained at last! Reviews!

Rosy Fire: Aww... thank you! Haku did leave the world with no regrets, I think. He died doing what he loved the best, after all! Thanks for the review, hun!

Falicia: Lolz, that's okay. :D Thanks for the review!

starrat: That scene was always heartbreaking. *sniff* Hope you enjoyed this chapter, sweetie!

The Queen of Goodbyes: Lolz, I'm happy that you liked it! This chapter didn't take too long, did it? Thanks for the review, hun!

ShikiUploadz: :o No author = no updating! Put that thing into a safe and throw away the key! :P

bonitalito: Hmm.. well, she didn't, but Naruto did for her! XD Thanks for the review, dear!

rinievermilion: Well, we all know how stubborn Sasuke is! Hope you enjoyed this chapter, hun!

Manaliac: *sniff* I know, it's so sad! But he died protecting Zabuza, what he always wanted! He would want it this way!

Nikita: Oh, I'm sorry. Umm... Kasumi woke up, saw the scene with Haku and Zabuza, tore the senbon out of her, and got to Sasuke. I think she honestly just numbed herself out there. Sasuke showing affection is always fun to write. ^_^, thanks for the review, hun!

Bella-swan11: Sasuke is a stubborn guy, but not even he can deny his feelings forever! Lolz, hope you liked this chapter!

MDA: I'm sorry. :/ If it helps, Haku did say goodbye to Kasumi, even if she didn't get to hear it until now. Kasumi isn't quite emotionless, she just hides her emotions well. Thanks for the review, sweetheart!

1XxKiraXx1: Kasumi was very emotionally affected by that scene and I wanted to show it. I'm so happy you liked that chapter! Thanks for the review, hun!

Wren: Okay, okay! I got the next chapter up! No need to panic, dear reader! I hope you enjoy this one too!

fanfictionnatic: I'll do my best! Thanks for the review!

Me: Mmk, thanks to my awesome beta! Also, review and check out my blog please!

Question: How do you think Naruto and Sasuke will react?