A/N: Intended to be read after 92

"I don't want these to be my last words,

All forgotten 'cause that's all they'll be,

Now there's only one thing I can do,

Fighting to the end like I promised to,"

-Die For You, Grabbitz

Miuna stumbled into the room with a quick little gasp after she was pushed, only for her feet to stop just short of the weapons piled on the floor in the center of the small room.

Kunai, a small pack of needles, shuriken, a short sword—

She fell backwards, but was unable to look away from the pile, because she knew what this meant. But she didn't feel ready. She was supposed to—she didn't want to—

Her eyes flitted up to the others in the room in a sudden panic, but no one else had moved, in a state of similar shock.

There was Nanami, sitting in a corner with his legs pulled up, the eyes behind his glasses flitting between them warily—

She didn't know him that well, but he knew how to strain poison from water snakes.

And then there was Yoko and Shoko, not twins, but cousins who had come from the higher caste, who had helped her take the organs out of a fish once after she killed but couldn't cut into it—

Yoko had his hands on Shoko's shoulders, but they weren't talking. They just stared at each other.

Kaisei, the final member of their group, snagged a kunai and backed into the wall, holding it defensively in front of him in a shaking hand—

He was slow. The slowest in the class. Miuna remembered that with sudden clarity.

She didn't think as she jerked forward, her hand quickly closing around the handle of the short sword when—

When she felt a presence behind her.

And then the door behind her opened. She heard the boy catch himself as he stumbled, just like her, but she couldn't bring herself to turn around, or even move out of his way.

She was stuck, even as everyone else in the room looked at him. Sweat trickled down her back, a sudden, primal fear making her feel the pulse of her heartbeat in her throat.

And then she heard a terribly wet noise, and the shadow of a monster was bent over Nanami. The body fell to the side with a soft thud, his glasses falling off, his eyes wide in surprise.

There was a kunai missing from the pile. Miuna blinked slowly, counting them again as the monster—as Kisame Hoshigaki stood.

When had he moved?

He wasn't the top of the class on paper, because he never really put much effort into anything they did, but they all knew he was.

Miuna came to a sudden realization. This wasn't the room one of them would prove themselves in. This was the room they'd all die in.

"Oh," she said to herself, as Kaisei was disarmed and he abruptly slumped against the wall, a neat red line across his throat.

Yoko stood, chest heaving, and ran at him, and that one was messy, because he had snagged the poisoned needles while Nanami and Kaisei were being killed.

Miuna listened to him fall, to Kisame getting on top of him, to the shk, shk, shk, of a kunai entering and exiting his body, over and over.

It happened so fast.

Miuna flinched as Shoko died too, and Kisame stood slowly, his eyes flicking over his shoulder at her. She threw up her short sword automatically to defend herself, trembling, but still unable to move.

Like Shoko, watching her cousin die, watching herself die.

Kisame wasn't smiling, just standing there with blood dripping from his kunai for what felt like minutes but was probably less than a second, and then he grinned, and it sent chills up her spine.

.

.

.

Kisame looked at the bodies on the floor around him, holding a kunai with fingers crusted with blood.

They were so... weak.

His attention was drawn to the wall, or behind it, where he could hear distant screaming.

It was easy.

Why was it so easy?

Why didn't he feel... accomplished?

He'd been told to do it and he did it... so why?

They had been just like bugs.

The door behind him opened, and even with his back turned, he could feel the pause, the attention given to his most brutal kill, the judgement.

Isn't this what they wanted him to do?

Wasn't this what he had been trained to do?

"Kisame Hoshigaki," they said, and it sounded like begrudging approval, "Here."

Kisame turned and saw the headband being held out to him. He dropped the kunai and went to grab it, his bloody fingers leaving imprints on the metal as he silently tied the headband around his forehead.

The proctor stood back to let him through and Kisame wordlessly left the room as the yelling became louder.

天上の妄想

"You can come out, Kisame."

Kisame was only slightly surprised that he'd been discovered, but he obliged, stepping out of the shadows and fully into the room.

He had a handle on the sword on his back, but he didn't unsheathe it. Not yet.

His master stood in the middle of the room, facing him, holding Samehada loosely with one hand. She was wrapped, but the area around her mouth was so deeply soaked in red that it dripped onto the floor.

"She's had her fill," his master explained with a cruel smile, jolting Samehada a little. It must've been true, because it didn't wake her. "One of them stashed herself on our boat. Put seals everywhere but didn't last long enough to activate them. I would've had you face her if you were there. You'd be an even better dog if you knew how to defend against seal work."

Kisame pulled his blade slightly out of its sheathe. "Are you a traitor?"

His master gazed silently at him, his expression never changing. "That's already been decided, hasn't it?"

Dripping blood filled the silence between them.

Suddenly, his master tossed Samehada away from him, and Kisame watched her slide into the wall before returning his gaze to his master.

"Such a useless tool sometimes," his master said, almost to himself. "I don't think she'll attack you, Kisame, and that's a problem, because I don't want to die."

Kisame grinned, even as he felt his stomach twist with some emotion he wouldn't put a name to. Couldn't, even if he wanted to.

He didn't say a word as he pulled his sword free and held it in front of him. The scrape of it against his sheathe was similar to the sound of his trust being scratched to nothing like crossing a name off a missing-nin list.

It was the sound of the bloody tearing of a flak jacket, a blade meeting flesh, and the last, scratchy breaths of a teammate who trusted you, who died because you followed what your master told you.

If a mission is compromised, the weak should be the first to go. Then, if your own strength fails you, yourself.

His master slammed his hands together in the snake sign. His hair billowed out around and above him, the tips hardening into points to rapidly shoot needles out at him from all directions.

Kisame lowered his head and twisted his blade diagonally in front of him to protect his face and his vitals, but didn't immediately move.

He kept grinning as pain stabbed its way up his legs, down his shoulders and arms as he kept his middle safe, but he was only half-aware of it as he was pelted with a barrage of hair needles.

What did it mean, to be betrayed?

His master had been the one to give him his shark summoning contract.

I took it from one of the islands. Can't remember which one. Thought you'd like it.

Had he betrayed his teammates that day when he put the village above them, or had they betrayed the village by being too weak?

If he died now, who would be the traitor?

If he lived now, who would be the—

Kisame launched himself at his master, ignoring the sudden pain piercing in his middle as he swung his blade, and the point plunged it upwards through his master's stomach and deep into his chest.

The force of it made his master stumble back into the wall, bringing Kisame with him and digging the blade deeper into him, and then his hands fell listlessly to his sides.

Kisame kept his head down as his master's hair became soft again, but the needles still in him didn't fall out. He heard his master cough, and blood splattered the collar of his uniform. It was only right that he use kenjutsu to kill him.

His master laughed wetly, struggling to focus on him. "Like I said. You're a very... good dog." And then he slid slowly down against the wall, finally falling heavily to the floor as his legs gave out on him.

Kisame stood over him as he went still and pale, and kept watching, unable to take his eyes off his master, unable to stop grinning.

He was alone again.

Needles clattered to the ground around him, blood flowing freely from his wounds as they finally softened back into hair.

Kisame was the one who had been betrayed, his master had betrayed him and the village—

Had he?

He could trust no one but himself. No, not even himself.

He hated himself.

Kisame turned from the body and took a step towards Samehada—

—only to drop to one knee as he faltered, pain radiating throughout his body, but he only closed his eyes, trained too well to make a sound. He pressed a hand to the floor after a moment and forced himself back up, leaving an imprint of his knee in blood behind.

He bent down, nearly falling again, but got his hands around Samehada. She was his. His master's spot in the Seven Ninja Swordsmen was his—

Kisame collapsed onto his knees and couldn't bring himself to stand again, dropping Samehada back to where she'd been.

He heard a tearing sound, but only watched Samehada rip the bandages apart around her mouth, her tongue darting out to lick at one of his leg wounds. To heal him, he realized, as chakra was forced into him. Chakra that thrashed and beat against his coils like the sea violently crashing against rocks, but only for those first few seconds until his own chakra smothered it.

Kisame stayed there, unthinking, unfeeling, and just breathed.

A/N: 天上の妄想 - Heavenly Delusion