-;-
Accustomed to Shinobi way of life, the Doctors clear Sasuke out the moment they get wind Kakashi, newly hailed guardian, has already checked him over – and left.
Knowing Kakashi was even there, was really all that they needed to discharge him.
[This world held no concern for child soldiers. In their eyes, the moment a kid graduates from the Academy they're no longer considered human or 'one of them'. It's easier to live without guilt. Easier to see them as another disposable tool.]
The Doctor waves him away with an official note clearing him from any strenuous movements for the next five days. Chakra healing or not, bones need time to heal and rest. Naruto took that as a sign to finally get one up on him.
"Have at it," Sasuke tells the kid as the team follows him briskly down the sterile hallway. Sakura's one-man mission to make the team a 'family' was damned well tiresome.
Hospitals were cock-full of ghosts and Sasuke was having a difficult time trying not to shiver too hard at the chilling atmosphere. Arms wrapped demurely around his bandaged rib cage, Sasuke steers clear of a loony-looking man cackling to himself in the middle of the hallway.
Hot damn.
He resembled a person who suddenly developed a phobia of touch.
Why do kids always choose the most inconvenient of places to give him grief?
Naruto pretends to have not heard him and continues to mutter his plans to the world. Bad habit to get into.
Meh.
Not Sasuke's problem.
The kid can dig himself a hole for all he cares. Maybe he could jump in it with him.
Behind, some ghosts start noticing something different. Something familiar. A divine-like presence of peace and rest that they grasp at like sand.
The air turns arctic.
Sasuke mutters a curse under his breath. Legs peddling out speed like a passionate drug dealer. Dog tags heavy under his shirt.
"Where do you live again, Sasuke-kun?" Sakura catches up besides him. Steamrolling through the body of a girl no older than five who looked to have been dropped into an airplane's propeller. Sasuke controls the facial twitch when Sakura's front momentarily splatters red with bits of bone and sliced skin.
Eugh. Screw Doctor's orders he's skipping lunch.
"The Jashin Apartment Building," he scowls, eyeballing the crowded entrance room which led to the exit. Around them was what could only be called controlled chaos with shinobi hot rolling in with casual admittance of 'yeah got stabbed again, what can you do about it?' and nurses tutting like a mother being told their child fell over after a game of cops and robbers.
There was less annoying deceased people here – just ghost nurses pointlessly arguing with the alive ones about how they're doing a crap job - permitting him to loosen a bit.
"Hey," Naruto chimes in on Sasuke's left, angling his head to look suspiciously at Sakura. "I thought you already knew where he lived. You and Ino used to follow the freak home."
Sasuke's scowl deepens at the memories –metal disc of a silencer against his head and everything suddenly stopping - the same time Sakura turns her hair colour.
"Used to being the operative word," she then hisses, "and I was only trying to be polite no need to bring up bad memories, Naruto!"
Naruto shrinks behind Sasuke, grimacing at her brewing anger.
They make it out the hospital without getting tailed by the undead.
-;-
"Looks…" Sakura pauses at the foot of the stairs leading to his apartment's entrance. Sasuke passes her, fishing his pockets for the keys. "Well." He glances back, half smirking at her straining expression.
For what it's worth, the girl was damned well trying her best to not let her thoughts show.
Sasuke knew all too well what his place looked like (being partly responsible and all that). In another life he would have pegged this place for a druggie den - and that kind has tried, but all the ghosts and Bad Luck running amuck has made it a literal ghost town.
"It's aged since I've last seen it." She settles on. "You sure it's…safe? The bricks seem a little old."
The entire building had just been renovated when Sasuke acquaintance it with his knack for death.
"I'll survive," Sasuke says, ironic grin in place. "Comin' up?" he asks, swooping the door open in a welcoming gesture he doesn't feel. All he really felt like doing for the rest of the day was abusing his status as a shinobi and getting shitfaced with Kenji.
Because fuck it's been a helluva long day and a heck of a long time spent being sober.
Sensing their overstayed welcome, Sakura rounds Naruto up with the promise of ramen and off they go. Sasuke waits exactly five minutes until he locks the door back up, and walks in the opposite direction he saw them leave.
-;-
When Sasuke wakes up, he's simultaneously disappointed, depressed, groggy and irritated all at once. Limbs compressed at odd angles and cheek mushed against the cool slab of something, Sasuke squints to see the molding jade tiles of his bathroom floor. Not for the lack of Sasuke's hygiene, he must argue.
"Death by alcohol poisoning," Kenji says somewhere above him. "That's low even for you."
"Go fuck yourself," Sasuke chokes out. Untangling himself like a struggling magician.
Immediately the feeling of a bed of nails suddenly attacking on him at all sides shoots out.
"Shiiiiiiit," he hisses. Fists digging into eye sockets. "I have the worst headache."
"Miss that," Kenji complains, seating himself down on the edge of the bathtub. Content to watch Sasuke huddle himself into the dim, wet mold patches of the bathroom's corner. Trying to punch the headache out. "Miss alcohol. Miss sex. Miss hangovers. You're lucky you get to keep on experiencing the nuances of life, bastard."
"Fucking piss ooofffff," Sasuke kicks at the soju bottles surrounding him. They roll painstakingly across the tiled floor and stop at Kenji's floating legs. "I don't need your whining ass. Go haunt some other asshole, this one's nursing a hangover."
"Just felt the need to notify you of your impending doom."
Sasuke found it hard to believe that there was a doom worse than being reincarnated into a world of employable serial killers.
He makes a small 'out with it' gesture.
"Hatake Kakashi is at your front door." Kenji snickers at his abrupt silence. "Might wanna brush your teeth, you probably smell like vomit." Sasuke sniffs his own breath, grimacing.
"Alright," he mutters to himself. Just a hangover. No need to be a little pussy about it Godfrey, you've been shot in the head fo Chrissake. If you can walk off literal death you can walk this shit off easy-bitchin'-peasy.
Bravely fighting the impulse to upchuck into the toilet as he stands up - hot flash of vertigo diving down spine - Sasuke marches through his tiny apartment to the front door. Eyes twitching at the sunlight beaming in through closed blinds.
"Sensei," he greets the man. Gaze locked onto his green jacket. He doesn't trust himself to look up and not get dizzy. "I'll be down in five minutes."
"Am I smelling strawberry soju in your breath or is that the new musk all those hip kids are wearing nowadays?"
"New musk," Sasuke says with no hesitation. "Citrus. You like?"
"Really brings out the alcoholic in you," there was a smile in his tone that just spoke of consequences.
"Constable, your performance out there today was such dog shit I could smell it through the radio. "
"Exactly what I was going for," Sasuke snorts, unsurprised when Kakashi pushes his way inside. Sudden bone breaking grip on his arm dragging him to his couch and dumping like a bag of groceries. Sasuke drops his head back, eyes shut and ears twitching at the silent – yet extremely loud – sounds of Kakashi inspecting his apartment.
A cold, heavy bottle lands on his lap. He doesn't need to see it to distinguish the item.
"Daddy doesn't look so happy," Kenji whispers into his ear, eliciting a chill down his clammy chest.
"Why strawberry?" Kakashi asks of all questions.
Sasuke makes a 'what can you do' gesture. "Never tried it before, and it was the cheapest crap the sly bastard had on him."
"Oh, so you're not just any budding alcoholic, you're a frugal alcoholic. Good, you had me worried there for a second." Kakashi seats himself on the edge of the coffee table. No doubt staring him down like his Chief did whenever someone ratted out his whiskey stash kept in the top drawer of his desk. "Anything else I should be aware of?"
'I tried to off myself last night' doesn't really roll of the tongue like it should do. "Other than my unbecoming conduct as a shinobi? Nope. All good."
"Well," Kakashi starts in mirth, "you're not exactly setting an admirable example for aspiring idiots."
What would?
"Should I go and off a baby then?" Kenji makes a frantic shushing sound Sasuke swats at. "Will that be up to administrative standards? Oh," he snorts, "Itachi would love that - " Kakashi yanks him up by the stained collar, empty bottle smashing into tiny shards and probably ruining his floorboards.
Sasuke dry-heaves. Staring up at Kakashi through baggy eyelids and a sheen of sweat and grows only think keeping him up was Kakashi's ruling grip.
"You're not in the Academy anymore, Sasuke-chan," Kakashi eye smiles. Tone far too pleasant to be nice. "Your personal issues are irrelevant when it comes to being a shinobi and they shouldn't have to interfere during working hours. It's pathetic, and a hindrance to others. You're seven hours late. Naruto and Sakura are running penalty laps as we speak because you decided to drown in yourself sorrow like some tacky character in a civilian low-budget action movie," Kakashi's single eye burns. "This misconduct better not happen again. Drinking's fine, potential alcohol poisoning isn't. You could have seriously hurt yourself Sasuke-chan."
I would like to respectfully point out sir, that, that was my exact intention.
"Next time you want to have a drink," Kakashi sighs. As though Sasuke was being unreasonable and he was being forced to make a compromise at gun point. "Notify me. Having someone to drink with makes the alcohol taste better I hear."
"No," Sasuke shakes his head. Quin would be appalled. "Eating fried chicken makes it taste better. Company sucks."
Unless she's there.
"Shush. The adult is speaking."
He grunts an ironic laugh.
-;-
It takes him longer than it should have to notice a certain lack of Rin-presence. He's washing his face, having just finished cleaning himself up with Kakashi poking about in his kitchen to flash Kenji a suspicious look in the basin mirror.
His lurking ghost catches on immediately.
"She's visiting a friend in the building," the man swoops a hand. "They go way back to genin days."
"Who is it?"
Kenji has the non-beating heart of the cat from Alice in Wonderland and develops an extremely hostile looking smile.
"Guess."
"Didn't give a shit anyway," Sasuke dismisses and walks out of the bathroom. Patting his face dry with a months old dirty hand towel.
"Uzumaki Kushina," Kenji snickers. "Naruto's mother."
Sasuke pauses in the threshold of the hallway, earning a piquing glance from Kakashi.
He giggles for all but two seconds – couldn't help himself – before shaking out of it and deciding fuck no.
Not his problem.
Not his mystery, and not his ghost.
Naruto's tragic plot line can go jump off a damned cliff.
-;-
"Teme! You asshat!" Naruto resembles someone who was just dropped into a typhoon. Where he found the energy to rush across the training ground and deck Sasuke in the face was a modern mystery.
Sakura, collapsed somewhere in the distance, manages her habitual scolding in a faint wheeze.
Nobody notices.
Kakashi yanks Naruto off Sasuke like a misbehaving kitten. Giving the kid a little shake and pointed finger.
"We do not hit drunken teammates outside sparring matches."
"I was provoked!" Naruto reasons, palms opened convincingly.
Sasuke scoffs. Dabbing his split lip with a fist and picking himself up.
"Wait – drunken?!" Naruto gives the dead man a disbelieving and affronted look. "You got drunk after we left you?"
Sasuke shrugs. Wincing at the volume and open sunlight.
"Enough. Sasuke-chan, hop to it. Hundred laps."
"Why does he get special treatment? Sakura-chan and I did three hundred!"
"Doctor's orders," Kakashi lets Naruto down, watching Sasuke jog off. Laboured breathing and nausea hitting him in a wave of unpleasantness.
-;-
Naruto and Sakura are angry with him, and Sasuke gets it. What he did was stupid.
He should have finished that last bottle of soju. Maybe then he would be dead and not have a hangover that rivals nuclear bomb testing.
"Our first day as shinobi and I feel like death before anything's even happened," Naruto hisses. Primarily at Sasuke.
Kakashi was dragging them through the streets of Konoha to get their very first D-rank mission – and they could barely move from the burning in their legs and abs.
Sasuke spares Naruto a sarcastic look.
Naruto catches it. He goes to say something but the man has to quickly duck into an alley way. What's left of his insides rolling and bubbling out. Team seven pause to catch breath, watching apathetically.
"Eugh, that just ain't natural."
"Screw you," Sasuke gasps.
-;-
Helpful criticism and thoughts are always lovely to hear (: