Transmission #9-0-6-2 Addendum "Leashed"
North Side the Wall, Tokyo Urban; Hidden Village: "Leaf"
Konoha suburb, Quadrant 3, "Hero District"; Haruno household
0 hrs; December 7, 1963
Sasuke had felt them before they were seen...
Troubled by a dream which never faded as they day grew old, weakened by the telentless sapping of the Curse Mark's pull, he'd even doubted he could make it through the dinner. The morsels of food felt like ash in his mouth, and became tastleless. He waded through conversation like rudderless vessel; talking on instinct, than possessing any weight. When it was over and finished, Sasuke was relieved.
Yet, now he wasn't so confident.
What started as an incurable nag to his sanity, grew to be an annoying pest throughout the day. The migraines persisted even after he awoke, no matter how many liters of water he drank he still felt parched, every bright light caused him to shrink away. Sakura's painkillers turned his mouth to cotton, numbed his mind, made his muscles feel weak, tender and supple.
He was in no condition to fight anyone tonight.
Yet, a whole platoon somehow, some way, tailed him to Sakura's house. Noble One's balls, how could he be so careless. So lazy!
Why couldn't he have seen them before?
"Sasuke-kun what's the matter?"
"Shh! Quiet - listen!" He backs away from the light of her lamp, peering out behind the edge of the window.
His eyes are tired, reddened by the lack of a good night's sleep, but his Sharingan pumps blood and chakra to expand his cornea, draw in what little light there is, his retina converting them to electrical signals to his brain.
A picture forms.
Suddenly, the world isn't so hidden to Sasuke any longer. All have expertly hidden themselves - thirty in total, and lay in wait in the great of every crevice, every corner, every darkened shadow.
"How many?" Sakura asks; she's been around him long enough to know when to sense danger. She gets close to him - not too close to give away their position, but enough to peer over his shoulder in her tiptoes. "The Ii and Oshima houses across the street are small, but provide good cover. They offer two avenues to close in, so we might get flanked if we're not careful. Sasuke-kun who do you think-"
"ROOT. Who else." Sasuke minds she's readying her leather gloves on her hands. "What do you think you're doing?"
"Providing backup." Sakura says to him haughtily, the harsh sound of the Velcro snapping as she tightens her sandals.
"I don't need you to back me up, Sakura; I need you to stay outta the way."
Again he's harsher with her than he intended, but this time it was out of a measure of genuine concern. For a spell ROOT had been snooping aling his oerimeter, tantalizingly close before peeling away from him. To him they were irksome pests flying about his tattered hide, and he meant to swat them away. But if they hurt Sakura...
Then, though, his collar is pulled violently and his head is quickly jerked to the side. Sakura bores down at him angrier than she's ever been. Eyes brimming along the line of rage and annoyance, her surprising strength holding him to the spot.
Though he'd never admit it, Sakura really was scary when he was angry.
"Say and do whatever the FUCK you want to me outside this house. But under this roof Sasuke - the same one my parents are sleeping in two doors down, in MY very own room, you do NOT order me around...Understood?"
Her voice was quiet, but it carried the weight of thunder.
For a brief moment, Sasuke swore he saw something flicker in her eyes, something fierce and wild, something that made him wonder if this was what Naruto saw every time he pushed too far.
He had faced his personal demons in the oast, the abyss of loneliness itself. But Sakura Haruno, when she was pissed?
That was something else entirely.
"Fine," Sasuke muttered, rolling his eyes. They didn't have time for this.
The ambush was already in motion, and the longer they stalled, the more time it gave ROOT to tighten their net. His grip tightened around the jinbari blade, thumb idly running along its steel spine, feeling the cold bite of the metal. A reminder. A promise.
"I go out first. Watch the alley to my left. Five there, three above."
Sakura nodded, her expression sharp with focus. "Got it."
No hesitation. No questions. Save for the one lingering worry which she tried to hide amongst her hard nosed features. Why are they here, and what do they want? Good questions. All which he had a hunch about, least whatever his guardian angel deigns say to him. That lingnering whisper to go with his headaches and oains and bad memories.
It tells him ROOT didn't move without purpose. If they were watching Sasuke, it wasn't for sport. They wanted him, needed him; Koshiro revealed as much at Aokigahara.
But as they sought answers, so too did Sasuke.
He slips off downstairs and out the back door. Slinking like a predatory cat into the moonlight. It carches his silhouette before he vanishes into the unforgiving cold, his senses piqued wity the Sharingan actuve and his paranoia driving him onward. But it was here, clinging to these liquid shadows running over his skin, hiding his presence, where he dinally felt...
At ease.
Peaceful.
Confidently himself.
Mist froths at his mouth, but not too much - he's careful, calm, sharp as a clean blade edge. He places a bit of ice into his mouth to hide his breath, he dampens his chakra signature by holding close his breath. An urge cajoling him lusts for more of this feeling, saying it's all it ever wanted to see within him; to observe him in his natural state...
That of a killer.
Asuma was wrong - much like he was about many other things; protector's never indulged in these feelings, never got off stalking their prey. Sasuke finds his quarry sitting off a ways to the edge of the meager Haruno homestead. He stood there with his black coar, black officer's cap, sniper's cloak hued in a dark blue to not catch the moon's shine. They had their back turned to Sasuke, who primed his juken blade like a cocked gun.
Right here it would be too easy to unfurl his steel and take their head. Like the old executioner's of shoguns past, Sasuke had gotten quite good with the use of the long-purpose bayonet. But his reflexes were slow and the bite of winter numbs his body; for he doesn't know what gives him away, but the ROOT agent turns on a swivel. The motion is mechanically smooth and harbors no hesitation. Sasuke barely has time to react as the tanto races towards his face.
Muscle memory and Kakashi's training saves him.
Along with the whispers of an unseen benefactor.
Sasuke tilts his head just enough for the blade to whistle past his cheek, its edge kissing the air where his face had been a breath before. The cold doesn't bite him now—adrenaline surges through his veins, sharpening him, driving out the sluggishness that winter tried to bury in his limbs.
The ROOT agent's movements are precise, devoid of wasted motion, their speed and discipline evident in the way they close the distance. But Sasuke is faster. His body moves before thought, a well-honed instinct forged from years of battle and the cold, unrelenting tutelage of his Comrade-Sensei's teachings.
The Sharingan drinks every detail—the subtle shift in the agent's footing, the minute tightening of their shoulders telegraphing their next attack. Time stretches, a slow current pulling him beneath the surface, where everything is clear. He twists his wrist, snapping his blade up just in time to catch the tanto's edge with a screech of steel. Sparks fly between them, vanishing into the frozen air like dying fireflies.
The impact rattles through his bones, but Sasuke holds firm, angling his blade to deflect rather than meet the force head-on. A mistake here—just a second's hesitation—and he'd be dead.
His mind catalogues everything—their grip, the length of their reach, the disciplined economy of their movements. ROOT didn't raise amateurs. This one had fought before. Killed before.
Sasuke smirks.
Good.
He pivots sharply, pressing his advantage, his jinbari blade a viper snapping forward. The agent barely twists away in time, their cloak flaring as they move to counter. Silent. Efficient. But they weren't fighting just anyone.
They were fighting him.
Sasuke's heart pounds—not in fear, but in thrill. The hunger stirs within him, the part of him that was always waiting, always watching from the dark corners of his soul. The same voice that had whispered to him in Orochimaru's domain, the same one that had purred when he cut through enemies with cold precision.
This is where you belong.
Not as a protector.
Not as a savior.
But as a predator.
The agent feints, their tanto dipping low, aiming for the gap beneath his ribs. Sasuke reads them like an open book, stepping inside their guard before they can react. His knee drives up into their gut with crushing force. A sharp exhale, a stumble—momentary, but enough.
He doesn't hesitate. His elbow snaps down onto their back, sending them sprawling into the frost-covered dirt.
For a moment, there's only silence—the moon casting its dim glow over the scene, their breath curling in the cold like twin phantoms.
Then Sasuke presses his blade to the back of the agent's neck.
"Who sent you?"
The agent says nothing. Doesn't struggle. Doesn't tremble. Just lies there, breathing even, their body unnervingly still, and their face expressionless. A silver porcelain mask covers them, the only thing peering up the two darkened slits which lead to nowhere.
From him Sasuke saw nothing, felt nothing. Even as he had him pinned with steel perilously close to cutting his life short, there was no fear. No identity. No self.
Only another tool fashioned for the job.
Sasuke scowls, eyes narrowing - he should kill them. It would be easy—one motion, one flick of his wrist.
And yet…
The agent suddenly moves. Fast. Too fast. A small click, barely audible, is heard. Sasuke's eyes widen as he catches the glint of something hidden beneath their cloak.
A flash bomb.
The world erupts in blinding white, and his vision becomes nothing but white-hot agony. With the Sharingan activated, his pupils constrict violently before rebounding into oversensitivity, sending a sharp, nauseating pain through his nerves. His balance wavers, but his instincts scream at him to move. Now.
Sasuke doesn't hesitate. Muscles coil, and he launches backward, flipping into the air as the concussive force of the flash bomb ignites beneath. The blast scorches the frost-covered ground, kicking up a cloud of debris that swallows the agent whole. But Sasuke isn't arrogant enough to assume they were down. They weren't running, simply maneuvering.
His body twists midair, and even through the swirling afterimages burning in his vision, he spots the blur of movement—a dark figure slipping through the haze, disappearing into the skeletal arms of the trees. His Sharingan flickers, trying to adjust, but every pulse of light leaves his nerves raw and grits his teeth. No time.
He lets himself fall, but not without control—his heel cracks against the side of a wooden fence post, redirecting his momentum as he drops down into the main thoroughfare. The street is empty for only a moment before more shadows move.
Backup had arrived in six, seven figures all clad in the same officer's garb, the same black as death trench coats. Sasuke's surrounded by a pack of expressionaless, silent wraiths as peel forth from the darkness, stepping into view with quiet, methodical precision. There are more unseen - once his sight recovers and the Sharingan is able to map his bearings, their presence feels so much like a noose tightening about his throat, cutting off all escape routes.
None speak.
They don't threaten.
Merely, watch him. Only him. As Sasuke steadies his breathing, rolls his shoulders as his fingers flex around his blade. His vision is still unfocused, letting them see every twitch, fidget and flex. He is like a coiled cobra threatening to lash out, every subtle move he makes a solemn promise he will strike. Which is good, because while their focus was primed towards him, it gave Sakura ample opportunity to make her move.
"SHAAAA!" Her fist flies like a falling comet, landing flush against one of the ROOT operatives.
It's about as hard a punch as Sasuke had ever felt Sakura give. She cries out in pain, as the masked assailant staggers back only a few steps. They don't flinch, don't make a noise. Fact is only sound Sasuke heard was the crack of knuckles, and the hard *thunk* of...wood?
"Ugh, damn it!" Sakura shouts, clutching her fist.
The agent she collects its bearings, pulls its tanto out in a quick twitch, then falls forward in a damningly quick charge.
Sasuke's body moves on instinct, the juken never hesitating as it's unsheathed. Protecting Sakura - like Naruto - was second-hand to him at this point. Almost as easy as breathing fire, or walking up a wall. The sword hits right where the crook of the neck meets body, and with a fluid wave of his arm, the head is lopped off.
There is no blood, though.
Maybe only a slight trickle, but that is all.
Sakura gasps when the body doesn't fall, yet instead prepares itself, and gets back into a defensive stance. Figures, Sasuke huffs.
His left hand is already performing one half of Horse, Serpent, Ram - the Sharingan focusing to form the ither half whilst his hand readies his blade to parry another advance. It was a foolish thing to use the Katon here. Against armed guards of The State no less. Was Sasuke thinking? No. His body and mind were too dependent on the urge telling gim to let go, this voice tickling his psyche to know fully his actions. All that mattered was it felt good letting go, like uncoiling this pent-up pressure welling inside.
More of the ROOT agents come out from their spots, slowly and with careful movements. Sakura curses in both frustration and pain - her hand, she says. A knuckle bone may be dislodged. But Sasuke couldnt care less; the red was becoming too real again. Too overwhelming. He had to let go, needed to.
Or else he'll just fall further away from control.
He takes in a breath, the cold air becoming hot in his lungs as chakra burns his chest. Fire is culled from a deep place hidden within him, where all the faceless sprites of his forebears congregate and cajole him.
"Katon: Gōkakyū no Jutsu!" he yells, and a burning plume of scorching fire melts the area in front of them.
The night ignites.
A roaring inferno bellows from Sasuke's lips, consuming the frozen air, warping the darkness into a blistering hellscape of orange and gold. The heat erupts forward, devouring the frost-bitten earth in its path, swallowing the ROOT agents in a wall of liquid fire. Shadows dance wildly against the blaze, bodies moving in a flurry of evasive precision. They scatter, some barely escaping the flames licking at their feet, others flipping backward onto rooftops, their movements unnervingly smooth—too practiced.
Sakura stumbles back, shielding her face from the sudden burst of heat. Her hand throbs, her knuckles screaming in pain, but she doesn't let it slow her down. She grits her teeth and pulls her good fist up, ready to fight.
Sasuke doesn't stop to check who was caught in the blaze and who wasn't. He doesn't care. The fire churns, rolling out in thick waves, steam rising where it meets the ice-rimed ground. The air smells of scorched wood, burning cloth, and something acrid—like singed metal.
And yet still, they move.
Through the rippling heat, Sasuke sees their dark figures reassembling, adjusting, countering. They weren't faltering. Not truly. Not like enemies should when faced with something like this.
His teeth clench.
"Are you just another tool, boy?" The voices of his ancestors hiss in his veins, their whispers clawing at the inside of his skull. "Another faceless pawn? Another discarded name in the long, bloody history of Konoha's forgotten?"
Sasuke snarls and drops low, his blade flashing in the firelight. No. He wasn't like them. Would never be like them. And he sure as hell wouldn't let them take him or Sakura...
Or Naruto.
A voice cuts through the chaos, slicing through the crackling fire and the sharp tension in the air like a blade through silk.
"Fūton—"
The wind howls.
A sudden burst of slicing gales whips through the battlefield, dissipating the flames in an instant. Sasuke's fire, which had been hot enough to melt rock and turn chainmail to ash, is snuffed out effortlessly, vanishing into the void like it had never been there at all.
The sudden extinguishing startles him—no, impresses him.
Sasuke hadn't held back. That fire should have reduced anything in its path to cinders. And yet, standing amidst the dying embers, looking as if he had walked through fire itself, was the one responsible.
Clad in his swirling Hokage robes, Lord Third atands tall, the ember of his cigarette flaring against the cold.
"That's quite enough!" Asuma says, walking in his slow, confident stride. The Sandaime was a man who had nothing to prove—a contrast to the silent, statuesque agents of ROOT, who regarded him with the same dispassionate neutrality they gave Sasuke ans Sakura.
A sharp whistle followed, cutting through the thick air, and from the alley's mouth, they emerged—the Hokage's Guard Unit.
At the front, Genma Shiranui strode forward with lazy precision, a senbon dangling from his lips, shifting only slightly as he spoke. His gaze was cool, measuring, but his stance? Loose, practiced—dangerous.
Behind him, the Hokage Guard Unit fanned out, forming a deliberate, unshakable presence between the combatants. They weren't simply backup, but an official declaration.
"Comrade-Commissar Terasoma," Asuma calls out, exhaling a thin wisp of smoke. His tone was calm, almost casual, but beneath it was something gravelly and firm. "But late in the night for you to be staking out the house of an underage youth? Don't need to remind you that sort of notoriety is frowned upon on in this Village. That, and I'm sure Daimyo Kaneko's condition requires you to be close at hand. Am I not correct?"
Just then Sasuke notes a ROOT officer, clad in black, the brim of his cap casting his face in shadow. The flames left no mark on him, as if he had been untouched, unbothered.
The man lifts his head. Sasuke doesn't recognize him; silver hair, gray eyes that glint with something unreadable, and a skeletal smirk that pulls at the edges of his face. And the air around him carried a scent—a distinct, unsettling fragrance of grave dirt and incense.
"Your one to talk about my notoriety, Mr. Numbah Three. After all, you do know me so intimately." The man calls out, his voice casual, but edged with command. He waves his hand brusquely, and calls off his comrades. Hidan is relaxed, even as the weight of authority behind his words is unmistakable. "I believe the Presidium exonerated me after that little incident back in what...'57? '58? Corroborated what I'd known for quite some time: kid was a little piss-ant, jagoff privy to jerking it too hard and fermenting anti-government sentiment. I was full in my rights to do what I did."
Genma spits out the senbon in his mouth, it sticking straight down in the ground. "The boy was twelve."
"And you people train these little bastards even earlier in the ways to kill, don't you? And I must say, you've done a helluva job." Hidan moves over to where the decapitated head rolls about. He picks it up carelessly. "Who says death has an age limit, Shiranui-san."
"I made it clear to Chikuma that if you want my help getting into the Library, then he's off limits." Asuma nods in Sasuke's direction, but Hidan is unfazed.
In fact, he laughs.
"Help? Oh No. No, no, no, no, nooooo... Your compliance, yes, Mr. Numbah Three. But we don't need your help. For that, I think you should look closer to home. Isn't that right, people?" Hidan chuckles low at the opened windows, the doors which now are creaked open, curious eyes awake now due to the commotion. Even Sakura's parents have come - Mebuki in a jacket and simple nightgown assisting her husband as he's without his cane. Both have a fevered look to go to their daughter, but fear keeps them checked. It doesn't stop Mebuki giving Sasuke a reproachful look.
Haruno-san never did quite like him as much as her daughter did.
"Reputation and rumor spread quite quickly among the proletariat, comrade. Like a fever. People have ever been impressionable. No different here than anywhere else." Hidden tosses the head to the decapitated ROOT agent, and with a flick of his hand motions for them all to go back; they abide the command, and ease their postures almost in sync with one another. "But really I'm curious to know how safe you really think you are, Mr. Numbah Three? Among them - and LIKEWISE!"
Hidden raises his arms to address the villagers too afraid to fully reveal themselves, but too curious to not view their Hokage and his guard unit in the street. A few of Sasuke's stray fires still flicker, causing shades to dance across faces both calm and adamant, and vitriolic and lascivious. The ROOT agents and their porcelain white visages are motionless, speechless, stand as still as stone; while the officer known as Hidan asks Konoha if Asuma truly has done right by them? Has he protected them? Made them feel safe? Them and theirs live off of scraps and angsty nerves to get through every day, unsure when and where the next attack may come.
First it was the Watchtower at Aokigahara - of which too many died due to carelessness.
Then the incident at Inogawa Foundry. Another dastardly attack which - though, thankfully didn't see any fatalities - spoke volumes as to how the defenses here in Konoha were a sieve; if one can carry out such an act in the heart of the Village, then they can do so anywhere else.
"Your Chief here is still in command of the defense in Konoha, and yet the sequence of events here have been as violent - or more so - as they've ever been. Not since the Akatsuki Crisis has the position of The Hidden Leaf Village been as precarious as it is now. And yet, for some reason, not only is he withholding information which would help us in dispensing justice here and instilling order. But now he's ruined a perfectly good ambush. Intended to capture one of the villains involved. A miscalculation I imagine, but one whose consequences will result in stricter conditions than they are currently."
"But have no fear, comrades! The Noble One and Sapporo have taken notice of your plight, and will not abide such acts to go unpunished. I assure you, you're safety and the integrity of this Village are of paramount importance to this, our Democratic People's Republic of Japan. And any who seek to undermine our goings-on here, will be equally held accountable. And blah blah blah blah... That is the solemn word direct from Comrade Director Chikuma himself."
The threat isn't unnoticed by all, as Hidan's eyes linger dangerously long upon Asuma's figure. Asuma steps forward, not to be intimidated by a man Sasuke knows not to trust. But Sakura's good hand clamps down on his arm. Her grip is firm, despite her injury. And her voice even sharper. "No, Sasuke-kun." She pleads to him, though his blood is boiling still.
Again, he's told to stand down. Again, he's forced to withhold, to restrain, to pull back from the edge when all he wants—*all he's ever wanted—*is to let go. His grip tightens on his sword, fingers coiling around the hilt with enough force to turn his knuckles white. His anger thrums beneath his skin, a barely contained inferno, and for a fleeting moment, it feels as though it will consume him whole.
But then—Sakura's hand. Firm. Unyielding.
He breathes.
The tension in Sasuke's jaw loosens, his shoulders falling just enough to show that, reluctantly, begrudgingly, he is stepping back.
His fingers slip from the hilt, and the heat inside him cools to embers.
"Hidan!" A voice which sounds like cracking wood and arid fields cuts off Hidan before he can speak further. "Enough of this rancor; you've made your point with your insolent blustering. Show some respect."
Sasuke and Sakura turn when they hear it; a sound of chittering, clacking, sharp as bone striking stone. Above them across the way, hunched over an arched roof is a grotesque effigy watching them. It speaks once more, its voice dry, rasping, like wind through brittle leaves, like a corpse dragging itself from its grave. Its gaze is fixed on them as it drops down with a heavy thud. It gives its apologies to an elderly couple who jump at the flick of its long, barbarous tail, pointed end gleaming under the moon and fire light.
"Very well, very well, Comrade-Adjutant Sasori; nearly forgot you were here." Hidan gestures at the hunched over gargoyle.
"Sure you did." Comrade Sasori hits the man with a deriding look. He floats over to where Asuma stands, now between ROOT and Sasuke and Sakura. The stunted little man looks up from where he crawled to Lord Third and firmly apologizes for the miscommunication; evidently, Director Chikuma failed to mention their operation tonight was meant to capture their target of interest. "A mere slip I'm sure, Comrade-Hokage." Sasori says, bowing his head as low as it could go.
Sasuke thinks Asuma should've crushed the man's neck right there.
"A failure to communicate is a fatal thing in our line of work. If Koshiro had told me, perhaps I wouldn't have had to rush out the Library so hastily. This sort of distraction can only prolong our business there. But as you say, it must've been honest mistake; he's got big shoes to fill, and is probably still learning on the job." Asuma says, the barb of his insult digging his contempt for the men before him a little further. "You and your 'things' may take your leave now, Comrade-Sasori. Positive you'll have to make a report of this soon as possible. Best not keep Comrade-Director waiting."
"No, it would not be." Sasori's tail swishes behind him before recouping inside his tarp-like jacket.
The ROOT agent backs away, recalling his company to fall in around him; all thirty or so do without question. Event he one who cradles its head int he crook of its arm. Sakura has an adamant look on her face, yet she's obviously bothered by the sight. Sasuke can feel her tense as it walks past without a care, without any sort of acknowledgement. Save for Comrade Terasoma, who places his cap on his head before smiling over to Sakura.
"Junior Commissar Haruno. Very good showing tonight. Was a fine punch. I'll miss having you by my side." His voice is light, mockingly pleased, like a teacher indulging a student who finally learned their lesson. "You'll make a fine adjutant in no time. But before you go, make sure you check that hand of yours; twenty-seven bones in the human hand, and breaking any one is a bitch. If you'd like, I can check on you tomorrow. Yeah?"
Sasuke barely stops himself from bristling.
Genma's voice cuts through the murmuring crowd, issuing firm orders to his unit. "Secure the perimeter. Keep the civilians back." His tone is clipped, professional, but there's something else beneath it—a quiet frustration. Like a man who had seen this play out too many times before.
Sasuke doesn't miss the way his eyes linger on Asuma.
For all the older man's bravado, his usual sharp-edged wit, tonight had taken something out of him. Asuma stood there, still, rigid, the glow of his cigarette the only sign of life. He takes a long drag, holds it for a moment, and exhales through his nose. The smoke curls around his face, obscuring the flicker of weariness in his gaze.
Sasuke knows that look.
It's the look of a man losing faith in his own station.
"Tch." He clicks his tongue, eyes narrowing. Pathetic.
Weakness spreads like rot. And tonight, Sasuke could smell it in the air. Not just in Asuma—but in all of them. The villagers, the shinobi, the leadership that let ROOT slither through the streets unchecked. All of them were shaken. And in their silence, their inaction, they let it happen.
Across the way, Sakura is insisting she's fine, brushing off her parents with the kind of forced confidence Sasuke has seen in her before—the one she wears when she doesn't want anyone to worry. She cradles her injured hand, fingers flexing gingerly. It's swelling. It'll bruise. He should tell her to get it looked at.
But he doesn't.
Because none of this should've happened.
ROOT shouldn't have been here. That filth, that man shouldn't have even had the chance to speak her name. Sasuke should have ended it before it started. Before Asuma had to step in. He was the protector wasn't he, so what the hell was he doing butting in?
His fingers twitch at his side, and he glances back toward where ROOT had stood, where they had walked away was the problem: they'd walked away. And everyone here—all these people who called themselves shinobi—let them. Because Asuma lacked the balls to do what's right, and instead played along to whatever The State wished and called it strategy. And now on the cusp of being sent away on some foppish PR mission, Sasuke and his classmates still would be forced to live with the decisions of an antiquated generation.
Much as he saw there west of the Uchiha compound as he returned. After Asuma looks at him with a baleful look and goes, "Go back. Rest. Don't worry about a thing...Trust me."
Trust...
That fucking word.
Again.
Asuma put too much stock in it, and now paid the price for relying on patience to see the world right itself. Sasuke saw the man in his traditional Hokage robes, the hat, the carefree cigarette hanging down his lips; he looked too much like a dull blade to be any kind of intimidating. Sasuke wanted to laugh—a dry, humorless thing, because what a fucking joke. Rest? In this place? Where everything felt like a mausoleum? His breath came sharp, controlled, but beneath it, his body hummed from the fight. From the sheer inadequacy he showed tonight. ROOT had walked away unscathed. Sakura had been hurt. And he—the last Uchiha—stood here.
Useless.
No wind struck through the house. No movement at all. Only the echo of his own footsteps which were swallowed by empty halls. He stormed down the corridor, past old lacquered armor and faded banners bearing the Uchiha crest. Artifacts of a legacy that meant nothing now. Relics.
Seeing them made him sick.
For the excitement tonight stirred something in him dangerous, but now there was no battle to burn it away; he wanted to be out there. Hunting his enemies, not to he hidden like his clan's ancestral museum pieces.
But instead, he was here. Sharp and bitter with nothing to anchor him. No goal. No purpose - because Naruto had bailed tonight. Sasuke saw. Or, maybe, was simply alluded to his friend's presence by the nagging sprite hanging about his shoulder like a low-hanging fog over an autumn pond.
Whether it could be believed or not, though, what infuriated him again was he was left scrambling for answers. Sasuke didn't like that. With no Kakashi to guide him, no Naruto to pressure him, and no enemy for him to break, all he had were them...
Their voices...
This dream...
Which agents started the same.
Darkness.
Then, the crow.
Its wings beat against the void, silent and patient, waiting for him to follow.
Sasuke stepped forward, boots crunching over shattered tile and broken wood. The remains of some great, crumbling complex stretched before him, an endless expanse of collapsed corridors and dust-laden ruins. The air was thick with memory, with something ancient—a place long forgotten by time.
But the crow knew the way.
It fluttered ahead, landing on jagged door frames, rusted lantern hooks, old archways that led to nowhere. Always looking back at him, urging him forward.
Guiding him.
Sasuke followed, weaving through the wreckage, eyes scanning the emptiness. He knew what he was searching for.
Naruto.
He had said he had something to tell him. Something important.
But he was nowhere to be found.
Sasuke's brow furrowed as he turned another corner, only to be met with more ruins, more empty spaces where his friend should have been. He felt the frustration burn in his ribs. The crow cawed—once, twice, insistently.
Then, for the first time, it changed course.
Not forward. Sideways.
Sasuke hesitated. But only for a moment.
He veers off the path, stepping into a dimly lit chamber where dust hangs thick and heavy, disturbed only by his own breath. The walls bore faded markings long eroded by time, yet a presence here was fresh.
Someone awaited him.
Sasuke stops when the figure materializes in the center of the room, arms crossed, posture expectant. "I've been expecting you. For quite some time actually," the voice says, smooth, assured. "I'm curious, have you been expecting me?"
Sasuke doesn't answer. Only narrows his eyes, the Sharingan spinning to life, analyzing every detail. Though for some reason it fails to penetrate the shadowed veil.
A slow smile curles at the edges of their lips. "If you truly believe you can hurt me here, please by all means, I welcome for you to try," the figure goes, its glowing eyes alight with glee and expectation. The crow hops aling its outstretched finger, finding a perch to rest in hell. "But you already tried before, and yet here I still persist."
"You're after Naruto, aren't you?" Sasuke takes a hesitant step forward. "Why, what do you want with him?" His hand instinctively goes to his blade, the only answer he's been seeming to give all these weeks. "And what do you want with me?"
"The only thing in this Village which still possesses any value, yet is being squandered, Uchiha Sasuke. By the effete snobs trying to corral you."
"And what exactly is that?"
"Potential." Like all the rest of those lifeless ROOT dolls from tonight. The stranger does not shirk, does not flinch, but lets the crow fly off into the ephemeral reality. "And what needs be done to unleash it."