#17 - Eto…; Hmmmm… (Uncertainty) - SasuSaku
Fandom: Naruto
Title: Through The Glass Half-Empty: Fragments
Author/Artist: alory_shannon
Theme(s): #17 - Eto…; Hmmmm…
Pairing/Characters: Uchiha Sasuke/Haruno Sakura
Rating: T
Disclaimer/claimer: A rather dismal view of one possible future. Part one of two. (#28 will be part two.) Not really my theory of what will happen in the series, but I suppose it’s a possibility at this point.
17. Eto…; Hmmmm… (Uncertainty)
At the age of seventeen, Sakura cuts her hair again. It had started to get long, falling a few inches past her shoulders, sleek and soft and beautiful.
It’s a shame to cut it, really. But it has to go.
She’s older now, far older than her seventeen years, and this premature maturity is made even more apparent by her new, much more severe haircut. No more long, wispy strands to soften the angles of her face, to hide the sharp glint in her eyes and the firm set of her mouth.
But being soft is not what being a kunoichi is about. It is a hard life full of hard decisions and even harder truths, and Sakura’s life has been filled with enough of these that, had she been of lesser mettle, she would have broken long before. But she is resilient; she has been tempered, folded in on herself and shoved into the fire so many times now that she is nearly indestructible.
It’s been nearly two years since they all vanished from her life without a trace.
Naruto had been captured by the Akatsuki, killed as they tore the Kyuubi out of him and left him to rot in a clearing in the middle of Rain Country. Kakashi had sacrificed himself, giving Naruto his life with the tensei ninjutsu he’d memorised when Chiyo-sama had used it to bring back Gaara, saying that this was the only way, that it was his duty to protect the younger generation and that if he hadn’t screwed up in the first place (too focused on the past to see the present), Naruto would never have been captured.
Naruto had never been quite the same after that, though-he’d been grimmer, quieter, and got tired so much more quickly. Still, that hadn’t stopped him from sacrificing himself to save the Village when the Akatsuki leader had finally unleashed the monstrosity he’d worked so hard to create: a hideous conglomeration of all nine bijuu. Stubborn as he was, Naruto had refused to back down even in the face of that atrocity; after a final appeal to the Kyuubi (which liked its new position even less than being contained by Naruto), he had obtained more than enough power to seal the whole monster inside his own body…and then, with a smile on his face, had taken his own life, taking the beast with him. (Like father, like son.)
Sai had vanished in that fight, and Yamato had been killed while trying to restrain Akatsuki’s terrible creation-Sakura had watched, horrified, as his body slowly disintegrated in the steady rush of flames. She had been injured herself and hadn’t been able to get to him to try to pull him to safety, but she knew that even if she had, it wouldn’t’ve mattered; he’d been determined to slow that terrible beast down and buy Naruto the time he needed to contact the Kyuubi and then perform his final, all-important jutsu.
Sasuke’s disappearance was much more arbitrary. He simply hadn’t returned, even after word reached Konoha that Uchiha Itachi had been found dead (‘brutally murdered’ was a more accurate description). They hadn’t heard a word from him since Akatsuki had been completely destroyed, though every few months or so there was the occasional vague report of a missing nin who matched his description.
Which meant that he was still out there somewhere. And she was going to find him and bring him back.
Besides herself, Shikamaru is the only one of the “Rookie Nine” and Gai’s Team left. He’s taken to smoking again, has gone through at least a pack a day for nearly a year now, ever since a small flaw in one of his many, varied plans cost his squad a life-Chouji’s. She knows that he no longer spends his time staring upwards at the clouds; instead, he works almost unceasingly in a vain attempt to forget, though he might as well be trying to wish away the scent of the acrid smoke constantly coiling about him.
Sakura had found him standing and staring at the memorial stone one morning, and he’d come every morning since; until Ino’s failure to return from an intelligence mission two months ago, the shapely blonde joined them, too, staring at the names and seeing faces that were not their own looking back at them from the polished surface.
Lee had died in the attack on the Village. He opened the final gate, saving a seriously wounded Neji, finally surpassing his rival at the cost of his life. Tenten had also died in that battle, as had Gai-sensei.
Shino disappeared on a mission a few months later; a half-dead Akamaru had returned carrying a critically-wounded Hinata on his back and Kiba’s ragged body in his mouth.
Neji and Hinata had gone on missions together from then on, which Sakura had at first thought of as a gesture of kindness; only when Neji returned from one their missions alone, smelling of smoke and with a blood-soaked bag in his hand did she realise the truth. (Protect the Main Branch and the secrets of the Hyuuga bloodline at all costs indeed.)
She had seen the guilt haunting his ghostly-pale eyes, however, and she was not surprised when he didn’t return from his next S-rank mission.
There are too many memories here, and too few of the people they contain here to remember them with. Far too few.
She’s gradually taken to walking by alternate routes to avoid certain areas--the Shueido bookstore, a certain weapons vendor, the Hyuuga compound, and many more, but especially the flower shop, especially Ichiraku--it is too painful to do otherwise. She’s already received more than her share of emotional training, she is a strong kunoichi, she should be able to deal with this, but it’s still too fresh and all too painful and entirely too real.
She needs to get out.
And Tsunade has just the mission for her.
In those two years, the beautiful Godaime Hokage seems to have aged even more than her apprentice, or perhaps the responsibility of her position has weighed on her a little more heavily ever since her grandfather’s necklace was returned to her a third time, ever since a certain blonde idiot (hero) had a foolish (unintentional) childhood wish fulfilled and had his name engraved on a certain stone in the middle of Training Ground Three.
Anything else? she asks, painted lips turned slightly upwards, but both women know there’s nothing behind the expression other than habit and common courtesy; it’s been a long time since either has smiled with her eyes and her heart as well as her mouth.
For a fraction of a second, Sakura hesitates, but there is something else, and it’s not something she needs, but it’s somehow necessary just the same. It just seems right somehow, she thinks as green eyes settle on the trinket, and before she knows it she’s said what she’s thinking.
Shishou...give me that.
It hadn’t quite been a request.
Tsunade had started a bit, amber eyes going wide, and tried to protest, but one look at the set expression on Sakura’s face had silenced her; wordlessly she’d handed her necklace to her apprentice, who had accepted it with a nod of thanks before bowing and leaving the room.
She had not looked back to see the tears gathering in her mentor's eyes, but she'd heard the last of the Sannin fumbling about her desk drawers for the sake that she no longer has to hide since Shizune is gone. (A terrible irony, that habits tended to be harder to kill than people.)
That evening, she had visited each and every place that held a memory one last time, since she knows that she herself might not return from this mission. The bridge, where Team Seven had met so many times. The field where she and Ino had picked flowers together as children. The Academy, where she weaves a slow path down to the front of the room, dragging the tips of her fingers across the desks, sliding into her customary seat for a moment, and closing her eyes, imagining that she was twelve again, and that if she pinched herself and then opened her eyes, she’d find that it was all just a long, terrible dream, that she was still surrounded by her friends, that happiness was still so commonplace that she could take it for granted.
The bookstore, the Hyuuga compound, the Uchiha district. She lingers in each for a long while, as if memorizing their every detail, absorbing their very essence, before passing on, silent as a ghost. (Sometimes she could swear that she was brushing elbows with the spirits of the departed--‘we are not so unalike, really,’ she could almost hear them say. ‘Your heart resides among us, yet somehow you keep moving even without it.’)
At Ichiraku, she slides onto a stool and orders a bowl of ramen, and though she has no appetite, she forces herself to eat every last bite, and drain the bowl dry. (“Thanks, old man,” she says hoarsely as she sets the bowl back on the counter with a dull thunk; both Ayame and her father wonder at the quiet tremour in her voice, then exclaim in astonishment when they find that Sakura has left enough money to pay for her meal exactly eighteen times over.)
She stops at the Yamanaka flower shop to buy two dozen sprigs of forget-me-nots, though her gaze lingers over the daffodils, the red roses, and especially the cosmos, until she’s given her change and the wrapped bouquet is handed to her.
Last of all is Training Ground Three, and the Centograph. She kneels before the stone, bowing respectfully, placing the flowers in front of it before sitting back on her heels at staring at her reflection cast back at her from among the names of her friends, her peers, her loved ones.
And still there are no tears. She hasn’t cried since Ino died; she’s gone so numb, she thinks she might have forgotten how.
Raising a hand she slowly traces the names, her fingers and her mind lingering longest on the loudmouthed blonde who had so literally given everything to save the people and places that he treasured, who had changed the life of every single person he’d come into contact with, changed them forever, unforgettably, irrevocably: a personal revolution. And Sakura closes her eyes, bows her head as if in prayer, resting her still slightly oversized forehead against the dark, cool stone and thinking of the world of change brought about inside herself due to the mere existence of an irrepressible whisker-faced boy who never knew when to give up.
The hint of a smile plays about her lips. Yet another infectious quality that he’d passed on to her, and she’d been more than just a little stubborn to start with.
I’ll find him for you, Naruto. I swear it. I’ll bring him back in your place…so lend me your strength and your bravery and that ridiculous hope…please…
After that, just one thing remained to seal that promise (the promise of a lifetime) so that everyone who looked at her would realise that she was different, that she had changed.
And so, just as she had five years ago, she draws her kunai, and cuts away her restrictions.
Once again, this is not the sign of a broken heart; Sakura has never felt more whole than she does the moment the keen edge of her blade slices easily through medium-length pink locks, or more at peace than as she watches the strands catch on the wind and whirl away. She watches them drift off and vanish without a hint of regret, eyes bright and sharp and steady, raggedly shorn hair (Ino would have scoffed at those uneven ends if she were here to see them) ruffled by the passing breeze.
And now, as she looks out over the city where she grew up, watching as the wind comes to claim the snippet of hair that she saved for it as an offering of sorts, snatching it from her hand and scattering it like a blessing on all that is below, she knows that she’s finally ready for this.
No more hesitation. No more uncertainty.
Once again, it is a sign of change, of determination…
…And a reminder of an old, second-hand promise, one that nothing short of death itself will prevent her from keeping.
Title: Through The Glass Half-Empty: Fragments
Author/Artist: alory_shannon
Theme(s): #17 - Eto…; Hmmmm…
Pairing/Characters: Uchiha Sasuke/Haruno Sakura
Rating: T
Disclaimer/claimer: A rather dismal view of one possible future. Part one of two. (#28 will be part two.) Not really my theory of what will happen in the series, but I suppose it’s a possibility at this point.
17. Eto…; Hmmmm… (Uncertainty)
At the age of seventeen, Sakura cuts her hair again. It had started to get long, falling a few inches past her shoulders, sleek and soft and beautiful.
It’s a shame to cut it, really. But it has to go.
She’s older now, far older than her seventeen years, and this premature maturity is made even more apparent by her new, much more severe haircut. No more long, wispy strands to soften the angles of her face, to hide the sharp glint in her eyes and the firm set of her mouth.
But being soft is not what being a kunoichi is about. It is a hard life full of hard decisions and even harder truths, and Sakura’s life has been filled with enough of these that, had she been of lesser mettle, she would have broken long before. But she is resilient; she has been tempered, folded in on herself and shoved into the fire so many times now that she is nearly indestructible.
It’s been nearly two years since they all vanished from her life without a trace.
Naruto had been captured by the Akatsuki, killed as they tore the Kyuubi out of him and left him to rot in a clearing in the middle of Rain Country. Kakashi had sacrificed himself, giving Naruto his life with the tensei ninjutsu he’d memorised when Chiyo-sama had used it to bring back Gaara, saying that this was the only way, that it was his duty to protect the younger generation and that if he hadn’t screwed up in the first place (too focused on the past to see the present), Naruto would never have been captured.
Naruto had never been quite the same after that, though-he’d been grimmer, quieter, and got tired so much more quickly. Still, that hadn’t stopped him from sacrificing himself to save the Village when the Akatsuki leader had finally unleashed the monstrosity he’d worked so hard to create: a hideous conglomeration of all nine bijuu. Stubborn as he was, Naruto had refused to back down even in the face of that atrocity; after a final appeal to the Kyuubi (which liked its new position even less than being contained by Naruto), he had obtained more than enough power to seal the whole monster inside his own body…and then, with a smile on his face, had taken his own life, taking the beast with him. (Like father, like son.)
Sai had vanished in that fight, and Yamato had been killed while trying to restrain Akatsuki’s terrible creation-Sakura had watched, horrified, as his body slowly disintegrated in the steady rush of flames. She had been injured herself and hadn’t been able to get to him to try to pull him to safety, but she knew that even if she had, it wouldn’t’ve mattered; he’d been determined to slow that terrible beast down and buy Naruto the time he needed to contact the Kyuubi and then perform his final, all-important jutsu.
Sasuke’s disappearance was much more arbitrary. He simply hadn’t returned, even after word reached Konoha that Uchiha Itachi had been found dead (‘brutally murdered’ was a more accurate description). They hadn’t heard a word from him since Akatsuki had been completely destroyed, though every few months or so there was the occasional vague report of a missing nin who matched his description.
Which meant that he was still out there somewhere. And she was going to find him and bring him back.
Besides herself, Shikamaru is the only one of the “Rookie Nine” and Gai’s Team left. He’s taken to smoking again, has gone through at least a pack a day for nearly a year now, ever since a small flaw in one of his many, varied plans cost his squad a life-Chouji’s. She knows that he no longer spends his time staring upwards at the clouds; instead, he works almost unceasingly in a vain attempt to forget, though he might as well be trying to wish away the scent of the acrid smoke constantly coiling about him.
Sakura had found him standing and staring at the memorial stone one morning, and he’d come every morning since; until Ino’s failure to return from an intelligence mission two months ago, the shapely blonde joined them, too, staring at the names and seeing faces that were not their own looking back at them from the polished surface.
Lee had died in the attack on the Village. He opened the final gate, saving a seriously wounded Neji, finally surpassing his rival at the cost of his life. Tenten had also died in that battle, as had Gai-sensei.
Shino disappeared on a mission a few months later; a half-dead Akamaru had returned carrying a critically-wounded Hinata on his back and Kiba’s ragged body in his mouth.
Neji and Hinata had gone on missions together from then on, which Sakura had at first thought of as a gesture of kindness; only when Neji returned from one their missions alone, smelling of smoke and with a blood-soaked bag in his hand did she realise the truth. (Protect the Main Branch and the secrets of the Hyuuga bloodline at all costs indeed.)
She had seen the guilt haunting his ghostly-pale eyes, however, and she was not surprised when he didn’t return from his next S-rank mission.
There are too many memories here, and too few of the people they contain here to remember them with. Far too few.
She’s gradually taken to walking by alternate routes to avoid certain areas--the Shueido bookstore, a certain weapons vendor, the Hyuuga compound, and many more, but especially the flower shop, especially Ichiraku--it is too painful to do otherwise. She’s already received more than her share of emotional training, she is a strong kunoichi, she should be able to deal with this, but it’s still too fresh and all too painful and entirely too real.
She needs to get out.
And Tsunade has just the mission for her.
In those two years, the beautiful Godaime Hokage seems to have aged even more than her apprentice, or perhaps the responsibility of her position has weighed on her a little more heavily ever since her grandfather’s necklace was returned to her a third time, ever since a certain blonde idiot (hero) had a foolish (unintentional) childhood wish fulfilled and had his name engraved on a certain stone in the middle of Training Ground Three.
Anything else? she asks, painted lips turned slightly upwards, but both women know there’s nothing behind the expression other than habit and common courtesy; it’s been a long time since either has smiled with her eyes and her heart as well as her mouth.
For a fraction of a second, Sakura hesitates, but there is something else, and it’s not something she needs, but it’s somehow necessary just the same. It just seems right somehow, she thinks as green eyes settle on the trinket, and before she knows it she’s said what she’s thinking.
Shishou...give me that.
It hadn’t quite been a request.
Tsunade had started a bit, amber eyes going wide, and tried to protest, but one look at the set expression on Sakura’s face had silenced her; wordlessly she’d handed her necklace to her apprentice, who had accepted it with a nod of thanks before bowing and leaving the room.
She had not looked back to see the tears gathering in her mentor's eyes, but she'd heard the last of the Sannin fumbling about her desk drawers for the sake that she no longer has to hide since Shizune is gone. (A terrible irony, that habits tended to be harder to kill than people.)
That evening, she had visited each and every place that held a memory one last time, since she knows that she herself might not return from this mission. The bridge, where Team Seven had met so many times. The field where she and Ino had picked flowers together as children. The Academy, where she weaves a slow path down to the front of the room, dragging the tips of her fingers across the desks, sliding into her customary seat for a moment, and closing her eyes, imagining that she was twelve again, and that if she pinched herself and then opened her eyes, she’d find that it was all just a long, terrible dream, that she was still surrounded by her friends, that happiness was still so commonplace that she could take it for granted.
The bookstore, the Hyuuga compound, the Uchiha district. She lingers in each for a long while, as if memorizing their every detail, absorbing their very essence, before passing on, silent as a ghost. (Sometimes she could swear that she was brushing elbows with the spirits of the departed--‘we are not so unalike, really,’ she could almost hear them say. ‘Your heart resides among us, yet somehow you keep moving even without it.’)
At Ichiraku, she slides onto a stool and orders a bowl of ramen, and though she has no appetite, she forces herself to eat every last bite, and drain the bowl dry. (“Thanks, old man,” she says hoarsely as she sets the bowl back on the counter with a dull thunk; both Ayame and her father wonder at the quiet tremour in her voice, then exclaim in astonishment when they find that Sakura has left enough money to pay for her meal exactly eighteen times over.)
She stops at the Yamanaka flower shop to buy two dozen sprigs of forget-me-nots, though her gaze lingers over the daffodils, the red roses, and especially the cosmos, until she’s given her change and the wrapped bouquet is handed to her.
Last of all is Training Ground Three, and the Centograph. She kneels before the stone, bowing respectfully, placing the flowers in front of it before sitting back on her heels at staring at her reflection cast back at her from among the names of her friends, her peers, her loved ones.
And still there are no tears. She hasn’t cried since Ino died; she’s gone so numb, she thinks she might have forgotten how.
Raising a hand she slowly traces the names, her fingers and her mind lingering longest on the loudmouthed blonde who had so literally given everything to save the people and places that he treasured, who had changed the life of every single person he’d come into contact with, changed them forever, unforgettably, irrevocably: a personal revolution. And Sakura closes her eyes, bows her head as if in prayer, resting her still slightly oversized forehead against the dark, cool stone and thinking of the world of change brought about inside herself due to the mere existence of an irrepressible whisker-faced boy who never knew when to give up.
The hint of a smile plays about her lips. Yet another infectious quality that he’d passed on to her, and she’d been more than just a little stubborn to start with.
I’ll find him for you, Naruto. I swear it. I’ll bring him back in your place…so lend me your strength and your bravery and that ridiculous hope…please…
After that, just one thing remained to seal that promise (the promise of a lifetime) so that everyone who looked at her would realise that she was different, that she had changed.
And so, just as she had five years ago, she draws her kunai, and cuts away her restrictions.
Once again, this is not the sign of a broken heart; Sakura has never felt more whole than she does the moment the keen edge of her blade slices easily through medium-length pink locks, or more at peace than as she watches the strands catch on the wind and whirl away. She watches them drift off and vanish without a hint of regret, eyes bright and sharp and steady, raggedly shorn hair (Ino would have scoffed at those uneven ends if she were here to see them) ruffled by the passing breeze.
And now, as she looks out over the city where she grew up, watching as the wind comes to claim the snippet of hair that she saved for it as an offering of sorts, snatching it from her hand and scattering it like a blessing on all that is below, she knows that she’s finally ready for this.
No more hesitation. No more uncertainty.
Once again, it is a sign of change, of determination…
…And a reminder of an old, second-hand promise, one that nothing short of death itself will prevent her from keeping.