Fish Bird

Chapter two:  The Skeleton Bridge

Note: // text // whenever it is seen indicates a thought process, not always Naruto’s but always a thought process. It’s mostly Naruto’s however.

Thank you to my beta/editor for bashing this about for me (somehow making it good!) and to my extra beta/beta who assailed me with *weep!* “Why do you not know how to use comma’s properly?”

                                                            *          *          *

//Okay Naruto breathe, breathe- it’s just…it’s just a bad dream. That’s all, it isn’t happening, this can’t be real. Quick close your eyes and pinch yourself! //

Amongst the bubbles of incoherency this foremost thought thrusts itself to the surface, as he stands there shivering from shock, cornflower blue eyes squeezed closed as he falls forwards onto his knees, all the blood seemingly gushing from his ears. As his hands grit the earth beneath his finger tips, he inhales the damp smell of crushed grass and soil up into his brain.

Naruto gently lets his forehead rest on the hard indents of his knee caps and pulls numb fingers towards his lower wrist, forefinger and thumb closing together like a vice.

            “Ouch!”

//That really hurt! //

So he’s not dreaming. He keeps his eyes closed for a moment: the key to it is not to panic- maybe when he looks up again it’s going to be someone else, maybe there wasn’t anything there at all… it might have just been that food he stole out of Kiba’s pack when he wasn’t looking. The liver and kidney biscuits or whatever the hell it was… it might be having repercussions now and just playing with his senses.

It really can’t be Sasuke… not now, not ever, it’s not allowed to be.

Naruto Uzumaki stands up, a little too fast because everything swims blotchily, there’s an awful bitter taste of acid gargling up the back of his throat as though he’s going to be sick. He bites down hard on his tongue, and ignoring the fact that his knees are shaking, he takes small tentative steps forwards, without really looking anywhere.

Then he looks back again, at the figure lying on the ground, hoping against all hope that it’s not what it first seemed to be. But life, cruel and cynical as always, laughs at him. Breaking glass seems to flash and splinter and hope shatters, the jagged pieces lying across something he’s struggled to mould and maintain, some cracked thing that’s holding itself together with duck tape and paper clips, but it is still holding… barely.

He’d never forget that face, even smothered in dirt and clots of blood; burned into his brain, he sees it in his dreams, like the imprint of a ghost haunting him.

            “Sasuke Uchiha…” he breathes slowly on the out breath. His hands are so numb as he pressed them against his eyes, he’s hardly aware of the sensation in his finger tips.

// What do I do? What the hell do I do?! //

He can’t hold down the bile this time, he turns, half coughing, stomach wrenching right from the bottom of his gut. It’s the smell, it’s that goddamned awful smell! It’s clinging to his nostrils and carpeting the inside of his lungs and throat with blood; and that higher, metallic smell that’s burning his eyes slightly and making him wince.

// I need to get a grip. Come on Naruto, get a grip. Deal with this. //

Naruto spits out the last glob of acid lying behind his molars; he places his shaking palms together and grits his teeth. He’s on a mission, treat it like mission, like something on a piece of paper, totally meaningless, a set of rules and obligations to be followed.

Had Kakashi-sensei been here, he probably would have taken over by now, but he’s not here, he’s not twelve anymore, he can look after himself, of course he can do this, he’s more then capable of it.

Naruto squares his shoulders and moves forwards, the stippled light glances across his skin casting deep dark shadows around his eyes, as tentatively he walks the earth. This after all could be some sort of an illusion, some sort of trick, someone pretending to be Sasuke after all. If he’s going to walk into a trap headfirst, he might as well do it with his head held high and go down fighting right?

The ground seems to creak slightly beneath his foot, rocks rubbing against the rough skin of tree roots that penetrate this place like huge dark creepers. It’s when he gets closer that he realises the grass is all withered and burnt in a rough circle around the body, little blackened stumps peeping out of the scarred soil here and there. Frowning, and hairs prickling at the back of his neck, Naruto presses forwards, licking his lips, feeling so apprehensive as he slowly kneels down; for the first time in years face to face with Uchiha.

            Hesitantly, hands fumbling like a child, he remembers what to do, standard procedure. Sasuke’s head is lying at an odd angle, eyes closed, skin terrifyingly pale. Too pale: almost bloodless underneath all that muck and grime. Maybe he’s dead- God is he dead? Is he? He’s clumsy as he tries to move the head so it’s at a less jarring angle from the rest of his body, fingers skimming the jaw line. His flesh is cold and Naruto begins to feel sick again, breaking out in a cold sweat as he fumbles for a pulse.

            // Oh God. Damn. Help! //

There’s the powerful urge to vomit up those biscuits again, seconds tick away like hours as he waits for it… for a long time there’s absolutely nothing… and then… something, very faint, almost nonexistent. Like movement in a spider’s web: a slight twitch and then a release and Naruto breathes out, air rushing out cold and fast in sudden glorious relief.

            It’s there at least.

He can’t help grinning, something that travels all the way up to his eyes. A light seems to sparkle behind the cornflower irises, while subconsciously his hand travels up to span the rest of Sasuke’s face, taking in the changes. His hair is still raven black, so dark that any falling light it catches turns indigo blue; the face has changed slightly. Older, longer perhaps, more angular: still beautifully formed. The mouth is the same as it ever was, slightly parted as it is now flushed and full and slightly pouting as the body draws in air. Naruto feels a fleeting stab of something in his chest thinking the face inhabits a space of melancholy beauty.

Absently he moves his fingers to brush the dark strands of hair away from Sasuke’s face, his digits rubbing against cuts and bruises that curdle against the milky flow of his skin. He leans down a little, his middle finger tapping gently against Sasuke’s cheek almost wonderingly. He wants him to open his eyes, to look at him, to say something.

Naruto opens his mouth, words forming and falling on his tongue; but he shakes his head feeling foolish. If Sasuke really did wake up, what would he have to say to him? What would Sasuke care? He’d already walked off once. What would stop him from walking off again? What if this was some sort of very ill spirited practical joke?

He… Naruto could walk away now, leave him here, go back to Shikamaru and Kiba and pretend that nothing had happened. That the person was lying in so many pieces there wasn’t even any point in them going to check. Case closed, moving on please.

He’d probably die if he did that….

Probably… most likely….

Definitely.

            When did life become so complicated?

All he wants to do is go home, curl up in bed, and pretend this is a really, really crap dream. The sort he’ll wake up from shivering, and lie there for a moment thinking “shit.” Before getting up to devour yesterday’s cold ramen for breakfast.

Reality, he realises as he opens his mouth to say something, anything: Reality really sucks. It really, really… does.

It turns around at the oddest of times and just punches you, right there, right in the gut, fist clenched tight; and then strolls away with a sexy sort of smile on its face, as if to say: “Got ya darlin’!”

He thinks maybe he’s a little afraid, a little unsure of what to do, because he’s standing, obstinately not saying or doing anything but licking his cracked lips and tasting the sordid salt of his skin rough and bitter against his tongue.

            There isn’t really very much he can say. Not enough to be put into words. It’s been closed off for such a long time he’s not quite sure of where to start. The funny thing is that a long time ago he used to dream of this. He had in his head rehearsed so many lines, so many actions. Practised entire speeches in those timeless hours of the night, when only the walls and moon could hear him. He had planned it all, actions and words. How it would end happily-ever-after, and everything, finally… everything would be back to normal.

            A child’s ideal, a child’s game that he’d given up a long, long time ago. No one lives ‘happily-ever-after.’ Not a soul.

Naruto wonders briefly at the chasm that seems to be laid out between them, him and Sasuke: deep, dark and bottomless. He couldn’t possibly breach that, could he? Even back in the days when he was willing, now it’s a concept beyond the impossible - living in the absurd.

He smiles a little for no reason at all, head tilted slightly to the left, so that dusty blonde trails of hair fall across his forehead.

It would be the understatement of the world to say that this situation was just uncomfortable.

He blinks long thick lashes, as he always does when he’s nervous, and it makes him look like a child. In a curiously stubborn and oddly attractive motion that completely disarms him, Naruto takes a deep breath in, clenches his jaw and looks straight upwards.

 “So Sasuke, long time no see, huh?”

            It’s not as if Sasuke can hear the words and it’s not as if there was any point in speaking at all; yet the statement is simply a genuine reflection of the different paths they’ve followed and the time that’s travelled like grains of sand between them.

To Naruto the words are so blunt, they hurt.

                                                *          *          *

Kiba and Shikamaru have been standing in the same position for what seems to be hours. In reality it’s only been ten minutes and thirty seconds. The reason why it feels like an eternity is the fact that Kiba has been trying to remember something for these past ten minutes, and this is slowly driving Shikamaru crazy.

            “Will you just spit it out?” he mutters between clenched teeth, eyes alert, as his mind he adds the words, “Before I throttle you!”

Kiba ignores him, face pensive. There’s definitely something familiar about this, something ominous. And it’s not just the smell of blood, it’s the type…. He’s smelt it before, and there’s something nagging at the back of his mind. Something assuring him that this just isn’t natural, that it isn’t right. There’s a bitter taste of acid on the air, a little ammonia maybe? It’s making his nostrils sting and his eyes water.

Kiba’s been taught from birth to always trust the gut feeling: “It’s a sign,” he’s been warned, “You’d be a fool to ignore it.”

Only he can’t work out what the sign is….

“He’s been gone too long,” Shikamaru continues to himself seeing as Kiba isn’t listening. In fact he’s had both his eyes closed, face screwed up and his fingers stuck in his ears, trying desperately to remember whatever-it-is for, oh yes, the last ten minutes.

// How did I end up with these idiots again? //

He was really going to have to talk to Tsunade after this was all over.

            “I think we should move closer in. I don’t like the fact he hasn’t reported back yet, it’s not that far ahead—”

Shikamaru never had the opportunity to finish this sentence however, as a proverbial lightening bolt fell from the sky, lifted levers of realisation and swung open a door in Kiba’s mind. In truth this realisation is not quite so holy; it’s more the sort that rams its foot right up your backside and then cackles callously.

“Crap, crappity, crappity crappity CRAP!” Kiba yells suddenly, and Shikamaru nearly falls out the tree in surprise as Kiba jumps on him, shakes him by the collar and ignores all protests of  “What the hell? Stop it now!”

“Fuck-a-duck Maru! I know that, I know that!” and without illustrating his point further, he tears off in the direction Naruto had formerly galloped.

Shikamaru allows himself to think a rational “They’re all lunatics,” and a “We Are All Going to Die,” before jumping to his feet and rushing after Kiba, cursing creatively under his breath as he goes.

He only has a few seconds to wait anyway: they move fast, terrifyingly so in fact, and as they stumble on the clearing, tripping around the vast wedges of tree roots that snake out of the ground like insanely huge earthworms, Shikamaru suddenly realises what is wrong.

            That person, the man that their Naruto is leaning over, shaking slightly, is supposed to be dead.

Sasuke?

He doesn’t even bother to yell at Kiba as he rushes blindly to Naruto: there could be traps, there could be landmines underneath them, there could be anything. The whole situation reeks of something absolutely abhorrent and intangible. It’s like walking straight through death and staggering right out the other side. This just isn’t supposed to happen, not now, not ever.

Kiba’s already there, shaking Naruto gently by the shoulders, trying to snap him out of his reverie. There’s a bloody hand print on his face and dried clots of blood in his hair, as if he’s run his fingers multiple times across his scalp. His skin is oddly pale and his lips cracked and bleeding as if he’s been biting them.

            The relief is, the blood on his face and clothes isn’t his, it belongs to the person lying next to him. The person with their eyes firmly closed and mouth slightly parted, the way that you do only if you’re…

            “He’s not dead.” Naruto says suddenly, his voice is hoarse against the soft flesh of his mouth. “I don’t understand why he’s bleeding, there’s blood everywhere…” he rubs his nose against his wrist, without looking up at either of them.

Kiba is sending Shikamaru one of those looks that communicates that he understands nothing of what is going on and that Maru should do something… now.

Naruto is talking to Kiba saying something which Shikamaru presumes to be mildly frenzied because Kiba has that snarling confused look plastered to his face, as if to say, “What the hell?”

The world could have turned itself upside down and things might have made more sense.

The primary source of thought that Shikamaru allows himself to flow from, ignoring Kiba’s startled gasps of “Why isn’t he dead?” and “What the hell is he doing here?” is that he doesn’t like it, not one bit, and it seems to stink of a set up. He won’t forget what happened last time he partook in anything involving the Uchiha prodigy. People had ended up hurt… and hurt badly.

“We have to get him back, now.” Naruto is saying, standing up and turning to Shikamaru, “Fast Maru, I can’t seem to get him warm again, and I’m afraid if he stays that cold for much longer… he’s going to die, so you’re gonna have to help me carry him back.”

“No.” Shikamaru starts unthinkingly, staring at Sasuke as he says it, unaware of the frantic hand gestures Kiba is making behind Naruto’s back. Naruto, who is now facing him, broad shoulders, arms crossed with a slightly disbelieving look on his face, as he looks from Kiba to Shikamaru, and back to Kiba.

// Well, I just stuck two feet in my mouth there didn’t I? //

Naruto tilts his head mimicking a politely enquiring position, his eyes softly dangerous; Shikamaru locks his jaw, whilst Kiba shuffles nervously from one foot to the other looking uncomfortable.

“I beg your pardon?”

“You heard me Uzumaki, I said no.”

“What do you mean ‘no’?”

“Well, which bit don’t you understand: the middle or the end?”

Naruto’s face contorts in anger; he can never stand being mocked, not when he’s trying to protect something important to him.

“Don’t play games!” he snarls, “What does that mean? ‘No’ you’re not going to help me? Or ‘no’, you’re not allowing me to take him back with us? ‘Cause you better think again before you say that Shikamaru, because hell will freeze over before I just let you leave him here to die.”

Shikamaru looked absolutely undaunted by the sudden fizzling anger radiating from his friend, while Kiba glanced back and forth, kneeling by the unconscious Sasuke, until his attention slips, eyes moving and frowning at Sasuke’s wrist.

            “Is your headband on too tight something? So you forget what happened last time?” Shikamaru bites back, hands in pockets, jaw muscles flexing as he keeps his face completely impassive. “People died. You nearly died, I nearly died, Kiba nearly died, we all nearly died, and some weren’t that lucky. Because of him, Uzumaki! I’m not willing to risk my life for someone who betrayed us for their own personal gain; or yours for that matter. It’s not worth it, he’s not worth it.”

            “I’m not leaving him here!” Naruto snarled back. He was smaller then Shikamaru by about three inches, but it was amazing how anger seemed to give him an extra foot in height. “He’ll die.”

“Do you listen to anything I say?” Shikamaru asked incredulously, “How do we even know it’s him anyway? It could be an impostor for all we know-”

            “It’s him alright,” Kiba interjected quietly not looking at either one, rubbing a red sticky globule of blood between his fingers. “You can’t fake the smell of a person’s blood. Not when there’s this much of it.”

            “He’s going to bleed to death isn’t he?” Naruto asked, turning his attention away from Shikamaru, body language immediately shifting into the less defensive, seeming smaller, loosing the fox’s ferocity. The look that ghosted across his face was the sort that arose when he and Sakura where arguing: lonely, lost and slightly bewildered.

“Kiba, you agree with me don’t you?”

“Naruto…there might not be enough time to-”

“But you agree with me,” Naruto cut in hotly, ignoring Shikamaru’s derisive snort of disgust, “don’t you Kiba?”

            Kiba looked like someone had turned a spotlight on him on a darkened stage in front a multitude of people he didn’t know, and had somehow mistakenly misplaced all of his clothes.

            “I..ugh…well.”

            “Don’t you Kiba?”

This last part was expelled so forcefully that as it was yelled the sound reverberated from curling tree root to tree root. Kiba licked his lips and looked at his feet with fascination before opening his mouth to say:

“You know sometimes when things are a Bad Idea? Well this isn’t on that level… no, no, this is on the level of Naruto if you do this you’ll get such bad karma you’ll die, like, you’ll get squashed to death underneath a mountain of punishment paper work.”

Naruto glowered at him, “So that’s it then? You won’t help me?”

            “Of course I’ll help you you moron!” Kiba responded so fast he seemed to do it without drawing breath, “We’ll both help you, don’t think we’re going to do anything else!”

            “Excuse me?” Shikamaru interjected, raising both his eyebrows so high they where in danger of flying straight off his face, “No we aren’t, I’m certainly not helping him to hurt himself again.”

Naruto rounded on Shikamaru and Kiba, reading warning sparks, darted up, ready, just in case things got ugly to (…to run the hell away…? Of course not!) to help.

            “What the hell gives you the authority to just presume that’s going to happen again?” Naruto’s tone, low and angry: “How can you just treat it as decided that that’s what will happen?”

“Oh, let’s not pretend for a moment that you don’t believe it too Uzumaki,” Shikamaru snarled back,

//Damnit he was angry now//

“but you just can’t leave things alone, can you? You never listen! You know, I bet if I looked hard enough I could see my words actually drifting into one ear and straight out the other again….” He made hand movements and stifled Naruto’s beginning words as he opened his mouth to argue back, continuing “Look, there they go! Shush now: maybe we can hear the faint whooshing sound they make as they drift on by.”

Naruto swore at him, “You know I’ll do it anyway, don’t you? Why are you even bothering to argue with me about it?”

“No, you won’t.” Shikamaru told him softly, his eyes narrowed dangerously. A worried Kiba began nibbling his thumb in a rather over enthusiastic manner.

            “What do you… shit, Shikamaru! Stop that!”  Realisation began to dawn in Naruto’s eyes.

“We’re walking all the way back alright, and when we get back then we can tell Tsunade about this and she can send a group of ANBU here and they can take care of it.” Shikamaru took a step forwards, and shaking with rage, gritting his teeth, so did Naruto,

“Stop it Shikamaru, I swear- I told you, I’m not… stop it! I’m not leaving!”

Shikamaru took another five steps forwards, and Naruto, cursing and yelling, followed.

Kiba, with the cold trickling feeling that his team-mates had gone insane, aimed a coherent “Huh?” at his golden haired friend who seemed to be fighting some heated internal battle with his feet.

“Shadow bind technique,” he was told somewhat curtly, “we are going. Come on.”

“Maru,” Kiba said softly, coming forwards with his back to Naruto. “If you do this, he’ll never forgive you. Even if he’s still alive when they find him again,” Kiba nodded towards Sasuke’s still form, “he’ll never forgive you for it.”

“At least he’ll be alive to hold a stupid grudge. It’s a bit difficult to hold any when you’re dead, isn’t it, which he’ll end up being at some point if we let him do this!”

Kiba seemed to be chewing the inside of his cheek again as he looked from Shikamaru’s stubborn face, to Naruto who was glowering heatedly at both of them, beads of frustration working down his forehead as he fought to break the full body bind.

Placidly he put forwards, “Hey, a lot’s happened between then and now. He’s got older and matured a bit you know? I mean that’s what happens when people grow up right?”

            “Kiba,” Shikamaru bit out between clenched teeth, “let me firmly and once and for all shake this deluded idea from your head. All people do when they get older- and this is a universally accepted fact- they just go crazier; in fact they jump the train and go absolutely insane. The only difference is they just get really good at hiding it.”

Slightly side tracked by this piece of information Kiba faltered, allowing Shikamaru to plunge on, “If he got hurt, because I allowed him to do this, I’d never forgive myself. I swore I wouldn’t let this happen again… I swore it. Not after last time, I don’t want to make the decision that will lead to the biggest mistake he ever made.”

            “Listen, I find it best to envisage Naruto as a type of cockroach-”

“I can hear you, you idiot! And it’s not up to you to decide my so-called ‘mistakes’ for me!” Naruto spat at both he and Shikamaru, his eyes dancing a furious dazzling blue.

“Ugh… See, when I said that in my head… it sounded a whole lot better. Anyway, come on Maru, it’s your call, I’m thinking it would be pretty bad karma if you just left a fellow ninja from the leaf village to just die out here.”

            “An ex-leaf village ninja, let’s not forget that.”

            “But a leaf village ninja, none the less. You can’t protect people, from themselves, no matter how hard you try, you know that.”

Shikamaru releases his grip somewhat, the words knocking to some effect on the inside of his skull. He runs his tongue over his teeth inside his mouth, and meets Naruto’s gaze head on for the first time throughout the entire argument.

“You have to promise me… if I let you do this Naruto, you have to do everything I tell you to? I want you to swear to me, that you will.”

For a moment Naruto doesn’t say anything, ragged snippets of hair trailing messily across his eyes in a ringing silence… and then,

“I swear.”

Nothing happens.

“Maru,” Kiba says in a hoarsely audible whisper, “you’re supposed to let him go now.”

Shikamaru glowers and ends up staring into the canopy above as he thinks about the troubles that have been forced into his head because of these two twits; and gently, inch by inch, lets the jutsu slide.

Naruto falls to the ground, massaging his neck, trying to work out the kinks that seemed to have formed in his spine. He’s still furious, anger bubbling throughout his nerves and popping in hot little bursts. Why does everybody feel they have to protect him in some way, manner or form? Hasn’t he proven himself enough times now? He’s so sick of people looking down at him.

“You never know,” Kiba is saying helpfully to both of them, grabbing Naruto by his shoulders and yanking him up, “it might all work out happily ever after.” Shikamaru’s voice is laced with icy sarcasm and he has a tick pulsing under one eye when he responds to this zealous statement, “Of course it is, you know just after hell freezes over.”

It’s beneath anybodies dignity to respond to this.

“Help me get him up,” Naruto says hoarsely his voice catching painfully in the back of his throat, “I’ll carry him over my shoulder; I don’t care about the weight-” But Shikamaru cuts across him with a brusque “Don’t be ridiculous.” Inclining his head for Naruto to come and help him, he murmurs: “We’ll both carry him; I’ll show you how we can make a stretcher.”

                                                *          *          *         

It’s cold. The thrumming sounds of machines, whirring against white-washed walls seems to dig right into the back of Naruto’s teeth, as he stands against the panel of glass looking down into the room below. He’s on his fourth cup of coffee this hour; the Coffee beans are mixed with the aroma of his own sweat, curling nauseatingly up his nostrils as he grimaces at the taste that’s washing down his tongue.

“N…Naruto?” the words are spoken softly, but no ones been in here apart from him for the last few hours.

He jumps, spilling most of the coffee onto the floor, narrowly missing his shirt.

“Naruto, I-I’m sorry!”

He laughs, that easy smile sliding easily across his face as he steps away from the dark brown puddle he’s just created on the floor.

“No, I’m sorry Hinata, that’s completely my fault.”

He turns and grins at her, watching as she flushes, long dark hair being drawn like a curtain across her face as she looks down, bashful and anxious as she always is around him.

“Hmm, Naruto, don’t you think you ought to get some sleep? You haven’t slept in... sometime. Well not since you brought Sasuke-kun back.”

“Three days yeah,” he stifles a yawn, still smiling. “Did Kiba tell you to come and gently chastise me because he knew I wouldn’t get mad at you?”

“Chastise you?” she looked somewhat puzzled, blinking her large eyes and biting her lower lip, “I wouldn’t ever dream of… I didn’t mean that…”

Naruto just continues to smile at her, elbows propped up on the metal bar that ran before the glass panel. He steals a glance down before winking at Hinata:

“Excuse me,” he murmurs -she flushes this time down to the roots of her hair- and strolling across to the other side of the room, he pauses before yanking the door wide open in one deftly aggressive movement.

Kiba fell forwards, glass held to ear; Shikamaru standing behind him looking somewhat guilty as Naruto glared at both of them hands on hips-

“You could at least have the guts to come do it yourselves!” he snapped irately at Kiba who was fumbling to hide the glass behind his back. He nodded his head in the direction of Hinata, “that’s not fair.”

“Look,” Kiba began, shoving the glass at Shikamaru, “we’ve tried asking you nicely, we’ve tried not asking you nicely, we’ve tried forcibly removing you, thanks to which I now have an extremely painful bruise on my ass. You need to sleep.”

“I’m fine.”

“No, no you’re not, you’re insane, you can’t keep going like this, eventually you’ll snap, think your middle finger is talking to you, and start referring to yourself in the third person as Johnny.”

//Right…//

“Hinata,” Shikamaru interrupted before Kiba could get any further with embarrassing himself, “could you get us all another cup of coffee please? I think this might just be another long night.”

                                                *          *          *

“Shouldn’t… shouldn’t he have woken up by now?” Naruto asks, more to himself than the others. Kiba is snoring loudly in his sleep, sprawled across three collapsible chairs; Shikamaru is glaring with intent hostility at him as if seriously considering ripping off one of his socks and stuffing it down his throat.

It’s late: the light that comes in from the window is hazy moonlight, which flows ebbing between gaps in the clouds. It falls on sterile hospital floors, dipping into the cracks between the slates. Naruto’s eyes are still locked on the glass panel before them, looking down into the room below where somebody is lying attached to a life support machine, the constant ‘bip, bip, bip,’ pulsing rhythmically into the silence. There are people in that room, some wearing white coats, others lined up wearing masks, backs pressed flat against the white cold walls.

            “He lost a lot of blood, besides we don’t know how long he was out there for.” It’s as though you can hear their inner thoughts of ‘I just hope he doesn’t wake up….’

Naruto yawns again, the fifth time in the past five minutes. He can feel his conscious friend’s penetrating stare boring into the back of his skull.

“Go to sleep right?” he asks, playfully, although in truth he doesn’t feel much like laughing. His stomach feels clenched, doubled up and knotted tightly in figures of eights inside him.

He doesn’t think he could sleep even if he wanted to. This is something bordering on obsession, and he just can’t let go.

            “Why…don’t you just rest you eyes for a moment?”

Naruto finds himself smiling despite himself: you’ve got to give them credit for being persistent, he has to at least give them that. He nods in accordance, he’s so undeniably tired that his only other option is to prop his eye lids open with match sticks anyway, at least if he falls asleep he’ll still be here.

//He won’t get away so easily.//

            “He’s not going anywhere Naruto. You know that, don’t you?”

Naruto lets himself slip a little down the chair, so the top of his head is leaning against the back. “Thanks Maru.” There’s a pause.

            “For the other day…you kn-”

            “Naruto, just stop babbling. Go on, go to sleep before I have to concuss you.”

His eyes skate closed before he’s even aware of it, his head rolls back and his breathing slows down a mere fraction, becoming rhythmic… and he begins to dream.

                                                *          *          *

Here it’s ice cold, a pressing black against his eyes, someone’s fingers smooth and supple. He’s lead forwards by a strong grip on his wrist and spun round. Spun hard and fast, so he falls, and the world is still black. Because he can’t, he won’t, open his eyes, because he’s been here before… he knows this dream too well.

Someone is laughing at him, just above him, standing over his body, looking down. Through the blindfold he raises his head and clenches his jaw, exposing his throat to the predator, and it is a predator because it stalks all the way around him, assessing him from every angle. It doesn’t miss an inch, it never does. He waits for it to settle over him, straddling his hips as it always does. He doesn’t fight it, he’s done so before of course, but to no avail, it only laughs, resistance amuses it, it makes it rougher, harder, faster, until it’s spent and he’s shattered, mind and body numb and splintered.

Besides, he knows it wants that, and he’s not going to pander to it’s pleasure. It starts slowly, teasing down from his collar bone, hot tongue trailing up his neck to his ear, tracing the outer shell. He can feel it breathing, hot against his skin and he fights to suppress the quickening of his own heart as it nips the lobe of his ear, applying pressure to his lower abdomen with its body.

The mouth trails across his face, tongue hot and sweet, he swallows and feels fingers trace the movement of his Adam’s apple, as it grins against his skin, murmuring, “Naruto,” that voice so similar and yet so alien, “come, love…stop resisting me.”

He turns his head away from it, fingers raking into the ground beneath him as the mouth travels down, whispering incoherencies against his skin. He bites his tongue to stop the sound that tries to burst forwards when it leaves a trail of hot saliva down to his navel, sticking it’s tongue directly into the small hole, and he gasps, he can’t stop himself. It laughs again, hands against his hips, this is stupid, where are his clothes? Why does he feel so naked? Why does he always feel so naked?

Teeth grate teasingly against the lower part of his abdomen tasting the skin there, he smells of beeswax and tastes slightly salty, and again there’s the pressure, hot and grinding this time, edging between his legs and spreading them.

            It’s getting much harder to think now, as a mouth comes to capture his own and he’s letting it, but keeps himself firmly closed, at it sucks at his lower lip, hot tip of the tongue tapping against his teeth, as it kisses his lips, then his eyes, his cheeks, following the line of his jaw. It’s head moved to his neck again, nibbling the skin lightly at the junction of the collar bone, kissing the hollow. It’s muttering something against the bone, he doesn’t know what, it might as well be in another language as everything turns to gibberish inside his head.

When did it get so hot? He can feel teeth again against the place where his shoulders meet his neck, sharp canines in a human mouth, bruising as they rake painfully over the tender skin that resides there, tongue sucking the slight blood spill the teeth leave, greedily, until there isn’t enough blood left and in hunger it bites down. Down into his flesh, tearing skin, and he screams and arches and it’s pressing down onto him hard, so there’s more pressure and this delicious feeling of being possessed. It’s teeth leave his shoulder, and he’s whispering thoughts, as they come to him, as it moves to his mouth, plunging in through slightly parted lips, no longer shut, hot, wet and trembling, sucking on his tongue and filling him completely. It pulls back, to gaze at him, hands firm and hard against his shoulders, pressing him down beneath it, applying pressure between his legs so hot white shoots of sensation sizzle up and down his lower abdomen, making his toes curl and his body stretch.

For some reason he opens his eyes, for some reason he looks up into the face he knows will be staring down at him, eyes dark and insatiable, neither inky black or smoky grey. And suddenly the ‘it’ has a name, and is no longer so alien or frightening, and- 

            “Sasuke…” Naruto says breathlessly, from between parted bleeding lips, before the head lowers, swallowing the sound completely, as Sasuke begins to demonstrate what a prisoner Naruto’s body really is to him.

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Someone kicks Naruto’s chair over in their sudden haste to get up; he lies sprawled on the floor, blue eyes flying open, looking dazed, unsure of why there’s so much noise around him or even where he is. There’s yelling, someone yelling his name, and screaming from down below, the sound of something being broken. Naruto scrambles to his feet; finger tips first, almost ripping muscles in his haste to get towards the window, tripping on his own feet, he smashes his shoulder against the metal bar, grunting at the pain and looking down.

            What he see’s makes him feel as though somebody has knocked a hole in his stomach.

The room has been smashed, broken glass and equipment lying scattered across the floor in chaos, the bed is empty, sheets tossed and ripped and thrown half way across the room. The occupant is standing some feet behind it, back to the wall, three masked men facing him down; there are needles in one arm and the flash of something dark and metallic looking as he yells; face dark and dangerous like a panther. One of the men move; and out of reflex Sasuke hurtles the bed at them, the object splintering, catching one of the men off guard, colliding with his chest and sending him slamming to the floor.

Sasuke stands breathing heavily, while from up above Naruto can hear his own blood rushing tempestuously in his ears like a river. The movement of the dark-haired youth below is slightly jagged, as if he’s lost motor control, and his eyes are pitch black as he looks to either side of him judging the distance to the door or window.

Naruto doesn’t know why he shouts Sasuke’s name when he does. He thinks it might have been to do with the fact that when one of the ninja moved, Sasuke didn’t seem to see it, and as the blow connected with his spine, his own hands only just stopped him from falling. Sasuke’s foot connects with someone’s head in a beautifully fluid movement, and for some reason Naruto realises that there are hands on his shoulders and around his waist, dragging him backwards from the ledge of the window and back onto the floor again.

He’s still yelling Sasuke’s name, because Sasuke’s standing there, still breathing heavily, face almost savage, facing down the last man, not seeming to noticed that the one he knocked down before is getting up, moving behind him. He just doesn’t seem to realise.

            Why?

An arm encircling Sasuke’s neck, driving his vision sharply upwards, so he gags and gasps for air, he sees the panel of glass, the silent watchers looking down on him. At the opposite ends of the room the two young men are both being forcefully restrained, both pulling forwards. Pressure is being forced on Sasuke’s knees as he buckles, but somehow he manages to keep his vision locked on the panel as hands press against his back and someone’s yelling for the doctor and the sedative. He doesn’t want to go back to sleep again because then there will be more of the nightmares. There’s a jabbing pain between his shoulder blades, and he keeps staring desperately up, searching for a way out.

Except there is no way out, not really, not anymore. From the word go, he knew he’d end up in this situation, stuck between the sulphur pits of hell and the bottomless abyss of space. He’s sealing his fate right now, in his mind, as his eyes lock into Naruto’s, turbulent blue meeting shores of burnt ash riddled with smouldering embers, and both of them can feel it, the connection. It’s a sharp jolt of electricity. For Naruto, it’s the beginning of something, something long coming. But for Sasuke, it’s the very end of hope.

            The world blurs and slips….

// Now the nightmares will come….//

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A/N would love to hear any feed back or criticisms you have on this, also thank you to a very kind reviewed who suggested what the title of this chapter should actually be! Ha-ha ever so slightly limey…*gasps!*