Naruto Fan Fiction ❯ Aftermath - Death of a serpent ❯ Chapter 1

Chapter one

Sasuke was dead. The party that has "rescued" him from Orochimaru had brought him back alive and apparently unscathed, but the preparatory drugs he'd had to take, as well as the dark Nin-jitsus he'd undergone had weakened his heart to the breaking point. Already withdrawn and sullen from his childhood experiences, the humiliation of willingly joining Orochimaru had hammered him ever deeper into himself. Ignoring both Tsunade's and Kakashi's warnings, he retreated to his room every moment that he was not savagely dominating the missions that the trio had been sent on. His heart had eventually been pushed too far. When they were sixteen it exploded violently, ripping his body to shreds. The image had seared, permanently and irrevocably, across Sakura's brain. It still haunted her on some sleepless nights, as she lay in bed, helplessly living through her endless mistakes. Should have seen, should have tried harder, sooner, better. It didn't matter; Sasuke was gone, forever.

After his death both Sakura and Naruto had secretly blamed themselves. Sakura had buried herself in medical textbooks she borrowed and stole from Tsunade, seeking some way she could have saved him. She was lucky; she didn't find any, though she still carried a mountain of guilt she might never be able to release.

She had realized her past uselessness then. Naruto and Sasuke had been soaking up new jitsus like sponges, striving and struggling against each other to improve; she had floated dreamily along in her own little fantasy world, never practicing or helping.

After Sasuke's death she had spent the night in a training area, pounding a much-scarred log and listening to Naruto's banshee screaming along with the thunderous detonations of trees he left in his wake. Naruto staggered in at dawn, disheveled, exhausted, leaving a 34-mile-long loop of burnt-out devastation in the forest behind him. No one said anything. Sakura staggered in half an hour after him. All her attacks had done to the training log was to leave a small, triangular chip in the wood.

That day she ghosted through the funeral, eyes glazed, mechanically mumbling responses to the thousand thousand apologies. She left soon after, dodging an incoherent Ino; she just didn't want to deal with it. She began her search for Lee then.