Naruto Fan Fiction ❯ There is Hope in Bird Song ❯ Song of Chance ( Chapter 2 )

Chap 2
Authors notes: Arg, I’m so sorry that this took so long. My excuse? I was battling over the decision of whether or not to make Sasuke a daddy. Decided not to, just one more complication that would turn this fic in a mind F##ker. That ain’t a good thing.

Disclaimer: If I owned Naruto… it wouldn’t be the popular series it is. Therefore, Own Naruto I do not.

~*~*~

“I can’t believe it…”

“Shut it Ero-Sennin.”

“The shame of it…”

“It’s none of your business, dirty old man.”

“You’re supposed to be my apprentice!”

“And this is supposed to mean what again?”

“You’re only supposed to ogle boobs!!”

“Hey! I ogle boobs just as much as you do, I’ll have you know!!”

“Oh really?”

And so on and so forth went the argument as Naruto and Jiriya continued the trek out of Suna. They were a day and half out and Jiriya was still reeling over a tradition Naruto had that the old man had just now found out about. He had only just learned in this last visit that Naruto and Gaara had a…. unique relationship.

No real surprise there, the blonde’s visit was widely accepted and anticipated thanks to the mellowing affect he had on the redheaded Kazekage. No one else could so easily make Gaara smile, nor actually make him #gasp# laugh.

Maybe this was because no one else understood him quite so much as Naruto did. There was no denying the fact that the two had a connection; which may have been there reason for the current argument between master and student. Naruto’s and Gaara’s connection and understanding hadn’t stopped with them just being friends. No, the two were lovers as well. Er… kinda…

Naruto did not love Gaara, not that way. He had tried to love his fellow Jinchuuriki, he really had since Gaara deserved to be loved, but… the emotion hadn’t come. So he faked it, since the redhead so clearly loved the blonde. Of course Gaara saw through the façade, but appreciated and loved Naruto even more for the blonde’s effort.

It had started the very first time that Naruto and Jiriya had visited Suna. Gaara had invited his friend to his quarters for a private dinner so that they could catch up on things. The soon-to-be Kazekage had made the first move, and Naruto hadn’t pulled away. He didn’t want to; he cared a lot for Gaara, especially since he was working very hard in becoming a better person.

Hesitant touches had deepened, as had the tentative kisses. The badger-demon vessel had then led the fox-demon vessel back into the bedroom and- we’ll leave the online sex-ed for another time.

Naruto had been given plenty of opportunities to say ‘No’, but hadn’t. He knew that Gaara would have quit the moment the blonde even hinted to the fact that he was uncomfortable. But he couldn’t say no to his fellow, not to Gaara. To anyone else, yes, the Konoha shinobi would have said ‘I don’t love you so this can’t happen’, but Gaara was different, special.

Besides, he really knows how to make it feel soooo good… It had taken over two years for Jiriya to figure out what all those over-night, private dinners meant, and the self-proclaimed Super Pervert wasn’t pleased with the fact that Naruto was apparently gay, with no appreciation for a properly stacked female figure.

Naruto did so like a properly proportioned female; he just also had a small thing for a certain specific redheaded ex-sociopath who knew just how to touch- Whoa! Better derail that thought! Don’t want to develop a, uh, problem in the middle of a desert where there’s no cold wate- What’s that shadow?

The sky above the two traveling shinobi was as cloudless now as it had been all day, so a large, correction, huge shadow passing over them was suspect. Naruto looked up, as had Jiriya a moment earlier. Damn! That is one big bird!

“Toad Sage!” the bird bellowed, “Jiriya! My Oath-bond is in need of aid!”

“The Eagle Clan, here?” Jiriya mused.

“Oath-bond?” Naruto asked.

~*~*~

“Where is it you want me to take you?” Asked the giant Goshawk that Sasuke had Called.

“Anywhere, I don’t care, so long as it isn’t Sound,” he shifted painfully on the bird’s back, wincing as his broken ribs complained, “or Konoha, I can’t go back to Konoha.”

“Are you well?” the small peregrine Kintchy asked as she hovered over her Oath-bond.

“Just a thrashed body and a few broken ribs,” Sasuke muttered weakly, “nothing of great concern.” The falcon muttered something about masochistic humans, but the black-haired youth ignored her. He was too busy stressing over what he was going to do now.

He couldn’t go back to Konoha, even though nearly all of his heart and soul yearned to return to his birthplace. H was a Missing–Nin, and his life was therefore forfeit. But more than that, he couldn’t face his old team.

The memory of Kakashi tutoring him, of Sakura’s tear-filled, love-smitten eyes and Naruto’s desperate effort to keep him from leaving; these things were all that kept Sasuke semi-sane (since he damned well knew he didn’t qualify as fully sane). Even though he knew he was deluding himself, Sasuke wanted to believe that the others still felt the same about him as they had when he left. He couldn’t, couldn’t go back and face reality.

For he knew, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that he was hated for what he had done, for his betrayal. Easier by far to avoid everything Leaf and fake that time hadn’t passed and that he hadn’t severed all ties and hopes for care.

The binds keeping him from suiciding were still there; facing reality would deprive him of his one reason left for living. He would then be forced to live a half-life, body living but soul dead and past hope of reviving. In other words, he’d descend into full madness; utterly unacceptable for a full shinobi.

The Hawk flew on in silence, the falcon gliding over Sasuke, who clung to the Hawk’s neck feathers. The blind youth could tell when the falcon was hovering over him due to the fact that for brief moments a small body blocked the increasingly harsh sunlight.

Had this been any other mode of transportation save bird flight, Sasuke probably would have succumbed to his body’s demand for rest. But bird flight was only comfortable for the bird. Each powerful down stroke of the wings made the bird lunge forward sharply, each short glide convinced the broken human that his stomach had been left miles behind him.

The gliding was still preferable to the beating wings, the former Konoha/former Sound shinobi’s broken ribs weren’t going to forgive him for flying anytime soon. As if to enforce that idle thought, the Hawk hit turbulence.

It was probably the least fun moment of the entire trip. It felt like Sasuke was trying to stay on an enraged mustang, and one that could tilt sideways ninety degrees and well as buck up and down. While lying prone on the back of the beast. With the afore mentioned broken ribs.

When the turbulence finally passed, the teen had to cough hard; it was suddenly difficult to breathe.

“Are you alright?” The Hawk asked when the first spasm eased.

“I’m… fine. I’m fine.” Sasuke wheezed, then coughed again, even harder and longer than the first time. He tasted blood, and his chest hurt far worse than before.

“Sasuke! That’s blood!” Kintchy shrieked, “You’re coughing up blood!”

“You are not fine!” The Hawk cried out over Sasuke’s weak protests to the contrary. “I am finding someone to aid you, for we cannot.”

“You don’t hav-“ Sasuke’s objection was overwhelmed as the Goshawk suddenly boomed out a call.

“Toad Sage! Jiriya! My Oath-bond is in need of aid!”

Jiriya… where have I heard that name before? Sasuke heard a vaguely familiar voice mumble something, and then an eerily familiar voice mumble something else. It sounded so similar, but he couldn’t place it. It was like an echo of something he knew, only deeper, more mature…

Subconsciously, he stretched out his senses as the Hawk slowly circled in to land gently, and the chakra pattern he felt was also oddly familiar. A powerful, golden aura, with a violent, savage crimson core- Oh Gods!

He knew that voice now, he knew that aura! He suddenly remembered who the name Jiriya belonged to, and he knew who it was beside him only too well. Naruto!! Oh gods, No! I can’t! I can’t face him!

“I can’t!” He cried out, physical pain overwhelmed by his profound emotional anguish, “NO! I can’t! Not Naruto!” His grip on the neck feathers loosened in his distress, the anti-suicide Coercions responding to late to what wasn’t deliberate suicide. The forward momentum of the Hawk and the bird’s backward slant as he fanned his great wings did the rest.

Sasuke slipped off the slick feathers and entered free fall. For a moment, he felt peace as he heard the distressed cries of human and bird alike. He could feel how far he was above the earth’s surface he was by the distance separating him from that achingly familiar prescience. He knew that there was no way he could survive the fall.

Finally, finally it’s over. I’m finally free and now I can repay you, Naruto, for all the pain I’ve caused. Too bad for the ex-Leaf shinobi that Goshawks are extremely agile and the Eagle Clan had every reason to work their feathered butts off to keep Sasuke alive.

The two below could hardly believe their eyes as the gigantic raptor pivoted midair with great vaneings of his wings. He angled his head down and with even greater beats caught up with the limp falling form. Outstretched talons closed around the body of the dark-haired youth with deceptive gentleness and the bird allowed himself to settle on the ground with a little less gentleness. No one dared even think criticism as the Goshawk hung his head, panting in effort and fright at the near-tragedy.

~*~*~

How many times had Naruto heard the phrase “Heart in your throat” but had never understood it? Way too many times, and now he knew what the old saw was describing only too well. The huge, ginormous bird had been too far away for the young blonde to make out what its rider was screaming, but what happened after was now forever burned into Naruto’s brain.

#FLASH# The rider slipping loose, hanging for a moment as if levitating.
#FLASH# The rider now falling, slowly, painfully slowly while Naruto’s body just stood there while his mind was screaming-
#FLASH# The Hawk somehow swinging its huge body around, and defining all reality by diving under its own wing.
#FLASH# The Hawk then reaching out with those mammoth talons as the rider kept falling just out of reach- He’s not going to make it. The talons moved nearer, but the body kept falling, falling- He’s not going to make it! The talons started to close, but the rider’s body wasn’t in them- He’s not going to Make It!!

Naruto blinked. The Hawk was on the ground panting hard, balanced on one foot while the other was clenched around a limp, dark-haired form that was moaning in pain. Huh? Did I miss something? Again? Jiriya ran past the dazed and confused Naruto to the person that had somehow, inexplicably escaped a bloody and gruesome death.

The blonde ran over the flash photos in his memory and was confronted by the image of the Hawk capturing the rider a mere fifteen feet off the ground. Oh. The apprentice ran over to join his master and was confronted by a sight that grabbed the heart that was still fluttering around in his throat and threw it down to his feet.

Sasuke. It was Sasuke that had ridden the giant bird that was still looming over the three humans. It was Sasuke that had nearly fallen to his death, only to be snatched back seconds prior. It was Sasuke that was now being gently released to lie on his side.

Sasuke the traitor. Sasuke the would-be killer. Sasuke the future vessel of Konoha’s greatest enemy. Sasuke my teammate. Sasuke my best friend. Sasuke who is like my brother.

Naruto stood frozen again, for once speechless. Konoha’s most spontaneous and random ninja was now left without a single clue as to how to proceed. The blonde shinobi had dreamt of hundreds, thousands of different scenarios for how he was going to reunite with his way-ward teammate. The scene in front of him didn’t fit with any of them.

Then Sasuke coughed hard and spat up blood, and the past didn’t matter. The fact that Sasuke had once rammed a Chidori’d fist through his right lung after calling the blonde his best friend didn’t matter. The fact that the friendly rival, who had once taken a fatal attack for the random blonde knowingly, was now coughing up his life’s blood at his feet did matter. A lot.

“Sasuke!” Naruto cried, rushing forward to ease his friend into a more comfortable position. “What happened? Where are you hurt?” Sasuke groaned weakly. “Aside from the lungs I mean.”

Jiriya made symbols that Naruto hadn’t seen before and did some arcane jutsu over Sasuke’s pale form, but for once the blonde ignored him. Filling his eyes with Sasuke was more important. The dark-haired youth had matured nicely, Sakura would be pleased.

His face had grown thinner and a little longer. Sasuke was taller than before, but not by much, and was still slender. Too slender? Naruto wondered, feeling ribs, these unbroken, too easily beneath the black shirt. Yes, Naruto decided, Sasuke’s much too thin. He could use a nice bowl of ramen!

But the blonde youth’s thoughts turned sad again, there was so much pain in Sasuke’s eyes, eyes that refused to look at him. Naruto also noticed faint lines around those eyes and at the corners of the formerly Missing-Nin’s mouth that spoke of even more pain.

“Broken ribs,” Jiriya grunted, breaking into Naruto’s reflections, “and the left lung is punctured. He’s going to need a medic Nin. And-“ Jiriya broke off suddenly and peered closely at Sasuke’s face.

“And what?” the dark-haired youth whispered, speaking finally. He wasn’t pulling away even though Jiriya had moved his hand and face uncomfortably near. Naruto blinked, he knew how much Sasuke valued personal space. Maybe, had valued?

“How many fingers am I holding up?” Jiriya demanded suddenly, holding up three fingers. Naruto blinked yet again. Sasuke wasn’t showing any normal symptoms of a concussion, or any other head trauma that would require that question. What was the Ero-sennin getting at? A long silence followed the question however.

“Well?” the Toad Sage insisted.

“Jiriya-sama-“ the little falcon how was standing near Sasuke’s shoulder started, then was interrupted

“I think you would know the answer better than me.” The dark-haired youth said in a low growl. Never before had Naruto heard a tone so bitter, and he’d had plenty of opportunity to hear it. Wait, does that mean-? Sasuke’s face was turned in the direction the hand was held in, his eyes were open, their color was clear, but-

The pupil was constricted to a pinpoint even though they were all in the Hawk’s shade, and the eyes didn’t seem to be focusing. Was Sasuke…? No impossible. Yet… Was Sasuke blind?

Jiriya grunted, “Thought so. Naruto!”

“Hai?” the blonde answered warily. He was about to be sent off, away from his newly recovered friend, he just knew it.

“You know where the nearest village is,” the old, hentai-book writer said, “Go fetch a rescue team, Sasuke here needs to be taken on a stretcher.” That the discussed youth wasn’t protesting as he should seemed ominous to the blonde, “Off now! Triple time!”

“Yeah, yeah…” Naruto drawled, reluctantly setting Sasuke down on his right side. “I’ll be back as soon as I can.” He murmured to the unresponsive youth. The other’s face was drawn up in pain, causing Naruto to squeeze his shoulder slightly in reassurance before he launched off at his fastest pace. The relief team would take longer to return, so the faster Naruto could fetch them, the faster they could get back.

~*~*~

Jiriya watched his apprentice race off for a moment, then turned his attention back to the youth before him. Orochimaru, you bastard, you really over-did it this time. It was painfully clear for an old, experienced shinobi like him to read the signs laid out before him.

Sasuke hadn’t been broken, he’d been shattered. The jutsu that the old man had used was one that allowed him to look inside a person’s body for a brief moment, although it didn’t allow him to act on what he saw. That’s what allowed him to see the three broken ribs with the bottom one piercing the left lung. It also showed him the signs of recent rape, clear since consensual intercourse left a different signature.

But that wasn’t all; even though there were no surface scars, the bone calluses of hundreds of different healed broken bones had been revealed by the jutsu. If Sasuke lived to old age, he was going to be one achy bastard during a weather change.

And yet even all that physical damage hadn’t been enough for the Snake-Sennin. Oh no, he had to break the record in Coercion Binding Jutsu’s as well. Never before in all of Jiriya’s fifty-two years had he ever seen so many Coercions in one place, ever. Not even the time when he had rescued over sixty slaves from an illegal market and he was just counting individual Coercion spells, not the different varieties. Each slave had had two to three Coercions each. All of those added up were still eclipsed by the number of ones hedging in Sasuke’s freedom.

“It’s a miracle you can breathe without permission.” Jiriya grumbled out loud. Sasuke barked out a weak, ironic laugh.

“He actually did that too, forbade me to breathe,” Sasuke muttered, “He did it to prove he could, to show how strong and superior he was.”

“Superior my ass.” The Sennin countered, “Anyway, I can do something about a great deal of those Coercions on you, although a few are going to require further study. Do you want me to break them?”

The expression on that came to Sasuke’s face forced the older man to revise his earlier assessment of the boy. Orochimaru would never, ever look that pathetically pleading. “Please,” Sasuke whispered, “please.” No, this boy was definitely not the same type as Orochimaru.

Jiriya quickly set up a sketch of a Circle to make things a little easier on the two of them while the Hawk backed up a little, but spread his wing out to shield the two frail humans from the hot, desert sun. The little falcon, who Sasuke called ‘Kintchy’ perched on the larger bird’s foot, watching carefully.

Now, aside from the fact that they are designed to inhibit all freedom, there is one other thing to bear in mind about Coercions. If they are not disabled from within, they are exceedingly painful for the afflicted when removed by someone other than the one who set them. Thus, Sasuke was able to break and disable a number of the ones on him with little discomfort save fatigue. But with Jiriya breaking the ones on him from without…. That hurt. A lot.

Yet Sasuke didn’t do more than hiss or gasp in pain from time to time as the spells were snapped, one by one. This, to the Toad-Sage, was as telling of what Sasuke had lived through as the multitude of bone calluses. If the pain he was suffering now wasn’t worth screaming over, then he had suffered truly great pain in the past.

The old man sighed as he shattered the last of the Coercions he could get to right then. All my training, all my studies and still Orochimaru can commit atrocities that I can’t stop. I told myself long ago to stop feeling guilty about it, that I can only do what I can and leave the rest to others, so why does it hurt so much to see this boy’s pain?

Jiriya went over to the collapsed boy and helped him lie down in a more comfortable position and propped him up on Naruto’s duffle bag. Then he sat down beside him on the dusty road. Sasuke’s face was completely mask-like, not revealing anything. To bad he couldn’t control his eyes, they seethed and rolled with intense physical and emotion pain.

“I was wrong about you,” the book writer confessed. Sasuke turned his face in Jiriya’s direction. “I was completely and utterly wrong about you. You wouldn’t be laboring under the amount of Coercions that you are if you weren’t good of heart. Orochimaru” Sasuke flinched at the name, “wouldn’t have felt the need to bind you so tightly if you hadn’t fought him with everything you have.”

“No..” Sasuke whispered while cringing slightly, clearly expecting to be punished for his defiance. When nothing happened he continued. “I’m- I’m not good. I- I’ve done- things- such terrible things. I- I- Oro- O- He made me- made me do such horrible things- I- I can’t- I’m not-”

“But you just said it yourself, Sasuke,” Jiriya interrupted, “He made you do those things, you didn’t do them voluntarily.”

“You don’t know- you weren’t there-” Sasuke protested, then winced back again, expecting to be punished. Jiriya had decided to ignore the cringing, sooner or later the boy would understand and accept the fact that he wasn’t going to be beaten for being ‘rebellious’.

“I have proof enough before me in your mental state and the layers upon layers of Coercions.” Jiriya stated calmly and gently, “If you had wanted to obey Orochimaru” Sasuke flinched again, “you wouldn’t have been bound. If you had enjoyed what you were ordered to do, you mental state wouldn’t be as fragile as it is.”

Sasuke stared sightlessly at the Sennin, brows creased with thought. Finally he sighed and slumped, defeated for now. “Maybe…” Jiriya reached out a comforting hand, only to have the youth jerk wildly away at his touch. Man-fear. Common enough in rape victims, it would undoubtedly take years for Sasuke to recover from it. Actually, if my experience is reading this right…

It had taken Orochimaru only a little over two years to so completely scar the young one, and it would probably take well over a decade for Sasuke to significantly recover from it. He’ll probably never really heal from this, but at least I can ensure that he gets the chance to try. And the least I can do, for having not tried to kill that bastard all those years ago, is to try and help the poor boy.

So Jiriya reached out again to lay a gentle, reassuring hand on Sasuke’s shoulder. This time, Sasuke didn’t jerk away, but it took until Naruto’s return for the fearful trembling to stop.

~*~*~

How Naruto got the medic team to Sasuke so quickly was later written down as one of the great mysteries about the boy. But somehow he had and now the former missing-Nin was safely ensconced in one of the small village’s hospital beds. His ribs had been set, his lung drained of blood, and the puncture had been Healed enough that it would heal properly. Naruto hadn’t left his former teammate’s side the entire time.

He had stayed close to his friend, watching carefully, as if he expected Sasuke to vanish spontaneously if the blonde took his eyes of the midnight haired youth even once. Even when the doctors had swarmed Sasuke, Jiriya’s money came into play there, Naruto had simply wedged himself into a corner of the room out of the way, and kept watch.

Now he had claimed the chair by the head of the bed that Sasuke was resting in as his private property and wouldn’t be budged. The traitor Nin couldn’t understand it; after all that had happened, why did Naruto still care?

“Why…?” he murmured.

“Why what?” Naruto pounced on the small outreach the way a starving predator would.

“Why do you still care? How can you still like me? Why haven’t you given up on me yet? Why aren’t you disgusted by me!?” Each word came out louder and more hysterical as Sasuke finally gave in to the internal pressure.

“Disgusted?” Naruto asked, cluelessly.

“Yes! Disgusted!” Sasuke sat up and turned in the blonde’s general direction, “Why can’t you see that I’m- Tainted!? How can you stand me?! Stand to be anywhere near me!? I’m tainted and polluted and- and completely unclean and-”

Sasuke’s self-directed tirade was cut off as he was pulled into a strong, gently embrace. It was so warm…

“No, you’re not tainted.” Naruto crooned, “You’re not polluted, you’re not unclean. You’ve just been through hell, but it’s over now and you’re safe. You’re safe.”

It’s a lie, Sasuke thought, it’s a lie, I am unclean. And- safe!? Ha! Oro- O- HE’S still out there and how can I be safe if That Man is still alive? And- I’ve done such- such horrible things… I don’t deserve…

Naruto shifted his seat from the chair to the edge of the bed so that he could hold and comfort his long missing friend a little less awkwardly. Sasuke realized he was trembling, but not with fear as he would have expected. The blonde continued to murmur soothing nonsense at the black-haired youth, rubbing his back and rocking him gently. A whimper of repressed emotion somehow managed to escape, and for some reason that opened the floodgates.

Sasuke had cried so many times over the past two plus years, but those tears of pain/shame/rage/humiliation hadn’t relieved anything, nor released anything. Perhaps that was because he’d either been alone, or had been in the middle of whatever it was that had caused him to cry in the first place.

He had never been held and soothed the way Naruto was holding and soothing him now. And when was the last time someone had offered his shoulder for him to weep on? Oh, right, never. It helped, it really helped.

With one hand rubbing his back, easing his tension, and the other stroking his hair, Sasuke felt… protected. Sheltered. Cared for and, dare he think it?

Loved…

Sasuke felt loved, loved by Naruto, the person he had ridiculed, scorned and had then tried to kill. Intellectually, the former missing-Nin realized that it was the friendly/brotherly type of love that Naruto was expressing, but that simply didn’t matter right now.

The care that was radiating out of the blonde was simply too strong to deny and Sasuke decided then that he wanted to drown in it. He didn’t deserve it, and later he would punish himself for his current indulgence. But right now he clung like a drowning man to the only life preserver available and wept out over two years of constant pain into the strong, broad shoulder offered him.

Naruto never let him go. Naruto had never let him go, not once. And he never would.

~*~*~

A.S.: gah, finally, got it done. Gomen nasi for taking so long, I was struggling with various plot bunnies that won’t- stop- freakin’- BREEDING! Rarg! Well anyway, here’s the update and hopefully the next one won’t take so long. Feel free to check out my other fics #hint# #hint# #nudge# #nudge# Ja for now!