In his short lifespan, there's only one time Naruto can think of where time seemed to stop completely. The Valley of the End, when the Nine-Tails' chakra pulsed through his body and spurred him onward-- Rasengan in hand and crimson eyes boring into the unnatural features that had enveloped his friend. Those few, short seconds before he fell unconscious might as well have been an eternity, the pain in his own eyes reflected in Sasuke's. Now is the second time. Raven locks that are unmistakable, messy and tousled just in the way that Naruto remembers it. Eyes pitch black that always made him think of the dark of night, and the scowl on his face that made Naruto want to poke and prod at him. If just to make it worse. When all of the air leaves his lungs in a rush, it only comes out as one name shrouded in disbelief, and with every syllable a painful throb of his heart. "... Sasuke?"
It sure felt like some cruel joke of fate, his brows furrowing and gaze softening.
an eternity ago, sasuke had been tormented by eyes. his, red and black and spinning; his, blue and guileless. he who ruled sasuke's terrors at night, and he who prickled him during the day. whether it was itachi, or naruto, a younger sasuke could escape neither of them. so countless and unending were his frustrations that they were enough to pack a dozen wells. and, now? sasuke has buried and sealed all of them until not a sliver remains. now, older, stronger, sasuke is improved in many ways.
it's not sasuke who's haunted in his dreams anymore, who's faced with the object of his inability and undoing when he wakes. nowadays, it's he who haunts others, stands distant and unattainable at the peak of the mountain like their figure forever out of reach, and he's not a ghost, either; before the biggest dreamer in the world, he's someone painfully real.
βand that pain, that harsh reality, couldn't matter any less to him.
" naruto. " empty, monotone, leisurely, like sasuke can't be troubled, at last his name falls, paperweight on ink-dark tenor. perhaps it's worse when there's nothing attached to it, not a drop of fondness, not an audible memento of anything that one former friend might affectionately retain for another. sasuke isn't that boy that naruto knows, after all. the greater part of him died the night his clan dyed the streets of the uchiha compound with their blood; the last of him, right before naruto's eyes. so it shouldn't be surprising when another friend reunites with naruto, too.
his hand unveils from inside the voluminous fold of his sleeve, revealing sparkling, crackling chidori with it. chi - chi - chi. its owner's eyes are black as pitch, unreadable like darkness without torch. they harden to obsidian as he sets forward on his motion.
" βduck. "
on beat with command, sasuke's concealed shuriken flies from his non-dominant hand. the scant makings of chidori are only a diversion, and behind naruto, his true target is clear: a rogue-nin claws with futility at their stuck throat and falls backward, lifeless. the kunai of their deadly intention slipping free from fingers.
