Naruto : Path of Wind

"Good." He turns his and studies Sasuke, curled up in the corner, and something like affection appears on his face. "He's very fond of you, you know," he says quietly. "Sometimes I think he spends more time with you than he does at home."

"He does," I confirm, a knee-jerk response more than anything, before his statement actually clicks in my mind. I stare at him, surprised. "You're his brother."

...

I've heard about the mythical Uchiha Itachi before, of course. Word of Konoha's Genjutsu prodigy and his gallant white Commander cloak can be heard in bars, training grounds, the Academy; hell, even the old man has had something to say about the guy a time or two.

When I'm feeling particularly stumped on something that theUchiha Itachi has already conquered in some spectacular fashion. Until just now, though, the connection between the big bad Commander and Sasuke's older brother hadn't clicked.

Which is kind of silly, because for all I've learned about the guy from others, the majority of my knowledge of him comes from Sasuke. As I've come to learn over the years, his older brother is pretty much the only Uchiha in existence Sasuke doesn't actively dislike. He actually seems to look up to him, to some extent, as a goal to reach if nothing else. Not too dissimilar to me and the old man, actually.

From what Sasuke's told me of him, he's one of an almost extinct species, known as the Tolerable-Uchiha. And yet this is the first time I've met him.

Itachi cocks an eyebrow. "Not what you expected?"

I shake my head. "Just caught me off guard is all." I make to ask him a question, only for him to raise a hand, a blank mask settling over his features. His other hand reaches up across his torso and taps his shoulder twice, pauses, and then taps three more times in rapid succession. Then he grabs his mask from its place hanging on his waist and puts it on, bowing.

"My apologies, but I'm need elsewhere," he says curtly. "Make sure my foolish little brother gets some food in him before he goes off training again." Then he disappears in a silent shunshin, leaving me with my sleeping teammate and my thoughts.

I consider going back to sleep, decide I've got more than enough rest saved up already, and contemplate my flower for a while. Then I contemplate the other flowers. I contemplate the sprawling market district through my window, contemplate the number of tiles in the floor, contemplate the ceiling...

God I hate hospitals.

Finally I press the little call button on the wall beside my bed, and wait impatiently for the nurse. She comes bustling in an eternity later, all prim and proper with her clipboard tucked under one arm and a plastic smile pasted on her face.

Well, maybe that's a little harsh. But she's definitely too happy for someone who spends half their life in a hospital. It's not natural.

"Good afternoon, Uzumaki-san," she says cheerfully, coming to a stop in front of one of the beeping monitors attached to my body and marking down some notes on her clipboard. "Is there something I can do for you?"

"Yeah, some clothes would be nice. I'd rather not go parading into the cafeteria with my crack showing for all the world to see," I say, tugging distastefully at the hospital gown underneath my blanket. My admittedly crass language doesn't even phase the woman, who promptly tucks her clipboard back under her arm and hits me with a stern look.

"You've just woken up from a small coma and are still recovering from very serious injuries, Uzumaki-san. You're not leaving that bed for another week at least." She smiles brightly. Unnatural. "I can definitely fetch you something to hold you over, though. Do you have any preferences?"

Ichiraku ramen. "Nah, I'm just hungry."

"Great! I'll go grab that for you right now," she promises, sweeping out of the room in a flurry of happiness and rainbows and where's my vomit bucket?

"Hey," A soft voice says, jerking me out of my sour musings. Sasuke sits in the chair the old man had dragged up to the side of my bed, studying me with bloodshot eyes and bags that match his shirt. He looks awful.

"Hey," I return quietly. His lips quirk.

"I look like hell, don't I?"

"Frozen over," I confirm. He grimaces.

"They wouldn't let me bring an extra bed in here, and getting food has been like pulling teeth. They said there were too many patients in need already." He snorts. "My father probably just told them to make things as miserable as possible for me so I'd go back to the compound."

"Why'd you stay here for so long?" I ask. "You've got the key to my place for when your folks are being dickish."

Sasuke shrugs, glancing away. "I wanted to make sure you were okay."

I exhale sharply through my teeth. "Was I that bad?" I ask softly.

He runs a hand through his hair, a nervous gesture. "You really were. You got beat on by a B-ranked close combat specialist who just so happened to have an affinity for one of the three most debilitating elements."

"I had the elemental advantage, though," I counter.

"It doesn't matter," he growls, clenching his teeth in abrupt rage. "Kakashi-sensei told us he was a seasoned chunin, and we just graduated. I should have been there."

"He was also cocky as all hell," I point out. A thought occurs to me. "Why weren'tyou there?"

As soon as I say it I know it came out wrong. I'm only curious as to what happened with that shinobi he choked in the mud, really. I managed the nukenin by myself well enough, and it doesn't seem like Sasuke meant to leave me to go it solo. But as soon as I ask the question he flinches, guilt darkening his features even further.

"He was a Genjutsu specialist," he explains lowly. "He had already ambushed Sakura and Tenten and knocked them out when I found the cabin they were in. He was about to... do something to Sakura, and I tried to take him down, but I-" He shivers.

"It was subtle. There was never an abrupt change in anything, like the Genjutsu they used on us in the Academy. He just reacted faster than I could adapt to and immobilized me with ninja wire. In the illusion, that is. Then he made me watch."

"... Watch what?" I ask when he doesn't continue. He closes his eyes.

"It doesn't matter. It was only a genjutsu," he dismisses. "I paid him back for it."

An image of Sasuke's face twisted with fury and the twig thin shinobi's own desperate sobbing appears in my head, along with the sound of muffled screams and choking. Yeah. He paid him back alright.

"What was it like?" Sasuke suddenly asks. I stare blankly at him. "Your kill."

Oh. My eyebrows furrow. "It was quick," I decide after a moment of consideration. "He was going to die soon, anyway, I think. These two dogs with Konoha headbands had already taken a couple bites out of him, and he was bleeding pretty bad. I still did it, though. Killed him." I notice the chill in the room, then, and wish I had some actual clothes. "He was powering up this big raiton jutsu and I tried to take him out before he could level me with it, but I slipped-"

"You slipped?" Sasuke cuts in disbelievingly. I scowl.

"There was a ton of mud and corpses lying all over the place. At least I have an excuse." He rolls his eyes at that. Victory. "But yeah, I slipped and he finished powering up his jutsu, and I had to improvise. So I sort of twisted my chakra to give me some momentum, broke through his jutsu, and stuck a kunai in his throat."

Sasuke takes that in, eyes firmly on his hands. "Do you feel guilty?"

"I don't... think so," I say hesitantly. "He was a nukenin and a sadistic bastard at that. He could have easily hidden from us if he'd only wanted to get away from Kakashi and Gai like he said, but instead he chose to beat up on us. I think it was... justified."

"Yeah," Sasuke agrees. "We couldn't even wake Tenten up until we were halfway back to Konoha, she was so bad. Sakura wouldn't talk to any of us until we got back to Konoha, and she still hasn't told me what he made her see. He deserved it."

I nod along with him, filing a talk with Sakura under the urgent category in my head and pretending not to notice the troubled look lurking in his eyes.

"Well, I don't know about you, but all this healing from debilitating wounds is making me crave Ichiraku's," I say brightly, throwing the covers off me and setting to plucking all of the no doubt vitally important tubes and needles out of my skin. It hits me that I understand the freaky nurse lady now, and her unnatural smiles. Anything to take the patient's mind off what they're in for. "Wanna come with?"

"Only because I haven't had anything to eat since yesterday," he says distastefully. The thank you goes unsaid. "And didn't you just send the nurse to get you food?" I pause in my methodical plucking to grope for the power cord connected to a shrieking monitor.

"Like hell I'm going to eat here when I could be having delicious ramen. I wanted to sneak out under the pretext of heading to the cafeteria, but now we'll just have to improvise." I yank the cord out and finish with the last of the wires, and stretch. The muscles in my stomach clench painfully, and I wince.

"Where'd they put my clothes?" I ask. Sasuke points to a small closet off to the right. "Thanks." I swing my legs over the bed, biting back a hiss, and touch down on the ground.

"Careful," Sasuke warns, but I've already let go of the bed. The room spins, my head slams into something hard and pointy, and I find myself on the ground with my brain trying to pound its way free of my skull. I watch in confusion as a few lonely drops of blood drip onto and stain the spotless whiteness beside my head, slowly growing into a little stream.

"Shit!" Sasuke curses on the other side of the bed. A chair screeches, my bed creaks, and then my teammate is crouched beside me, resting a cautious hand on my shoulder.

"That... hurt," I say.

"What happened?" Sasuke asks, concern seeping into his tone. I squint at the little puddle of blood formed by the droplets. Why is everything so hazy? I was fine just a second ago... "Naruto?" His voice is more urgent now.

"My legs," I say, finally. "Didn't hold up. Head is kind of fuzzy." A lightning bolt of pain cuts through my abdomen, and I groan. "Stomach hurts."

The sound of a door slamming open pierces the haze in my thoughts, followed by quick footsteps on the floor and a sharp intake of breath. "Uchiha-san?" A male voice asks.

"He tried to stand up," Sasuke replies. He doesn't move, though, keeping his hand on my shoulder. "His legs couldn't support his weight. He says his head feels fuzzy."

"I'd imagine." The owner of the voice, who I assume to be a medic nin of some sort, kneels down and presses the palm of his hand flat against my skull, where I suppose the bleeding is coming from. Pain, of course, is the result of this, but it's thankfully followed by a soothing warmth. The palm retracts, and the medic nin hums. "Is that all he said?"

"Stomach hurts," I mumble.

"I figured as much." The man's tone switches from calm and soothing to stern and reproachful in a heartbeat. "You're still suffering from chakra exhaustion. What made you think trying to stand after only a week of recovery was a good idea? We had you hooked up to those machines for a reason, you know."

He continues on ranting while I close my eyes and sigh, clinging to the warmth of his medical jutsu.

"This sucks," I mutter, and fall into blissful unconsciousness.

...

 PS : don't forget to write a review and throw power stones for the story :)

...

if you want to read ahead of the public release you can join my p atreon :

 p atreon.com/CarriePoppins