[Fic] White Rain Chapter 3

[zapenstap.livejournal.com]

Title: White Rain
Characters: Naruto, Itachi, Sasuke, Sakura, Everyone Else, OCs
Genre: Drama
Theme: Family
Rating: Mature
Warnings: OCs (developed)
Pairings: SasuSaku
Summary: 7-10 years after the end of the manga, a woman and her two children seek asylum in Konoha. This would be a simple mission for Konoha, if the woman didn't claim the children were Itachi's

I do not own Naruto.

A/N: Thank you so much to everyone who reviewed! I really appreciate it, seeing as this story is initially OC-focused and therefore dismissed (I’m aware) by people who just don’t have the patience or interest in that. For those of you reading, BLESS YOU. I think it will be worth it, but you will have to let me know.

A note about the intervening years between the projected end of the series and what Konoha is like now. I really hope I don’t write anyone into the story who ends up dying in the manga (yikes), but I AM guessing. I will explain my guesses that are relevant to this story, i.e What kind of Hokage Naruto is, Sasuke’s situation, Sasuke and Sakura’s relationship, information about Itachi, etc. will be integrated. I’m not going to explain things like how Akatsuki was defeated or how Sasuke was reconciled to Konoha because it doesn’t matter to this story (just the original one!) If those things don’t happen, then it’s an AU. ^_~

Judging from what reviewers have said (SO IMPORTANT—please review so I know what is working, what is enjoyable, etc, and sign in if you want a response!) for the most part, readers are getting what I want them to get. Thank you thank you thank you!

A note about SasuSaku: It’s difficult to write someone else’s characters in general, but especially for really popular fandoms (that have diehard shippers, lol). Since I didn’t make them up, I don’t know everything about them, and this is a new pairing for me. Therefore, the interpretation in this story is one among many possible interpretations, especially considering that the story isn’t even over and the manga could end up NaruSaku or something else. For those who either revile or worship the pairing, try to view the interpretation here as contained within this story.

I also thank my beta, whose crits are like eating vegetables: not always enjoyable, but undeniably good for me. Yum. I wish I had more of them!

Full Story: White Rain on Fanfiction.net

White Rain

Chapter 3

By Zapenstap

“Are you all right?”

The boy leapt down from his seat on the rock and dashed toward Sasuke. The expression on his face matched his words, but his eyes were Uchiha eyes, black lashes framing black spheres.

Head still spinning, Sasuke stepped backward, trying to regain his balance. He had never expected to see that face again, not in the flesh anyway. The sight of it sent trembles running up his arms.

“Stop where you are,” he said, and held out a hand for emphasis, keeping a measure of distance between himself and this stranger.

The boy with Itachi’s face froze.

This was all wrong. Sasuke knew this was not Itachi, not the real thing and not a ghost or vision of the past. They did not resemble each other beyond features, and of course this boy was only a youth. The resemblance was unsettling, but it might be just a coincidence.

Or, he reasoned, it could be a trick.

Sasuke activated the Sharingan as a precaution, and though he did not feel that the boy by himself was a threat, he gathered chakra into his left hand until Chidori crackled in his fist. This was easy for him now, and he often found that such a demonstration was all that was needed to head off trouble.

The boy stood still, gaping at the ball of lightning formed from nothing, and then stared transfixed into Sasuke’s eyes. His face radiated a mix of fear and wonderment. Sasuke ignored his emotions. More importantly, under the penetration of the Sharingan, the boy’s appearance did not change. He was not a genjustu. Whoever he was, he was real.

“Sasuke, stop!”

Sasuke released the Chidori, though not on account of Tenten’s shout. She darted between him and the boy. Her hands were empty of weapons, palms held up and facing out to fend off Sasuke’s advance, despite that he had not intended to attack. Not that Tenten could prevent him from the killing the boy if that had been his intention.

The initial shock of seeing his brother’s face on a stranger was fading. What he felt now was a curious kind of self-contained emptiness. He recognized it, and knew it to be manufactured, a battlement built quickly to ward off a mountain of regret that would undermine his composure if he allowed it entry. When he spoke, his voice sounded cold, almost icy, even to his own ears. He ignored it. Right now, all he wanted was answers.

“Who is he?” Sasuke demanded of Tenten, and then of Lee, who leaped to her side as if in fear for her safety. Strange. Sasuke did not think his voice sounded harsh. Maybe it was his face.

Astonishingly, the boy stepped out from behind them both, moving toward Sasuke as if in a daze. Now that the Chidori had dissolved, he seemed more amazed than frightened, more spellbound by Sasuke than Sasuke was of him. Having thrown caution to the wind, he moved boldly out of Tenten’s reach and into the open. “Are you…?” the boy faltered and fell silent. Sweat moistened his brow.

“Sasuke Uchiha, this is why the Hokage has summoned you!” Lee interrupted. “Come quickly and learn for yourself.”

“I’m not moving until someone tells me who he is.”

“What’s wrong with your eyes?” the boy asked. He was still staring at the Sharingan. As soon as he spoke, he abruptly shook himself, as if realizing only upon hearing his own words that the question might be rude.

When Sasuke didn’t move or speak, the little girl darted in to stand next to the boy. Ignoring Sasuke, she rose on her tiptoes to whisper something in his ear, holding her hand over her mouth so that the boy had to lean sidewise to catch her words. The boy answered her in a voice too quiet to be heard, but Sasuke did not need to hear him. With the Sharingan, it was easy to read his lips.

“Mom said ‘Sasuke’ was our uncle.”

“That’s not possible,” Sasuke stated, shaken for a moment out of his forced detachment. “That would mean...”

The little girl furrowed her brow and frowned at him, as if daring him to call her a liar. The boy said nothing.

Reigning in his emotions, Sasuke looked more closely at them both, especially the boy. Despite what he had said aloud, he could easily believe that this was Itachi’s son. But at the same time, he couldn’t believe it. Who? When? Why? It didn’t make any sense. He could not imagine how Itachi would willfully have left behind a family after destroying the one he was born to. No. It could be a coincidence. This boy could just as easily be some kind of a doppelganger. It could even be some ninja trick to deceive him into thinking… he wasn’t sure what.

Speculation was worse than useless.

“I’ll ask again,” Sasuke said. “Who is he?”

Tenten looked questioningly at Lee. Lee shook his head, arms crossed, the corners of his mouth turned into a disapproving frown.

“We don’t really know the details,” Tenten said. “I could tell you what it looks like to me, but I think you already know.”

“You must speak to the Hokage,” Lee repeated.

So Naruto knew something about this. Sasuke frowned. And he had just let them run around? Albeit, with Tenten as a guard, but it was still unorthodox. Bursts of chakra flickered from Sasuke’s fingers as he struggled with the agitation he was feeling.

The boy watched Sasuke’s fingers twitch and flash, but even though his eyes were wide, he managed to address Sasuke directly. “We don’t want to cause trouble,” he said. “This is my sister, Rina.” He gestured to the girl. “And I’m…” He looked at his sister. She stood half behind Tenten, eyeing Sasuke warily. The boy turned back. “Well, I’m told I’m named after my father. My name is Itachi.”

Sasuke shook his head. He felt odd, almost woozy. To have the same face and the same name was too much for coincidence. “My brother is…”

He trailed off. Dead. Killed. Betrayed. Condemned by…

His mind seemed to drift out of conscious awareness, hearing but not able to comprehend beyond the alarm bells being wrung inside his skull. He didn’t see anything, couldn’t think, and couldn’t feel beyond the dull, aching pain that crawled from his chest like some starved creature.

The tomoe of the Sharingan rotated. This time, it did not see the future. It saw the past.

“What do you see… with your Sharingan?”

“Sorry, Sasuke… This is the last time.”

“It was… to protect you.”

Sasuke clenched his eyes shut. He didn’t want to remember. He had tried so hard to forget. His brother was dead.

Stay dead, damn it! Stop haunting me, please. This is too much.

He opened his eyes.

“Sasuke.”

It took Sasuke a moment to recognize Neji’s soft, but insistent voice. It took him another moment to realize that he had grabbed the boy by the shoulders and was staring into his face, boring into him with the Sharingan, as if he could somehow communicate with his brother through this child. Had he spoken out loud? The child was immobilized in Sasuke’s grip, eyes wide with surprise and more than a little fear.

“Sasuke, let him go.”

Neji was calm. Others had been saying something, Sasuke realized, but he hadn’t heard the clamor they were making through the din in his own mind. Neji was gripping Sasuke’s left wrist, Byakugan activated, his other hand in the air, index and middle fingers extended and poised to sever Sasuke’s chakra if he failed to let go.

Sasuke stared at the boy. Itachi’s son.

It was difficult to unclench his fingers. They seemed to have stiffened like the post mortem of the dead. Once Sasuke managed to peel back his hands and step away from the boy, waves of nausea threatened to overwhelm him. Neji caught him as he stumbled, the Byakugan receding as Sasuke’s own Sharingan vanished.

“I don’t know what…” Sasuke gasped.

“Just relax. You’re fine. It’s just emotional stress, probably from past trauma. Sit down.”

Sasuke reclined against the rock the boy had been sitting on moments earlier. The others gave him room. He took several moments—maybe it was minutes—just to breathe. Slowly the dizziness cleared and his stomach seemed to settle. He gulped down fresh air and stared at the sky, ignoring everything around him as the world straightened itself. The sky was a clear, crystalline blue.

“Are you all right?” Tenten asked the boy, stooping to look him in the face.

The boy nodded. “I’m okay.” He was still staring at Sasuke with wide, black, Uchiha eyes. Saskue looked away. “How do you do that thing with your hand?”

Sasuke blocked out the question, wishing the child would vanish for just a moment, and feeling too disoriented to walk away himself. “Where did you come from?” he asked Neji to get his mind off it. “And where’s Lee?” he added, noticing that Lee had left the group.

“The Hokage sent me to fetch Tenten and the children,” Neji responded. “You were all supposed to meet in a controlled setting. Since that was a failure, I asked Lee to bring Naruto and their mother here instead.”

“Sorry,” Tenten apologized. “We could have coordinated better. I thought I would show them the training grounds here, since it was thought you were training on the other side of the village. Lee said he looked everywhere for you.”

“I finished early,” Sasuke explained. “I was on my way back.”

He was still avoiding looking at the children—Rina? And Itachi. Insane. He wasn’t ready to confront them. He didn’t want to look at them. He had a lot of questions, but most of them were for Naruto.

“So…” he said after an interminable silence, unsure how he felt. “These two are Itachi’s…” He faltered. It just seemed so impossible.

“They’re mine.”

It was a woman’s voice.

Sasuke looked up.

“Sasuke!”

That was Naruto, running to meet him from where the village road intersected the training grounds. Sakura was with him, and Lee beside her, but Sasuke ignored them at first. Behind them was a woman, walking with a bag slung over her shoulder, dark brown hair curling in the heat and humidity.

Rina ran to greet her. When the girl reached the woman, she tugged at her hand and gestured to Tenten, Sasuke, Neji, and the training ground with a little voice only her mother could hear. Itachi, the child Itachi, cast Sasuke a troubled look and remained where he stood as if unsure he had permission to move.

So this was the woman.

Sasuke’s thoughts wandered, careened around the edges of the dark places in his mind, and skimmed over where his most precious memories congealed with the most painful. Questions bubbled to the surface, long-suppressed questions about his brother, about those missing years between Sasuke’s two darkest days. If this woman really knew him… There were answers he wanted to know, but the questions themselves he wasn’t sure he could bring himself to ask.

So in silence he wondered: if it was true, why her? Upon seeing her face and figure up close, and knowing what pleasure a woman could bring to a man, he had one reason in mind, but it didn’t seem like nearly enough—not for Itachi. Had his brother trusted her? Sasuke doubted it, considering, but he must have liked her well enough if he had shared her bed more than once. If that much was true, Sasuke wondered if there had been others, or if this woman was the only one during that time. It wasn’t like it mattered, and Sasuke wasn’t sure he cared, but there was so much about those years, and about his brother, that was a mystery.

What he really wanted to know was if those years had been all miserable, or if some parts had been more bearable, even in patches. Was this woman evidence of something from Itachi’s adult life—something other than death and pain—a glimpse of bright moments buried in the gloom? Sasuke wondered. Had his brother even been capable of enjoying such a thing, considering the betrayal, the hardship, the extent of his conditioning? If to his younger brother he had been so cruel, beyond what was necessary, or even forgivable, why not a lover? Had Itachi been kind… or had a Shinobi’s life turned him irredeemably cruel?

And then there were the children. Why allow such a thing to happen? Of this, Sasuke’s heart was filled with even greater doubt. It could easily be a lie, or some kind of elaborate scheme. Or what if it was true, but his brother had been a pawn, or betrayed in some fashion by this woman? Betrayal…again. He wasn’t sure he could stand it, and felt his hackles rising at the thought, the dizziness and nausea close behind, and focused once more on deep, calming breaths.

“Sasuke,” Naruto said, stopping in front of him and putting a hand on his shoulder. “Are you okay?”

“Sasuke, we didn’t want you to run into them like this,” Sakura whispered, her voice lowered to be heard by him and Naruto alone. “We were going to explain things first.”

Sakura’s hands felt cool on Sasuke’s arms as she helped him to his feet. She smelled like cherry blossoms, the very flower she was named for. He didn’t lean on her to rise, but he filed away the pleasure he experienced from her touch, to recall when they were alone.

“Let’s talk about it now,” he suggested. “Away from them. I have some questions for you, Naruto.”

They did as he requested, leaving the woman and her children with Neji, Tenten, and Lee to be watched, or to ask questions, or whatever it was they would do while Sasuke sorted out the matters on his mind. Walking between Naruto and Sakura, the three members of former Team 7 departed from the group and reconvened in a small grove of trees a hundred yards or so down the road—out of sight and earshot from the strangers.

Sasuke sat on a log in the center of the glen and listened while Naruto and Sakura filled him in on the events of the day, relaying to him the information they had learned from this woman Lucia, her two children, and the reason they gave for coming to Konoha.

“So you’re letting them stay?” Sasuke demanded when Naruto had finished. “Just like that? Without even questioning her more deeply? What if this is some kind of ruse or scheme? She could be dangerous to Konoha.”

“There’ll be more time for questions,” Naruto told him. “But I had already decided we’d take her in, so there was no point keeping her in suspense about it. As long as I’m Hokage, Konoha won’t turn away women and children when all they said they were looking for is a place of safety. It’s even more important if these really are Itachi’s kids. As you know, I have a dream for this village, and in my dream, Konoha does all it can to repay its debts, as long as that payment goes toward building a foundation for a better future. That’s what I care about most. I thought you above anybody would see that. Come on. Would you have turned them out? Your brother’s kids? They’re innocent.”

Sasuke looked away. Itachi’s kids. Innocent. With all they had to go on so far, he supposed Naruto was right. They couldn’t have just turned them out, but what was he supposed to do with information like this? “It doesn’t mean I trust them,” he said. “They could be after something. It’s a long way to travel just to escape a drunk with a bad temper, and if this woman did know my brother, she may have ties with other dangerous people. Don’t forget, it isn’t common knowledge why my brother did what he did. I doubt she knows anything about it, and that means she willingly slept with a murderer. I understand what you’re saying, but I think we need to be cautious.”

Naruto nodded, arms crossed, brilliant blue eyes staring thoughtfully beyond Sasuke at the leaves dangling from the branches. “Yeah, maybe so, but that by itself isn’t a crime. Anyway, since she is going to stay here, she’ll be part of Konoha, and I want her to feel welcome. I know what it’s like to be an outcast, to have everyone treat you like you’re a villain, or a threat, just because of an association with something others consider to be dangerous. I’m not going to do that to her, or her kids. We’ll take them in, but I understand that there’s a risk. So we’ll also check out their story.”

“He has a point, Sasuke,” Sakura said helplessly. “It makes sense. We can check out her story. If she was in these lands much, even ten years ago, someone must have noticed. We can send a team to do an investigation. We can ask her more questions too, but this way it won’t be an interrogation so much as verification. We’ll be able to check her story against our own intelligence without making her think we don’t trust her.”

“Because we will trust her,” Naruto added firmly. “Unless we have a real reason not to. It’s important that we do. Living in suspicion is no way to live. Besides, my gut feeling is that Lucia really is looking out for her children. So I think we should give her our best.”

Sasuke looked up at the sky. Sometimes Naruto was naïve, but often times he was right. Which this time? A few wispy white clouds drifted overhead now, briefly obscuring the sun.

“All right,” he said. “As Hokage, you win. I’ll accept their presence, at least until we learn more.”

“Accept their presence?” Naruto muttered. He sounded disappointed. Sasuke looked at him, and noticed Sakura looking at them both, her eyes drifting between them, eyebrows turned down and a concerned crinkle forming in her brow and across the bridge of her nose. Naruto plowed right ahead without noticing. “Shouldn’t you be a little more… I don’t know. Interested in them?” Naruto asked. “The boy is named after your brother after all, looks just like him, and he’s not at fault for his mother’s choices, whatever they are. I thought for sure that you would see this as an opportunity.”

“Naruto,” Sakura began. “Don’t push it. Sasuke just said he doesn’t trust them yet, and anyway, it’s not easy to just…”

Sasuke interrupted her. “An opportunity for what?”

Naruto made a face, the kind of face he made when he failed to think an idea through completely and wound up with a truism that didn’t quite fit what was needed.

“Hmmm. I was thinking that since he’s your nephew, well… that’s one more in your family, and when you get around to rebuilding your clan…”

“My family is dead,” Sasuke interrupted quietly.

Sakura bit her lip.

Naruto didn’t say anything. His blue eyes slid away from Sasuke’s face, but Sasuke could tell he was thinking, that the wheels were turning inside his skull, and that whatever ideas he was coming up with were going to be ridiculously insufficient.

“Naruto…” Sakura whispered again. She put a hand on his arm. “Seriously. It’s not the right time.”

Naruto threw up his hands. “All right. All right. I just thought I would mention it.”

“Look,” Sasuke said. “It’s not that I don’t appreciate the thought, but things are never going to be like they were for me. I can’t rebuild the past. It’s gone. Besides, even if this kid has got Itachi’s blood, he wasn’t born here, and he wasn’t raised by anyone in the clan. He’s not an Uchiha. He’s not even a ninja. He knows nothing of our way of life.”

Naruto folded his hands behind his head and grumbled something under his breath. Whether he meant to be understood or not, Sasuke heard him anyway: “He could be if you trained him.”

Sasuke didn’t answer. He would trust Naruto, but he wanted nothing to do with the boy. It was hard enough trying to get by with his memories of the past following him like ghosts. A constant reminder walking around with his brother’s face was not what he needed. He would put up with the boy’s presence in the village, but he didn’t want to know him. He wasn’t going to get invested.

“Just keep me posted on anything you learn,” he said. “I want to know what they’re up to.”

Naruto sighed. “Well, okay. It’s decided then. I’ll settle things with Lucia and figure out a place for them to stay. While they’re here we’ll have some people keep an eye on them and tomorrow I’ll meet with the Jounin…”

“Tomorrow’s our fight,” Sasuke reminded him. “Don’t forget.”

Naruto grinned. “Oh, don’t worry! I didn’t forget about that!” He turned to Sakura. “Psst, Sakura. I could really use a few extra hours training if you think you could help me out with some things in the morning. Minor things. I’d really appreciate it.”

Seeing the expression on Sakura’s face, Sasuke internally winced on Naruto’s behalf.

“No way, Naruto! You’re going to have to figure out some other way of balancing your tasks. I’m going to be sleeping in tomorrow morning. And then I’m going to help Sasuke train. I really hope he clobbers you.”

Relieved by the distraction, Sasuke grinned at Naruto with a vague feeling of triumph, even though he hadn’t done anything. Sakura’s expression was unyielding, and Naruto’s jaw dropped open in a mock-expression of betrayal. “Oh, Sakura, you traitor,” he moaned. “First you leave me for Sasuke. Now this! You can’t do this to me.”

“Oh, can it, Naruto. I did no such thing!”

Naruto dropped to his knees. “You don’t understand, Sakura!” he wailed, trying a new tactic apparently—the really-over-doing-it strategy. “I don’t trust anyone else to help. I don’t know anyone as smart as you. All alone, I’ll be buried in paperwork until long after the match is over. You know me. It will kill me to do it all myself, really it will. No one will ever respect me as Hokage ever again. I’ll be the laughing stock of the whole village!”

Sakura’s face turned a bright shade of pink. “You just don’t want to go through the mail!”

“Pleeeeease.”

“No.”

“Pleeeeease. Come on. It won’t take more than an hour this time, I swear.”

“No.” But she laughed.

Sasuke could tell it was a losing battle. Sakura would end up helping, but only under certain conditions, and when Naruto slithered out of those conditions he would come to the match with a black eye.

Sasuke reclined and looked at the sky through the trees as the argument between Naruto and Sakura escalated to outright silliness—the state in their bickering where Sakura’s indulgence of Naruto’s antics turned to annoyance and she started to rail on him. At length, they settled on a compromise that was much what Sasuke had predicted.

With gleeful farewells, Naruto left the grove, muttering about working out the details of room and board with Lucia and her family.

Sakura remained behind, holding her right arm behind her back with her left hand clasping her forearm below the elbow. Sasuke recognized the stance. It was a gesture of contrition, but only because she had something on her mind and wasn’t sure if it was the right time to bring it up. She rocked on her heels in silence for a moment, eyes darting around the grove to admire the leaves glimmering like emeralds from the tree branches.

“You have something you want to say?” Sasuke asked her as the silence between them ripened into richness.

He sat up to accommodate her as she settled down on the log to his left. They sat like that quietly for another few moments. Sakura leaned forward with her elbows on her knees, her hands clasped loosely in front of her, staring at the ground between her feet. Sasuke touched the back of her head and combed his fingers through her hair, almost unconsciously, waiting for her to come up with the words.

“Sasuke, I’ve been thinking,” she said in a soft voice.

He sensed the significance in her tone. This was a serious conversation, one she wasn’t sure she wanted to broach. He tried not to press her, but it was torturous waiting for her to speak. There were so many problems, so many things she could say, all things he had thought about, he was sure, all things he had kept silent about and was afraid she would bring up one day.

[TRUNCATED]

- Not the end of the chapter! I ran out of time to tag.

Click Here for all of White Rain Chapter 3 on Fanfiction.net

Comments

[premium-shaday.livejournal.com]

OMG!! WASS SHE PLANNING!!
YOU EVIL PERSON. I GOTTA KNOW!! DON'T DENY ME TEH KNOWLEDGE!!

I love this story.Srsly. It's grand!

[zapenstap.livejournal.com]

YAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY. Someone READ it. I'm so happy!!!! That's like... better than zero. hahaha. Yours is the best review I've gotten. Glad someone likes it. Thanks so very much!

[uchihalol.livejournal.com]

Teehee, I was afraid I had missed or forgot something from the previous chapters when I read the ending. What's Lucia planning? :O!

I love your OC's!

[zapenstap.livejournal.com]

THANKS FOR READING!!!!! who hoo. I got two! ^_^ And nah, you didn't miss anything. Does it seem like there's a gap? I wondered about that scene, buuuuuuuuut, I think it's communicating the right idea. Thank you so much for loving my OCs! that's always a big challenge since I want to be a professional author. I wish more people would give them a chance, but I understand that OCs can be pretty horrible in fic. Anyway, thanks a lot!! ^^

[uchihalol.livejournal.com]

No, there's no gap. I usually like to re-read a previous chapter everytime there's an update to a fan fiction just to catch up, but I only had time to read the new chapter this time.

Please don't thank me for liking your OC's, they are all wonderful. I love Itachi especially of course, but they are all great. I think you're doing an excellent job portraying everyone else in their right characterizations too, but there is definitely a personal touch that every good writer has, and yours is very unique.

That last scene did keep me on the edge of my seat. I was wondering at first if it was just going to be a straight-forward fic, but I'm very glad to see that there are going to be some plot-twists and hidden agendas, because I really enjoy your OCs and the way you perceive how Konoha will be after the end of the canon.

Anyway, can't wait for the next chapter! :D