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Falling is Like This	By : WolfPilot06 Category: Naruto > Yaoi - Male/Male Views: 840 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto, nor any of the characters from it. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

Chapter List
- 2
- 3
Title:
Falling is Like This (2/?)
Author:
WolfPilot06
Pairing: SasuNaru
Warnings:
Slightly AU, shonen ai,
death of major character, angst, slight language.
Notes: And
with a little tiny bit of transition, Wolfie plunges
into plot. Now, this was actually rather
deliberate. When a person dies, life
doesn't give you a break. It just goes
on. This doesn't mean that the effects
of a person's death aren't felt, though�

Please, if you read, please
review. This is my current baby, and the
fact that so few people seem to like it is a little disheartening.
---

Life went on after Uzumaki
Naruto died.

The world did not seem to
care that Konoha's number one ninja at surprising
people had pulled his ultimate unexpected trump card and died. Konoha still received
missions, Tsunade still had to issue orders, and Naruto's friends still had to
carry them out.

It was all terribly unfair.

--

Tsunade sighed, tapping her
pen against the desktop in a rapid staccato as she peered blearily at the two
shinobi standing across from her. Dusk
had fallen long ago, and though there was nothing Tsunade would have loved more
than to be able to fall asleep at her desk, she had work to do. Tsunade began doodling on her blotter,
ignoring the fact that Shizune would take her to task for defacing the fifth
one this week.

"Where is he?" she burst out
irritably. Shikamaru sighed, shifting
his weight and looking at the ceiling in bored askance.

"He's been late to
practically every mission briefing since � " he paused, his easy-going
expression tightening for a moment as he grimaced. "Let's just say that
he's not taking Naruto's death well."

"None of us are,"
Tsunade muttered darkly. Still, her anger abated a little. They were all suffering in the aftermath of
Naruto's death. Half the time, they
found themselves waiting for a familiar boisterous voice to hail them from down
the street or turning upon seeing a spot of orange in their peripheral
vision. It was almost as if Naruto's
ghost walked the streets of Konoha, his face and laughter so fresh in their
memories as to almost be real.

"Well � " The
second shinobi piped up uncertainly, her pale face drawn and weary, "H-He
almost seems � angry. It's as if he blames N-Naruto-kun for�for
d-d-dying." Her voice trailed away.

Tsunade viewed the delicate
Hyuuga heir sympathetically. Of all of
Naruto's friends, Hinata had taken Naruto's death particularly hard. One didn't have to be a genius to figure that
the girl had been desperately in love with the irascible blond, and that he had
never thought to realize that she did.

"In a way, he is."
Shikamaru scowled at the floorboards, lazily scuffing patterns in the dust with
the toe of his shoe, "He and Naruto were always weirdos. They had this twisted agreement that they'd
be the ones to kill each other, or something." A half-wry, half-sad smile
twisted his lips. "We even had a
betting pool as to when they'd finally snap and strangle each other to
death."

"How interesting,"
noted a cool voice. Shikamaru stiffened,
his expression growing wary. The Uchiha
heir was perched on the windowsill, dark eyes boring into the genius
relentlessly. Shikamaru shuddered at the
violence implicit in Sasuke's gaze and found himself calculating the chances
that he'd be able to catch Sasuke's shadow before Chidori found itself a new
home in his chest. "I'd be
fascinated to know what your bet was, Nara."

The shadow-user licked his
suddenly dry lips nervously, noting as he did that Tsunade had straightened
imperceptibly in her chair, and that Hinata subtly had placed herself between
Shikamaru and Sasuke.

"I didn't place a
bet," Shikamaru said, his voice calmer than he felt, "I figured the
probability of your actually killing each other was too small." He smiled
weakly, "I thought the chances of Naruto choking to death on ramen were
much higher."

Sasuke snorted quietly and
stood, approaching his two fellow shinobi with catlike grace. Shikamaru only relaxed when his companion
came to a stop on Hinata's other side and faced Tsunade, hands akimbo at his
sides as if he'd been standing there the entire while, waiting for Tsunade's
orders.

The Fifth Hokage sighed
loudly, muttered something about troublesome brats under her breath, and pushed
a folder across her desk. The tension in
the room immediately shifted as the three Leaf-nin
snapped to attention.

"I'm sending you three
on a B-ranked reconnaissance mission," Tsunade said without preamble,
"Apparently, around Kirigakure, there have been multiple sightings of dead
people come to life."

The three looked at her
incredulously, though Sasuke's look was more of a disbelieving glance before he
went back to perusing the contents of the folder. Tsunade laced her fingers together and rested
her chin on them.

"The Mist shinobi are
baffled as to the origins of these sightings.
They claim that it's not genjutsu,
though it would have to be a pretty high-level one to confuse so many people at
one time."

Sasuke next gave the folder
to Shikamaru, dark eyes shifting back to watch Tsunade silently.

"A lot of trouble seems
to originate in Kirigakure," Shikamaru noted dryly after scanning the
mission report quickly and giving it to Hinata. "That Zabuza
guy Team Seven fought came from there, as did that shark-faced Akatsuki member
and Orochimaru's pet psycho."

Tsunade snorted at
Shikamaru's referral to the Kaguya clan member that Gaara and Lee had reported fighting, though she secretly
agreed that anyone who followed Orochimaru so blindly had to be either
incredibly stupid or psychotic to an extreme.

"What are you suggesting
we do?" she asked, amused, "I can't exactly send a task force down
there to wipe them out. We've got a
tentative treaty of sorts with them, and they still have five of their Seven
Swordsmen."

"We've got him." Shikamaru suggested jokingly,
hooking at thumb at the impassive Sasuke. His expression grew serious
again. "As far as I can determine,
our mission is merely to determine the source of the trouble." He
carefully watched her face, "We're not to deal with the problem if we do
find it, though?"

Tsunade shook her head.

"Kirigakure hasn't given
us permission to act on their land," she said, "They've only asked us
to lend them the Sharingan and Byakugan to look into the matter. They lack doujutsu users."

Sasuke merely grunted, though
Hinata nodded her understanding.
Surprisingly, it was she who spoke next.

"Tsunade-sama," she began hesitantly, "These reports seem
a little odd. It seems as if the 'living
dead' possess actual, corporeal forms, rather than illusionary
bodies." Hinata leafed through the
report again, pulling out a page. "In this report, it says that the dead
retained some characteristics from when they were alive, and that their
movements were jerky and erratic. If it
were genjutsu, one would think that
the caster would make the reanimated dead look, well, more reanimated,
no?"

Tsunade nodded, contemplating
the Hyuuga's words.
Hinata had a great deal of sense when she wasn't busy stuttering and
being uncertain; Tsunade had learned to value her insight greatly.

"It might be an imperfect
genjutsu," Tsunade suggested,
"These dead people don't seem to be doing much more than stumbling around
and staring at people. Someone may
merely be trying to perfect the technique."

Again, Hinata spoke, her
voice thoughtful.

"Somehow, I don't think
so, Tsunade-sama," she disagreed, "My
instinct is telling me that this is something of a game. The dead appear around people they once knew,
and after they've gotten the people's attention, they disappear again. It's almost as if the person summoning them
is playing around with people's minds."

Shikamaru straightened a
little at that, his bored expression becoming a bit more alert at Hinata's
words. The other three present glanced
at him, all too familiar with the calculating look on his face.

"You have a theory,
don't you, Shikamaru?" Tsunade said, arching an eyebrow.

The shadow-user looked
slightly shifty.

"I do, and I
don't," he said evasively. "I'll have to see these 'living dead'
myself to be sure, though. If it's
alright, we'll leave tomorrow at daybreak.
We should reach Kirigakure by nightfall; we'll rest tomorrow night and
investigate these so-called 'living dead' the day after."

Tsunade nodded and gave
Sasuke, who had yet to say anything on the matter, a searching look.

"What about you,
Sasuke? Do you have any ideas?"

Sasuke's expression remained
bland, but for a moment, Tsunade swore she saw his gaze darken, as if in
response to a particularly bad memory.
He shook his head slightly.
Tsunade frowned; the Uchiha scion was keeping something from her, but
whatever it was, she would have a hell of a time prying it from his stubborn
mouth.

Sighing, Tsunade waved her
hand limply at them.

"Go off, then. Get some rest. I expect you back by the end of the week;
send a report if you encounter enemies and need help. Dismissed!"

She turned back to the
reports lying on her desk, waiting until after she heard the distinctive 'pop'
of teleportation jutsus before she allowed herself to
relax again. Sighing heavily, she
half-heartedly picked through a few complaints submitted regarding mismatched
mission assignments, mentally making a note to shove the matter at some hapless
flunky later. It took her a moment to
realize that she was not alone.

"What is it,
Sasuke?" she asked without looking up.

"Have you heard anything
regarding the people I asked about before?" His deep timbre voice was
deceptively calm, a hidden, dark undertone of barely restrained anger lying
beneath the composed veneer. Tsunade
shook her head slowly.

"Sasuke," she said
quietly, "All we have to work with is that the ones who attacked you were
Mist shinobi. We don't know why � "

She barely kept from
flinching as Sasuke's hands slammed on her desk, a pile of papers tottering off
the edge from the force of the blow. Furious
Sharingan eyes bored into her apprehensive gaze as she leaned back, trying to
keep calm.

"They were after
Naruto!" he half-yelled. The
surface of the desk splintered as he dug his fingers into the wood. Tsunade stared at Sasuke, unable to reconcile
the unflappable, stoic Uchiha heir with the snarling creature before her. "After he died, they fucking ran away!
They didn't even try to get the scroll.
It was on Naruto's body, and they didn't even bother looking for it!"

"You know that Naruto
was murdered. I know Naruto was murdered, but damn it, Sasuke, he was a
shinobi! He knew the risks of taking
missions just as well as you and I!" There were tears burning her eyes,
but she furiously refused to let them fall.
She couldn't. Naruto had been like a little brother to her
� he had been the embodiment of all her hope and faith in humanity. When Sasuke had returned, alone,
blood-spattered, and homicidal, and reported Naruto's death, Tsunade had felt
her heart freeze within her chest.
Sasuke wasn't the only one
upset by Naruto's death; Tsunade wanted nothing � nothing � more than to be able to find his murderers and gut them
with her bare hands, but she was the Hokage.
More than anything, she held the position Naruto had so deeply coveted,
and she would be damned if she was going to sully his memory by neglecting the
duty he'd cherished so much.

"Shinobi die, Sasuke. If we hunted down every enemy shinobi that
killed one of ours, there'd be no
shinobi left."

"If it was in the course
of a mission, I'd understand," he snarled, though Tsunade doubted he
really would. "But they were targeting
Naruto! Why the hell would they? Naruto was just � he was an idiot, a moron, the fucking dead-last. What could be gained from killing
Naruto?"

"Think, Sasuke!"
She snapped, standing abruptly and meeting Sasuke glower for glower. "You of all people should be able to put
one and one together and figure out why they would have wanted Naruto dead. Naruto told me what happened at the Valley of
the End. Put your so-called genius to
use. You
tell me why they killed him!"

They glared at each other,
violent crimson eyes meeting defiant golden ones in a clash of wills. For a long moment, there was no sound apart
from that of their heaving breaths.

Slowly, bit by bit, Sasuke's
grip upon the edge of the desk eased, his expression slipping back into its
usual blank state. Tsunade watched the
transformation apprehensively, setting her jaw as she watched Sasuke deduce the
meaning behind her words.

"Kyuubi no Youko."

Tsunade nodded and sank back
in her chair, though she didn't look away from Sasuke's face. It was impossible to tell what the man was
thinking.

"You have to
understand," she said quietly, "As the Hokage, I cannot do
anything. To demand retribution would be
to start the shinobi wars all over again."

Sasuke's eyes flashed, and
Tsunade could guess what he wanted to say, that he could care less about
starting a shinobi war if it meant getting revenge for Naruto's untimely
death. She raised a hand to cut him
off. Locking eyes with him again, she
chose her words carefully.

"As the Hokage, I cannot allow you to pursue Naruto's
murderers. As the Hokage, I forbid you from deviating from your
mission while in Kirigakure. If I find
that you have acted rashly, I will be forced to punish you accordingly."
She paused meaningfully, watching realization dawn in Sasuke's expression.
"I am sure that, while you are investigating the origins of the
disturbances reported, you will utilize your time efficiently to solve the
mystery and find the culprits responsible.
You are to report on every aspect of your mission upon your return. Do you understand?"

Slowly, Sasuke nodded, his
eyes fixed upon hers. "I do."

Tsunade smiled grimly.

"I'm glad we have an
understanding."

---

To be continued�

---

Again, comments and criticism
most deeply appreciated.

**Wolf**
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