Life Amongst the Leaves 12

Chapter Twelve: Loss

I wasn't sure why I had woken up so suddenly, but I knew that something was wrong. It was very wrong. But what was it?
Confused and still very groggy, I ran- or the more accurate term, fell- out of my room and into the hallway. I managed to make my way down it, searching for answers. Both Luna and Suichi's rooms were empty. When I made my way down it, I wished I was still asleep, that this was one big nightmare.
Suichi was sitting on the floor, back pressed against a wall. I hadn't seen that expression on his face since his time in the cell. Luna was next to him, hand on his, while tears silently poured down her face. Standing to the side of the door was a grim, not just angry but grim, Yue.
"What . . . What happened?" I asked, afraid to hear the answer.
"Last night, the village was attacked." Yue said. "A group of sound ninjas slipped in and stole a scroll containing a powerful jutsu, killing two of the three guards on duty." His eyes met mine. "Kin was the third."
"Then . . . What happened? Why is . . . You said only two were killed by the intruders . . . So what's wrong with . . ." I was grasping at straws, trying to deny it. It just couldn't be. From what Yue said . . . But what else could've gotten this response when it had to do with Kin?
"He only said what he did because Kin didn't die by their hands." I spun around to see Phobos standing in the doorway. It was a side of him I'd never seen before. He looked . . . Tired. Tired and sad, as though the weight of the world had been dropped onto his shoulders. "He died by his own."
"What?" I stared at him, wide-eyed. No . . .
"Kin knew a forbidden jutsu called internal combustion. It's a very powerful technique, but as you can guess it comes with a price. You'll never see any damage on the outside of the body after the technique is used, as that remains untouched. But on the inside . . . The jutsu completely scrambles the organs. Kin died almost instantly." I couldn't say anything.
Suichi seemed to have snapped out of his shock, and stood. Guess he meant to leave the room. "Should've known it wouldn't work out. Something like me . . . Guess I wasn't meant to be helped."
I dunno if he would've said anything more or not, seeing as Yue apparently took that statement as his cue to slam a fist into Suichi's jaw, lifting him off the ground and slamming him into the wall he'd been leaning on just seconds before. Twin sharingans(I'd learned what the 'optical jutsu' of the Uchihas was called) swirled with a rage I hadn't seen in Yue before.
"Shut. UP." He snarled. "Is this all of the strength you have? All you're worth? I'd thought you were strong, stronger than this, at least. But boy, did you prove me wrong."
"You shut up." Suichi said, glaring as he wiped his mouth.
"Or what? You'll call big bad Trouble to beat me up. Oo, I'm so scared." His voice had hardened with disdain. "Too bad he's nothing but a coward and a weakling, just like you." He grabbed Suichi, yanking up off the floor and pinning him against the wall by his throat, hand wrapping about the marks that had remained visible since the choker's disappearance.
"Hey!" I protested, starting forward. But Phobos's hand gripped my shoulder, effectively restraining me. I looked at him, only to find him staring intently at the two combatants, sharingan swirling away.
"Let it continue, Dragon Sachiel."
"But-"
"Trust me, Sachi."
"Do you think that just because you were beaten around way back when, you have the right to dispair? So what if you were beaten?! So what if you were raped?! That's done and over with! It's time to move forward. How long are you going to let them control you, huh? How long will you live in fear of him? How-" Yue was then cut off.
"SHUT THE HELL UP!" Suichi threw Yue across the room, pinning him down and hitting him again and again. And yes, it was Suichi. Not Trouble, strangely enough. "What do you know?! You don't understand anything about me or what happened in my past you self-righteous shrimp!" He flung Yue again, though this time Yue caught himself. Suichi went after him, pulling a out a kunai as he went. Yue barely managed to dodge the kunai, and then it caught on his shirt, tearing the back of it open. Suichi rightened himself, probably intending to strike again, but stared.
Yue's back was covered in scars.
Scars of all shapes and sizes crisscrossed the pale flesh. A long, jagged, rope-like scar spanned across his back from shoulder to hip, as though he had been ripped open. Most were completely healed, but there were some that weren't, obvious and painful-looking.
But the most horrifying were the small signs of the Uchiha clan that looked as though they'd been branded all over his back. Some looked distorted, as though they'd been dragged slowly across the bloody flesh to increase the pain.
The kunai clattered to the floor as Suichi's arms went limp. Yue's eyes locked onto his, the grimness returning.
"Actually, I think I understand your pain a lot better than you think." He said softly.
After a very long silence, Suichi finally said, "I'm sorry."
"What for? I was the one trying to get myself hit." Yue shrugged. "I was kind of surprised you started fighting me without Trouble, admittedly . . ."
"I've been blocking him for awhile now." Suichi admitted, still looking guilty. "He's furious with me."
Luna, who had stared in horror at the whole thing, sighed in relief, slowly relaxing. Phobos turned to me. "See? What I tell ya?"
I wasn't listening, really. The second Phobos let go of me, I strode forward, between Yue and Suichi. From the look on Suichi's face, I knew he knew what was coming. Yue raised an eyebrow at me. I turned and slapped him as hard as I could, open-palmed across the face, then turned again and did the same to Suichi.
"Sachi?!" Phobos said. "What are you-" But I was already striding toward the hall. "Sachi!"
"Shut up! All of you just shut up!" I snapped. "I don't want to hear it. ANY of it. Now leave me the hell ALONE." With that, I stormed down the hall to my room. Glancing over my shoulder, I saw Luna move so that she was standing in the way of anyone who wanted to follow.
As soon as I was safely in my room and had sat down on the bed, I let it go. You could say . . . the dam finally burst.
I cried. I buried my face in a blanket to muffle it, and I cried.
I never cry in front of people. In fact, I go to great lengths to hide it when I do. It didn't used to be like that. But, when I let people see it, it was seen as weakness. And if a sign of weakness was shown by me, people took it to mean they should walk all over me even more. So I stopped letting anyone see. Not my parents, not Luna, not Sensei, not even Suichi. I've gotten good at finding ways to muffle to sound, so anyone listening would never guess what I was doing by now. Heck, by now I've started to wonder if it's not so much that I won't show tears to anyone but an empty room, or that I can't. Luna, Suichi, and Sensei have learned to tell when I'm about to(I always get my angriest right before), but they've never seen me do it. They've learned it's best to leave well enough alone.
I cried for a long time. I guess I'd been holding it back for awhile. There was the problems with Suichi, my mother's 'accident,' if that was what it truly was, the apology I knew I should at least offer Naruto and the uncertainty of whether or not he'd accept it, and now . . .
Explaining what I did to Suichi and Yue is difficult. The first part, I guess, was anger about what Yue had done to Suichi, no matter his intentions. It never mattered to me that my father was probably wrong about telling me Suichi was my 'responsibility.' I even knew the reason behind it was basically his way of saying, "my daughter is a lost cause and failure, but look, she still has a use." But I took it to heart, anyway, stupid as that was. So it bothers me when anyone hits Suichi. And hey, they say good intentions are what the road to hell is paved with, you know. I'd been in a bad enough mood after hearing Kin died, anyway. And then there was Phobos's 'trust me.' I don't trust anybody with Suichi or any of my friends easily, and it was especially a mistake to tell me that under the circumstances. I didn't really care if he was just asking me to or actually telling me to. Either way, that statement just makes me angrier. On top of all that, the entire thing frightened me. If Yue and Suichi had continued, one of them would've died. They were just too equal. And there were great consequences for either victory. If Yue had won, I'd have lost one of the two people who knew me by heart. If Suichi had won, who knows how he'd respond. It scared me.
And Sensei isn't the only one on our team that doesn't like being scared.
I heard footsteps outside my door an hour or two later. At first, I thought they were going to come in, but instead, a small, folded piece of paper was slipped under my door. I got up and hesitantly picked it up. I stared at it for a long time. Then I walked back to the bed and started crying again. This time, I did until I fell asleep, too tired for anything else.
It was from Phobos, according to the name at the bottom, and it read, "I told Suichi and Luna this, and thought you might want to know . . . Kin was holding the letters when he died."