Author's Note: This story is crack. It's a bunny that I knew I shouldn't play with, but it grabbed me and wouldn't let go.
Warnings: Blood, demons, sex eventually.
Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto.
Vice
Chapter One
Sasuke woke up sore, his mouth dry, his head pounding. Every breath was a spike of pain driven into his temples. Opening his eyes, he found himself faced with the depressingly familiar sight of a hospital room. Thin grey light filtered in through the blinds, sketching the room in raspy, imperfect detail.
Sasuke sighed, blinked, and sat up, only to clutch his aching head.
He felt like shit. And he had the vague impression there was a very good reason for that. Blinking again, he assessed the damage.
No bandages, which was always a good sign. No casts or splints either, also good. His joints complained as he tried to move them, but he could move them. A little stretching would probably work out the kinks. He cracked his knuckles thoughtfully, then rubbed his forehead.
There didn't seem to be any visible damage - not even scrapes or bruising.
If the hag had healed him, she was losing her touch. He couldn't remember ever having woken up from her treatments so drained and sore still, and he'd had them more often than he cared to admit.
His skin felt raw, like it was sunburned maybe. Even in the poor light, he could see he wasn't burnt, though. His skin looked parchment white.
Forcing his dry throat to swallow, he scanned the bedside for the button that would bring a nurse. With any luck, whoever was on duty could shine some light on why he was here.
The last thing he could remember was facing off against some asshole from Cloud. He'd been an ugly guy. Dark glasses. Big hands. A scar had run down one side of his face. He thought Naruto and Sakura had been there as well - someone had to have brought him back.
Shifting his shoulders, he winced. The burn almost seemed on the inside. He rubbed the backs of his arms uncertainly. Where was that button?
He found it, after a moment, sitting on the edge of a tray left next to his bed. Sasuke grabbed it with shaking hands and pressed the button hard. A buzzer sounded somewhere near by. Fighting for another breath, he leaned carefully back into his pillows and waited for someone to show up.
The sheets were rough against his skin, the blanket too warm, his clothes twisted uncomfortably. A fever? he wondered. Poison, maybe? But there should be some swelling or discoloration or something. Maybe a medical-jutsu. Kabuto had used more than one of those in ways that they weren't intended for, and the results could be devastating. Sasuke didn't think his opponent had been a med-nin, though.
It might be easier to remember if his head didn't feel like it was packed with cotton batting.
The sound of the nurse's flats echoed up the hall. He heard her coming a long time before the door opened, and a woman in white stepped through. She was medium height, he noted automatically. Not heavy, but without the musculature of a kunoichi. Sasuke relaxed a little. Her eyes were brown, her expression sympathetic.
"You're awake," she observed with a strange balance of concern and enthusiasm. "How are you feeling?"
Sasuke didn't bother answering that. He was in a hospital. Was he supposed to wake up chipper? "What - " he rasped, and then paused to clear his throat. That made him cough, which hurt like fuck all. The woman waited patiently while the fit passed.
"What happened?" he asked, finally. His voice was a little stronger, at least.
The woman regarded him silently for a long second before she said, "Would you like to talk to the doctor?"
Sasuke squeezed his eyes shut. If he'd wanted to talk to a doctor, he would have asked for a doctor. "No," he told her instead, with greater patience than he felt. "I'd like to know why I'm here."
"Your friends brought you," she said then. That's a start, Sasuke allowed, taking in the way her brow wrinkled as though she was confused or concerned. At least she answered him this time - for an instant he'd been afraid he was speaking in tongues. "They said you'd been injured on your mission."
"Injured?" Sasuke pressed. "What was wrong with me?"
"I don't know." The crease in her brow folded deeper. "They said that they had to do their best on site, but they weren't sure the technique had taken."
"So Sakura healed me?" That made sense. Though Tsunade had taught her, Sakura was still forty years behind the Hokage. Her healing might still need perfecting.
"I don't know. I could ask my superior? She might have been told who did it."
Sasuke shook his head carefully. "No, it must have been her. Don't worry about it."
"Is there anything else I can do for you?" She asked, eager to help.
Sasuke sighed. "Water?"
"Water," she repeated, nodding. "I'll be right back with some."
Shifting, Sasuke tried to get comfortable again with no more success. The muscles in his back twinged. His leg twitched. The air was too thick, heavy and warm, and it felt artificial with filtering and disinfectant. Maybe he could ask the nurse to open the window when she got back. But then she might open the blinds as well, and he wasn't sure he could handle the light yet.
He made a mental note to tell Sakura her technique could use some work. Not that he meant to sound ungrateful, since this was undoubtedly better than bleeding on the ground somewhere in another country, but if she was going to keep him alive, it would be nice to feel like he was alive too. He yawned and waited for the sound of the nurse's quick, tapping footfalls to come back.
It wasn't long before she reappeared, carrying a tray with a brown plastic pitcher and matching glass. She smiled at him when she swept in.
Sasuke watched her from his position on the bed as she set down the tray and poured his water. He watched the way her wrists bent and she shifted her weight when she put the pitcher down. Her stockings were white, he thought, but they looked grey in this light. Her skin looked a little yellow, almost, and bright in the shadow.
"Thank you," he muttered, forcing his foggy mind to clear. She offered him the glass of water. He was sure that he'd reached out to take the glass - sure of it. Instead his hand touched warm, soft skin. He was dry, lifeless by comparison to her. His thumb moved over the pulse in her wrist. It fluttered as weakly as a butterfly's wings.
Something shook deep in Sasuke's chest. The shudder moved down his spine, vibrated like a bass note in his lungs.
The water glass fell out of her grip, spilling a cold patch across the blankets that covered him. Sasuke didn't look at it, didn't look away from her arm and her shocked, half-hearted attempt to pull free without hurting him. He didn't even blink, watching the way she moved.
He pulled her closer to the bed. She wasn't nearly strong enough to resist. The warmth of her arm seeped into his hand, and suddenly the atmosphere wasn't so unbearably uncomfortable. His hand ached, and his jaw, his teeth, but it wasn't the same as before. It wasn't dull the way that had been. It wasn't really pain at all. Not really.
He ran his thumb over her pulse point.
His foggy mind focused, but there was nothing there other than the fog. It wasn't right.
He licked his lips. There was something, something under her skin and in it, in her... Something he needed in that strange, clear haze. Something he knew on a visceral level would make him not feel like shit.
He almost laughed, just a short little bark of a chuckle, but it stuck in his dry throat.
She said something inane. He didn't catch the words, just the frantic chatter of her voice. He ignored it, breathing her in. He could smell it, under the scent of soap and hairspray; it buzzed. There was no other word for it. It was almost like chakra thrumming in the air around her, and in her flesh, but not.
Something was wrong.
Her knees hit the bed, and finally she tried to jerk away from him more forcefully. She twisted away, pulling hard and throwing her weight backward. Her shoes slipped on the tile, making shuffling sounds.
He was hardly thinking as he pulled her half on top of him. He wasn't thinking at all when he let go of her arm and grabbed her face, pressing her lips to his in a motion that wasn't at all a kiss. Her hands groped at his shoulders, struggling to push him away.
He could open her up and drink her like water. He knew it. He felt it, in the heat that seemed to be growing under his palms and against his lips. It was in her, in her blood, in her skin, her hair, her look, in the tears just starting to fall from her eyes and in the slick saliva that he tasted on her mouth - everything. He moved to her cheek, catching a tear on the tip of his tongue, then brushed his lips against her trembling eyelid. She whimpered, and it - whatever it was - tingled through him, banishing the soreness, soothing over something raw and new in him.
She gasped, trying to get free of him. Detachedly, he wondered why she wasn't screaming.
Something was very, very wrong.
He touched his lips to her cheek, her chin, her neck. Every contact brought more of it. There was a flavor almost on his tongue and half remembered.
His mouth closed over her neck, and he bit her, but gently. There was no reason not to be gentle. The nurse froze over him, arching away. She wasn't as warm any more. Her skin parted easier than it should have under his teeth.
He knew the taste of blood very well, but this had it in it. It wasn't the blood itself, but released from the wound into the air. He could drink her blood. He could breathe it in the air.
His hands shook as he held her still.
This was very, very fucking wrong...
A buzzer sounded somewhere far off. Sasuke let go of the nurse in a rush and she flopped free of his arms. She fell to the floor bonelessly, the call button clutched in her hand.
Panting, Sasuke jumped out of bed, instinct putting his back to the wall while he scanned the room rapidly. There was nothing there. He saw pale blue walls, turned grey by the light. Flecked green and grey tile floor spread out under him. The hospital bed waited, wet and rumbled, in the middle of the room. The nurse bled from a superficial wound on her neck, which didn't explain why she looked so pale, or why her lips were nearly the same corpse-color as the wall.
She moved feebly, awake but clearly insensible.
Consciously, he slowed his breathing. He couldn't stop the tremor in his shoulders, or the wobble in his knees, but his head cleared rabidly. He didn't hurt anymore. Not at all.
Sasuke let himself slide down the wall, falling to the floor in an undignified pile.
"What the fuck?"
To be continued.