E T E R N I T Y

In a world of waring clans, Sasuke Uchiha searches for one thing, the identity of the demon who has watched over him since childhood. Time has finally caught up with him, and a three hundred year old grudge will finally be fulfilled. SasuFemNaru, ItaSaku.

CHAPTER ONE
MY GUARDIAN ANGEL

"Lovers ever run before the clock" ~ William Shakespeare, The
Merchant of Venice.

Sasuke Uchiha watched from his seat on the tatami mats (next to his brother and in front of his parents) as the clan leader, Madara Uchiha, took his place at the podium at the front of the hall.

He had never seen the man before – he had always been too young to attend the clan meetings, but now he was six years old, and he had activated his Sharingan, younger than Itachi. He was finally eligible to attend the clan meetings, even if he would remain in training for another year, maybe two, before being sent on missions.

He stared at the man in front of the clan in curiosity, and immediately felt a bone chilling shiver of something awful trickling down his neck; he couldn't place the feeling – he had never felt it before – but it seemed to stem from the fact that everything about his leader seemed to utterly repulse him.

He wondered if it was the family resemblance – the older members of the clan had often said that he looked like Madara because of his hair, his serious nature, but he knew that wasn't it. Something inside him felt absolute distaste for the man, and he had no idea why.

It made no sense for him to hate the man – he was the best leader the clan had had since it had come into existence, and the fact he had lived as long as he had was a testament to his abilities. Besides that, he was Sasuke's somewhat distantly related Grandfather.

He was the latest descendant of Madara's granddaughter, Chidori Uchiha. The first Uchiha to wield the lightning element, and the element had been passed on down the generations all the way to his mother, and finally to him, skipping out on Itachi for some reason.

He was the man's direct ancestor, so technically he should feel noting but respect for him, but the thought that he would one day have to follow this man's orders made his skin feel... unpleasant. A calm, rational part of his mind told him to be patient, to keep his distaste for the man private.

Sasuke had listened to the calm part of his mind before, and it had never led him wrong. It was almost like a voice, someone guiding him from a distance, but that was stupid – the only clan capable of that was the Yamanaka clan, and if one of them was inside Uchiha land, they would be killed.

The man called for attention, and the hubbub in the room died to a still silence. He began to talk about recent excursions into Senju land, just over the border of their own territory. Itachi was one of the ninja's that stood to give their reports on how the border raid had gone, and he felt a little jealous.

He would have to learn to manipulate his both his elements, and probably master a specific weapon to a mediocre level before he would be allowed on the most simple of missions. He was forced to wait till the end of the reports before his part in the evening arrived.

"Now, as I understand it, we have several new faces with us this month – please stand up an introduce yourselves, and tell us your capabilities so far" Madara instructed.

Sasuke didn't like his voice at all – it sounded mean – but he pulled himself onto his feet in front of his mother all the same, casting a brief gaze at the others who had also stood up. He could see his cousin Tobi, and another cousin named Sai standing up. They were both several years older than him.

He watched as they both introduced themselves to the gathering, before his turn came – it came out a little mechanically thanks to a combination of nerves and dislike, but his mother had drilled him for weeks on this after his Sharingan had manifested so he managed it.

"My name is Sasuke; I'm six, and I manifested at two thirds of my Sharingan. My elements are Fire and Lightning, but I have yet to specify in a particular weapon" he said loudly.

There was a brief muttering amongst the gathered clan members as he stood awkwardly; his parents had been gushing about his Sharingan almost as much as they had when his lightning element had been specified.

He didn't really understand it, but his mind (a sort of conscience, or imaginary friend) told him not to worry, so he didn't. It was still odd hearing people muttering about him though.

It was even more odd seeing the raised eyebrow on his ultimate grandfather's face – he looked vaguely amused by the knowledge he had just shared with the clan for some reason, and that made him uneasy. Making someone you disliked interested in you, for whatever reason, couldn't possibly be good. He wasn't tall or smart like Itachi, but he knew that much.

"Two thirds? In both eyes? That's quite an achievement, especially for a boy your age – you said your elements included Lightning?"

Sasuke nodded uneasily – he didn't like the sudden interest the man was giving him. He knew nothing about Madara, hardly anyone did; he was very secretive, and the only thing that seemed common knowledge was that he and his brother Izuna had somehow lived for three hundred years since the start of the clan wars, and didn't look a day over thirty.

"That would make you one of Chidori's descendants then... You're one of Mikoto's boys aren't you? Could you repeat your name for me?"

He sounded excruciatingly polite, too polite for Sasuke's comfort, but he nodded again before repeating his name.
"My name is Sasuke, sir" he replied, trying to keep his distaste to himself – no one seemed to notice.

Madara remained intrigued though, taking in his image; he examined every detail from the structure of his face to the small birthmark on his neck – the one that looked like a bad scar – with almost religious fervency. Sasuke didn't know what was wrong with that look; it seemed to be a casual observance on the surface, but there was something that sent that unpleasant trickle down the back of his neck.

"You look a lot like my son... A lot like him, dare I say it, almost identical..." he mused.

He looked towards Sasuke's mother, a visible glimmer in his dark eyes.

"It seems you have a sense of humour, great-granddaughter mine – I assume the name is a mere coincidence?" he asked curiously.

Sasuke felt his mother rise behind him, and give a small bow as she placed her hand on his shoulder.

"My father suggested the name sir; as you know, Itachi did not receive the Lightning element, but the Water element. He thought it would be lucky to name him after your granddaughter at first, but we thought Chidori would have been a strange name for a boy, so we decided on her father's name instead" she explained.

Madara glanced at them for several moments, before bursting into laughter, much to the surprise of the gathered clan members.

The laughter brought that awful feeling on his skin once again – it wasn't fear, he knew fear inside out. He privately felt fear every time he used his chakra to form one of the family fire techniques, but this was something else. It was more - if equally - unpleasant, and for some reason horribly familiar.

The man stopped laughing, and turned an almost eager, direct gaze on his own eyes.

"How intriguing... How absolutely tantalizing! Well, congratulations, Sasuke. If your achievements so far are any indication, I think we can safely expect some great things from you."

He turned back to more important matters, like the Hyuugas and Senjus, finally allowing Sasuke to retake his seat on the tatami mats feeling worse than he had at the beginning of the meeting; when Madara mentioned his achievements, he didn't think he was talking about his element or his Sharingan.

Itachi gave his brother a curious look as they walked home; he didn't think anyone else had noticed, but something about Madara had set Sasuke on edge.

His brother was well enough trained to keep his emotions from showing in public, but he had noticed the almost subconscious way in which he had shrunk away from Madara as he had spoken to him. He didn't really understand that – Sasuke got along with most of the clan, partly for his element and strong, early Sharingan (signs of a strong future fighter), but mostly because he was just a nice kid.

Why did Sasuke seem to dislike Madara so much? The man was a little odd, but he was from a different time. It was explainable given how old he really was... Truth be told, he'd never been much of a fan of Madara himself, but he'd never had such a viscously distasteful reaction as Sasuke had (well, viscious to anyone but him).

It was like Sasuke's fear of fire; no one else could see it, but every time his brother practised the fire ball, or the phoenix flower technique, there was a sick revulsion that appeared in his eyes the minuet the flames appeared.

He had asked Sasuke about it once, but he hadn't been able to explain it himself. For some reason, he just hated fire. Both dislikes were strange, but still not without their own bias.

Sasuke was ten years old when his brother disappeared.

He was, at best, gloomy as he filed into the clan temple with the rest of the Uchihas, sliding in in one of the front rows beside his mother and father – there had been a mission into Hyuuga territory, deep into it. The dispatch had yet to return, and his brother was one of the people missing.

As was tradition, two weeks after going missing, the priest would hold a ceremony to invoke luck, to help the missing Uchihas find their way home; on the altar were offerings of certain flowering branches, nuts, certain yellow, orange, and other fiery coloured plants, all surrounding the bronze statue of a raging, nine tailed fox. They were changed every day.

Sasuke had never been too interested in religion, even as a young child his mind had been on other things, but he knew the basics: the offerings were a pleading appeasement to the guardian demon supposed to reside and watch over the Uchihas and the land they occupied. Apparently, the demon wasn't too genial towards its charges, so a lot of appeasement was required.

The older generation always begged Madara to make better offerings, fully convinced that the bad droughts and monsoons that wreaked havoc over most of their land were a result of low piety, but Madara remained adamant that the flowers and tree branches were enough, alongside the occasional few slices of tofu, and a chicken.

He listened in boredom as the priests droned on in a dull monotone, begging the guardian demon for assistance in guiding the lost clan members home, or to wherever else they were supposed to go. He didn't really believe a few old prunes' chanting and waving some daises and almond branches around was going to help his brother, but then again... It couldn't possibly hurt could it?

The part of his mind that always seemed to have a mind of its own (he sometimes thought it sounded like a woman) told him to stop being a worry wart. Deciding to be optimistic as instructed, he turned his gaze towards the pale blue, almost purple flames flames of blessed fire warily.

All thoughts of worry about Itachi disappeared as one of the priests touch the burning torch to the offerings. He had never liked fire – something only Itachi knew of – but he hated holy fire the most. It had an unnatural colour that always made him sick with irrational rage.

Everything about it was repugnant to him. The flames seared the petals, crackled and spat sparks as they scoured the bark of branches, licking the base of the idol in the centre of the flames. It was his first time to one of these holy ceremonies – there wasn't much call for them bar weddings and funerals, and his family were all still alive – but his first instinct was to douse those flames as they encroached the bronze fox.

The twisted expression of anger on the snarling jaws of the solid metal animal had been odd before, but as the flames flickered their eerie light, encroaching the statue, it looked more like a shrieking agony. A horribly deep-rooted agony that could only be felt from loss, not of life, but something else. He didn't realise he had been staring until he felt his breath tightening in his throat.

It felt like something was suffocating him; was this a panic attack? He'd never had one before...! He wasn't someone prone to panic. Besides, this wasn't just a simple shortness of breath; he could feel something bruising his skin as it tightened, forcing a sharp pain into the bones supporting his head.

This was awful, he could feel the air around him, but he couldn't breathe... His hands grasped at his throat, trying to remove whatever foreign obstruction was strangling him

'It's not real. Your imagination is feeding it. If you think about something else, it will pass. Think about something else. Think about anything. Think about my voice. Think Sasuke, Madara is looking your way!'

Sasuke thought about the voice of his mysterious female conscience. The more he thought about it, the more he began to wonder if it really was his conscience. She was always there, but he didn't seem to know what she was thinking the way she would if she was his conscience.

She was completely separate from him, but at the same time, she was not. She was not dangerous, irritable perhaps, and quick to turn so, but not dangerous. She actually looked after him, and cared about his welfare.

And familiar – so achingly familiar that he wondered how he had never noticed her as a separate entity before. He knew this person, this woman separate from but trapped inside his mind. He knew everything about her, but no matter how he tried, he couldn't grasp his own knowledge. Why couldn't he understand, remember?

'Not yet Sasuke. I'll tell you one day, but you aren't old enough yet. Train – train like you've never trained before, and wait. When Madara makes his move, You'll know, and that's when you'll be ready. I promise.'

In all the years he had known this voice to be part of him, which had been for as long as he could remember, he couldn't remember her breaking a single one of the few promises she had made. No matter how many dire straights he had fallen into, she had always led them out, even on that first solo mission into Senju territory.

She was a complete unknown, but she was the only person besides Itachi that he implicitly trusted. Perhaps, perhaps, he trusted this mysterious voice more than his brother.

"Sasuke! Sasuke, what happened? Are you all right?"

The strangling feeling was gone, and he saw his mother's face staring into his, any sense of public decorum replaced by panic. Even his stoic father was frowning more than usual as he stood beside her.

He could still feel the bruising on his neck, and judging from his mother's alarmed brush of fingers against the sore skin, they were visible too. Once she was certain he was not going to suffocate, she wrapped her arms around him.

"Oh thank god! It's bad enough with Itachi missing, I can't loose you too!" she sobbed.

Her let her hug him as he glanced towards Madara – he was shouting orders, presumably under the impression someone had used a technique on him and had infiltrated the main compound.

Sasuke caught the mixed expression of pensive thought, eagerness, and surprisingly, panic, amongst the age lines around his eyes. Sasuke didn't like that look, so he turned his attention back to his mother, hiding his face from the man's vision in her shoulder.

If Madara could see the ovular stars in his eyes that he had caught sight of, reflected in the bronze statue, things would have been awkward at the very least.

Two months after that ceremony, Itachi returned to the compound without anything more than a few scratches and the weariness of travel.

Sasuke could sense there was something a little different about his brother though, and he suspected it had not gone unnoticed by Madara either. Sasuke waited three days before deciding it was the right time to start questioning his brother. He waited until he was certain that Madara was out of the compound, before asking his brother what had really happened during his training session.

His brother was – unsurprisingly – unsurprised by the knowledge that his slight change had not been undetected by his younger sibling. They shared everything, and so he had no qualms about revealing his location for the past two months.

"Sasuke... I think I met a demon..."

It was like a bell clanging, a key fitting into a lock, finishing a childish board puzzle – the moment his brother spoke those words, he knew that the female mind that existed in the back of his own belonged to a demon of some kind.

It didn't alarm him really – he had always known there was something... beyond-human about her, and had considered demons once or twice in the past, but his brother's revelation was like confirmation.

"I was blundering around in the middle of Yamanaka land, trying to get back to the ravine leading to the west side of our territory, and she saved my life. I had been heading down the wrong ravine – you know how easy they are to get mixed up – and she stopped me before I hit Senju territory..." Itachi continued, a sense of amazement in his voice.

Sasuke didn't blame him. Demons kept to themselves – many of the kids his own age didn't even believe in them any more, but his mother was a bit of a superstitious one, so he and Itachi knew all the legends about them.

His namesake was supposed to have run into some bad business with the guardian of the Uchihas – something that had resulted in the horrible weather they had . Even the woman inside his head only spoke directly to him in times of importance. She never answered him unless she wanted to.

"Are you sure she was a demon?" he asked his brother.

Itachi frowned, before nodding.

"I think she was young though – she healed me, but she acted like she hadn't had much experience with it before, and her hair was pink. Not red, actually pink. I don't think she realised it wasn't a normal hair colour, and she didn't seem to know much about civilisation. She didn't even know what year it was... She was an absolute crybaby too..." he explained.

Sasuke thought about the voice in the back of his mind; there was always been an odd feeling of age with it. Everything she told him was as if it came from personal experience.

He didn't bother asking the voice herself; ever since that incident in the temple, she had been deathly silent, and Sasuke knew from his own experience that she was not going to answer him. He supposed the new epiphany would have to be enough for now.

Sasuke woke up drenched in sweat, feeling as if he had just been in the presence of a huge bonfire. Sitting up in his futon, he slid open the paper door leading to the outdoor walkway to get a breeze of cold October air.

This happened every year; on October 10th, for as long as he could remember, he had woken feeling hot and sweaty, and utterly lost, as if something of greater value than his life had been taken from him. The day was always just as bad.

He stared at the clouds covering the stars pensively; something was happening to him.

He was old enough to notice that now, to notice all the niggling little things besides the female demon that hadn't spoken to him since he was ten years old – two whole years now. He didn't really know what, or if it was dangerous, and he had no idea how Madara was involved in it, but he knew it had everything to do with the demon.

Itachi had been acting strange recently. Well, he had been acting strange since he returned from his mission and had a run in with a supposed demon of his own. He kept leaving on lone scouting missions into dangerous Yamanaka land, despite the risks that accompanied such a venture.

Sasuke knew he was visiting his rescuer, and while he was glad his brother had found someone (even if they were a demon), Madara had also noticed Itachi's recurring missions and absences from the clan meetings.

If he kept this up, the clan would send spies after him, if they hadn't already done so. He wouldn't put anything past the ancient man who led their clan – the man was a monster far worse than any demon. He knew that on pure instinct, and Sasuke had learned to listen to his instincts.

A noise from his parents' room drew his attention; it wasn't a good noise. It sounded like something being muffled. He recognised the clang of metal slicing through skin well enough from his own use of the Katana to put things together. He headed down the walkway, carefully to avoid being overheard by the attacker, before throwing open the door to his parents room.

What met his eyes was a scene of horror; the attacker had left through the inner doorway, but had left two bloodstained corpses behind him. Even before he rushed to his parents sides, pulling his mothers body towards him, he knew they were beyond help.

There was too much blood on the floor he knelt on, on the bodies, on the walls, on the familiar glinting sword that he had left in the entryway just that afternoon.

Dropping his mother gently back to the floor, he stumbled over the floorboards and picked it up; that was his sword. It was a relic from his namesake, the Kusanagi. His mother and father had given it to him once the trainers had deemed him at a mediocre level of use with normal swords, and now it was covered in their blood.

When Madara makes his move, You'll know, and that's when you'll be ready. I promise.

The words flickered through his mind, an almost distant memory, but he finally understood what they meant. Madara had done this – for whatever reason, Madara had ordered the execution of his parents. Maybe he had done it himself. He wasn't really certain.

The next thing he knew, he was surrounded by appalled and horrified clansmen beside the bodies of his parents, covered in their blood, and equally stained sword in hand.

Yup. Another new story. I set it in the clan wars this time, with demon folklore! Another challenge - next I'm thinking a crime story... Well, technically I've already started writing it but not on the computer - it has some wrinkles to be ironed out first. As far as I know the only other main pairings in this are going to be ShikaIno and... Oh, and past SasuIno... ish. Possibly some NejiHina too.

Title is 'My Guardian Angel' by Red Jumpsuit Apparatus.

Anyways, hope you liked it.
Nat.
xxx