Divinity

- Chapter One -

A Mess is Made

: :

Had Sakura known how unbelievably dusty the museum was, she might have had second thoughts about applying for the job.

Ok, sure, a little dust was to be expected. Yeah, it was one part museum, one part library (though they didn't rent out books, which was a shame) and 99% of the contents of the museum were old as shit.

But, seriously, when was the last time someone grabbed a feather duster?

Muffling a sneeze in her elbow, Sakura frowned to herself and finished dusting off the tops of the M books, tossing her ruined rag into the cart with all the others. Leaning back slightly on her ladder, she admired her work for a moment before giving it a nod of approval and climbing back down to the ground. Turning back to her cart, she quirked an eyebrow at a book that some visitor must have left for her to put up, sitting inconspicuously on a corner.

Rolling her eyes, Sakura grabbed the book and checked the spine – "Surviving the Outdoors: Helpful Remedies from Common Plants?" – one hand on the cart as she headed towards the 500 section.

The library was by no means as large as the actual museum part, but Sakura was still inwardly glad that she had spent that free period senior year as the librarian's aide. The curator of the museum had no patience for training new employees with anything other than the basics (and Sakura liked to think that she had impressed him with her Dewey Decimal System knowledge), so she was left mainly to her own devices while she kept the library in order.

Speaking of the curator…

Sakura paused as she rounded a bookshelf corner, watching as the red-haired curator hurried past the entrance to the library and down a hall, eyes pinned to a clipboard as he made his way undoubtedly to his office.

She was a little ashamed to admit that the source of her initial interest in the job was Mr. Sourpuss himself.

Yeah, ok, he was kind of cute. But Akasuna-san (as he preferred to be called – "I have no desire for any form of familiarity, Miss Haruno") turned out to be pretty damn insufferable. Fortunately, she didn't really see him that often. Sasori was pretty busy running the museum and being a reclusive shut-in in his office.

But, besides grouchy red-heads and dust bunnies the size of dogs, the job was pretty fantastic.

Well, maybe Sakura just thought so since she was a History major.

She was really looking forward to when Sasori would promote her to working in the actual museum part. Hopefully before the end of the year, considering she was just here until December for a nice gap year to earn some money before heading back to university life.

Ah, yes, the pay. It was pretty nice considering she'd just been dusting shelves and putting books away the past two weeks.

Eyes scanning the spines of the books, she searched for Surviving the Outdoors' spot before quickly finding it's empty space. Humming to herself, she grabbed a fresh rag and was fully intent on heading back to finish her dusting when the gongs of the grandfather clock at the entrance to the library rang out.

"Geeze," Sakura muttered, checking her phone to verify the time, "7 already? Where'd the day go…"

Shrugging to herself, she tossed the rag back onto the cart and wheeled it towards the supply room for the library, meticulously storing everything away before she was satisfied and headed to the employees lounge.

Lounge was a strong word. It was just the main backroom of the museum with a vending machine, break table, and the sign-in clock. Sakura was just about to step into the lounge when she heard someone call her name behind her, inwardly groaning as she recognized it as Sasori's.

"Ah, Haruno, there you are."

She turned to face him as he walked down the hall towards her, two cardboard boxes stacked in his arms.

"Yes, Akasuna-san?" She had a bad feeling about this.

He nonchalantly deposited the boxes in her arms, ignoring her moment of fumbling in favor of pulling a small notepad out of his pocket and scribbling something down, waving her off.

"Go take those down to storage," Sasori ordered, paying her very little attention, "the holiday section in the back. Finally found the last of the winter decorations…"

Sasori didn't wait for an answer and Sakura found a small victory in sticking her tongue out at him childishly once he turned his back, headed back down the hallway as he muttered to himself. Sighing, she juggled the boxes for a moment to pull out her phone, checking the time again. The museum closed at 7pm, sharp, but Sasori didn't lock the backdoor until 7:30. Plenty of time to get rid of this junk and beat him to the door before he gave her any other errands.

There weren't really that many other employees, but, they were all long gone by now and the walk to the storage basement was silent, the only sound being that of Sakura's footsteps. Freeing a hand to open the door to the storage area took a little effort and she groaned at the dim light.

Taking the steps carefully, she bee-lined for the back of the creepy basement, careful not to bump into any of the other storage boxes. Sakura eventually found the holiday section, nudging a fake jack-o-lantern to the side as she searched for a spot for her boxes.

"There's so much junk here." she mumbled, finding a nice perch for the boxes before grabbing her phone and holding it up for better light. She took a moment to scan the room, giving a low whistle at the mountains of boxes and shelves she could see.

Feeling her phone vibrate in her hand, Sakura took a step back to check her messages. A quick reply sent to her mother, she turned to leave, cursing softly as her foot caught on some tinsel that had escaped the box.

The box came tumbling down and she let out a surprised yelp, quickly trying to catch it before anything fell out.

Fortunately, everything stayed mostly inside the box. Except for a lone Christmas ornament that, luckily, didn't break as it hit the ground.

Instead, it rolled off out of sight and Sakura cursed again.

Making sure the box would stay put, she hurried after the run-away ornament, pausing as she realized it had been caught in the crack of a just-barely-opened door. Frowning to herself, she held her phone light up to read the sign on the door, curiosity getting the better of her.

"Old Exhibits? I didn't know they stored some of the actual museum stuff down here…"

A glance to her phone told her that it was just 10 minutes past 7.

Plenty of time to do a little snooping.

Glancing back down the storage hall, she nudged open the door a little further and stepped into a quaint, but stuffy room. Hand searching the wall blindly for a light switch, she managed to turn on the lights, the room illuminated gently.

With a quick glance around, she spotted a few taxidermied animals, what looked to be the decorations for an Egyptian Pharaoh exhibit, a few boxes, and some old paintings displayed on the left wall.

Eyebrows quirked, she stepped a little closer to examine the paintings.

"Time to put my major to work! Let's see if I can recognize anything."

They all seemed to be part of the same exhibit, or at least the same theme. Sakura recognized the art as Renaissance era and, crouching down as her foot bumped something, she found a plaque with dates and, presumably, the title of the collection.

"16th century," she read aloud, walking further into the room, "The Eight Miracles. Doesn't really sound familiar."

Sure enough, however, she counted 8 paintings in total. She made her way to the end of the room, intending to work her way back up and leave once she'd looked at all the paintings.

The first was of a knight, stereotypical shining armor and sword held up in the midst of an attack. She squinted through the soft light to pick out details of the knights face. The painting was depicting a moment of some battle obviously, the knight poised to strike. His helmet seemed to have been knocked off, laying a few feet behind him.

Chewing on the inside of her cheek, she held up her phone again, eyes picking out the details of the knights expression. Well, what she could see of his expression. The lower half of his face was obscured by a cloth mask. Unfortunate addition – she had a feeling he might have been a handsome knight. Grey hair, yes, but he definitely didn't look like some old man.

Stepping back, she gave the painting a once over before pausing, eyebrows furrowed.

The armor wasn't quite… right. A little more staring and she finally realized that the armor had a slight samurai vibe to it. She looked over the background of the painting and realized that the setting was definitely Japanese, cherry blossom trees in the distance.

Odd.

"I know Japanese armor started adopting European characteristics around the 16th century," she mused, hand on her hip as she moved to the next painting, "But not to that degree…"

She glanced back to the silver knight, frowning to herself.

"Are these really from the 16th century?"

The next painting was another of a knight in battle, as were the next five. All of the knights seemed to be participating in the same battle, if the setting in the background was any clue, though there was no enemy that Sakura could see.

Still, all the armor seemed to be a mix between European knights and Japanese samurai.

Sakura paused, staring at the painting of a woman knight, hair tied up in a bun as she took a knee, apparently catching her breath in the midst of the battle.

"It's gotta be a work of fiction. Her hair is blue." Subconsciously, she reached up to tuck a few stray strands of pink hair behind her ear. Ok, so maybe blue hair wasn't entirely implausible.

"Speaking of hair," she continued with a soft laugh, "this guys' is ridiculous."

Sure enough, this particular knight's hair was just laughably long, nearly down to his knees and just a big, wild mess of black locks flowing majestically in the wind. Still, the knight looked oddly familiar… She couldn't quite place why, but his face seemed kind of familiar. Maybe he was someone famous and she'd seen art of him before.

Shrugging to herself, Sakura looked over the six paintings once more, from the silver knight, to the brunet with the face guard, then the blue haired woman, the one with white hair and stunning sea-foam eyes (arguably the youngest of the group), and the knight with the long black hair, gaze lingering on the only knight that still had his helmet on.

His armor almost looked blue and he was, by far, the largest of the knights. Sakura gave a nod of approval at the build – "What a wall of guy." – before eyeing his ridiculously large sword with a raised eyebrow. No way that was actually a weapon someone was capable of wielding.

Oddly enough, as she looked over the faces of the other knights, she could tell that they were all of Asian descent. This was so weird… Why would art of Japanese warriors – knights? – be in Renaissance-style paintings?

Rubbing the back of her neck, Sakura moved on to the last two paintings.

She stopped for a moment, however, as the battle scene seemed to have ended with the previous six. The last two paintings were more like portraits, the knights obviously depicted as posing for the artist. Whoever this odd artist was.

The second to the last was of another woman knight. She stood tall and proud, facing the viewer with a stern, battle-ready look on her face and her blonde hair pulled back. One hand rested on top of what looked like some kind of tall box, the other holding the hilt of her sheathed sword. She looked fairly young, in Sakura's opinion, maybe around early twenties.

Sakura was only 23, but it's not like she was going into battle any time soon.

Shrugging, she moved on to the last of the paintings.

This was certainly the odd one of the bunch.

While the other paintings had all been full body depictions of the knights, this one was a simple torso portrait. The eighth knight also faced the viewer, smiling slightly – almost knowingly with this odd arrogant look that kind of ticked Sakura off – and making unnerving eye contact. His black hair matched his black eyes and, while there was definitely more detail in his face than in the other knights, it was kind of disappointing how… boring he looked compared to the others.

Pursing her lips, Sakura gave the painting another once over before stopping, gaze zeroing in on what appeared to be a paintbrush in the knights hand.

Obviously this guy was a knight, what with the armor, but maybe this was also a self-portrait of the artist? An artist knight? Kinda weird but, ok.

Sakura was pulled from her thoughts as her phone buzzed again and, with a start, she realized it was already 7:25.

"Shit, I didn't realize how long I'd been looking at the paintings."

Quickly replying to her mother's text, she made her way towards the door of the room, glancing back at the paintings before pausing for a moment. The painting of the artist knight was kind of crooked…

Sighing, she quickly moved back to the portrait, carefully grabbing a corner of the frame and adjusting it until it was parallel like the others.

Only, the moment she let go of the wood, she let out a surprised yelp, her fingers shocked suddenly as if she'd touched metal.

She squinted at the frame in distaste. Did wood normally do that?

"Whatever, I gotta get home."

She'd only taken a step towards the door when she head a low groan, like the kind you hear in old houses when the wind blows on dark, spooky nights.

Sakura paused, glancing back at the painting curiously. She waited a moment and, seconds later, there was the sound of straining wood again. Ok, spooky.

Starting to feel a little unsettled, she took a cautious step back, eyes pinned to the painting. The groan sounded again and, this time, with it came movement.

As in, movement in the painting.

Like, something behind the painting pushing out on the canvas.

Frozen in place, Sakura continued to stare with wide eyes, watching in horror as the canvas of the painting bulged and stretched outwards in places, the image of the knight distorting. There were more groans and she swore the temperature of the room dropped by several degrees.

Holy shit, was this how she was going to die?

She managed another step backwards, the canvas continuing to stretch and strain as whatever was behind – in? – tried to get out. All of the force finally focused on the center and, breath caught in her throat, the canvas tore.

All at once, black water began to gush out of the tear and Sakura scrambled backwards, tripping over her feet and falling onto her rear. She was instantly aware of the scent of ink and, with a small gasp, she realized it wasn't water pouring out of the painting, but ink.

She nearly screamed as the gush of ink suddenly surged into a flood, the large puddle under the portrait spreading further as the ink flowed out, just inches from her. Still facing the huge puddle of ink, she scrambled backwards until her back was pressed against one of the taxidermied animals, quickly pulling her feet closer and away from the ink.

The flood slowed to a trickle before finally stopping, a few drops still dripping from the shredded edges of the canvas. Her grip on her phone tightened and she watched the puddle still, her heart pounding in her chest.

Sakura glanced up at the ruined painting, letting out a surprised gasp.

The knight was gone.

There was a moment of silence, Sakura unsure what to do, before the ink suddenly began to move. It retreated backwards, the edges of the puddle pulling in until the ink started to rise off of the ground, forming an ambiguous shape in the air.

With bated breath, Sakura watched as the huge glob of paint shifted and bubbled, slowly taking form.

When the ink finally stilled, it was in the shape of a person, crouched over slightly as if they were taking a knee. Sakura stared with wide eyes before she was forced to look away, a blindingly bright flash of light suddenly bursting from the center of the ink form.

Rubbing at her eyes, she looked back to see not ink, but an actual person.

The room was silent again, the temperature raising back to what it had been, and Sakura could have sworn her heart had stopped.

The person slowly straightened, standing to their – his – full height, eyes closed as he stood for a moment.

Hands shaking slightly, Sakura realized it was the artist knight from the painting.

"What the fuck." She whispered, immediately regretting speaking as the knights eyes snapped open.

He looked around the room slowly before his gaze stopped on her, lips slowly curling into that insufferable smile. He took a shaky step forward and Sakura scrambled to her feet, backing away as far as she could.

The freaky knight opened his mouth to speak but was caught by a cough, hunching slightly as he tried to catch his breath. He took another stumbling step and Sakura quickly inched away, the two of them basically switching places as he stumbled forwards to the wall for support and she moved as far away as possible while still heading towards the door, back to the wall of paintings. She bumped the ruined portrait with her shoulder and it was knocked from its hold, falling to the ground with a soft thud. The knight braced himself against the wall, taking deep, shaky breaths.

She felt kind of bad for the guy, he seemed so out of it and that armor looked kind of heavy.

But, still, what the fuck was going on?

The knight seemed to regain his composure after a few moments and turned to face her, holding his hands up slowly as if to calm her. He took a moment to clear his throat before opening his mouth to speak again.

Only this time, he was interrupted as the door to the room suddenly swung open, hitting him in the face as it opened inward and hid him from view behind it.

Sakura gave a surprised shout, jumping in shock before noticing an annoyed looking Sasori standing in the doorway.

"Haruno, what the hell is taking you so long down here? Do you have any idea what time it is!"

"S-sasori! I-" she stammered, hand on her chest as her heart pounded.

"No excuses! What are you even do-" He stopped short, however, as he noticed the painting behind her.

Sasori stared for a moment, gaze shifting from annoyed, to horrified, to pretty damn pissed.

"What did you do?!"

He stormed towards her and, desperately, Sakura glanced towards the door, struggling to explain to Sasori. She stepped away from the wall, the painting falling face down.

"Sasori! Th-there's – the painting! It-"

"Do you have any idea how old this is?!" He interrupted, crouching down to grab the frame. "It's from the 16th century! And you've ruined it! This collection has been in my family's care for nearly five hundred years, I-"

He stopped mid-sentence as he lifted the painting up, noticing that the torn canvas was blank.

Sasori was silent for a moment and Sakura stumbled further back into the room, wide eyes glancing from Sasori to the door.

The curator's expression returned to one of horror and the door slowly began to close. He stood, turning to see the knight standing there, his hand on the door as he pushed it shut.

Sasori stared at the knight with the same horrified look Sakura had and she felt oddly relieved, taking a step towards the red-head.

Only, Sasori's gaze snapped to her, sending Sakura an intense, accusing look.

"You didn't."

: :

notes: ok so I initially planned on updating other stuff before I started on this bu t I had too much inspiration that I didn't want to lose so here we are

gonna try to get a few chapters of this out and then work on updates for other fics!

the knights, if it wasn't too clear, are: Sai, Temari, Kakashi, Yamato, Kimimaro, Madara, Kisame, and Konan. so expect plenty of multisaku goodness with these guys in the future (plus possibly some sasosaku, though I gotta be careful cause if I put too much sasosaku in itll be all I focus on)!

thanks for reading, I hope you enjoyed it! please leave a review if you did!