LONG A/N: So, I've kinda been writing this Anko-centric thing for a while now. The muses have been kind, but also somewhat cruel, in their operation within my brain. I've got about 9500 words written on subjects that keep jumping around against my will. There's an odd span of half-written instances (which I do intend on finishing, just over time and in fragments o.O), spanning from Anko's last conversation with Orochimaru as student and sensei, Anko's stay in ANBU care after his defection, her inevitable 'house arrest' afterwards... Her 'friendship' with Kurenai as teenagers, her strange relationship with Kakashi... --skip skip skip-- Her likeness to Sasuke, and totally cracked-out coincidental meetings between the two in the future.
Uh, anyway, within all this mess I have finished one section. And I decided that it'd make a decent prologue before I go back to the beginning.
So, yeah, I hope you guys enjoy this? Let me know if there's anything weird about it or hard to understand (because lord knows my mind constructs some intensely horrible sentence structure). ;)
Here we go-- my 'whatever' which is being tentatively called 'Oracle' for the time-being, because I kinda like it but I'm sure there's a better title to be had elsewhere and it's escaping me---------!
O R A C L E
Prologue
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'For Want of a Nail the Shoe Was Lost...'
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She'd known.
Like some brand of cursed oracle, all mind and no heart, his path was very, very clear to her. The moment she found out that the brat had received the mark- she'd fucking known the consequence before anyone else had even a chance to begin considering it.
And it disgusted her. From the burning on her own shoulder right down to her very core.
If she's considered jaded, she thinks- then what does that make him?
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"Do you know what you're doing?" Her uncharacteristically neutral voice drifts from her leaning position just outside the gates.
He's already taken that step. He's past the threshold now, but he can still turn back. And she's pretty sure he's detected this in her inquiry.
His pause disconcerts her momentarily; but his crimson stare, which bores into her eyes unwavering, most certainly does not.
"I do."
Spoken with the clarity only a man looking nowhere but forward can capture.
Anko steps out from the shadows then, her form cutting into the streaks of moonlight filtering through the trees and pins him under here own stare. She may not have eyes which practically glow in the darkness like some type of beast's, and she may not have the kekkai genkai so bloated with lore that powerful men salivate just thinking about it...
What she does have, however, are the eyes of a woman who has seen and experienced a lifetime too soon and lived to tell about it.
And perhaps there is nothing more powerful than eyes like those.
Sasuke seems to accept this notion easily enough, despite the adrenaline trying to push his body into a full-on sprint. For a moment all he notices is the way she seems to pick him apart under her gaze-- and the way his cursed seal itches as if new again.
(There is a particular, undeniable clarity brought about the moment she removes her hitai-ate and lets it fall to the earth.)
She steps up to him then, close enough that her trench-coat seems to billow around him as if it were arms dragging him nearer for secrecy.
In a way, it is. There is an atmosphere of urgency filtering through the tension surrounding them, hiding them for just long enough-- so that true contact can be made.
So when her long fingers are playing across the seal on his neck, as if touching the delicate strings of a harp, he does not flinch or turn away. Especially not when he notes the way her other hand is clasped over her own neck, over her own burden.
For a long moment, they simply hold one another's gaze, unmoving, taking in a silent conversation. His eyes have long since turned back to their natural inky color, but hers are still as razor sharp as ever.
There's an important lesson here, he realizes. And he sucks it all up like so many scrolls found hidden in his late father's study.
Anko speaks again, slowly and lightly this time, her breath ghosting over his brow as she levels her face with his in a way that would have been cause for discomfort any other time.
"Do. You. Know?"
It's the same question again; but it's marked with a different kind of connotation this time.
Which is of course not lost on Sasuke. He knows. He knows exactly what she means and-- by the ache on his shoulder, down to his very core --it's all much clearer than it's been in a long time.
(If the second-to-last living Uchiha is anything, he is unwaveringly loyal to causes such as these.)
So he smirks that trademark smirk, reaches back behind his head to tangle his fingers amidst hair the color of their twilight backdrop, and lets his own hitai-ate slide away from his forehead to land with a muted thud on the ground between them.
They're not two Konoha shinobi anymore, you see. Not like this. They're just two people with similar goals, similar strife carved into their pasts.
"I do."
She steps away then with her own matching smile, just as broken and heartless as his own. For a second she honestly wants to speak with him longer, make sure that he truly sees just how treacherous his new path will be... However, somewhere deep down she has faith that he already knows all about it; perhaps he's been identifying with it far longer than she could ever be totally aware of.
"It won't be easy," she says instead.
He will be a traitor like she once was-- but in her clear opinion, a 'traitor' with a goal spun from gold is not really a traitor at all.
Adversely, she once had one as well; though the differences are staggering because hers were constructed of thorns and shit, and it's something she'll have hanging over her head until the day her body is introduced to the earth.
His will be not without regret, of course-- no real goal is ever free of such things --but it will be just and it will be of honor. Because along his road towards vengeance on a man who utterly destroyed his life; he will also be getting revenge for a woman who he perhaps has entirely too much in common with for it to be coincidence.
(They both know she is caged far too tightly to ever avenge for herself-- and that, though something he doesn't actually have in common with her, is still something he can respect.)
With a nod of understanding he steps away, turning his back to her and setting his eyes on the tree-tops.
"That girl will cry."
He nods again, never averting his eyes.
"That idiot will probably cry, too."
For a split-second he tenses then relaxes all the same and inclines his head, this time turning to direct a knowing look over his shoulder. They exchange another pause before he leaps using sure feet onto the nearest tree branch, one hand hanging low in front of him to rest fingertips near his toes, the other smoothing the rough bark belonging to the trunk which unknowingly supports his first real steps into history.
Anko bends to pick up his discarded hitai-ate, smoothing her thumb over the cold, metal plate as she grips it, and calls out to him.
He must have been losing himself somewhere in that maze he calls thoughts, because for a second he seems startled. His body remains low and crouched as he turns back inquisitively.
She chucks his only reminder, his only signature binding him to Konoha other than the crest on his back, straight into his outstretched hands.
He'd almost forgot-- it wasn't his intention to leave completely naked, after all.
"Don't forget where you came from," she half whispers, just loud enough for the breeze to carry her voice far enough for the boy to hear. "And..."
Sasuke stops in his actions of tying the symbol back onto his forehead, listening-- truly listening --for what will probably be the last time for many years to come. He raises an eyebrow at her continuation.
"... make him suffer."
Anko is sure her statement applies to more than one monstrosity in the mind of the boy-- no, man --who's back she watches disappear into the foliage after one last smirk, nod, and words of understanding.
"I will."
There is no truer sentiment she can reflect on at that moment above his simple decree. The promise of violence, the promise of revenge. Despite his age it seemed as though he had been born to say those words on that very night outside the gates of Konoha; back emblazoned with the Uchiha Clan crest and an impossibly far reach to his vision. Always looking ahead, forward.
Purpose.
As Anko ties her own symbol of belonging-- but also closes the temporary opening to her self-inflicted cage --into place... She realizes that she's never been so sure about anything in her life bar a few epiphanies here and there.
But this is no self-realization.
This is no sudden epiphany.
This is faith.
(And if Anko is anything, just as the Uchiha now running towards his own destiny seeped in blood and hardship, she is faithful in causes such as these.)
All she can do now is wait. And blunt truth be told, she is a master at this technique as well.
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As she walks back to her empty apartment along the cobbled streets, empty and quiet just how she prefers them, she realizes something that only half-disturbs her.
Over all the years-- after all the time that have passed, the trusted partners she's acquired, the missions good and bad, the respect that's blossomed from within her, the appreciation she's realized... After all these things, she realizes: underneath it all she's still that lonely 12-year-old girl left behind on a forest trail, blindly throwing kunai at the back of a man who'd broken so many things upon his sudden departure.
Twelve years later she hasn't really changed at all-- only adapted. Whether this is good or bad escapes her entirely.
For now Anko can only hope that when her time finally comes there really won't be anyone or anything she'll have to answer to.
TBC...