Hinata paused after reading the note in her hand.

Hinata maybe stopped loving Naruto a year or two prior to this shitstorm she called a life. "Stopped loving" was a strong phrase, she realized. She still loved Naruto, deep in her heart. Love like that can't simply dissipate like gas from her soul, where it reached and took hold and arrested her. But the love mutated. Poisoned by disappointment, angst, and, like everything in Konoha…by Sasuke Uchiha.

Naruto's chasing after Sasuke did not end well. Sasuke returned to the village a serial murderer, and Naruto returned forever destroyed by his quest to bring his friend back.

Little did Naruto know that his friend was killed on the battlefield.

No, Hinata mused, Sasuke died much earlier than that…

Naruto had been stupidly trying to resurrect ghosts for years. The villagers, his elders, his friends, for a time, goaded him on the entire way. They all believed that Naruto's transformative power—the power to take the worst scum of the Earth and make them into diamonds—could reach the likes of Sasuke, a snake bent on eating himself.

And Naruto's naivety, coupled with the world's complacency, killed Naruto, too.

Now, there is no one Naruto hates more than Sasuke.

Except maybe himself.

Naruto's light was extinguished by love. He loved Sasuke so much he died as a result. To die as a result of love: Hinata knew that in physical form. She imagined now that…the physical pain of life sacrifice is nothing like the pain of sacrificing your soul. Dying is easier than that.

So she "stopped loving" Naruto, because she was too cowardly to even attempt what he had done. She would let Naruto have everything—her mind, her body, her youth—but she could not sacrifice her soul. Not anymore.

Maybe that's what Hinata thought was so unforgivable out of all of this. Out of the countless victims Sasuke claimed, the most treacherous and horrible of them all had to be Naruto. The man who put Sasuke above and beyond all else was Sasuke's most famous and mutilated victim.

Here I go again, Hinata thought, acting as if Naruto's dead.

He may as well have been.

He may as well have been.

His loud, cheerful voice replaced by silence. His smile replaced by blank stares. The bright blue of his eyes replaced numbing gray. Tired eyes barely had the strength of will behind them to stay open.

She remembers the day, when Sakura and Naruto were together last. Sakura had gone to Naruto in search of the comfort he'd always been willing to offer her. Naruto had just been told the news of the murders, and had come to terms with the idea that Sasuke was irredeemable.

He looked at Sakura with ragged, yet passionately empty eyes and said, "I hate him."

Hinata will never forget what his voice sounded like. Full of angst and gravel and pain and hate and emptiness and glass.

I hate him.

Naruto's love for Sasuke wasn't gone, but like Hinata's for him, it mutated. This mutation was a defense mechanism, to prevent Konoha's golden boy from turning to rusted copper. Worn by a love that would never be reciprocated.

It was too late, however. The rusting had begun the moment Naruto said those words.

Sakura turned away from him, and Hinata shed tears. She mourned the loss of Naruto's light.

That was the worst thing about this.

As far as Hinata was concerned, Sasuke murdered the love of her life.

xXx

Hinata visited Sasuke again. He sat in his hospital bed. Upright. He glanced passively at his hands.

"Sakura died here…" Hinata stated bluntly when she entered the room.

"She died right next to your bed as you slept. Killed herself."

Sasuke never looked up from his hands.

"You're a worthless, disgusting piece of shit who didn't deserve the friends he had,"—she inched closer to his bed—"Sakura and Naruto are shells…burnt husks of the people they were before."

He looked up at this. His eyes looked…downcast.

"But so are you," she twisted a nearby chair to face her, so that she could sit. The metal legs scraped loudly against the floor.

"You killed…the love of my life," she began again, "Maybe not physically…but he's gone. The Naruto you and I both knew died. Years ago."

Sasuke could only look at her.

"Whether you confess to these crimes or not…I will make sure you suffer for the rest of the shitty days you have left of your horrible existence."

Hinata took a breath and threw her head down towards her lap.

Not looking up, she said through clenched teeth, "I know you didn't kill these other people and I'm starting to think you have no clue who is actually responsible,"—her heart ached as tears threatened to fall—"but I swear to God, Uchiha Sasuke"—she reached for his hand and grabbed his index finger, pressing it lightly, as if to comfort him—"if you don't help me find who put my sister in the hospital, grasping onto the last bit of life she has left in her"—in one swift motion, Hinata yanked on the appendage downward and hard until she and Sasuke heard it crack—"I will make your last days a living nightmare!"

Sasuke shouted in pain, but no one came around the corner to check what was wrong.

She pulled a crumpled up note out of her pocket as Sasuke shouted, and shoved the paper down his open mouth. A part of her hoped he would choke.

"By the time you pull that out of your mouth," Hinata began as she headed for the door, "your saliva would render it illegible, so I'll tell you what it says."

Sasuke looked at Hinata Hyuuga, this formerly timid, scared little girl, in abject horror.

"It says that my sister was found in the forest where your old killing spot used to be, near death. Naruto found her."

Hinata could not fight the tears any longer, and let them spill, "And when I read that, all I could think was Naruto found her…and I thought maybe he attacked her.

"Maybe your sick, twisted ways got to him so much he decided to carry it out in your stead, rather than lose you. Rather than lose his purpose as your defender!

"And then I thought, that could not be the case. What makes more sense is that Naruto has been fucked up by you in the same way Sakura was. Disgusted and enraged by you, yet they love you all the same. So they visit you in hospitals and find a closeness to you at your murder sites because they are pathetically trying to find something, some kind of closure."

Hinata smiled in spite of herself, "They are your greatest victims."

As she reached for the door handle, Sasuke mumbled to her, "I'll help you."

He added, "Just don't talk about them anymore."

I think it's been a couple years since I've updated this. Since then, I've grown as a writer and don't think this story at all reflects my growth. However, I will work towards finishing it regardless. I feel bad for leaving this story behind to the point where I don't remember my original vision for it.

I've fallen victim to works that haven't been updated in years as well, haha, so I understand the frustration. However, because of my ideas and the lack of feedback, I thought this story just...wasn't good. Regardless, there is a following for it so I will try and finish. Thanks to those who have read, and please give feedback if you can.

~M.o.t.C