Chapter Text
The small child that comes back from the hospital isn’t the same as before.
One could imagine it was due to the unfathomable trauma of watching their older brother commit a massacre, and while that is true, one would also have to delve deep into the child’s mind to find the true reason. From there, they would realize their misconception.
For this was not a child’s mind anymore. It was…something else.
It was akin to different parts tugged together, like homemade rags, stitches ripping apart at the seams.
Yet it’s in this state that Sasuke finds herself, walking towards a home that is hers but not quite. As she opens the door and sees the mess, she can’t quite comprehend why no one bothered to clean up her mother and father’s blood, why she has to grab bleach and inhale the sharp fumes as she scrubs and scrubs the tatami mats. So forgive her if she is more than a little confused, because the last thing she remembers is standing on a stool. Yet here she is, sixteen yet seven. Two minds smushed together haphazardly like a toddler mixing red and green playdough.
A girl out of her world, a boy who can’t seem to stop crying. No longer individuals, one in the same.
It doesn’t take long for her to realize that the bloodstains were everywhere, not just in the house.
Sasuke couldn't do much about it, like how she couldn’t do much about her quickening breaths every time she managed to find a spare body part.
Although, as time passes, even the random fingers and pieces of skin start to become mundane.
She picks them up and tosses them in a gardening bucket, as if they were stray worms on the street. Later, she’ll place them in her neighbor's dusty fire pit, watching the reds and yellows consume flesh.
Sasuke knew that setting these pieces of her clan aflame wouldn't stop anything. Danzo had definitely already gotten his disgusting paws on her family's corpses. Yet, it was almost calming to watch the rotting skin burn away, therapeutic knowing that at least he wouldn’t get these specific remains.
And while she couldn’t recall the parting rites or rituals, she did remember attending a funeral in which an elder was burned. So perhaps every Uchiha funeral was the same, and all would be burned like ancient kings? It made sense, as her clan certainly enjoyed their fires.
Maybe one day, if she ever saw her brother once more, she’d ask.
Sometimes Sasuke wouldn’t, no, couldn’t get up.
She’d lay in bed, blanket up to her chin, simply staring at the ceiling. If she didn’t blink for a while and allowed her vision to blur, Sasuke would notice the ceiling patterns shift. They would tilt to the side, and sometimes lean towards her. Just your mind playing tricks, her friend used to say. It happens to me all the time, too!
When she slept however, it wasn’t bursts of imagination that filled her dreams. It was clear as day that these weren’t random stories created by her mind or tricks to scare. They were images of the past mixed with wishes. Memories of being sixteen, a pencil in her hand and the television playing faintly in the background as she drew in her sketchbook. Memories of holding a kunai in her palm, her brother gently correcting her bent wrist. Of watching her brother slice through her mother and father and oh god, Nii-san? What are you doing? What’s going on?
Then she’d wake up and stare at the ceiling, watching the patterns tilt and turn like always.
Bathing was supposed to be relaxing, a way to cleanse yourself of sins and grime.
But for Sasuke? It was painful. It meant having to come face to face with a body that was familiar, yet wrong. A body in which she grew up in, but that didn’t exactly click with her brain.
So she’d be quick about it. Hastily washing herself then running out the bathroom as if she was a missing nin about to be captured by ANBU. Going to the bathroom wasn’t fun either, though slightly easier.
Nonetheless, she often found herself standing in front of a mirror. Examining her child-like face or touching the back of her hair and wondering how it could puff up like that without hairspray. She’d also poke the weird warmth in her body, feeling how she could force it to stay in one spot or twist to go in the opposite direction. Lifting her finger, she pulled down her left eyelid. Then, with a push of the warmth in her body, her eyes flickered red.
It was like she could see her Chakra bubbling around her eyes. The energy faintly reminded her of angry rain clouds, threatening to burst from their crevices. Leaning closer to the mirror, she focused her attention on her left eye, all while ignoring how her movements felt so painfully slow. Practically with her lashes touching the mirror itself, Sasuke took note of the blood vessels in the whites of her eye that looked about ready to pop. Which made sense, because quite frankly Sasuke was starting to feel a headache coming and goddamnit, what if you get Chakra exhaustion?
She shoved the warmth away, a hiss escaping her lips as pain exploded behind her eyes. Slamming her lids closed, she brought her palms up to roughly rub at them, hoping to relieve the sharp pain. Countless breaths passed before Sasuke even attempted to open them again. Her vision was slightly blurry, but adjusted quickly to the light. Blinking owlishly at the mirror, all that stared back was a child with puffy midnight eyes with a serious case of eyebags.
Sasuke sighed.
That could’ve gone better.