Blood of the Broken, Scars of the Spiral (there are whirlpools in our veins)

Chapter Twenty Nine

IMPORTANT!!! This chapter requires context, so make sure you've read Chapter 28 before you read this one. Also, it is more graphic than usual, so reader discretion is advised. 

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Naruto kept his eyes closed. He wished he could retreat back to his mindscape but he couldn't do that to Shin.

"You may reveal only one piece of information," he had been told, "and that is your code name– Koshin."

He had been given another piece of information, a string of numbers, and had been told that if he revealed them, then they would stop interrogating him and Shin. But to reveal them would mean failure.

Failure was unacceptable.

Naruto had long-since learned his lesson about trying to step in Shin's place, to stop him from being punished. Watching his partner's head be held under water over and over, watching him be whipped, watching them break his fingers... it was so much worse than having that very same torture inflicted on himself, and that, he believed, was the entire point of this horrific ordeal.

He watched numbly in his restraints as Shin's face was forced again and again into the tub of water. Resistance to Interrogation, or RTI training, was so far easily the worst part about Root. Every couple of weeks he and Shin would be escorted away from Usagi and Koi and taken to some type of cell where they would be 'interrogated'. The first few times Naruto had broken quickly; he could deal with the pain being inflicted by the interrogators upon himself, but witnessing Shin being tortured had broken him every time. That was, until he realised that every time he broke, the next time it would be worse for his partner.

He'd gotten better at staying silent after that.

Eventually, Shin was pulled choking and spluttering from the tub and chained to the wall in the same kneeling position that he was. They were both fixed with thick blindfolds, ear-plugs and steel gags from nose to chin, with just a small gap over the mouth wide enough for a funnel to be forced down, and through it a tepid drink poured into her mouth.

(Their porcelain masks had been taken from them for this. Apparently the one time other than sleeping and eating that it was acceptable to remove their masks was for complete sensory deprivation torture)

Naruto swallowed the liquid flooding his mouth as quickly as he could to keep from choking. A dark panic borne of suffocating clawed at his mind, memories of the orphanage and his own time having his air stolen away by that girl* years ago now, haunting flashes of scorching, spasming lungs was all he could think of until the funnel was eventually removed and he was free to cough and choke, the drink spilling down his chin, dripping onto his neck and down his bare chest.

Breathing heavily through his  thick, clogged nose, Naruto hung listlessly in his chains, something almost like pride warming in his chest. This was the fifth session in a row that he hadn't broken. He'd been tortured and watched Shin be tortured without making a sound. He wondered if Danzo would be satisfied yet. If he wasn't... he didn't think he could cope with this any longer without truly shattering. He could deal with being hurt himself; his very bones had been moulded by the life he had lived to suffer and withstand the pain and suffering that would break lesser men, but to watch another be hurt...for no good reason at all...

That did more to break him then any other cruelty that Danzo could inflict upon him.

At least there had been one benefit to the extended periods of time he'd been forced to spend chained with his senses cut off from him. Naruto had never been more aware of her chakra under her skin, how the currents and eddies twisted and churned under his skin, how he could make it dance and twirl and eddy– and form seals.