Antiquated Folly: The Crimson Letter

Chapter 2: Derilection's Call

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What must one commit in order to achieve the thing that they aspire to? What piece of themselves must they surrender? Who must they forsake?

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"How can you understand me, huh?! You who's been alone from the beginning."

As a forehead protector launched into a clear day sky. Unfasted blue tails of fabric trailed behind the centerpiece of calloused metal.

A large crater was the center of a forest clearing – ragged, deep, and arid. Soils and sediments around it implanted larger boulders of unearthed stone and root systems. The devastation traveled along two antithetical paths exiting towards the timberland on either side. Despite what motion must have been present prior, everything was baron and still. Silent and motionless, but for the whistling of daring breezes.

Two shinobi suddenly appeared at those forest exits. One with golden hair. The other, raven. Their bodies were battered, blood was the train that trailed behind each of them. Cerulean eyes burned on chilling obsidian across that dismantled scene, hardly discernible from the distance.

"It's because of those bonds that we suffer... You don't know what it feels like to lose them!"

At the peak of the headband's flight, the silver portion of its finish unveiled to the sun. It revealed the gouge dead center along the engraved insignia of the Village Hidden in the Leaf.

The intonations of countless birds suddenly harmonized with the sharp crackles and renders of lightning ripples. Magnetized chakra lapped around a contracted hand harshly, vividly condensing and brightening, magnifying in sound and intensity as magnetic electricity occurring in succinct lashes without pattern. That hand steadily vibrated with the pinnacle corralling of that energy.

Within the splayed out palm of another hand, wind pulled from all directions towards the center to join wispy slivers of circling chakra. Whispers transitioned to frictions and poppings, pulsating with each major revolution as more and more streams of current filled in the gaps of an energy sphere. The resultant, vibrating hum as it reached a maximum threshold ushered a daunting, potential energy. That hand was gracefully still.

"Why, Naruto? Why would you go this far for me?"

The tattered Konoha forehead protector started its descent. Clanking metal and flapping ribbon tails through a frictionless sky.

Naruto stood with his Ransengan, woefully eyeing Sasuke and his Chidori. He watched Sasuke's mouth contort into a declaration of his name. He identified the painful anger and subtle regret that persisted in his former teammate's glaring eyes. Despite what should have been drowned against the roars and hums of their signature abilities, Sasuke's call was painstakingly loud to him.

He tried to return the same holler of Sasuke's name, but even as his lips made the parting, no sound released. No longer could he hear the whirling hum of wind energy in his hand, nor the roaring of lightning energy in Sasuke's. His soundless footsteps that turned into a running stride against his will were in the same deaf octave as the broken heart he felt pounding in his chest.

The overwhelming silence formed unbearable rounds of shrill ringing in his ears.
No matter how fast he was suredly running, everything was moving so slow. He felt the instability of his surroundings coming in and out of focus, the transplanting of images and extended moments hauntingly from his past and threateningly from his future. No matter how he tried to will himself to stop in his tracks, his body pulled. The path forward became a nightmare.

He knew they couldn't be real, could they? His mother and father's melting hands that barely scraped against his orange and black jumpsuit as he passed them by. No matter how hard he tried to turn his head to take them in, he could only imagine their screams as fire from the Kyuubi's chakra engulfed them.
Surely he was dreaming, wasn't he? If he were really in full faculty, he would have stopped to help a shinobi and kunoichi who were hovering over a wounded child. He would have taken off his jacket, to shelter an old lady who seemed to be shivering after him under blankets of snow despite the flames. More and more instances, more and more friends, acquaintances, people he'd let down. All their looks were of distaste and betrayal, disappointment by his lack of response.
No, not Hinata. He made himself reach. He felt the searing of his muscles as he reached towards her firelit body, her pearl eyes looked at him with fear and worry, he could see his name on her lips. His head turned after her. Despite peripherally everything being on fire, behind him there was only darkness. To his horror he could no longer find her, he couldn't see anything he desperately wanted to see.