Additional One-Shots

Shattered [Sightless]

A/N: So, I don't have a place to put this in Sightless, it's simply a short little scene that has nothing to do with the current arc. But, it has a lot of hints towards one of the final scenes (okay, the final scene) in Sightless!

For the first hour after the man had retreated to his room there was nothing but the sound of things crashing to the ground. At one point, Makoto was rather certain he could smell things burning. It took all he had not to go check and make sure that the angry shinobi wasn't going to burn the whole place down. Only the knowledge that it would be incredibly difficult- given that the majority of it was fashioned from stone- kept him stationed in the hall. To be honest, he wouldn't have even been there if it wasn't for the pre-teen girl at his side.

Her eyes had never shifted from the door before them. Despite the fact that he was rather certain that the girl next to him wasn't being influenced by her bloodline limit at the moment, Makoto never saw a tear. It was strange. It was as if she, too, was waiting to hear someone say that they were mistaken.

After all, how could Orochimaru be dead?

He'd heard the news. He'd seen how the few subordinates in the hide-out abandoned it in the following days- with the exclusion of Kabuto. The strange silver-haired male had hidden himself away in one of the many laboratories, refusing to speak to anyone.

Just as Yukio was doing now.

Makoto couldn't imagine why. For someone like Yukio, this simply meant finding another employer who would let him do as he wished as long as he fulfilled their dark requests. There was no shortage of the rich and corrupt in their world. Yet, the shinobi had demanded evidence and upon realizing the most likely truth of what they'd been told, he'd shut down.

It was strange, Makoto realized. He had never before thought of Yukio as being able to care for anyone. Then again, he doubted that was the cause in this case- the man had never seen Orochimaru as anything more than a means to an end. It was only the question of what Yukio's end had been that remained; that and what he would be willing to do to achieve it now. As long as it didn't effect Makoto or Jin, however, he cared little about what the answers to those questions were.

"He's not coming out," Makoto eventually told Jin, his eyes dropping to the young Kurama. "We should go. I don't like the feeling coming from that lab of the brat's."

She didn't respond.

"Jin, let's go," he urged. "We have a long trip ahead of us. We should get going before it gets dark. You know how I hate traveling in the cold."

It wasn't as much that Makoto hated it as much as it was problematic. When the sun went down and the earth cooled his ability was cut in half. It was the nature of his clan, the Kurosawa clan tended to be sluggish in the cold. It was one of the many, many ways they were comparable to lizards. While the cut in his skill still put him at a higher level than the average shinobi, it put Jin in more danger than he felt comfortable exposing her to when she was like this. So, they needed to leave.

He'd never had an intention of bringing Yukio with them, so it mattered little to him whether the man ever left his room.

Just as he was about to just pick her up as he'd done on many occasions, the girl suddenly moved forward. Before he'd realized she'd even taken a step- the cool atmosphere in the underground base having put his reaction time below Jin's incredible speed- she'd pulled open Yukio's door. He was rather surprised to realize that it hadn't been locked. What didn't surprise him was the sight of every item in the man's room turned on end; Yukio settled in the far corner of the room. The palms of his hands were pressed against his eyes, his knees tucked to his chest.

"Yukio-san?"

The man didn't move at the sound of Jin's quiet, prodding voice. Undeterred, she began picking her way across the room. Makoto swiftly moved behind her, seizing the girl by the back of her shirt.

"What are you doing?" he childed, eyes narrowed in just the slightest degree. "Don't go near him."

She squirmed in his grip.

"Makoto..."

The firm, protesting edged to her voice was unfamiliar to him. He dropped her reflexively, the girl landing softly on her feet. He simply blinked in surprise as she instantly moved to crouch before Yukio.

"Yukio-san, we're leaving."

Several minutes passed in silence before she slowly reached forward to pry his hands from his face. He stiffened beneath her touch, but didn't stop her.

His skin around his eyes was puffy and red, a sight which froze Makoto where he stood. Jin didn't seem to care, or if she did it was easy for her to suppress. Either way, she simply offered him a closed eye smile.

"What are you going to do, Yukio-san?"

"... she's gone."

It was strange- a tone that like the firm edge to Jin's voice, Makoto had never heard before. It... sounded broken.

"Gone?" the man echoed.

It was if Yukio hadn't heard him, his gaze resting solely on Jin. He never moved, never blinked. Makoto realized then that perhaps he wasn't even really looking at Jin, but whatever had him stuck in the corner of the room. Yukio had always seemed like an unhinged psychopath, but in that moment... he simply seemed like a broken man.

"... she's gone. If he... she's gone."

The ends had been a person, Makoto realized, then.

Jin didn't say anything, nor did she release Yukio's hands. Rather, she shifted to her feet and tugged on their connected hands as she took a step backwards.

"C'mon, Yukio-san. If you don't know what to do, you can come with us till you feel better. You like being with me, right?"

Yukio blinked, then, his eyes finally seeming to actually focus on the girl before him.

"... you... smile like her."

Jin simply kept the simple smile in place as she once again pulled on his hands, leading the man towards the doorway. She didn't prompt him to explain, rather she simply gave a noncommittal hum. Yukio didn't need comfort, he simply needed to speak. How the clueless Jin knew this, Makoto wasn't certain. The only thing he did know was that he seldom saw this side of her- the calm, relaxed girl. The girl that she might have been had she never been abandoned in this hell.

As they walked out of the base, Yukio continued to mumble baselessly, none of his words connecting to one another beyond the constant reference to an unknown girl. Whomever she was, it was clear that the man had suddenly come to the realization that she was out of his reach. A realization that had been prompted by Orochimaru's death.

At one point, he fell silent, trapped in whatever was going on in his shattered mind. Eventually, these thoughts seemed to come to a peak as he pulled his hands from Jin and cocked his head back to stare at the trees that they'd reached at some point during his period of thought. His expression was unreadable, his jaw locked. Makoto went tense at the sight.

This was worse than the broken man, and it was definitely worse than the usual, playful psychopath. He wasn't sure what it was, but it raised the hairs on the back of his neck.

"... I want Maemi."