Shizi woke up before dawn, an odd time for her to wake. Without even thinking about it, Shizi was out her window and wandering the streets aimlessly. She turned a corner and stopped short when she sees a ravenette male in white shorts with a navy blue shirt, broken by a white and crimson fan-shaped family crest.
"Sasuke?" The boy whirled around at her voice, obsidian eyes wide in surprise.
"Shizi?" The girl tilted her head to her right in curiosity. "Why are you out this late?"
"I could ask you the same, my friend."
"I've decided it's time for me to leave the village. I learned all I could from the people here, but I need to learn more if I'm to reach my goal."
"Where will you go?"
"I plan to go under the teaching of Orochimaru." Shizi involuntarily cringed and her ears pressed into her hair, as if she were to block out the name she already heard.
"He's an evil man, Sasuke. Why him?"
"I'm aware of his past, Shizi, and I'm sorry for what he's done to your late Sensei. But he knows almost every Jutsu there is to have in this world. If I am to get stronger, I have to gain every ounce of knowledge he has to offer me. It's my family's dying wish." Shizi knew what it means to have the burden of a dying wish, Kandahar gave her one of her own. She ruefully smiled and dropped her chin to her chest, knowing what she was to do but not wanting to follow through.
"You understand that once you walk out of those gates, you'll be branded a traitor and a Rogue?" Sasuke firmly nodded, he knew the consequences, but the chance of getting stronger than him weighed greater. He expected the girl to fight his decision, like Sakura just finished doing, but was surprised when she finally looked up at him with teary grey eyes.
"Then I guess all that's left for me to say is I'm going to miss you. Team 7 will never be complete until you return." Shizi enveloped the boy in a soft hug. "Come back strong, Sasuke Uchiha. Make your family proud." She pulled back and slipped an antique necklace into his hands, the boy's onyx orbs glowing with confusion.
"It was Kandahar-Sensei's favorite necklace. Told me it reminded him of his best days in life. So, in case you start to forget why you stayed so long in the village, if the lines ever get blurred along the journey, it'll be there to show you the right path. And so, goodbye, Sasuke Uchiha. May we meet again." Since Shizi has known the stoic male, he never once gave her a genuine, happy smile. Until now. Instead of his usual smirk, Sasuke fully smiled at the neko girl before him. It warmed his heart a few degrees knowing that at least one person wouldn't hate him at the end of this. He still had one friend.
"Thank you, Shizi Yemao, and goodbye. We will meet again." And with those last few words, Sasuke Uchiha left Konohagakure, his friends, his battle partners, everything. Shizi and her kind, supporting words echoed in his mind and heart, as they would for years to come. Make your family proud.
Shizi soon returned to her home and went back to sleep, woken up by Naruto that morning to tell her news she already knew. Sasuke had left the village for Orochimaru. She was sitting at the table slowly and silently munching on her breakfast when Kakashi asked her a question that had been bothering him since Naruto left to retrieve the last of the Uchiha.
"You knew, didn't you, Shizi? That Sasuke was gone." Shizi glanced up at her guardian through dark lashes and slowly nodded.
"He told me right before he left. Explained it all to me and I understood. Very few people have the burdens he does: the last of the Uchiha clan, top of his class, great prodigy of the Land of Fire. He felt like his time here had reached its end for the time being, and who was I to argue with him?"
"You know that since he left he isn't allowed to return and will be condemned as a Rogue Shinobi?"
"Yes, and he knows that as well. He was well aware of what would happen if he left, but he decided to do so anyway. Even if I wanted to stop him, it would be wrong for me to. I have no say in the village, I can't even get hospitals to help me, what gives a freak like me the right to dictate someone like Sasuke's destiny?"
"I'm not mad at you, Shizi, you did what you thought was the right thing. I just want you to know that the next time you see him might be when you're given orders to kill." Shizi snorted out a small laugh and stared down at her chopsticks in the bowl of rice. That was a very real possibility in their paths, given the order to kill the other. And if Orochimaru could kill Kandahar the Great Reaper, then she could only imagine the power that Sasuke will gain under his tutelage.
"Shizi? Are you alright?" The deep voice of Kakashi pulled her from her thoughts and into reality. She shook her head clear and looked over at his unmasked features. He was a very handsome man, even if he was her caretaker. But as beautiful as he was, his eyes were distant and cold, like he had seen too many horrors of humanity to keep having hope it will one day be better. Like Sasuke's eyes.
"Yeah, fine. Just thinking about what would happen if that day came to pass." Kakashi lifted a brow in curiosity. It was always a wonder to hear what Shizi thought of, it was the brightest piece of color in his darkened life. He was amazed at how she could have had such horrible things happen to her, but she always smiled and cared for those around her. Like Obito and Rin used to.
"And what were you thinking?" Shizi raised her chopsticks like a salute to the memory.
"That shall be a most interesting battle."
YOU ARE READING
Beautiful Monsters
Fanfiction"The true measure of a Shinobi is not how he lives, but how he dies..." Shizi Yemao's pretty smile hides her secrets and her pretty eyes have cried too many tears. It's scary what her smile has come to hide, and she has gotten better at hiding the...
