A New Story

Time Out!:

I awoke stiff, the lids of my eyes stuck so tight that they shuffled open struggling to focus the light. The blaring colours of white and grey meld to form an indistinct world, their intensity hurting the muscle around my eyes as I darted my view from left to right. Even though the air settled within the room with a calm cooling, the pain of this gust narrowed my vision and momentarily stung the pupils of my eyes. Still the room hung around me like the hangman's noose, I wanted to see where I was, I needed to know, this struggle filled my aching chest with panic as I drew a breath. I trifled with the irritation in my throat, refusing to cough the annoyance away, not willing to let my awareness alert the bodies I could see move in my unfocused sight. Moments, only seconds; pulled the wagon of time into an eternity, the horsemen of fear driving my pulse down a road of phantom horrors as the gauntlet extended forever onward to my approaching Time snuffed Out.

"Argies?" Hinata stopped tapping her fingers once she realised he was awake, calling out his name so that everyone knew that the worry was over.

He looked at her, his vision once again clear, and he caught the worry on her face. The worry that was in everyone's posture, instead of reassurance the room held a sense of peril that did not fill him with ease and his momentary calm on hearing her voice returned to anxiety. A foreboding withdrawn atmosphere; they were not sitting by his bed side but instead away from him, on the far wall, standing by the window, looking out, looking down, looking away from Argies, not in conversation, all with a mourning sorrowful mood. Coughing, he quickly counts how many were there, not trusting his mind to be able to construct the correct number. 'Kiba, Shino, Hinata. Team 8. Tenten, Shikamaru, Fuma, Taka. Genjuu?' His eyebrows lifted, alert to this new detail, Genjuu was in a bed next to him, unconscious. Nobody said anything until it suddenly dawned on him...

"Sasuke" Argies just manages to croak "What did I do?" His face turns from worry to guilt as he tries to pull the blankets off himself to get up, but on moving he realises just how weak he is. He feels his gut knot and his body cramp to the sudden movement, but a hand settles him back down.

"Stop worrying" The voice says with frustrated anger "Everyone is fine, you didn't do anything" Shikamaru says from behind gritted teeth, lowering his face and voice so that only Argies can hear.

"But..."Argies protests even as his muscles strain and cut off his words.

"You didn't do anything." Shikamaru reiterates his mood grim.

The door to Argies ward suddenly opened, the room was too large for a hospital and Argies began to understand why his fellow friends were so tense.

"Next!" The voice called from outside the room and Sasuke entered handing a card to the next to be interrogated; Shino.