| [Feb. 21st, 2010|04:36 am] |
For the first time in years, Kakashi didn't dream. There was blackness behind his eyelids, and nothingness inside his skull, and if he'd had the choice he would have given half his stolen jutsu to stay there. But physical sensation crept slowly back, driven by body that knew it wasn't safe, and he slid like a knifeblade back into the real world.
He was lying down.
That alone was almost overwhelming. But his senses didn't stop there; they spread out, catching information and dragging it back, demanding he pay attention. There was light, a faint red glimmer shining though closed eyelids. Cool air, brushing over stretches of exposed skin -- he was wearing clothes again. The scent of things, finally, that weren't smoke. A hundred things, crowding in at once, dragging his attention a hundred different ways. Cotton cloth, old stone, blood and urine and vomit, fresh air, his own skin, ginseng-poison-pain--
Too much.
He dropped his mouth open, dragged in a shuddery, scentless breath, and let it out.
Scattered wits tried to collect themselves. He twitched his wrists and ankles, but found no metal or leather, only the lingering bruised reminders. No broad strap pinned his chest back against a chair. No hands touched him anywhere at all.
A day and a half's worth of memory reported back, and Kakashi drew another unsteady breath. Let it out. His throat burned like the aftermath of a chemical fire.
There were still no hands.
He shifted carefully, slowly, drawing his arms up beneath him -- arms that moved, finally, when he wanted them to -- and pressed his palms flat against something solid but soft. Every single muscle ached, right down to his core. He drew a last breath.
Shoved up, wrenched himself sideways, forced his eyes open, and moved.
It was a closed cell, empty of everything but two mattresses and a body on the floor; Kakashi slammed his back up against the corner furthest away from the door, where no one could get to him without him seeing them first, and slid down when his knees abruptly gave way.
Silence.
The body twitched. Kakashi locked his gaze on it.
Nothing else stayed still; he could feel himself shaking. Could feel himself, when he yanked his hands in close and flattened them over his chest, up to his bare face, over recently-shorn hair -- he grimaced hard and dropped them, fighting the urge to wrap his arms around his knees. To grab himself tight and scream everything out, because he'd already done that second part and it hadn't helped.
The body grunted, groaned, and rolled over. It was bare-chested, hands chained awkwardly together in front. Long brown hair fell in snarling tangles around a bone-white face; pale golden-brown eyes sought Kakashi out and stared at him.
And Kakashi finally, disbelievingly put together who he was looking at, and what that meant.
Genma.
Still alive.
He reached for his chakra -- singing now, bright and violent -- to rip the genjutsu apart. |
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