Chapter Text
Green. Green, everywhere green. Green above your head, green licking at your toes, green brushing over your arms and bare forelegs. Heavy breaths puffed into the warm spring air, your legs shook and hurt, but you kept pushing forward, deeper and deeper into the forest. Getting swallowed by the intense green of the leaves.
Green, so much beautiful green. Full of wonder you looked upwards. So many shades of the color, mixed together by the shadows and the sunlight, ranging from a bright emerald-green to a dark, almost black moss-green. And then brown, the earthy rich brown of the trees. Fascinated to the very core, you stared at the trees, growing higher than you would ever be, stretching their arms and fingers towards the sun and the sky. Your wide (e/c)-eyes wandered around, sliding over the miracles of the nature in childish innocence, your hands and chubby fingers absent-mindedly reaching out and caressing the surface of each and every plant you were able to touch.
Life pulsated underneath your fingertips and you giggled when the petals of a delicate flower brushed over your skin, soft and silky like the fabric of the one expensive night gown your mother owned. Once more you carefully let your fingers wander over the tender edge of the petals, then let go, knowing any more harm could cause irreparable damage to the flower.
Your father had taught you from an early age how important it was to respect the nature at any time.
You wandered further, deeper into the forest. No fear coiled in your guts at possible dangers or getting lost. You knew this place by now like the back of your hand.
A smile spread over your face as you realized you were close to your favorite spot in the forest and when you passed by a thick intercourse of bushes, leaves and young trees, sun greeted you.
Surrounded by green plants, the softest grass a mind could imagine, a small and clear river parting the earth and a riverbend made of round stones and sand. Happily, you ran towards the river, already searching for a stone you could skip over the water, the loose fabric of your t-shirt and pants fluttering in the wind.
“Not this one…” Giggling, you pointed at a too large stone, the edgy top barely reaching over your shoulders. You came to an abrupt halt, just a few inches apart from where the water licked at the earth and kneeled down, brushing gently over the stones and sand. “This one isn’t flat enough,” you continued, wearing a bright smile, “and this one is too small. This one too, this one too…”
Determined you skipped through the several stones, until your eyes fell upon a perfect candidate for some decent jumps over the surface of the river. As your fingers got a hold of the stone, you felt how smooth it was, how flat, how warm the concrete was from the sun shining for hours now. Simply perfect.
“You’re perfect,” you also told the stone, who was unfortunately not answering, “perfect to break my record of three skips. Today I’m going to make it, I can feel it!”
Striking a pose, you announced that to the forest, your voice confident and echoing in between the trees and swallowed by the bushes.
Then you cocked your head. Something was wrong here. You didn’t know what, but there was this eerie feeling in you, nagging at your insides and at your brain, ringing louder and louder with each second.
Later, when you were older, you would shake your head at the actions following your realization. So many things could’ve happened if someone else had waited in the forest, someone with less innocent intentions and more criminal energy.
“Hello?” Your thin voice echoed over the clearing. “Is someone there?”
Only the rustling of the leaves answered. But you still weren’t convinced. The stone dropped forgotten to the ground as you stepped away from the river and closer to the spot where the strangeness of the clearing seemed to increase: two trees, one of them slightly thicker than the other, but both had the same height. Confused you stared first at the right, thicker one, then at its thinner brother.
“That’s not right…” you mumbled to yourself, reached out to the thin tree and stroked over the rough surface, gently tracing marks and little sprouts, “If you’re the same height, you should also be about the same scope…”
Maybe one of the trees had more or less light? But as you checked, you could find no sign that one of the trees suffered or benefitted from any kind of natural advantage or disadvantage. No, wind, sun and water had granted both trees the same chance, so there was no visible explanation for the headway one tree had over its neighbor.
Hesitantly you reached out to the thick tree, eyes flying upwards to the crown and the leaves. “So, what is your secret…?”
Just as you expected, your fingers slid over bark, tiny leaves sticking out, knots and dwells, a mouth, a nose, were those eyes…?
Impossible. Curious, you stroked again over the particular patch of bark, your eyes just as much searching for the resemblance of human features as your fingers. Here, this knot could be a nose and those dips eyes and this special spot really resembled a mouth, with a lot of imagination…
Then, two things at once happened. Once, your index finger rimmed deeply in thought the small mark where the mouth of the tree could be. Second, the knot opened and sharp teeth dug into your limp.
With a loud scream you tried to rip your hand away. But the teeth dug harder into your finger, pain ripping through your hand and making you cry out again.
“LEMME GO!” Tears of pain stood in your eyes as you screamed at the tree. Snot and spit rolled down your chin, together with more words, begging the usually so peaceful plant to let go. “PLEASE! IT HURTS! LET GO!” Desperately you tugged at your hand.
And really, the tree let go. Still screaming in horror, you stumbled backwards, clutching your injured and puckering hand to your chest and staring at the plant.
What is this? Trees aren’t eating meat, so why is he biting me?!?
But then…
A boy peeled himself out of the tree. Literally. Scared beyond measures, his skin turned from the brown of the tree to a lively skin-like tone, maybe a bit paler than yours, how his legs parted from the hiding spot, how his hands twitched and regained their sense of touch again. He was the same height as you, brown, long hair peeking out from underneath the haori. The metal blinked in the sunlight, but the dark clothes he wore seemed to swallow every ray of light falling into his direction. His dark eyes scanned your stature and unconsciously you scrambled away from him, eyes wide and the bitten hand pressing to your chest.
He just… stood there. Goose bumps wandered down your back and forearms at the strange look he gave you. Devoid of any kind of emotion, only a hint of annoyance visible.
After a few deep breaths, you managed to find some of your courage. “Who…? Who are you?” you asked. Echoes of your voice didn’t even reach the other side of the wide clearing when the boy walked closer. With every step he grew bigger, with every meter he left behind, his face seemed to twist and contort into a mask of monstrous glee, enjoying your obvious panic and your shallow breaths. You tried to crawl away, away from this… from this thing right in front of you, but it was useless. Features unmovable and the creepy eyes casted into shadows, the human look-alike creeped closer, unhurried and knowing he would capture his prey in the end, while you screamed and begged, all the while grabbing to single grass tufts and pulling yourself over the earth.
From one moment to the next, he vanished. Another high-pitched scream left your mouth and awaiting a cruel fate, you closed your eyes. You didn’t want to know what was going to happen to you. You didn’t want to know how your young life was going to end.
Shivering in your shoes, eyes shut tightly and curling yourself into a small ball of gangly limbs and slender childishness, you waited. And waited. Waited a little longer. Waited a tiny bit more, then you carefully cracked your eyes open, one at a time and halfway expecting to see the creepy, soulless eyes of the boy directly in front of you.
Blue sky, white clouds, the friendly sun shining and leaves dancing to the light breeze in the air. But no creepy tree-boy. Then a groan and a muffled word. Startled, you flinched upwards, your breath still ragged and flat, but deepening with every inhale.
As soon as you saw him, a strange tug at your mouth came to life. For some seconds you tried to suppress the motion, tried to suppress the bubbly feeling deep in your chest, but it was too mighty and too funny not to laugh. Your laughter echoed over the clearing and the ears of the boy grew red, a stark contrast to the grass and earth where he laid, sprawled out on the ground.
He stumbled. The creepy boy stumbled, stumbled over some non-existent stone or something, all the while trying to look as intimidating as possible. Now he just looked like what he was: a boy of the same age as yourself, maybe a little bit older or younger, in dark clothes maybe, but absolutely not creepy anymore.
As you stood up, still giggling and smiling brightly, those deep eyes followed every of your moves. They measured, tried to plan ahead, to look through you and your intentions. But they widened in surprise and mild shock as you walked up to the boy and bend down, one of your hands reaching out and the open palm inviting him to take your good-willed offer.
“I want to skip some stones over the water. Want to join me?”
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The alarm was blaring right into your ear. With a jolt you sat up, looking for the danger and finding the source of the annoying noise in the hands of the one you shared a home with.
“You’re an idiot.” you mumbled, let your body fall backwards and buried your head again in the pillows.
A warm chuckle met your ears. “Just wanted to see your lovely face before I have to go.”
“Then you’re a sap.”
“You never complained before.”
“I’m complaining now.”
“Now come on (Y/N),” Kiyoshi pouted, you could hear it, “don’t be so cold to me. I will be gone for a month! No homemade waffles for the time being! No expert-opinion about your colleagues when you need to rant a bit!”
Tiredly you rolled around and faced your boyfriend for by now nearly seven years. “I think I will manage to not have a shoulder to whine into. But the missing waffles could be a problem…”
Kiyoshi crossed his arms over his chest, the black hair falling into his eyes until he had to blow it with a cute pout out of his vision. “You only like me for my cooking! How mean!”
“Well,” you sat up and slung your arms around his neck, dragging your boyfriend in for a short hug, “then I would advise you to burn your food more frequently. Otherwise you keep going to travel around and not stay here.” You allowed yourself to fall backwards and into the warm cushions. “How long will you be gone again? I keep forgetting the exact plan.”
While Kiyoshi again started to explain the detailed plans of the feudal lord to travel around the fire country with him as the personal cook in his footsteps, your thoughts started to drift off after hearing the time of return (“In exactly four weeks, two days and seven hours.”)
For years you hadn’t thought about the strange encounter in the forest. It seemed so far away, like a long-forgotten dream, suddenly coming to life again.
Quickly you shook your head. Sappy woman. Come back to earth.
“(Y/N)? What’s wrong?” Kiyoshi asked, his warm, dark eyes instantly filling with worry as they hushed over your face, trying to find traces of your emotions or a possible impending sickness.
“I’m fine, you worrywart,” you chuckled, “and you should go soon. Time runs, you know?”
One glance at the clock standing at the nightstand and your boyfriend jumped off from your shared bed, hastily running around and collecting the last bits of things he claimed to absolutely need.
Really seven years? And he hasn’t changed one bit. Time really runs.
Slowly you sat up, yawning on the way and ruffling shortly through your hair. Listening to the male running around and cursing occasionally at the different scattered things was almost an everyday issue. The only difference today was that he would stay longer away and not only for his job at a famous restaurant here in Konoha, where he had to stand up early and work nearly until midnight. In comparison, your job as a nurse at the Konoha hospital was just as busy. A lot of your friends asked you on a frequent base if it wasn’t stressful to match your schedules to have at least some hours every day together. But it was alright, you would always say and laugh at their unbelieving faces, because you loved each other. You were accustomed with each other’s habits, knowing what the other liked and disliked like the back of your hands, noticing even slight differences in each other’s actions. Dealing with your busy lives was nothing, after all you did what you loved and were able to live with the person you loved from the bottom of your heart.
It had been alright. But… For you, it wasn’t anymore. It was like… Something was missing, something essential, something you hadn’t missed a few months ago, though now it was like a sharp pebble in your shoes, constantly there and annoying the hell out of you.
Maybe the time spent apart would your brain allow to figure things out.
One last time, Kiyoshi stuck his head into the bedroom, breaking into a wide grin as he saw how you tried to rub the sleep out of your eyes. “Well…” Awkwardly the blackhead scratched his cheek. “I guess, I will see you in a month?”
Instantly you put a pout on your face, glaring playfully at Kiyoshi. “What? No goodbye and save travel-kiss? Who are you?”
The relief on his face was easily visible. He weaseled over and bend down to peck your lips, then was faster out of the room and your shared flat than a flash. Only to leave you in his wake, asking yourself if he was just as much reading the atmosphere right as you did.
With a sigh you plopped backwards into your bed. No use in overthinking it. Whatever it was. Certainly not a loving and healthy relationship.
“Not healthy…” you snorted and rolled on your side. With a sigh you breathed a few strands out of your face. “Sounds like he constantly beats me up.”
That was so far off from the truth like saying the first Hokage had been an evil villain.
No, not “unhealthy”. Just… Just not what it had been once.
For some more long moments you laid there, lazily playing with the edges of your warm and cozy blanket, then you abruptly got up and started to prepare yourself for another stressful day at the hospital. The chef nurse had appointed you for the next week for the two stations which were especially reserved not only for active shinobi injured during a mission, but also for ANBU, the elite department directly listening to the Hokage. To put it mildly, a just as worthwhile as dangerous task. A lot of rules were tightly bound to that position. Don’t remove their masks, don’t ask questions, be as non-threatening as possible.
Easier said than done in those ridiculous full-body suits the nurses had to wear if blood, poison or other unknown liquids were on or in the patient. And considering you were working with ANBU, that meant you had to wear those terrifying things all of the time.
An hour later, you were ready to face the day. Your stomach filled with an easy yet energy-rich breakfast, hair and teeth brushed and clothed in some relaxing clothing, you went out, locked the door behind you and only wasted a small thought on the loneliness of the apartment which would await you later today.
It was a nice day. The sun was shining, some clouds drifted over the blue summer-sky and no wind was disturbing the scenery of absolute peace in front of you. Children playing on the streets, their laughter floating in the air, young families walking around, talking to each other and making gentle jokes, groups of friends, loudly chattering and throwing their arms into the air whenever one of them made a terrible pun and sometimes even shinobi could be seen, jumping over the roofs of the nearby houses and on their way to important missions.
Just peaceful. Nice, relaxing. You breathed deeply in, savored the fresh and still warm air. Then you started to walk, a bag slung over your shoulder and a light smile on your lips. Most of your friends would describe it as a slightly teasing one, one corner of your mouth higher than the other, your eyes sparkling in childish mischief, but lately those comments had stopped almost entirely.
Maybe it had also something to do with the dullness of your relationship with Kiyoshi.
Stop thinking like that.
Shaking your head, you continued the way to your working place, the hospital of Konoha. Today it would be a day-shift for you, at least that was what the timetable had shown yesterday. But as you stepped into the changing room and threw out of routine another glance at the fateful paper, you took a double-take, only to hiss full of rage underneath your breath.
This goddamn slave-driver of a head nurse had yet again overthrown the whole plan! Conveniently to her advantage and to the advantage of her little pets and favorites. Unluckily that didn’t include you, so you were now stuck with a goddamn 32-hour shift!
“What is this shit?” you growled and stomped over to your locker. The earlier fairly good mood was completely erased at the sight of working for nearly two days straight, with some of the most dangerous shinobi your village could offer. At the thought of an ANBU going crazy while you tried to help him… Your stomach coiled into a tight knot. Panic flooded your mind, sheer and raw horror at the mere thought of a kunai pointing towards your neck, the sharp knife so close to end your life, wandering down your pulse and blood running along the grey metal…
Blindly you felt for the locker and clawed into the rims, not caring about the pain running through your hands. You didn’t want to experience something like that ever again. Never again.
That won’t happen. Keep your cool woman, just keep your cool and everything will be fine.
Your fingers were pale as you slowly loosened them, deliberately one by one until you felt good enough to continue the procedure of slipping into this ridiculous suit you disliked so much. At last, you adjusted with jittering fingers the hat one last time and wrinkled the white and formless uniform out. Around you the room had filled. Other nurses came in and left, either on their way to a shift, taking a deserved break from patients and demanding doctors or hastily stripping their dreaded outfits off, eager to get home to their families and lovers.
Chie stumbled to the locker beside yours, her brown bun falling apart and her slender shoulders slumped underneath the weight of her responsibility.
“Hard shift?” you asked.
Tiredly the female nodded. Even her breathing seemed slowed and exhausting in itself, ragged and dragged out. “It’s like every male shinobi at once forgot how to avoid injuries. Why only the men? Why not the women? They would be at least responsible enough to come before the wound would start to reek like a dead fish!”
“And our favorite guest?”
Chie sighed in annoyance. “Than I would’ve excused myself. No, Hatake thankfully,” she clasped her hands together in a prayer, “thankfully didn’t come in today. But never say never, I heard he’s on a mission currently and that his return his scheduled for tomorrow.”
In annoyance you massaged your temples. “So, we have to count on a possible visit next week.”
The brunette opened her locker and stared for some seconds at her carefully folded clothing, before she oh so slowly started to peel her sweaty uniform off. “Ye. Next week. Until then, let’s hope he doesn’t stumble over a too sharp butter knife. I swear, if I have to deal with his antics one more time…”
You shortly hugged Chie from behind, feeling how the tension left her shoulders at your cautious touch. “Don’t worry too much. Maybe this time he has a team who doesn’t need his protection, hm?”
“Hopefully. Would be a first.” With a shake of her head and a little smile, your friend thanked you. Then her smile wavered, made place for a wrinkle of her forehead and a spark of guilt in her eyes. “Didn’t Kiyoshi leave today? How are you feeling?”
“Good.”
“Don’t lie to me.”
“But I’m telling you, I’m fine!” you said. To prove it, you stretched your arms out and spun around once, two times. “It will be nice to have some time for myself, one month, I tell you! One whole month!”
Worried, Chie’s eyebrows wandered higher. “That doesn’t sound like-! Well, you’ll figure it out, I believe.”
Your head swam from the confusion and the dimly rising awareness of something. “Figure it out? What figuring out?”
But your friend only waved nonchalantly her hand over her shoulder, her steps already directed towards the exit and a relaxed day with her family. Automatically your bottom lip jutted out and you crossed your arms over your chest, hiding the shaking of your fingers and covering your stomach, where a tight knot had started to form over the last minutes of stolen time. You weren’t able to buy more time by chattering with other nurses. They all were busy and you would favor to go to hell than stopping them from helping patients and saving lives. One last inaudible sigh, then you walked out of the break room, praying inwardly for a calm day and that your path wouldn’t cross the one of a dangerous ANBU.
Nearly two full days. Two days of running around, reacting to emergencies, smiling at people with only a few hours to live and spending hope where none was left. It was draining, but also so incredibly rewarding when another patient jumped out of the sight of death, saved by a surgery or the care you and the other nurses gifted them with, when another patient finally manage to stand up with a prothesis for his missing leg, bombed away by an invisible trap, when a mother held her daughter for the first time in her arms, the happy tears in her tired eyes after days of hoping and praying to the gods that the new life would pull through.
Your work was both, draining and giving much needed energy back at once. It was wonderful and terrible, both extremes so close standing by each other that at some days you had problems to differentiate between them. Sometime in between, you managed to sit down for an hour and sleep, leaned against a nearby wall and a mug of coffee in your trembling hands. Then you were back up again, skillfully managing to care for wounded, injured and sick people.
Day and night were swarming together, mashing and clashing, and inside the hospital it was hard to tell what time it was. Only when you threw a tired look outside, away from the bed where one of the long-term man had laid for months, fighting an incurable heavy illness and ultimately losing the battle within himself, you realized it was close to sunrise again.
Half of your shift was done. Half of your shift. Only some more hours, only half a day left. With new enthusiasm, you left the deathbed behind.
And until now luck was on my side, you thought halfway enthusiastic and only a tiny bit hopeful, let’s hope it will stay there.
Minutes later, luck decided to change sides and slap you on the way right in the face.
Different from common beliefs, shinobi and especially ANBU weren’t delivered to the hospital with a lot of screams, tears and pained shouts. Most of them had an almost horrifying control over themselves and their bodies, not even complaining when their battered and bloodied limbs were bandaged and their broken bones steadied and treated. They almost didn’t look human, with their terrifying masks and blood-stained uniforms, lying lifeless on their beds in their full armor and staring at the ceiling. Only sometimes their fingers would twitch. A single sign they were still alive, still able to feel the pain.
This time, there were three different ANBUs coming in. You just had tried to catch your breath at the reception, checking for any immediate emergencies on the schedule when the formation entered, for each stretcher four carriers. Ghosts dressed in grey and black, their steps not making any sounds on the linoleum of the entrance, their animal features underlined in red and green. You suppressed the immediate horror in your stomach at the sight of the ANBU and fell into their steps. They knew the way by long-achieved knowledge, you didn’t have to say anything as you ran alongside them to the special complex for ANBU. Only when the sealed doors had opened for you and the injured, you dared to direct some words to the leader of the squad.
“What injuries?”
The man, his hawk mask sending cold shivers down your spine, pointed at the first. “Stab wounds in the abdomen, normal kunai, possibly poisoned. Breathing is flat, pulse nearly non-existent. Chances of survival go towards zero.”
“Carry him into room 401.”
He nodded sharply. “Bear has severe burns, second grade and some third. Tried to disarm a landmine. Her left hand doesn’t look good, maybe it needs amputation. A provider for prothesis is already contacted.”
ANBU had their own specialists for artificial legs, arms, hands, toes and fingers. They were fitted for battle and most of their secret features involved extra knives, poison or extractable weapons. You nodded only and waved at another room, knowing the second stretcher with the tall and well-built woman was going in there, just as silent as they had entered the dark hallways. “And the third?”
Quickly you threw a glance at the last injured ANBU, trying to assess his injuries before the squad leader could say anything. The first thing you noticed (to your shame and relief) was his fit physique. No blood covering his limbs, no bend and broken bones. His rugged brown hair was tinted black of ash and fire, the edges of his white mask just as smudged as the single streaks of black in his hair. One arm was strapped into a provisory cast made out of sticks and a strange black fabric. One more look and you were sure where this fabric had come from: from his own right leg. There you could see unmarred skin, a bandage where only little blood seeped out and tainted the once white linen and again unmarred skin. Not much, not severe. This one was lucky.
“Nothing serious,” the leader had actually the audacity to chuckle, “just a bruised arm and a single stab wound to the upper calf. He lost a lot of blood, maybe the femoral arteria is nicked.”
Still a serious issue, nothing to laugh about. Your eyebrows drew together on instinct, while your thoughts ran wild, ideas how to solve this problem as quickly and swiftly as possible flew through your head. But what did you have to expect of a bunch of suicidal ninjas, always ready to die for your civilian ass and the peaceful village you lived in but such a cynical behavior at the doorstep to afterlife?
A coping mechanism, nothing else. Deep down, there had to be still some human feelings like fear and the natural rejection of death, not the quiet acceptance they all showed in the hospital.
Sure, try to tell that yourself. And what about their behavior in a fight? You saw that, experienced it.
A cold shudder crawled over your back. Right. The old, thin scar at the base of your neck seemed to burn underneath the many layers of clothing. The instinct to reach up and cover the long-healed wound was there, but you suppressed the urge, like every time you had to deal with the crazy antics of the ANBU. “Still,” you rasped, “we have to check his leg and see if his muscles were damaged. Room 413 for him.”
Thankfully the squad leader didn’t object to your order, only lowered his chin slightly in acknowledgement. Silent like the shadows themselves, the third stretcher was carried to Room 413.
A last nod at the ANBU, then you started to organize the different treatments. The nurses appointed today to the most stressful and nerve-wrecking job in the hospital were thankfully professionals. All of them had seen far worse than that and without flinching backwards or jerking away from the terrible wounds, they started to treat their eerily silent patients, used to their coldness and apathy. So did you, but like usual your hands trembled oh so slightly whenever you had to get close to one of the elite ninjas. The other nurses didn’t notice, you were good at hiding your fear, but the ANBUs were a completely different story. Their covered eyes were basically glued to your figure as soon as you touched them. They sensed your dislike for them, smelled the cold sweat in your neck when you felt them twitching underneath your hands, heard the awfully loud pounding of your heart and the accelerated breathing.
No matter how many times you would do this, it would never feel right. Not like it felt to heal and treat real patients, not those… those puppets.
Time flew by and as you were finally able to look up from the cooled and wrapped bandages of the female ANBU, you assumed the morning sun had dawned over Konoha. Gentle hues of yellow, orange and red creeped over the sky, already turning into a light and shiny blue, hinting at the nice weather which would follow later. A beautiful day, but you would see almost nothing of it, like you could only imagine the beautiful sunrise outside.
Kiyoshi should have left the wide forest around Konoha by now…
Quickly you shook your head to get rid of the sudden thought. There was no time to worry about your private life. First, it was almost non-existent to begin with, second, there were patients waiting for you and for your care. No time to worry about anything remotely private.
A group of four nurses had worked at the woman with her self-inflicted burns, all the while of team of six had fought for the life of the poisoned first. They were still busy, you could hear their hushed words as you passed by their door on the way to Room 413, to the last, not that severely injured ANBU. “Can you come in with me?” you asked one of your fellow colleagues, a man with a pony tail reaching to his lower back, a big and strong man, a wall to hide behind, “for this one we don’t need the whole entourage.”
He nodded only. You heard his steps in your back as you marched to the last door and when you entered, his clinical clothes shuffled loudly in the silence.
The room was sparse and identical to the others you had found yourself in over the years. White walls, a bed with white sheets, only slightly smudged by some dirt, ash and dust, tiny blood spurts in the sea of white, black clothes and grey armor on soft linen. There were no windows to reduce some of the stress for the ANBU. Less opportunities for enemies to break in and kill them.
Still, the ANBU’s mask immediately jerked around as soon as you set one toe into the room. Though he relaxed when his invisible eyes slid over your uniform and the one of the nurse behind you. By now you were fairly good at reading the masked shinobi, like that you saw the spur of tension leaving the shoulders of the patient. Only a tiny spur though.
“Hello,” you murmured in a low, hopefully calming voice, “we’re here to properly treat your injuries.”
First Rule while treating an ANBU: Declare every single one of your intentions clearly to them. Tell them what you’re going to do, otherwise you might lose your head.
For heavy seconds, the man didn’t react. Intently you stared at his neck, not straight into his face, not daring to meet the overbearing, analyzing stare he gave you and your colleague.
Second Rule: Don’t look into their eyes. In that regard they’re all like wild dogs. Ready to read your motions wrong and down to kill you.
Then, finally, he nodded sharply and your knees almost gave in at the small motion. Nevertheless, you maintained the control over your own limbs and walked slowly, but steadily over to the bed, knowing any kind of hastiness could destroy the small bond of trust the man put right now into you. As far as ANBU knew something like trust.
Rule three: Don’t trust an ANBU. Never. The very moment you save their lives, they think about how they could end yours in the fastest way possible.
“My name is (Y/N) and that here is Rai,” you said and pointed first at yourself, then at the man in your back, “we were informed that your injuries were not as heavy as the one of your teammates. That is the reason we only come now to you, I apologize.”
“I understand.” The ANBU’s voice was hoarse, like he had inhaled the worth of a lifetime of cigarettes. Dark and promising it echoed through the room, reminding you of water, earth and trees, their branches stretching towards the sky. It was a gentle voice, so unlike all the other voices you had heard over the years, that you actually stopped shortly everything what you were doing and actively allowed yourself to really think about the affect it had on you.
If I wouldn’t know better, I would think… Nah. Just your stupid dream, nothing else.
“We’re going to check you for any other injuries first,” you said to him and hid your again slightly trembling fingers in your lower back, “before we continue to treat the rest. The bandages you used look like they can hold out a few more minutes. Can you describe to me how did you receive them?”
Unsurprisingly, the man shook his head.
Rule number four: An ANBU’s first priority is to keep his missions a secret. Ask for permission for more information, don’t pry into it yourself.
Weakly you gestured to Rai, who understood without a word needed. The bigger man stepped to a waiting table with different clean bandages and antiseptic liquids on it, while you tried to swallow your fears down and closed the last bits of distance between yourself and the bed. The last bits of safe territory between you and the ANBU, gone, melted away like ice under the summer sun.
The first thing you noticed as you stood so close to the unknown person was the calmness radiating from him. Other shinobi were always looking out for threats, watching out for themselves and for others, never relaxed and never not on duty. This one was in comparison like a big tree. Nothing but the strongest winds would be able to sway him.
“A medic ninja will soon arrive,” you informed him weakly, “and to prepare for his arrival, I will take a quick look at you. Is that alright?”
Rule Number Five: Always, absolutely always ask for permission. Reference to Rule Number One.
Other ANBU’s would’ve said nothing, only quietly tried to bear your examination with the same stoic front they would’ve used to face the torture of an enemy. This one didn’t. You needed a few seconds, but when a muffled sound escaped from the confinements of the mask, you would swear on your pride as a nurse that the male was chuckling.
Maybe the lack of sleep finally caught up on you.
“May I?” Your fingers reached out to his wounded leg, stopping inches before touching the soiled bandages and waiting in anxiety.
The only reaction was a slight angling of his head, the brown-greyish hair leaving smudges of ash on the once white pillow as he did so.
You took it as an invitation. Still, you were cautious as your fingers carefully plucked the bandages at the calf apart, revealing more and more of the wound. Almost instantly the scent of old and new pus filled the small space, disgustingly sweet and heavy. Inwardly you cursed, seeing the long cut, nearly reaching the bone and really nicking the femoral artery. Slightly swollen and red flesh rimmed the infected wound. Where a clean cut should’ve been, maybe some blood decorating the scene, was a long and ugly gash of inflamed tissue, ripped with the strength of a mad man and reaching from the middle of the strong calf almost down to the kneecap.
“How old is this?” Over your anger at the reckless and not at all sufficient description of the injuries you even forgot the rules which existed to protect your neck. Without any hesitation, you slipped a pair of gloves over your hands and started to clean the injury, not even waiting for the ANBU to answer. There could only be one answer.
“Weeks,” he rasped strained out, “maybe a month?”
“Weeks,” you muttered to yourself, “Weeks, he says.”
“Why? Is it that bad?”
“It’s infected. Is there anything else to say?” It was routine for you, to clean cuts and injuries from dirt and pus. But for a long time, you hadn’t had such a particular bad case in your hands. Without looking, you gestured towards Rai, who placed some gaze soaked in disinfectant into your gloved palm. “This will hurt a lot,” you informed the ANBU, who tensed up at your warning, “Probably I have to scrape out the older pus and infected flesh to reach the healthy one underneath all this mess. Only afterwards the medic can properly heal the wound. Is that understood?”
Another wink and Rai held out several dangerous looking items to you, for example a slender pen. At the end a ring of sharp metal blinked under the artificial light. It was perfect to remove infected skin and tissue, but it hurt pretty badly. Well, depending on the state of consciousness the poor patient was in.
The man exhaled loudly. His fingers gripped tightly into the white sheets until you heard them groan, though his injured leg was as relaxed as possible. He jerked his head towards the wound, apparently living after the principle “the sooner, the better”.
Quickly you threw an apologizing glance at the porcelain mask, the earlier fear forgotten in the face of your work you loved. “I try to be as careful as possible.”
You didn’t offer any narcotics. No sane ANBU would take something blurring or numbing his or her senses. In the back of your mind you registered how Rai held his breath as you lowered the sharp instrument to the infected leg and how the hands of the ANBU ripped the first hole into the linen.
When the metal touched the skin and nothing happened, the man made the mistake to think it wasn’t that bad. He relaxed noticeably, only to nearly scream when you made the first move. Because when you truly started to scrape the pus away, to dig the metal into the overly sensitive flesh and tissue, only then the pain rushed through his veins. Burning through his calf like a lightning, making sickening squelching and yet hard noises that even you became a little bit sick, even after all those years you worked as a nurse.
Every scrape was another fight, every little patch of previously infected and now cleaned skin a small victory. But it was so much. You worked efficiently and tried to lessen the pain to a minimum, but sometimes you had to dig hardly into the flesh and pull at the skin, to search for healthy blood vessels and matter. The ANBU earned with every suppressed scream and trashing a little bit more of your respect. Lesser men would’ve given in to the urge to scream their throats out, to give in to the agony and martyrdom, but not him. Only the leather of his gloves groaned and his teeth grounded together when the pain grew, otherwise his muscles remained relaxed.
Hours later, you cleaned the instrument, looking not without pride at the now cleanly bleeding wound. Dark red spurts of blood run down the leg and soaked into the white bedsheets, but it was clean blood. Healthy, not tainted by infection or soiled by pus.
You bowed in front of the bed and the ANBU, weakened by the long session, could only turn his masked face into your direction. “The medic will arrive in a few minutes, Please, try to relax a little bit, the worst is done.”
You weren’t even sure if he heard you or even realized you were talking. The cleaning had taken a toll on the man. Spent and exhausted to the very core he laid in the bed, his hands still twitching from time to time like he still felt the metal scraping and digging into his leg. Like that, you and Rai tried to be as silent as possible while cleaning the instruments and managing to prepare everything for the arrival of the medic shinobi.
You had no idea how much time passed, but you were sure it was already morning or even midday when the stressed medic arrived, a middle-aged woman with the Konoha sign dangling around her neck.
“What do we have here?” she asked sharply and already walked over to the patient.
“Infected wound in the left calf,” you said, “starts near the femoral artery and goes towards the knee. He lost a lot of blood, the wound was infected, but we cleaned it. The bone was slightly injured, but apparently nothing serious.”
“Any signs of necrosis?”
“No.” Quickly you stepped around the bed and revealed the wound yet again, checking absent-mindedly your work. “Still, the wound was nasty. Dirt and ash were approximately the catalysator, it didn’t get cleaned properly over the last month, therefore the infection could spread.”
The woman nodded. “I can see that much. Whole leg is swollen and red.” As she touched the calf with cautious hands, the ANBU twitched violently.
An emotion rolled over your mind, mighty and in the first moment unrecognizable, only seconds later you recognized the strange, stomach-twisting feeling. You felt with the man, took sympathy in his pain. Never before you had taken part in the healing process of an ANBU. They were soldiers, mere puppets in the hand of the Hokage and you only helped to heal them because it had been one of the little downfalls of a job at the hospital.
Again, the old injury at your neck started to tingle. You suppressed the urge to touch the marred skin and concentrated on the matter at hand, more namely the healing process of the ANBU.
Strange. You didn’t know this man, didn’t even hear his real voice, didn’t even see his face, though you disliked him not as much as the other ANBU’s you got to know throughout the years. Maybe because he actually had reacted to your words. Yeah, that must be it. Other ANBU’s tended to ignore you and your attics as much as you could, but this one had at least reacted, even though weakly and almost pathetically.
The last bits of the treatment were pulled through in silence. Only the medic ninja spoke to the ANBU in a quiet, hushed voice. He answered just as weak. Maybe it was some kind of debriefing or whatever stuff shinobi wanted to talk about when there were also civilians present. Rai and you worked around that for too long to be bothered anymore; just one or two glances were exchanged plus some eyerolls at the “secrecy” the shadowy warriors should exude but missed greatly.
Your job had ruined every imagination or fantasy about shinobi. Only the hard reality remained after all those years of seeing how emotionally stunned most ninja truly were, how much they hurt their loved ones around them, how they didn’t think at all about their family and friends when they threw themselves into the next best enemy to prove their loyalty to their village.
Shinobi only brought pain. From genin to chunin and jonin to the most dangerous section of all, the ANBU corps. All of them were maybe “brave” and “skilled”, however, they failed entirely as human beings. Especially ANBU.
All in all, you left the room of the injured man an hour after you had cleaned his wound. A clock on a nearby wall told you enough to sigh out in relief and sag against the next best wall. Only half an hour left of your shift. Blessed thirty minutes of attention, care and friendly words, then you would be able to be as unsocial and uncouth as you wanted.
With slightly trembling knees you pushed yourself away from the cold wall and hastily made your way out of the secret station of the hospital. When you passed by the rooms where the new patients were lying, a cold flare run down your spine. You speed up a bit, slinging your arms around your middle to protect yourself from the unknown danger of the elite shinobi.
Not that it would help in the likely case of one of them snapping.
Thankfully your services weren’t needed anymore. Like that, you were able to leave the hospital on time, more stumbling than walking out of the entrance and blinking tiredly at the bright afternoon sun.
You had no idea how you managed to enter your flat. But somehow you must’ve had enough hand-eyes-coordination to stuff your keys into the belonging lock, push the heavy door open and strip out of your clothes before you slumped into your queen-sized bed. Only in your underwear you barely covered yourself with your blankets and curled your body into a small ball before sleep claimed you with a mighty wave.