Bursting Red

Only in dreams is my regret like a pale guiding light…

Day one.

“Come with me.” The tall demon eyed man said to Deidara from the doorway. My head tilted to the left intending to make eye contact but I quickly lost my nerve and settled my sights on the loose nail hanging from the wall. A scuffling of shoes and both men were gone, I was left alone in this cell. Deidara and I hadn’t spoken a word to the other for the past three hours, not because of some petty argument either but because we had nothing to say to each other. And if we did, it was probably best to leave things unsaid. He found my last words insulting, like I was insinuating that he didn’t know me, or better yet care to know me well enough. And for that his ego was endlessly bruised. My uninjured arm wrapped Deidara’s blood stained robe around myself, covering up my undergarments shyly. He had seen me, nearly. Yet it still burned my cheeks to think he had undressed me himself. I slid myself off the stiff bed and onto the roughly made concrete floor, hissing in pain as my arm brushed the blanket. There were no windows in the dim room, it was wall after wall, all of them seeming to close in and begin to crush me. I couldn’t stay here. As I thought my hand slipped over the ground, subconsciously feeling about till I felt the tip of a jagged piece of glass touch my fingers. Without thinking I picked it up, only to have it slip through my immobile fingers.

And I decided then that maybe sleeping would be a better escape than thinking.

The bed was uncomfortable to say the least, with its linen cloth blankets that felt more like a burlap bag and its stiff sheets that looked like they hadn’t been changed since the last owner of this room. Biting back a whine I slipped in, my mind reeling back to how nice home must be right now. The pillow bit in roughly to my cheek and I figured I wouldn’t be sleeping anytime soon. Time went by and I took that chance to work out an escape. All of which fell flat considering I didn’t know the layout of where I was at to begin with. My consciousness went in and out until I heard the subtle creak of a door shifting open.

“Stop this, I know you’re not sleeping, un. Get up.” He growled, angry at me for some unknown reason.

“Why should I?” I retorted childishly, keeping my back to him. He stalled, stepped forward and the bed shifted under his sudden bout of weight. “I’m sorry, that was uncalled for.” He laid down next to me, still silent. “What did they want with you?”

“They wanted to see what I could do and they wanted to know about you, if you could do anything.”

“What did you tell them?”

“That you’re as normal as they come, hm! You can’t do anything out of the ordinary.” That I was dead-weight. Like it wasn’t obvious to begin with, I was pathetic and I surely didn’t belong here. “But they didn’t say anything about getting rid of you. So we still have time to find you a way out, un. “

“And you won’t leave with me.” I stated. He tilted his head from the pillow towards my back, then closed his eyes in exhaustion. He was tired of telling me over and over again I knew, but I couldn’t let a chance go by where he might say yes.

“No, I won’t.” As expected, a heavy tension fell over us. I didn’t want to talk to him and he didn’t know what to say. He didn’t even dare touch me at the moment and like I usually did, I cried. Out of pity, out of fear, out of exhaustion. I cried until I fell asleep into dreams of a better time.

By the time I woke up I couldn’t tell if it was morning or still deep into the night. Our windowless chamber felt like a concrete box, suffocating. I woke alone in the bed, no sign of Deidara in the room at all. Frightened, I sat up quickly and fought off the pain of my sudden movement with a muffled yell. How much longer could I live like this? They took him, I concluded. They took him away from me and I wouldn’t see him again. My heart was beating so fast it nearly hurt my chest and it almost felt as if my throat was closing up. Scrambling over the edge of the bed, my bare feet touched the cold concrete flooring and I was racing towards the door erratically. Breath falling short at the thought of Deidara being in the cruel hands of this sick organization, bending at their will. “I won’t let them!” I cried out as my body hit the door, my injured hand groping for the door knob. “I can’t..” The door opened suddenly and I tumbled outwards like a child as my injured leg gave way. My arm fell beneath my weight and I screamed out loud violently, they all heard me.

“You’re still alive then?” In passing, a man stopped and stared down at me. With the dark lighting and tears in my eyes I couldn’t quite make out who it was. But he had a gentle sort of voice, more gentle than I would have imagined for someone of his status. “Give up on him, you’re wasting your time.” Steps carried away and the sound of a door shutting filled the empty corridor. I was alone once more. I brought my foot up towards my elbow all while trying to ignore the throbbing pain my leg was delivering, using what was left of my arm that was not nearly numb to gather strength to stand. One more, I thought through gritted teeth.

“You don’t understand, I can’t give up on him. That’s the pain of love, it’s not that easy!” I cried out to no one, but I’m sure everyone heard. My free hand grasped onto my injured arm, it was almost like I could feel the wound in my arm re-opening, quite painfully too. The corridor I was stumbling down was long and narrow, the light was hardly catching off the walls. Each step was agonizing, but I couldn’t let them corrupt Deidara any more, as stupid as it sounded I still had faith in his ability to change.

It’s funny how bad luck works, like it’s deliberately out to get you or something other.

I stumbled out through the hallway, my bare foot catching on a loose wire and I hit the floor again with a painful thud. “What’s this? What are you doing out of your cage, dog?” That laugh. It was the same man who maimed me just the day before.

“What have you done with Deidara-kun?” Even to my own ears I sounded slightly desperate. Maniacal almost.

“Deidara-kun, eh? You’re Dei-da-ra-kun is busy at the moment, I hope you weren’t planning on seeing him all in one piece. Eh, what’s this pretty little thing huh?” His hand forced my chin up as he crouched before me, two fingers of his wrapping around the delicate chain that hung from my neck. Keeping safe the priceless gem Deidara had given to me. “I bet Kakuzu would love this, looks like it’s worth a fortune!” His fuchsia eyes delivered me a sharp glance countered with a malicious grin.

“Don’t touch that!” Too late. His fingers pulled the chain and with a small snap, pieces of silver drifted through the air before cluttering to the floor in several pieces. His hand flew upwards in a fist as he stood to his feet, happy to have the piece. My hand clasped to my face, instinctively wiping away the flood of hot tears that were escaping.

Hidan moaned dramatically, swinging around the sea foam green gem at the same time. “How the hell does he deal with your sniveling? All I’ve seen of you is whine, whine, whine. How annoying!”

“Well I wouldn’t be crying if you hadn’t taken away all I had left of Deidara!” I wish I hadn’t said that, I really should have known better. It just made it all that much more easier for him to make me miserable.

“Pathetic girl, he wasn’t lying when he said you were useless now was he?” My crying halted almost instantly, almost afraid I had heard him right.

“Useless?” I said softly, smothered by my own panic. “He said I was…useless?” The silver haired man bent low to my level, a snide sneer plastered on his sharp face.

“He said plenty of things, dear.” He stood tall and dropped my necklace into a pocket on his robe, closing his eyes contently. “Useless was only one of the names he described you with. And believe me, he wasn‘t holding back. Seems he‘s got a lot of bottled up anger in him.” A door slammed somewhere behind me and footsteps advanced slowly but steadily. “What the hell do you want?” Hidan looked above my cowering figure, glaring daggers at the person behind me.

“I can’t concentrate with your constant yelling, it’s aggravating so go be annoying somewhere else.” It was that same cool voice from earlier in the corridor. I turned my head slightly, scared to look but still curious enough to dare it. “And leave the girl alone, her noise isn’t helping either.” The boy was slender and appearing to be not much older than myself, a mess of red hair gently framing his almost feminine features. His heavy lidded eyes were a soft brown, but they were cold to say the least. The unknown boy didn’t even glance at me.

“Hey fuck off Sasori! I’m busy, you can go find somewhere else to do whatever it is you do behind that door.” The same Sasori from before? No, something was amiss. Quicker than my eyes could catch ‘Sasori’ dashed forward, leaving Hidan in a slight shock before he shuddered painfully. And he crumpled to his knees. With wide eyes I looked up, blood smeared the slender hand that was clenched into a tight fist and with a glance I could tell there was blood seeping through from under Hidan’s hair. Sasori stared down at me blankly, stepping forward and dropping to the ground in front of me the remains of my necklace.

“If you were smart, you would move before he revived.”

“Wait, why-why did you do that for me?” Bewildered by his almost vague display of kindness I tried to find something beneath that cold exterior but nothing was there. His eyes drifted upwards and he stepped forward with that same look on his face.

“Don’t flatter yourself, if he kept it you would have just kept crying.” Those brown eyes flitted over to my damp face and he looked for but a second. “And it makes it hard to concentrate when you’re being so loud.” And he left me to myself. A small shriek escaped my lips as Hidan moved about, groaning something about how it was the second time again this week. He healed awfully quick. I forced my legs to move and I pressed forward, panicking more as I heard him get up.

“That damn freak show, thinks he’s so much better than everyone else! Ah, Jashin will give me the power to take that brat’s head straight off! But first, where’s that little bitch?” My body twitched as I slid my small frame behind a large, loose board broken against the wall. Hidan cracked his neck and swiveled on his foot. “Come on out sweetheart, it won’t take long…”

“Hidan, I told you twenty minutes ago to meet me outside and you’re still in here! You idiot, we’re in a hurry so get moving.” The detached voice was low and gruff, not to mention angry. I shut my eyes, wrapping my arms around my legs painfully, all I wanted was Deidara.

“Oi…shut up.” Hidan growled rudely, “I was busy but I’m coming so stop nagging will ya?” I watched his feet shuffle by the narrow opening of the board, holding my breath until the door would close behind them. Suddenly, a kunai broke through the board, stopping short within half an inch from my forehead. “I hope you’re still alive when I get back, I’m not done with you.” Even after he left I found it hard to breathe.

“Deidara…please come back.” I muttered to myself. It was no surprise I was scared to leave my hiding spot, but I knew I had no choice. I needed to find him. The room I was in was a small sitting room. If it could even be called that. Everything was tattered, like all these people did was fight with each other. Not like that was hard to imagine.

“And what if you didn’t find him?” The voice was coming from the walls, speaking to me like some kind of dream. I looked around in fright but saw nothing. “Would you live without him?”

“I wouldn’t.” A slinking sound could be heard, like swallowing.

“How unfortunate.” My eyes drifted towards the deeper voice and to my horror I saw what could hardly be called a human. His lower half was being consumed by the wall and what surrounded him almost looked like a cocoon made of plants. What I couldn’t figure out was who he was, half black and half white, his face was hardly distinguishable. “Yes, I must agree. It’s quite unfortunate he’s coming this way.” A door to my left opened up and by then my nerves were shot. I let out a wail and collapsed to the floor, I couldn’t take it. These people, these monsters. I was in a prison surrounded by soulless killers. Through the wet I saw a flash of yellow.

“Nezumi-kun!? What are you doing out here!?” I clung desperately to his black robe, fingers digging in frantically to scratch the flesh beneath. It was like someone else was screaming, crying out his name in such relief and fear, I didn’t want to believe it was me.

“Please…please Deidara-kun. Help me, anything! These people, they want me dead!” I barely said through ragged sobs.

“Shh…shh, it’s fine. You’re okay now, hm.” Like I child I clung onto him, unable to find the courage to move. I couldn’t even explain how comforting it was to see a familiar face not marked with loathing towards me, that hunger. It wouldn’t leave my clenched eyes, like it was embedded on the back of my eye lids. We were moving and I could only presume he was heading back towards the sleeping quarters. “You weren’t supposed to leave the room, hm.” He said impatiently. Yet eyes were soft and caring. “Not until I came back anyway.” He laid me down on the bed, moving himself besides me. “I figured it out…” he whispered softly in my ear. “how to get you the hell out of this place, hm.”

My eyes shot open and I stared back into his wide blue eyes fearfully. “Don’t make me leave, after everything you’ve done to me I haven’t given up hope on you. We can still have a life together.” All I did these days was cry. This was delirium, pathetic. At this point I would beg to have him even lie. “Just tell me…you’ll come with me!” My hand clenched at his shoulder and for a moment even he looked sad. “You don’t realize, there is nothing without you…I can give you a better life, this wasn’t the plan.”

“Nezumi…hm, you were right, you‘re the naïve one now. I wish you wouldn’t keep saying these things. I can‘t give you what you want…” He shifted above me, his hair sliding down and brushing against my exposed shoulder. Blue eyes met green and suddenly his mouth pressed firmly against mine. Softly, sweetly and painfully quick. “You don’t understand, hm. I can’t come, for your own good.” I hadn’t kissed him in what felt like so long. My mind fell to tatters.

“That makes no sense. I need you there with me.” A smile met his lips at my soft spoken words.

“You have a chance at happiness without me, hm. I can see what I’ve done to you and it’s absolutely killing me. Really. If I don‘t let you go now…I might not be able to let you leave later.” He dipped his head lower and brushed his lips against my own begging mouth. I was numb, out of my mind and undeniably hooked. “I have to do this,” warm lips pressed against my bruised neck, pressing hard enough to make me groan in pain. “For one reason.”

“What is that reason?” His hand wrapped around my injured arm and squeezed, forcing my arm against the bed. The pain was blinding and I bit my lip to stop the scream from sounding out. The taste of iron tickled my tongue and I swore I saw a hint of mania flash behind those cyan eyes. Right then I knew he was one of them, this wasn’t my Deidara. Again his mouth pressed against mine, harder this time. His tongue licked away the bits of blood still spilling from my lip with an undeniable hunger. “Well?” I said through gritted teeth.

“Because, I love you Nezumi-kun.”