Silence

It had happened without any warning. Nothing had been said or anything left behind. Naruto had come back from training with Jirayia and then he vanished. Without any reason or anything. He just left. There was no sign of struggle, nothing. People knew he’d returned and then that night he was gone again. His apartment was clean and the kitchen had been restocked. Everything was arranged like he was gonna live there again. His back pack was left in the bedroom, his weapons all set out on the table like they’d just been cleaned. All his clothes folded and put away neatly. They only sign of something not being right was the framed picture of Team 7 had been thrown across the room. Lying in a pile of shattered glass. A shard digging into Naruto’s face.

Everyone who knew Naruto and looked through the apartment could tell something was wrong. To clean, to normal looking. Even the food in the fridge and cupboards was to organized to be something Naruto had done. They checked all the training grounds. Kakashi sent out his dogs to find him but they could only find traces and then it was nothing that lead to anything. No one could find anything but something Pakkun found. It was Naruto’s forehead protector. The metal was twisted into a spiral that no one had ever seen anything like it. That was a feet very few Ninjas could accomplish. Search parties were sent out into different countries to try and find the blonde. There was nothing. No sign what so ever of the blonde.

Some older members of the village believed that Naruto had run away and staged this all. Become a Missing Nin like Sasuke or something but everyone who knew Naruto wouldn’t believe it. When a group of parents at the school started talking about this rumour. Iruka was ready to defend his own student, but was beat to it by Konohamuru and they other two members of Konohamuru corps walked right up to them and told them off. Saying that Naruto was the strongest Ninja in Konoha and that’d he was gonna show them all that some day when he came back.

While rumours of him becoming a Missing Nin travelled around, another rumour started. Some believed Naruto to be dead or some kind of Hostage of someone who wanted the Kyubi. Yet Jirayia knew that Naruto was too strong and too smart to fall for that kind of trap. Someone who wanted Naruto for that. Wouldn’t make it try to look so normal. It made no sense for them to clean his house and make everything normal before stealing him away. This was something else. Something they weren’t thinking of.

Another idea, was that he went to find Sasuke. He’d made his promise to find him and bring him back. Maybe he was trying to bring him back now. Then rouse the question of why stage that all? Why make it look like he wasn’t leaving. They could understand not telling him where he was going, but why the suspicous set up, the photo and the forehead protector. Nothing made sense as too why he would leave like that?

All of his weapons, clothing, money, food and personal items had been left at his apartment. Sasuke’s forehead protector and Tsunade’s Hokage necklace were both sitting on his night stand. What reason would he have for leaving them?

***

The search parties found nothing and soon it was clear that no matter how long they searched. With nothing else to say everyone assumed something different of Naruto’s fate. Not knowing where he went or what happened to him. Life had to go on, so Tsunade made they only statement she could. Uzamaki Naruto was assumed dead until evidence came that could prove this to be false. From that day forth, the name Naruto was hardly mentioned and the village of Konoha seemed to have lost a bit of it’s laughter. It became quieter it seemed. Though many people actually admitted to hating the bear of the Demon Fox, they now admitted to hating the silence that came when he left.

Another three years passed before the name Naruto came back to the village. Though Naruto didn’t return, Uchica Sasuke did.

***

The morning was quiet, peaceful and eerie in those manners. Kakashi had never liked how that sense washed over the village upon Naruto disappearance. He had never come up with his own theory on what happened to his blonde student, but he carried the forehead protector with him. Tucked away in a pocket on his vest. A silent remainder that the boy had existed and touched his life while so many others seemed to forget. Kakashi walked to the place that Team 7 had done there first mission. The black stone that stood in the center of his vision was blocked by a man dressed in solid black. He was familar and his fingers were tracing a name that had only been carved three short years ago. Uzamaki Naruto. The stone that he had once in ignorance declared would bare his name now did.

Kakashi walked up to stand beside the cloaked figure. The finger that traced the name started to tremble and finally fell to the man’s side. “Is it true Kakashi? Is he dead?” Two onyx black eyes met Kakashi’s and he was shocked to be meeting the face of Uchica Sasuke. In his six years away from the village he had grown in height. His face simillar but different then Itachi’s. His hair looking as though it was rarely taken care of in those six years. Cut around the shoulders, probably with a kunai.

Looking straight at the stone and the name carved there, Kakashi sighed. “Naruto vanished three years ago. He trained with Jirayia for three years and on the same day he returned, he vanished. His apartment was clean, everything in it’s place. We haven’t found him, all we found was this.” Kakashi pulled the forehead protector from his pocket and held it out to Sasuke.

He took it carefully in both hands. His fingers tracing the metal and the twists that had been placed in it. “So you don’t know if he’s dead. You assumed.”

“We couldn’t find any trace of him. Tsunade had to tell the village something.”

“I suppose she did.”

Kakashi straightened. His tail of Naruto done he had a few questions for Sasuke. “You’ve returned here, it means you must have killed your brother.”

He shook his head. “No.”

“No?”

“I faced him and I have the strength to do so. I fought him and I was going to finish it as well. He said something that unnerved me. I wanted to live, not as an Avenger but as a person. I did not kill Itachi, but he will no longer hurt anyone again.” He looked at Kakashi, a sad smile on his lips. “I wanted to come back to Naruto, to beg his forgiveness and tell him it was over. I wasn’t going to leave him again. But I’m too late.” Sasuke held the twisted metal close to his chest almost cradling it. All that he had left of the blonde boy.

Looking away from Sasuke and back to the stone he let out a sigh. “I always thought that they only person who’d bring Naruto back was you. In three years no one has been able to find him. Gaara of the Desert couldn’t even find him. Even Sakura believed it. She was heartbroke when you left but when Naruto left I’d never seen her cry like that. If you go to see anyone, go see her.”

“You know when you told me that I’d automatically go looking for him, didn’t you?” He got no response from the Copy ninja. “I will Kakashi. I’ll bring him back.” He turned and left. It took him no time to find Sakura’s window.

***

Haruno Sakura had almost grown a coldness about her since Naruto left. That last beam of sunlight in her life had left her. She still studied hard under Tsunade and Kakashi trying to become the best she could. When people asked why she just hadn’t given up, she told them so she could impress Sasuke and Naruto when they came back. The smile she gave was fake and all of those who knew could tell but they said nothing. Sakura had to do what she could to keep herself from going insane. Over the years she’d matured into a woman, tall and well figured. Actually quiet beautiful but there was a sadness in her eyes that never left.

When Sasuke knocked at her window he was almost shocked when she came to the window. He recognized and didn’t recognize her with the same pink hair only cut barely half an inch away from her head. She looked at him and a smile came over her face when she recognized his face. “Sasuke.”

“Sakura.” He reached forward and hugged her. Six years had been far to long. She started to cry holding him tightly. “I’m sorry for what I did. I didn’t realize everything I’d be throwing away. I have to do what’s right now. I’m going to find him and bring him back.”

She pulled back and he wiped away her tears. “He said the same about you. He never gave up on you Sasuke. He didn’t run away like people think. Something was defiantly wrong. I could tell that was not the way he’d leave.” She went over to her dresser and pulled out a small box. “He wouldn’t leave these behind.”

Inside the box was Sasuke’s scratched forehead protector and the Hokage’s necklace. Silently Sasuke pulled them out and slipped the necklace around his neck and tied the forehead protector around his neck. “I’ll find him. I swear I will.”

“I know you will Sasuke.” She watched him jump down from the tree and head out of the village. Even though she despaired she knew that Sasuke would find Naruto. If anyone could find him. Sasuke could. When she went about her day people notticed a light that hadn’t been there for years. When Tsunade asked she simply smiled and told them that they were coming back.

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Please don't hurt the Ne, I know I suck.

DISCLAIMER - I do not own Naruto. I wish but I don't