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i.
The temple bell stops.
But the sound keeps coming
out of the flowers.
— Matsuo Bashō
If he has to choose a single word to define home, it would be sound . There is always a symphony of noises here: the hiss of a lab machine, the dripping water from the ceiling, the clink of glass vials, the grind of a key in its lock, the constant screaming.
Sasuke shares a room with one other boy, in a damp room with solid metal bars instead of doors. Everyone in Otogakure sleeps behind bars, and those who sleep behind doors are the ones who are exceptionally different - the marked ones. Special.
Kimimaro is one, and Sasuke sees him more often than not, because he makes it a point to visit Jugo who is his roommate. Kimimaro doesn’t have the time or energy for anyone other than Jugo, so when Jugo’s attention is directed away from him, Sasuke watches the water drip down the ceiling instead. It’s calming; it helps him sleep at night and it keeps his mind focused in the day.
Sometimes, Kimimaro does glance his way. When he does, Sasuke feels something take hold behind his ribcage – is this what it feels like to be special? “How are you, Sasuke?”
I’m fine is the only answer. Because he is; they all are. They get three meals a day, training from Orochimaru, lessons from Kabuto, and experimental sessions conducted by the both of them. Sasuke gets something no one else gets, not even Kimimaro: one hour a week above ground, running on grass and climbing trees and prickly sunlight on skin, with Kabuto’s gleaming glasses trained on his every move.
He drinks it all in – the warmth of the sun, the cool wind that caresses his cheeks. He grabs fistsfulls of leaves from the trees, throwing them up high and watching them fall around him like rain. Being under the sun makes his blood sing, even though he remembers nothing but the shadows of a life underground. For some reason, Kabuto doesn’t like him playing with leaves. Enough, Sasuke-kun.
He always tries to hide a leaf back for Jugo. It’s the only spot of colour in their dirt-coloured room and pale palms, a vibrant hue of green and yellow even in the dim candlelight.
Sasuke’s favourite colour is yellow.
“It’s beautiful,” Jugo whispers without fail, handling the leaf so carefully, as though it is one of the many glass vials in the laboratories they are taken into during experiments.
Today, he brings back a drier leaf, one the colour of Jugo’s hair. The seasons are changing. Jugo’s finger breaks through the fragile surface when he turns it around, and abruptly, the tears begin.
“It’s okay,” Sasuke says, shushing him gently. “Next week I’ll br—”
Jugo’s sobs turn into screams, and Sasuke doesn’t move in time when Jugo’s fist comes swinging at him. His body has changed, coloured the same shade as the steel bar they see every day or the rocks that Sasuke sees once a week, the ones that mark the entrance of the hideout. The pain exploded through him when Jugo slams a fist into his shoulder. Sasuke gasps more from the shock than anything else, because this still hurts much less than a normal day at the lab.
More sounds: the pitter-patter of footsteps as the assistants rush into the room, the hiss of a syringe sinking into his roommate’s lumpy neck, the scrape of Jugo’s heels against the rough floor as he’s dragged away.
The bruise is already flowering a sickly yellow across his pale skin.
Hours later, Jugo returns to the room, limp but normal. Sasuke is the one who’s taken away next, placed into his own room with a door, complete with a built-in lock and a square flap for those on the outside to peer in.
Sasuke is seven when it dawns on him that maybe he is special, too.
Experiments take place in capacious rooms that are three degrees colder than every other place. Sometimes there are group experiments, which Sasuke prefers because it means Kabuto’s attention is divided into neat sections, like the colourful pieces of dango they receive on special days. Three to a stick, three to a room.
Individual experimental classes demand more. This is when Orochimaru pokes at his eyes or prods at nerves or bone with cool metal instruments; when he asks Sasuke to please tilt his head back to drip clear liquid into his eyes, a drop that catches the harsh lights of the lab and Sasuke can see a rainbow sparkling within, a flash of beauty before the pain; when he shines a light so bright into his pupils that Sasuke can only see shadows for hours after he leaves.
A lack of sight heightens your other senses, Orochimaru likes to say, and Sasuke nods as he absorbs it all. The advice, the scoldings, the sleepless nights, the torn muscles.
Sasuke never cries, and barely makes a sound. He’s better than average at written lessons, but definitely not the best. The experiments offer him a time to shine; in his head, he’s the top in class.
Today is a group experiment, and Sasuke bites back a smile of relief. His other two classmates for the day are Tayuya and Kino. They’re each strapped to a metal chair, and Sasuke’s short legs dangle high above the floor.
Snakes slither in a clear aquarium on the desk next to Kabuto, their scaley bodies twisting and churning across each other. The lab is silent, save for Tayuya’s mindless humming. Kabuto picks up a vial of dark liquid and tips it upside down. He brings a syringe to it, long needle piercing the rubber valve and drawing the liquid, drop by darkened drop, into its chamber.
“This is nothing new, children. Venom of a mamushi pit viper. Expect swelling, muscle degeneration, visual disturbances, and fevers for five to seven days.” Kabuto smiles assuringly. “Shorter, if you’re stronger.”
Tayuya stops humming.
The fear is always at its peak right before the cold needle makes its mark, and it’s in this tiny space between Before and After that Sasuke truly feels afraid. No matter how many times he goes through immunisations, it always makes his head spin and his tongue go fat in his mouth, like the worms he finds under the rocks in the outside world. What if he dies, what if Tayuya dies, what if Kino dies, what if Jugo dies?
Kabuto walks up to him and flicks the syringe. This is the Before. Sasuke keeps his tongue between his teeth, just in case he screams.
The injection plunges deep into his upper arm, and the cold venom floods through him. “That’s all there is to it, Sasuke-kun.”
After leaves the taste of metal in his mouth and a numbness spreading over him.
Tayuya screams when it’s her turn, and Kino struggles against the restraints. Sasuke’s vision grows hazy with every breath he takes, but he’s focusing on the sense of pure relief that balloons like a bubble within him: once again, he’s the best in class.
The fever begins when he’s escorted back to his room. It breaks four days later.
Sasuke is eight when Kabuto checks up on him on the fifth day, and with a happy hum he makes a mark in his file. Kabuto is kind enough to let him read it: Now immune to most venom and bitter poisons.
Oto calls itself a village, but it’s actually just a hideout of subterranean tunnels and a maze of rooms. Instead of citizens, they are one big family because everyone here has no one else.
Sasuke knows most of the children who live here, and the first time he sees her shocking red hair, they’re at the canteen for lunch. It is the single brightest colour his eyes have ever come across and he likes it, because red reminds him of the colour leaves turn when the weather above ground turns cooler, and leaves reminds him of yellow.
“Your jaw is touching the table,” Suigetsu drawls and Sasuke feels his cheeks burn.
“It is not,” he replies quickly, even though he needs to close his mouth. Sometimes, ignoring Suigetsu is the best thing anyone can do. “Jugo, look at the colour of her hair!”
They’re still best friends, him and Jugo. Too many things happen here on a daily basis for him to hold something as trivial as a punch against Jugo.
“Let’s ask her to sit with us,” Jugo says amicably. “Hey, over here,” he says, waving his wide palm in the air.
“ Hey— ” Suigetsu starts, choking on his bottle of water.
“Wait—” Sasuke says at the same time, because sometimes observing something is much harder when the subject is right across from you. It’s something he’s learnt from Orochimaru and Kabuto.
The girl looks at them, and her eyes meet Sasuke’s first. Her eyes are just as red as her hair, and Sasuke can’t turn away. She has red glasses too, lips pressed into a subdued line that he knows is hiding the fear that threatens to engulf her whole.
What’s done is done, he thinks with a small sigh. Sasuke lifts up his hand to wave her over.
Tray in hand, she makes her way slowly towards their table across the lively canteen. Her eyes never leave Sasuke.
“Hi,” Jugo says kindly, when she arrives. He elbows a greeting out of Suigetsu, who just sloshes onto the bench and disappears with a splash across the girl’s feet.
“Wow, you didn’t drop your tray!” he says, materialising right next to her. “I think I like you already.”
“H-Hi,” she says, speaking directly to Sasuke.
“Hello,” he replies politely with a nod of his head.
“I’m Karin...Uzumaki Karin.”
“My name is Sasuke,” he says. “Just Sasuke,” he clarifies after a beat.
Karin’s small mouth breaks into a wide, open smile.
They are nine years old.
Everyone in Oto is an orphan.
Everyone in Oto is special. No one lasts at Oto if they are not unique or different or feared. There are those more special than others, and Sasuke thinks it’s like a scale: some are like Kimimaro, who only go where Orochimaru goes, while others like him get to sleep alone behind a door, or in Suigetsu’s case, a tank filled with bubbles the size of his head. Then there are those who sleep in communal rooms, like Karin.
They all have strange abilities and special powers.
Jugo has his rage that physically transforms him into a monster, while Suigetsu can turn flesh and muscle and bone into water. Karin’s power is related to chakra, but they’re not sure exactly how it works. She gets flustered whenever asked, and no one has dared to try again since that one time she bashed Suigetsu’s head in after his incessant questioning and no one got to eat dinner, because she splashed him all over their food.
“What makes you special, Sasuke-kun?” Karin asks, her eyes wide and full of admiration.
“I’m not sure,” he answers truthfully.
Jugo and Suigetsu have stopped asking him, because they know he’ll tell them when he does finally find out.
“Maybe it’s your face,” Suigetsu says.
“My face?”
“You’re pretty. Almost as pretty as Kimimaro-niisan,” Jugo adds helpfully.
Karin scoffs. “Sasuke-kun looks much better than Kimimaro.”
“Kimimaro-niisan has a kekkei genkai that allows him to shoot bones from his fingertips, so I don’t think he’s here because of his face,” Jugo counters.
Sasuke picks up his spoon and stares at the reflection in its warped surface. Pale skin, big eyes, dark hair that is always messy at the back. “It’ll be cool to have a kekkei genkai , like you guys.”
“You get to go outside, so maybe your power has something to do with that?” Jugo says.
“You get to go outside ?” Karin asks, her eyes widening. “Above ground and under the sun?”
“That’s literally the meaning of outside,” Suigetsu says, sipping noisily from his bottle.
She glares at him, her mouth open and the colour of her cheeks mean she’s ready to fire back, so Sasuke quickly cuts in instead. “I get to go outside once a week. My favourite parts are the leaves on the trees.”
“I miss the trees,” Karin sighs. “And the plants and the grass.”
Jugo nods. “Me too, I miss nature and the squirrels and the birds.”
“I didn’t think I’d ever miss all of that once I left Kusa, but I do. But living here is better,” she says, swallowing tightly. “It’s safer.”
“My clan didn’t have a village to call home. We just wandered around,” Jugo says.
“Well I don’t miss Kiri at all. It was way too hard to see five steps ahead and I was always falling over my own feet,” Suigetsu replies. “Hey Sasuke, where did you come from?”
A frown tightens across Sasuke’s usually smooth forehead; he does not have many worries here at home. The spoon is now warm in his fingers. “I don’t remember. I don’t know my ability, I don’t know my clan name, I don’t know which village I’m from. Everything I know is from Oto.”
Sasuke is ten, and still a slate as blank as the dark eyes that return his stare from the back of the spoon.
“Hello, Sasuke-kun,” Orochimaru says, ushering him and Kabuto, who trails behind him, into an unusually dim laboratory. “Things will be done a little differently today.”
“Okay,” Sasuke replies, only a little afraid. Adaptability is a learnt skill; every day is an adventure here.
“A friend will be joining you today,” Kabuto says, walking into the corner and lighting a candle. The flame flickers, and Jugo is seated on a chair, leather harnesses across his chest and arms and legs keeping him immobile.
“Jugo!”
“Sasuke,” he says, voice wavering in fear.
The apprehension creeps up his spine, one quickened breath at a time.
“Today’s lesson is simple,” Kabuto says. “You’ve been taking chokutō lessons with Orochimaru-sama. He would like to see your progress on Jugo.”
Sasuke shakes his head automatically. “Orochimaru-sama, I can’t–”
“Let’s begin,” Orochimaru says, as though Sasuke’s words were only whispered in his head.
Kabuto pushes something into his hand, and it’s his usual chokutō - sleek and sharp and comfortable in his grip. Recently he’s been made to practice in blindfolds, so wielding this sword is as easy as breathing now.
Today, it clangs uselessly on the floor, and Sasuke backs up against the wall, as far away from Jugo as he can get. “I can’t!”
Orochimaru’s eyes meet Sasuke’s, narrowing with displeasure. “You will.”
And just like that, Sasuke’s brain seizes. His body moves on its own – a hand picks up the chokutō, two legs bring him to Jugo, and muscle memory brings the blade in front of his best friend’s torso. The blade sinks into soft flesh, three inches to the left of Jugo’s navel. A flick of the wrist drags the sword across his stomach, then deftly upwards towards the chest.
A rivulet of blood and organs spill on the ground, over his feet, across his white shirt. Everything happens just as precisely as he’s been trained for.
Sasuke opens his mouth to scream, but no sound escapes his mouth.
The pain doesn’t come from his heart; it’s from his eyes. They burn as his vision wavers and warps, throwing shadows that don’t exist over Jugo’s lifeless face.
The only sound in the entire room is the metallic thud of the chokutō when it hits the ground.
“There it is,” Orochimaru rasps with pleasure, and suddenly Sasuke is on his knees, blade on the floor, Jugo looking at him without his torso torn up. Sasuke looks down, and his hands and shirt are pristine.
“Genjutsu,” Kabuto explains, picking the spotless chokutō carefully off the ground. “You just experienced a powerful traumatic event with regards to someone important to you. We couldn’t actually let you kill Jugo. He’s too valuable.”
His mind is still reeling, his inhalations rough and exhalations uneven.
“Don’t lose your focus, Sasuke-kun.” This comes from Orochimaru, before he slides out the room like a spectre.
“Your eyes,” Jugo says, voice alight in wonder. “What is it?”
Sasuke is eleven when his kekkei genkai awakens.
“Your Sharingan is beautiful,” Orochimaru breathes, shining a beam of light into Sasuke’s aching eyes. “Completely formed, too.”
Sasuke knows he’s talking about the three black tomoe in each eye, perfectly symmetrical. Kabuto and Orochimaru tell him a little about his eyes, but it’s not enough to explain the surge of power that shoots through him or the bursts of pain that colour his vision.
“Orochimaru-sama,” he asks, because maybe history can help him. “Why am I allowed to play outside?”
Orochimaru contemplates the answer. “I made a promise to your brother when he brought you here.”
“I have a brother?” Hope swells up, unbidden, within him.
“He’s dead. He brought you here where you would be safe.”
“Oh,” Sasuke replies. “What is my clan name?”
He can almost see the thoughts forming in Orochimaru’s mind as he chooses his words. Orochimaru takes Sasuke’s chin with two fingers, turning his head slowly from left to right. Sasuke’s eyes stay trained on his face, taking in those familiar reptilian eyes and bloodless complexion. “Your name will find you sooner or later, Sasuke-kun. It will come bringing pain, but it is not your burden to bear yet. Don’t get caught up in it, because your blood doesn’t take things like the truth very well.”
His Sharingan spins as it captures this prophecy in perfect clarity, word for word, breath by breath.
Sasuke believes him, because nothing pure and true can come from eyes that can see the ghosts of the future, or revive the spirits of the past. It’s safer to be just Sasuke.
He never asks again.
Fight Night is the closest thing they get to a festival in Oto, because there is special food to increase their chakra, emotions run high, and everyone gets to stay up past curfew.
Everyone gets paired up, and the only objective is to destroy your opponent. If they win, they are bestowed the ultimate prize — survival. No rules, no mercy.
Only a handful of people are spared from the bloodlust: Orochimaru, Kabuto, Kimimaro, and several aides.
For their little group, things go as smoothly as they possibly can: Jugo rips his opponent into half, Suigetsu is actually pretty skilful with a blade, and they finally get to see Karin’s ability in action. Huge chains burst out from her chest, binding her opponent in an otherworldly grip. They watch, transfixed, as she drains her opponent of his chakra, leaving behind the husk of a human body.
Sasuke’s opponent is a boy who wields a flute, a haunting tune rising up to surround them as Sasuke’s own eyes whir red. He is smaller than Tayuya, so this is probably her brother. Sorry , Sasuke mouths as he uses his eyes to cut through his paper-thin auditory genjutsu and body flickers to land a precise kick to the back of his neck. The cervical spine is one of the body’s most fragile areas, and it’s over when he hears a sharp, neat crunch.
Karin is there to greet him at the top of the makeshift ring, and he can feel Orochimaru’s slick gaze following him. “You are amazing, Sasuke-kun,” she says. His steps are slow to hide the tremors. “Your eyes are amazing.”
Sasuke can only nod.
“We both have red eyes. You could be an Uzumaki too!”
“Uzumaki Sasuke.” He lets the name, the sum of its syllables, settle on his tongue.
Clans are names and names are powerful: they possess the power to hurt, the power to heal. He shakes his head, more to dispel the discomfort than as an answer to Karin. Don’t lose focus , he reminds himself. No overwhelming emotions, no distracting hang ups. A good, blank slate.
Karin’s smile falls. “Are you okay?”
“My eyes...they use a lot of chakra.” He’s sitting on the ground, knees drawn up to his chest.
Karin is silent for a heartbeat. “Here,” she says finally, crouching down next to him and rolling up her sleeve. She sticks her arm in front of his face. There are marks upon marks on her skin; she is tattooed by scars shaped like a ring of teeth.
“What’s this—”
She shakes her head roughly. “You’ll feel better. Just bite down, and suck through your teeth. I swear I’m not being weird.”
His teeth meet soft flesh, and then it yields. Karin makes a sound like a gasp, and the chakra that flows into his mouth is a heady mixture of sweet and salty, like a salted sakura leaf wrapped around soft mochi. It doesn’t hide the sharp tang of blood. In the ring below, someone is fighting with a jutsu that sends up visible bursts of chakra into the air, exploding high up like fireworks.
They sit there, quiet, panting, for a little while.
The four of them survive to mark a complete Juunishi cycle: one year for each of the twelve zodiac animals. They all turn twelve this same year in Otogakure, alive and breathing and only a little broken.
ii.
in the midst of horror
we fed on beauty—and that,
my love,
is what sustained us
— Rita Dove
His first mission sends him to the Land of Waves.
“What’s my objective, Orochimaru-sama?”
“Just a little recon. You will observe a genin team from Konoha. Watch how shinobi from other villages fight, kill whoever you want, but don’t get caught. The report you will submit on your return is the true test. I want to know what you can learn from the outside world,” Orochimaru says.
There are three things on the table for him: a brand new map, a sword almost as long as he is tall, and a hitai-ite with a deceptively innocent music note etched across it.
Villagers are only provided with a hitai-ite when they receive their first mission. It’s a key to the outside world; out of the four, he’s the first to receive one.
“Understood, Orochimaru-sama.”
“Have fun,” he says with a wide grin, tongue flitting out from his mouth.
Sasuke offers up a small, obedient smile.
The dazzling sunlight gives him a headache on the first day of his journey. His eyes are more sensitive now that he’s awakened his visual prowess, so he modifies his plan to rest during the day and move under moonlight.
Game is easier to catch at night, but harder to cook while staying hidden because the flames of his small fire climb high in the silent night.
Four days after he sets out, Sasuke alters his tactics. Tonight, he sleeps under an ocean of stars. The pinpricks of light twinkle from a different world, shrouding everything in a reverent silence. The night is peaceful. Sasuke doesn’t like how easy everything feels, so he rolls up his sleeping bag and continues onwards, steps light and deft as he makes his way closer and closer to this target.
On the fifth day, the scent of salt hangs heavy in the air. Sasuke takes a little detour, out from the heavy cover of the trees, and to the open coast. The ocean sprawled out before him is breathtaking: blue water the colour of rare snakes he’s seen at the labs, sand that glitter under sunlight, and the horizon’s endless stretch. He’s arrived at the Land of Waves.
Six days after he first leaves Oto, in the watery light of dawn, he finds himself in the middle of a forest. There is a boy sprawled across the grass, sleeping noisily.
Bright orange clothes, a mess of blonde hair. Sasuke inches his way closer, curiosity piqued - he’s never seen so much colour on a person before. According to intel, this is a member of Konoha’s Genin team. No names, just brief descriptions of each character. The boy is completely unguarded, not a kunai in hand or barrier seal in sight.
Kusanagi is unsheathed with a mere whisper, and the boy does not even stir. Strips of sunlight catch against the smooth steel blade as Sasuke levels it against the sleeping boy’s throat. He should die for his carelessness.
Two thoughts flit through his mind. Yellow is a beautiful colour, and then: Maybe not yet.
He’s never met a proper stranger before.
When the boy’s eyes blink open, it is a slice of sky, stolen from above their heads. Sasuke stares, even though his own eyes throb uncomfortably from the unfiltered vibrancy.
“Huh,” he says sleepily, rubbing the back of his hair. “Who are you?”
Sasuke hopes his jaw isn’t wide open. He swallows, and points to his hitai-ite. “A shinobi, like you.”
“Ah!” he replies, pushing himself up to sit. “Where are you from? I’ve never seen anyone with that symbol before.”
“It’s pretty far from here.”
“We travelled a distance too!” he says happily. “I’m from Konoha.”
“My name…I’m Uzumaki Sasuke,” Sasuke says, using the first surname that comes to mind.
The boy stills, his entire demeanor changing. There’s a sudden tension that tightens throughout his body, and the boy finally looks like he’s on his guard. Finally.
“You can’t be an Uzumaki.”
“Why not?”
“That’s my name! Uzumaki Naruto!”
Sasuke stares at him, and this Naruto glares back, eyes narrowed with fear and something strange that looks a lot like hope. For a few breaths, no one moves.
Finally, Sasuke laughs, the sound carving itself out of him in deep, shaking breaths.
“What’s so funny!”
“Okay, I lied. I don’t know my clan name. I never knew my family so I’m just Sasuke.”
Naruto’s expression softens. “Y-You grew up alone, too?”
He shrugs.
Naruto breaks out into a beaming smile, one that outshines the radiant light in his eyes. This boy is a human container of energy, and Sasuke can almost feel it come off him in pulsating waves. It makes Karin’s intensity seem demure. “Me too,” he says, a little quieter, but he perks right back up. “Where did you get the name Uzumaki from?”
He inches closer because apparently they’re best friends now, and Sasuke takes a full step back to give them some breathing space.
“I have a friend in the village.”
“Wow, it means I’m not really alone…!” The smile grows even bigger.
“She looks nothing like you, so she could be lying?” Sasuke says. He makes it a point to check with Karin when he gets back. “Or maybe you’re the one that’s lying,” he adds.
“I’m not a liar,” Naruto huffs. “Maybe Kakashi-sensei would let me follow you back to meet her, after we finish this very important mission with Tazuna-san. I can ask Sakura-chan if she’d like to follow, but Sai would probably be annoying and join us as well.”
From afar, the sound of shoes against grass and a light chatter of disjointed conversations drift over - these are the sounds that people without a care in the world make. Sasuke doesn’t reply, and Naruto is oblivious. He continues talking about making a grand adventure to meet this long-lost relative of his, and that he hopes she isn’t lying because it’d be so cool to meet a living, breathing Uzumaki.
Sasuke makes a non-committal sound that seems to placate him.
“Hey hey, wanna spar?”
The sounds draw closer, and Naruto turns his searing blue eyes away from him, distracted.
Sasuke concentrates the chakra into his feet, and leaps up onto the branch of the closest tree. By the time Naruto pivots back around, Sasuke is gone, hidden several meters away and shrouded by dense leaves up high - the perfect bird’s eye view of the three new people who gather around Naruto. One adult, two children.
His eyes burn as the Sharingan takes, and Sasuke watches silently.
Sasuke starts writing the report on his journey back.
He pens the characters carefully into a scroll during the day, and spends the nights watching the stars peek out from under the clouds until the tranquility buries itself deep into his skin, into his muscles, spreading like an itch he cannot reach. Serenity and silence are unsettling.
No casualties from my hand. The team from Konoha is too relaxed to be a useful weapon for any village.
He thinks about the girl with beautiful and impractical hair the colour of delicate cherry blossoms. From the way he observed her wielding the kunai, he thinks she probably had more training in flower arrangement or music lessons. They’ve learnt that girls in powerful villages take proper kunoichi lessons instead of the death matches or monthly full body reviews they all get at home.
Sakura wears the crest of a clan on her back, but it is not one we have studied. She may have the potential to be molded into someone stronger, given the right training.
He shifts his attention to the third member of the squad, a skinny boy who smiled too much.
No identifying information on his clothes. Most likely civilian-born. Sai can be dispatched; the village does not need shinobi whose emotions can be read like an open book.
He’s down to the last member of Konoha’s Team 7. A maelstrom of colours and energy and easy smiles that calls itself a boy.
Uzumaki Naruto is an orphan who has a strange power within him. My eyes traced chakra from an inhuman source. He would make an interesting subject and a useful addition to Otogakure.
Yellow has always been Sasuke’s favourite colour.
Allow me to bring him home.