Chapter Text
[. . .]
"I could be a good mother."
[. . .]
Chapter 1
Founded
[. . .]
Little 8-year-old Levi refuses to move from his dirty spot in the corner, huddled against the bedframe his dead, rotting mother lays upon.
He doesn't know how long he's been here. Sitting. Not so alone because his mother is right next to him like she's always been, but she's since stopped speaking and reassuring him of things he understands are lies. He's gone in and out of lethargic, stomach-eating sleep, his little body cannibalizing itself as the hour presses on, waiting for her to wake.
She doesn't.
Levi doesn't understand why, but he believes that this time around, she won't come back.
It's a scary feeling.
It's not the first time his mother has been bedridden for days. He's fretted over her many times in the past, doing the most he can with his infinitesimal body whenever she asks him to bring her something like water or the spare stash of stale bread she keeps under a creaky floorboard. She's done so this time around as well at the beginning of her croaking sickness, but she hasn't woken up as he expected her to the last time she lovingly caressed his face.
When she told him that she loved him very much.
Her once warm body has gone stiff and cold and she smells like the people he's seen dangling dead out in the dark and ghastly streets. Sights that his mother had ensured to cover his eyes from, though never on time enough to stop him from seeing it.
Something that Levi is dreading and might vomit if he thinks too much about it. So he doesn't. Stubbornly he waits by her side for her gentle order, hoping against all odds that the scary, sunken, and skeletal look on her face begins to fill in again, coloring her back into the very light peach he has time and time again told her is the prettiest ever.
He doesn't care that he might wait forever. His mommy is right there and she needs him.
If she calls, he'll be at her side.
He closes his eyes when the dull ache in his midsection returns as a stabbing pain. It hurts a lot, but he doesn't have any more molded bread to eat and he's scared that if he goes out to look for some, his mom will wake up and look for the bread that he's remorsefully consumed without her permission. Or worse, she'll disappear, and he'll be all by himself without the embrace of his mother he misses very much.
So he remains.
And he waits.
And waits.
And waits until the pain subsides into that uncomfortable throb again.
He has no clue how long he's spent here. He doesn't know how to count very well because the promise his mommy made became null after always being very busy getting money to feed them both, and he hated that just when she had the time to tell him about how nice numbers are, she got sick. After the scary man left her room, she hasn't been the same.
Levi hated whenever a man came into their humble space, where it was meant to be safe. He's been put into a desolate corner with his mother's friends when that happens, helplessly waiting until she comes back to collect him. It's never too long and the women are nice when he stays quiet, but he prefers his mother's company to everyone else.
She is all he has, and he’s cried enough. Now he’s too dizzy, too dry. Even the tears have abandoned him.
He's cried enough and he feels light-headed, parched, and sullen. As much as he wants to, it hurts to cry, and nothing comes out.
So Levi sleeps.
Because that is all he can do now.
[. . .]
He startles awake when he feels delicate hands wrapping themselves around his body.
His eyes open wide and seeking, heart jumping at the thought that his mother is awake and grabbing him and hugging him and she must be healthy again because she has the strength to—!
He begins to tremble in confusion rather than anticipation when, instead of seeing his mother's blue eyes, he finds green.
The room is dark, but Levi can nonetheless see and feel the tickle of the glossed, long, beautiful hair colored in something he has only ever seen on his mother's lips on rare occasions. A woman with a purple thing on her forehead and the cleanest face whispers words he cannot understand, easily maneuvering his body so that she carries him by the legs with her elbow, his face pressed against her chest in a manner his mother had done so many times.
She smells like something very gentle and clean, and Levi, in his stupefaction, presses closer, lifting his weak arms to grab fistfuls of a dress he has never seen on anyone.
Levi doesn't know what's going on. But he feels safe, and as much as he wants to, he can't move his head without hurting just to see if his mother is watching this. He can't muster the strength to ask his mother either because he's just so thirsty that it hurts to speak, though something tells him she wouldn't have answered anyway.
Weird but soft noises that sound like words but also don't come out of the woman's mouth, and Levi breathes erratically in confusion despite watching with caution as her hand comes to run through his tangled hair, her fingers detangling knots without the sharp, painful tugs his mother had always promised were 'almost done'. Her motions are slow, and Levi sees his world move as she walks, steady. Her arms are strong, and Levi chances a glance when she finally turns around toward where the door is, intensely searching for where his mother should be at the angle that's provided.
He can't help the noise of protest that comes out of his mouth when he sees a tall, cloaked figure hovering over his mother's bed.
No! He wants to scream because it's a man and men always come to hurt his mother, but the woman carrying him shushes him kindly, rubbing his head. Levi doesn't understand, but he refuses to leave his mother in the hands of a man again because she's sick, and she might be dead, and he doesn't know—!
Levi cries.
He cries, sniveling and squirming through the pain coming from everywhere, and the woman holds him like his mother does, whispering sweet nothings he can't comprehend.
The woman leaves him and his mother's tiny home. She moves past the hallway, where the air smells sharp and wrong, like it did the night the blood came, easily making her way down the steps without any sort of sound. All the while, Levi sobs quietly into her shoulder, helpless to stop the cloaked man from being around his hurt mother.
When they make it outside, Levi coils into her further when the frigid air rushes in, but her body radiates enough heat to stop him from feeling fully cold. Not even a second later, he's jostled lightly around until his back is leaning on her propped arm, and she's seated, gazing at him in a manner so loving it throws him for a loop.
She gives him a sad smile before turning her head to the side and shuffling her unused arm for something in a bag. A cup. Fresh, cool water shimmers into the wooden cup from a glowing stream at the woman's fingertips.
Levi sniffles, blinking the tears away while he takes a second to process what he's being offered. His blurry vision focuses on her worried face and then lowers to see what she's holding—his eyes light up. Eagerly, desperately, he opens his mouth for the sloshing liquid. Little by little, he swallows down the sting of thirst, impatiently waiting when the cup needs to be refilled again from an invisible water source coming from the woman's hand.
He's frankly too occupied drinking the freshest water he's ever tasted to care about why she can do that.
Levi drinks until his belly is full enough to throw up. He doesn't vomit out the good water even though he thought he would, and the pain is less, but there's a sore emptiness that longs for food in his stomach.
He makes no outward complaints, however. He's just so tired and he's been given water from a nice woman that acts a lot like his mom.
She even thumbs his cheek adoringly when he begins to close his eyes. The sensation makes him open them up again because he still begs for his mother to be in the place of this woman, but his heart dies fast upon recognizing that she is not a threat.
She is the first person to treat him so kindly.
Levi is scared, but he doesn't fight the succumb to slumber. He wants to because the man is still out there, but he... strangely doesn't do so. The warmth of the woman's embrace sinks into his skin and right into his heart.
He's been found.
And that's enough, for now.
[. . .]
Sakura holds the boy close, heartbreak swelling in her chest until it nearly crushes her.
He is so small. So light it’s like holding a ghost.
Carefully, she wraps her spare cloak around his frail body, circulating her chakra to raise her body temperature enough to shield him from the freezing air. His head tucks into her neck, a thin, exhausted little thing clinging to the fabric of her shirt.
She can’t imagine how long he’s survived like this.
Not for the first time, Sakura curses the nightmare that brought them here. It was only about thirty minutes ago — the ambush in Iron Country. The deranged man who boasted he could traverse infinite worlds, preying on helpless villagers for his grotesque experiments. She and Sasuke fought him without hesitation — but at the height of the battle, when the man activated his jutsu and Sasuke triggered his Rinnegan at the same time, the unstable clash tore open something monstrous.
The portal swallowed them whole.
And now here they are, stranded in a foreign world without bearings — and no way home.
Sasuke approaches quietly from the decaying brothel, a dark silhouette against the gray air.
"Anything?" Sakura asks softly.
He shakes his head, holding out a scroll.
"Nothing that indicates where we are," he confirms.
Sakura takes the scroll solemnly, tucking it into her bag. Inside is the body of the boy’s mother—the woman whose final dignity Sakura refuses to abandon. She will find a place to bury her. They owe her that much.
"Then we keep looking," Sakura says, her voice steady.
Sasuke’s gaze flicks to the bundle in her arms—the tiny boy, sleeping fitfully.
"Rest first," he rumbles. "I’ll scout ahead. Find better shelter. I’ll come back for you."
She nods, understanding.
The child is too fragile to endure much movement now. Jostling him across rooftops would only worsen his condition.
Sasuke lingers a moment longer, his hand twitching at his side, before he vanishes into the shadows.
Sakura sits back down on the cold stone, cradling the boy closer. His breath is shallow but steady against her skin.
She whispers to him, even though he’s asleep:
"You’re safe now."
Deeply sighing, she nestles the child, waiting for his return.