Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto.

(Warning: dark fic.)

Alerion

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Part the Fifteenth:

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Closure

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He didn't attend Sakura's funeral two weeks later.

Tsunade had called him in six days after the incident, once Sakura's case had been nearly wrapped up and things were beginning to die down after the news of her death had been released to the public. She'd taken him to be blood tested, but it seemed as if any lingering remains from his last few hits of marijuana over a month ago had been flushed out of his blood stream and there was no way to confirm physically that he had ever even used. Even though he was willing to consent and take any punishment set upon him, Tsunade said she was tired of everything that had happened and would instead only show his clean records to her superiors.

He asked her if that was legal, and she told him she didn't really give a shit either way.

"I've had enough of all this," she'd responded wearily. "I'm going to quit here soon - this job has taken its toll on me and I don't think I could survive if something like this ever happened again. I'd rather not send another person to jail if I can help it."

He'd only continued to look at her silently.

She met his unrevealing gaze with steady amber eyes. "Sakura's funeral is going to be next week. It's going to be more of the Police Department's doing - meaning only a few outsiders will be allowed in - but I don't mind if you show up as well, seeing as…seeing as you were the closest to her before she died."

He'd swallowed, and when he replied his voice was hoarse with the lack of sleep he'd had since her death. "I think I'll pass, Chief."

She'd paused. "Is it Itachi?"

That, and the fact that he wouldn't be able to handle himself at the sight of her lifeless body. It was out of the question - he didn't need her funeral to make him feel alive. "More or less. I haven't seen him since…since you read her letters."

"I understand then."

Just as Sasuke turned to exit the room, Tsunade called softly to him, "Just make sure you go check on your friend, Naruto, in the hospital soon. He'll have some community service to complete once he's better since it can't be denied that he used illegal substances, but other than that the law is still pretty lenient - or, better yet, still being decided since it's such a controversial subject. He woke up this morning and was told about the incident. I'm sure he's not taking it very well, although it seems that he's had a visitor checking in on him since he was admitted." Her voice allowed him to guess that she knew exactly who the visitor was (as he could also hypothesize) yet she was going to leave the matter alone and out of the hands of the police.

Sasuke nodded briskly, his eyes still focused on the door. He heard the rustling of papers behind him, and his eyes widened when he felt an envelope being pressed into his hand. His eyes flashed up to meet Tsunade's grieving yet hardened gaze.

"He'll want you to read these to him," she ordered, then stepped back and moved to sit at her desk.

He stood still for a moment before her voice reached him one last time.

"And, Sasuke, don't avoid Itachi much longer. He needs support more than you think, and you're the only one left he can trust, even if you believe so otherwise."

With a clench of his jaw he was out the door and gone.

When Sasuke went to visit Naruto the next day, he found the blonde sitting with Hinata on his hospital bed, a small smile on his face as he watched Hinata delicately cut an apple into slices and then deposit them into a bowl, her gaze lowered and cheeks lightly flushed.

Naruto had just taken the first bite of one when Sasuke pushed open the door and stepped soundlessly into the room. The blonde swallowed as his blue gaze hardened slightly, but Sasuke could see that the hatred Naruto had expressed six days ago was gone.

Hinata stood up and bowed before leaving the room, sensing that the two needed some time alone. She gave Sasuke a small, understanding smile before she closed the door behind her.

Sasuke stood motionless for another minute, unsure of exactly where to start.

"Nice to see you haven't killed yourself, man," Naruto finally began casually.

And Sasuke relaxed as much as he possibly could anymore, and stepped toward the bed, the letters clenched in his hand.

Naruto had read the letters to himself - seeing as there was no feasible way Sasuke could go through that again - and had reacted with sad, heartbreaking blue eyes as he silently cried afterwards, unburdened by Sasuke's presence.

He wiped his nose when he finished, then turned his melancholy gaze to Sasuke. "I guess we should've seen something like this coming," he said softly, and frowned after, closing his eyes and turning away to hide the last few tears that had yet to escape.

Sasuke remained silent, his only response the tightening of his closed fist.

"Hinata told me what happened," Naruto continued once he had collected himself. "She's been watching over me since I was admitted, and she's been taking care of me since I woke up yesterday. She said she's never used drugs and doesn't plan to." He smiled gently. "Hinata had always been there for her friends when they needed help, because she knew they each had their own demons to deal with." He paused. "She told me stories about the good times she, Ino and Sakura had back in high school. She said Sakura had been the mother hen to their little family of friends. I can picture it perfectly."

Sasuke could see it so clearly it hurt. He closed his eyes for a moment before reopening them.

"Well," Naruto said, and placed another apple slice in his mouth; he chewed and swallowed before continuing quietly, "now we can only make use of the memories we have and try to move on, right? Sakura's gone" - his voice faltered - "and there's nothing we can do to change it."

Sasuke wanted to lash out at Naruto, to shake him and scream into his face that there was no such thing as moving on, that healing from this for Sasuke just wasn't possible -

But he kept his mouth shut and remained unmoving, because he knew something like that would shatter the fragile peace Naruto had momentarily created for himself.

Sasuke turned to indicate he was leaving.

"Do you think I could keep these letters?" Naruto questioned. "I want Hinata to read them. She deserves them more than I did."

Sasuke paused before nodding slightly - a small jerk of his head - and turned the doorknob, stepped out of the room, and closed the door softly behind him.

He twisted his head to his left to meet a pair of clear, pale violet eyes.

"I-is he alright?" Hinata asked delicately. She was genuinely concerned, that Sasuke could easily tell.

"Yeah," Sasuke responded in a short, clipped tone. "He'll be fine."

"T-thank you, Sasuke," Hinata's voice caught him before he could begin to walk away.

He paused to listen.

"You allowed Sakura to t-truly live before she d-died when I don't think she e-ever had the c-chance to before. A-and I would l-like to thank you for that."

He felt his chest tighten considerably. His throat began to burn.

He walked away without saying anything because there was nothing he could find within himself to say.

Sasuke learned within the next few days that Sakura's friend Ino had heard about her friend's death and hadn't smoked since. Hinata even told him that Ino had signed herself up for rehab, finally after having come to the realization that the drugs had prevented her from being aware of any of Sakura's problems while she was alive, and maybe even then also having denied her the chance of saving her once dear friend. Hinata said Ino was on the right path to learning her lesson about life and how delicate it was, and that rehab for her would prove to be the best thing available.

Not that Sasuke really cared. He was just glad that she was being force-fed the same reality he and all the others, including the department and Naruto, were as a result of Sakura's death.

It wasn't until the day after Sakura's funeral that Sasuke finally decided to visit Itachi.

He approached the door to his brother's apartment warily, making sure to take careful steps as he came to face it.

Sasuke knocked once, waited a good six seconds, and then the door was ripped open.

"What do you want, Sasuke?"

Itachi's voice was worn out, his eyes weary, his whole body seeming to crumble with exhaustion.

Sasuke opened his mouth, then closed it. He'd never seen his brother look so totally defeated, as if life had had its way with him and he'd completely given up. The shock rendered him speechless.

"If you have nothing to say, then leave." This time a flicker of energy - anger, irritation, anxiety, what that flash was Sasuke couldn't tell - entered Itachi's deadened gaze, and Sasuke finally recovered his voice.

"I just…I just wanted to tell you that I'm sorry." He swallowed. "For everything."

"What is there to apologize for?" The elder Uchiha's tone was distant, even cold.

"For not telling you about Sakura when I knew all about her!" Sasuke snapped. "That night I came to you I had met with her less than twenty-four hours before!" Sasuke found his voice rising, gravelly and hoarse. "I'm sorry for lying to you, I'm sorry I couldn't save her, I'm sorry I was too selfish to give her back to you when I should've" - Sasuke inhaled unsteadily - "I should have known bringing her back would've been the best thing for her -"

"But it wasn't what she would've wanted," Itachi cut in quietly.

Sasuke clenched his jaw.

"Although you knew who she really was better than I, even I can tell that Sakura got what she wanted and wouldn't have been satisfied any other way. There is nothing to apologize for, Sasuke -"

Except for the fact that I stole the only girl you've loved since Mother died, except for the fact that I betrayed you and hurt you and I don't think you can ever trust me again -

"- so just let it be. We can't change what has happened."

And with that, Itachi slammed the door closed.

Sasuke could hear the sound of a vase being thrown into a wall just a few moments later. The sound of it shattering - he could just imagine the broken pieces falling at his brother's feet - compelled him to the window, where the curtains on the inside were parted just enough for Sasuke to see in the apartment.

He found that Itachi had sank to the ground against the wall in his kitchen, oblivious to the sharp slivers of glass surrounding him, and had pulled his knees close to his chest. His forehead was pressed into his open palms, his face not within Sasuke's view.

On top of the counter directly across the elder Uchiha, among the broken remains of the greater percentage of Itachi's dishware and home decorations, stood a single framed photo of Sakura and Itachi together. Sakura's lips were pulled into a secretive smile, her eyes closed as she pressed a kiss to Itachi's cheek. The elder Uchiha had his arms around her waist, his mouth a slight upward tilt, his warm obsidian gaze forever locked on her.

The portrait was the only thing in the room Sasuke could see that was unbroken.

Silently, he backed away from the window and gave his brother the privacy Sasuke knew he desperately needed.

Because even though Itachi had said that they couldn't change what had happened, he seemed to be the very one who had yet to come to terms with the reality of his own statement.

Everything was fragile in the world. Sasuke came to know this with each passing day.

Every second without her smiling face filling his gaze was just another reminder. Each glance at Itachi's dull eyes, each flash of pink he saw, each goddamn moment that she wasn't with him only reinforced his belief in the statement.

He was fragile, he knew, able to break so easily, just like so many other things. One touch to the trigger, and he was shattered, never quite able to put the pieces back together in their original positions. He was chipped in places, his own life's puzzle so different from what it used to be that he could barely recognize himself.

Pieces were moved, some discarded - never to return - and then some changed as a whole. Resentment toward life grew into respect, disinterest into passion, oblivion into knowledge.

…sadness, into even more sadness. But it was such a melancholy that didn't quite fade away as it pulsed within him every second he lived. It was there when he quit business school and began criminal justice classes, it was there when he went to sleep every night, and it was there when he steadily began to cope with the pain instead of dwelling in it.

He came to accept the fact that she wasn't coming back. Sakura was dead, and there was nothing he could do to change it. Albeit, that acceptance came with many hardships and many cases of denial on his part, but still, it came, and Sasuke finally learned.

He closed his eyes and drew in a deep breath, these thoughts floating around in his mind, as the sky lightened above him. His legs hung off the side of the cliff, and not for the first time he considered jumping in after her.

But that would be giving up completely, as she had done, and he knew she would want him to live out the life she was never given the chance to have.

Sasuke opened his eyes, squinting as the first few rays of sunlight streamed through the clouds. The gorge below him was quiet, and he watched as the water became tinted with gold.

After a few moments, Sasuke slowly rose from his sitting position, dusting off his jeans. His classes began at nine, and he didn't want to be late.

With that, Sasuke shoved his hands in his pockets and turned away.

Just as he was about to open his car, however, he glanced back over his shoulder, and paused. The sun broke through completely above him, shining light upon the ominous scene, and with a small upward curve of his lips, he ducked into his car and drove away.

He'd return to visit her soon, after all.

Sasuke wasn't a perfect child. He had smoked something far worse than ordinary cigarettes, cheated on life, and lied to both himself and others more than could be forgiven. He wasn't a perfect child, and, yes, his parents were dead - had died long ago - but the loss didn't affect him as much as it used to; the loss of the girl he loved stood prevalent above all else. Still, he did his best to deal with the pain, to accept the fact that he would wake up every day for the rest of his life and never be able to see her beautiful smile again, and he promised himself never to go back to what he had become; and, this time, he would keep his promise, not just for himself, but for his brother - who Sasuke could see inwardly struggle with the loss everyday as he continued his job as a detective, partner-less and lacking that certain spark of life in his eyes ever since the incident - his best friend - who, after coming to terms fully with the death of the girl he claimed he'd loved and recovering from his addiction, had started dating Hinata and gradually found happiness once again - and, above all, for his reason for existing: Sakura - the one and only girl Sasuke knew he would ever love so much.

Because the day Naruto showed up to college high, he entered a world he had never known before, a world that became both his hell and his paradise, and he was never going back to it.

And so destiny had crept in, its wisdom teaching him the pain and thrill of falling in love, its severity tearing his definition of the world to nonexistence, its ways rupturing, shifting, healing…

And, piece by agonizing piece, destiny showed him just how precious life truly was.

A/N: Holy crap. It's finished. FINALLY.

And thus marks the end of Alerion. It's been a long journey, but I'm glad I was able to spend it with you awesome people who have stuck with me through my sporadic updates and chronic writer's block. If not for your constant prompting, I don't think I would've gotten around to finishing this, but alas, here we are.

This story kind of ran away from me in the beginning, and I'm glad I was able to bring myself back down to earth and actually wrap it up in at least a semi-pleasing way. I don't think I would have liked it to end any other way, and I hope you all feel the same.

So, one last time (at least with this story; my fan fiction days are far from over), I would be immensely happy if you'd review, because I crave your opinions more than anything.

I love you all so much, and thank you for fighting through this with me.

Sincerely,

Silver Echo

P.S. I've also drawn a picture of Sakura for this story, if you'd like to see it. The link is on my profile.

P.P.S. Criminal justice courses are often the first steps of entering the police force. Think of that what you may. :)

P.P.S. Lastly, if you would all check out my new story, Shinka, I would be overjoyed. It's SasuSaku, of course, and this time I made my first real attempt at keeping Sasuke in character, so I would love to hear your thoughts on how I did!