In Another Life

In morning, not long after you set out again, Kakashi splits off without a word. (“Scouting ahead,” is the explanation he gives—and maybe it is true.) Or maybe the icy bastard just couldn’t bear to walk beside you any longer.

Tenzo raises an eyebrow but doesn't question it.

You don't ask.

Now it’s just you and Tenzo, the mountain path narrowing under your feet as the forest deepens. You keep expecting to see Kakashi’s figure appear ahead—aloof, mask and silver hair catching the light—but there’s nothing. Just the steady sound of your own footsteps and Tenzo’s quiet presence beside you.

You feel it before it happens.

The shift.

It’s not sudden, not jarring. Just a subtle wrongness that settles into the base of your spine like cold fingers. Barely more than a change in the wind—if the wind were sentient. If it were watching.

The ridgeline rises ahead, dark with the slanting shadow of late afternoon. The sun’s dipped low, spilling rust-orange light through the trees like blood in water. The forest is quiet—too quiet. The kind of silence that presses against your eardrums. No rustle of leaves, no call of birds, not even the thin whine of cicadas beneath bark.

You and Tenzo stop at the edge of the path, eyes sweeping the tree line.

His gaze meets yours.

He doesn’t speak. Just gives you a nod. Professional. Calm. Measured.

The way you’ve done a hundred times before.

You breathe in. Out. Let your senses stretch.

The air doesn’t feel right. Thick. Warped.

Not like chakra. Not like poison or genjutsu or any technique you’ve been trained to identify. Just… off. As if the world itself has paused. As if something is holding its breath.

You scan the clearing. Sparse trees, a dip in the earth, a ring of flattened grass where the wind hasn’t stirred.

But there is no wind.

Tenzo crouches low beside you, voice low. “Feels like before,” he murmurs. “But closer. It’s moving.”

You nod once, slow. “We can’t leave it. Let’s move in.”

But the second your sandals hits the soil beyond the treeline, something shifts.

A pulse in the air. A strange reversal.

The hair on your arms lifts. Something brushes your skin—not a breeze. Not a breeze. Something deliberate. Sentient.

Your body reacts before your mind can catch up.

You pivot.

Too late.

Your heel catches. Your balance shifts. Your foot lands out of rhythm.

And suddenly, you’re stepping out of cover.

Wide into the clearing. Exposed. Vulnerable.

Like a rookie.

You know better.

You know better.

And still—your body moved.

“Wait—!” Tenzo’s voice is sharp.

But the warning comes half a breath too late.

The trap doesn’t spring in the way you expect. There’s no explosion. No sharp clang of a wire snapping or a puff of smoke.

Instead, the earth… folds.

The space ahead warps inward like a sinkhole made of air. Like the clearing itself is collapsing into a single point, sucking sound and color and balance with it. Your stomach lurches. The pressure behind your eyes spikes.

It isn’t natural.

It isn’t jutsu.

It’s something else.

Tenzo’s chakra flares bright and fast behind you, reflexive. Protective. But the pull catches him at the edge, dragging at his feet. His balance goes, and he’s slammed into the tree line with a sickening thud. His back hits bark. His head snaps to the side.

You don’t think.

You move.

Chakra floods your limbs. You dive forward, into the arc of danger, skidding past cracked earth and warped air. You reach Tenzo just as his legs give out, just as the pull tightens.

Your fingers catch the back of his vest.

And you yank.

Your shoulders scream. Your arms burn. The world distorts around you like a warped reflection in water. The pull fights you—grinding, heavy, wrong. You drag him back through raw willpower, chakra flaring through every muscle, teeth clenched tight against the strain.

You do not let go.

Not when your knees scrape the earth.

Not when something tugs at the edge of your vision, whispering in no voice at all.

Not until the clearing collapses behind you with a soundless crack, like reality slamming shut.

Then—stillness.

You’re both out.

Tenzo is groaning, his breathing shallow, one hand limp and the other pressed instinctively to his head. Blood weeps from his scalp, winding down the side of his face. His eyes flutter.

He’s alive.

Your arms shake under his weight as you cradle him half-upright.

The adrenaline drops like a stone.

And only then do you realize—

Your hands are cut. Your knee is bleeding. You can barely breathe.

Only then does your body begin to shake.

You turn your face away from Tenzo’s so he won’t see it.

The tremble in your jaw. The hollow in your throat.

Because you made a mistake.

Because you almost got him killed.

Because something wanted you to.

And it got close.

Closer than anything has in a long time.