Chapter Text
“Sasuke.”
Sasuke didn’t respond. There was no way he could. He stared forward with the first taste of fear on his tongue.
“Sasuke.”
He took a step forward, the moist carpet squishing underfoot. Another step, and before he could go any further, Naruto had grabbed his wrist tightly. His nails dug into Sasuke’s wrist, snapping Sasuke out of whatever dazed trance he was in. He turned to look at the blond, his Rinnegan spinning wildly.
“Sasuke,” Naruto stressed his name, eyes filled with fear and bright blue eyes a shade darker than they should’ve been, “where are we?”
Sasuke turned his head to look around them. The walls were a faded yellow, a faint pattern barely discernible. The carpet was a faded brown color, and the stench it gave off was a moldy, mildew-y scent, and the overhead lights were too-bright fluorescents, humming loudly.
Sasuke glanced at Naruto, if only for a moment. Naruto looked back, looking distraught, and gripped onto Sasuke tighter.
“I don’t know,” Sasuke said, swallowing loudly. He tried not to let his voice shake.
Naruto still held a vice grip onto his wrist. He stepped closer, invading Sasuke’s personal space. He didn’t mind, he’d take any comfort he could get. “I think it– I think it was your Rinnegan, but I–” Naruto asked, frantically looking around, “we weren’t supposed to end up here, right?”
Sasuke’s wrist throbbed. “No,” he said quietly, looking around the haunting room, “No, we were not.”
Naruto took in a few shallow breaths, and Sasuke didn’t know how to help. He reached with his other hand and pulled Naruto’s fingers away, and his grip loosened, then vanished completely.
“We should find a way out,” Sasuke said. “We should– we should start walking. Maybe we can find something. There has to be a way.”
Naruto yanked at his wrist again, spinning Sasuke toward him, and he didn’t have the heart to tear his hand away this time. “Can’t you use your Rinnegan to get us out of here? To get us back to the village?” Naruto asked frantically, a wild look in his eye.
Sasuke focused on the feeling of Naruto’s hand on his wrist, and despite their awful circumstances, tried not to blush. In this place, wherever the hell they were, he knew he’d feel better with Naruto by his side. In any place, really.
“I don’t know if that’s a good idea,” Sasuke said, trying not to let his nervousness show. “I used my Rinnegan and we ended up here. What if we end up somewhere worse? We don’t know how this happened. This shouldn’t have happened. This shouldn’t have–”
Naruto’s grip on his wrist tightened painfully. Sasuke looked up and met his eyes, and Naruto looked more concerned for him than the situation they were in. His heart swelled.
“Calm down,” Naruto said, loosening his grip when Sasuke let out the breath he didn’t know he was holding. He hadn’t realized that he was starting to panic, but really, who wouldn’t panic after finding themselves in an unknown place like this? A better question was, where the hell were they? “You’re freaking out.”
Sasuke bit the inside of his cheek and willed himself to relax. He tried to think clearly, and to not give into panic and despair. He had Naruto, after all, he wasn’t completely alone in this. As long as he had him, he’d be okay. They both would be.
“I’m fine,” Sasuke said, but neither of them believed it. Sasuke swallowed hard, then looked past Naruto and down the hallway, to the continuous yellow rooms with the squishy, smelly carpet. “We should walk. Maybe there are other people here, and they can tell us what’s going on,” he said, and couldn’t quite mask the shake in his voice.
Naruto nodded sharply, then looked behind him. He turned and stepped to Sasuke’s side, his hold on his wrist lighter than it had been before, something more gentle. Naruto’s hand traveled further down his arm, slowly, until he was holding the very end of it, a finger resting against his palm. They were nearly holding hands, and Sasuke willed Naruto to just do it, to summon the courage Sasuke couldn’t. Naruto rubbed his thumb across his wrist a few times, trying to comfort Sasuke as much as he could. Sasuke tried not to react, he tried not to let Naruto know the effect he had on him.
Sasuke couldn’t let his stupid, unrequited feelings get in the way of their situation. Sure, Naruto was almost holding his hand, but they were in a strange new place that reeked of something horrible, fear spreading like a disease, and who wouldn’t want to feel any amount of comfort in that moment? Who wouldn’t want to be reassured that everything would be alright, even if it was a lie? Despite Sasuke’s hard exterior, he desperately wanted any amount of physical contact with Naruto, and he wasn’t going to give it up while he had it.
Sasuke looked at Naruto, whose shoulder was pressed against his. Naruto looked back, brows scrunched together with an awful look on his face. Sasuke was sure he wore one of the same, and couldn’t bring himself to change it.
Sasuke turned forward and let out a breath. He didn’t know what he was doing, but he knew deep down that they’d escape. They’d get back to the village at any cost. They’d make it home, and they’d do it together.
Sasuke took a step forward, and then another. Naruto kept his hand on his wrist and followed. They walked from one yellow room to the next, hoping against hope that somehow they’d find an exit and make it home.
—
They’d been walking for… a while. It had been a long, long while. Hours, at least, they’d been walking, and there was no end in sight. The fluorescent lighting and the yellow rooms kept going on and on, and Sasuke felt a spark of dread low in his gut that this very well could go on forever. He didn’t understand how the rooms were seemingly limitless, just room after room of nothing, but somehow it was true. He would just have to accept that they had jumped universes thanks to his Rinnegan, and that he couldn’t take it back, at least not now. Maybe not ever.
Naruto stayed close to his side, walking in step with him. The carpet, soaked with… something, made an awful sound with each footstep, and Sasuke was worried that whatever it was would seep into his open–toed shoes. They were in an unknown environment, and who was to say that the fluid wasn’t toxic? There were so many unknowns about where they were, and Sasuke didn’t know how to find an answer. He didn’t know what was going on, but maybe, if they were lucky, they could find a door and escape back to their world. Maybe this was all some awful dream, and they’d wake up to their regular lives back in the village at any moment. Sasuke hoped for that, because if it were anything else, Sasuke didn’t know what he’d do.
Sasuke stopped in his tracks, a horrible thought occurring to him. Naruto stopped with him, concerned. “What?” Naruto asked, inching closer to Sasuke.
Sasuke licked his lips and looked away into the next room, and the one after that. He turned back to Naruto and sucked in a breath. “Make a clone,” he muttered, holding his gaze. He needed to know.
“Why?” Naruto asked, confused.
Sasuke huffed. “Just do it.”
Naruto gave him a scrutinizing look, then let go of Sasuke’s wrist. He made the signs for the shadow clone jutsu, and Sasuke’s worst fear was realized. Nothing happened.
Naruto’s eyes widened, and he stared down at his hands. “It didn’t work,” he said, all emotion absent from his voice. He tried again, but nothing happened.
Sasuke stepped back, then made the signs for his Chidori. Again, nothing happened. He stepped back into Naruto’s space, not wanting to be far from him. He didn’t want them to be separated.
Naruto looked up at him, eyes wide and scared, like a cornered animal. He didn’t say a word, which scared Sasuke more than anything.
In a last ditch attempt, Sasuke tried to activate his Sharingan. When his right eye turned red and captured the look on Naruto’s face with perfect clarity, he let out a sigh of relief. Naruto smiled for the first time since they’d entered the warped reality.
“I have my Sharingan. I’m guessing my Rinnegan will work, too,” Sasuke said, “Visual jutsu works here, but anything else doesn’t.”
Naruto nodded, still too shocked to speak, then looked down at Sasuke’s wrist. In a moment of bravery he didn’t know he could muster, Sasuke offered his arm to him, and Naruto gladly took it, hand on his wrist once more. They started walking again, sinking into silence.
Sasuke’s Sharingan faded to black, letting his vision rest. He didn’t need to use it, at least not now. He knew that even though they were somewhere else entirely, they weren’t in any immediate danger. They were safe for the time being. Sasuke just didn’t know how long it would last.
It didn’t take long for things to change. Suddenly, the yellow walls faded to cement, the carpet disappearing into a darker shade of concrete. Fluorescent lights hung from the ceiling, much like ones from the place they’d come from. Dark puddles dotted the ground, though he didn’t know where they’d come from.
Sasuke stepped into the new room, Naruto by his side. He looked behind them, and all he saw was the vast expanse of their new surroundings, the yellow rooms from before gone in a flash. Sasuke sucked in a breath, panicked all at once.
He didn’t know how it happened, but it did. He’d wanted to end up somewhere else, but this wasn’t what he’d imagined. He thought that by some miracle they’d end up back home in the village, but this was far from it. They were somewhere else entirely, and he couldn’t help but feel terrified.
Sasuke glanced at Naruto, who looked as scared as he felt. Whatever this place was, this alternate reality that they were trapped in, had changed completely. Sasuke only had one question, one that he knew would haunt him.
If this wasn’t the way out, what was?