ONESHOT - SASUKARIN; MIDNIGHT TALK
Fellow SK shippers and I have been discussing how do we envision Sasuke and Karin as parents; and while I was thinking about that I was hit by a sudden mental picture. And so, this little drabble-turned-one-shot was born.442Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡpysJGGx3Cv
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Title: midnight talk442Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡzr2bwvghBl
By: Kanae (Goth-Punk88 @ ff.net)442Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡcnn4ss7Ez5
Rating: T442Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ29JsVZgmqA
Word Count: 1.462442Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ9rHC6aPQkL
Author's Notes: Takes place post-series.
midnight talk;
A spark of alert flashes through her consciousness, briskly pulling her back from slumber. For a moment, she is disoriented—but then she feels it. That ghost of a caress, his finger absentmindedly tracing that particular spot above her left breast. The spot that was buried underneath bite marks but that he somehow never failed to find.442Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡJ2r8rxqsga
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“Sasuke…?”442Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡx8F0Vbqg8C
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He does not reply straight away; rather, his body speaks for him—the hold of the arm circling her waist strengthening, his fingertips pressing against the tender skin of her hip and his toes coming to rest against her ankle. But when his voice joins his body language, it is nothing more than a mere murmur.442Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡIaW0I5RyXE
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“…What if I’m not a good father, Karin?” he inquires, his breath tickling her bare breast. “What if… they hate me?”442Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡAy5n60GOl1
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His free hand travels from her collarbones to her swollen belly, and Karin has to resist the urge to swat it away out of annoyance at his insecurities. Letting such a thing get to him, this was so unlike him.442Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡyd83YJ4pom
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“Why would they hate you, Sasuke?”442Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡGBATRfLxXc
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His fingers move up, up and come to lightly trace the tear-shaped scar that both of them knew only too well, and she feels it again, then—that fluctuation in his chakra. That drop of mud that had sent ripples to what used to be a peaceful current and that had pulled Karin back from her own rest.442Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡGbIYQUc3zG
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“… I almost killed their mother, didn’t I?”442Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡUEMG91OIbD
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So this is what this was about, huh?442Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡmUa83QgbDd
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Karin sighs, raising her hand and letting her fingers entwine with locks of Sasuke’s jet-black hair. “We’ve been over this before, Sasuke.”442Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡTcu96uOQFj
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“I know,” he acknowledges, but his chakra is still stirring and his voice is still a strained whisper. “I know, Karin. But…”442Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡSqGyunatH0
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“Sasuke—”442Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡop7WHASLxb
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“—What I did was… still is unforgivable,” he says, his voice gaining strength in order to overpower her complaints. “What right do I have to be the father of your children, Karin?”442Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡJjimRaqTo4
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Their eyes meet, then. Karin’s glasses lie discarded on the nightstand, but she does not need them—not when he was this close, with his head lying on the crook of her neck. Not even the darkness of the room could prevent Karin from reading the look in his eyes as clearly as she could read the turmoil swimming inside his chakra.442Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ90KS96efQ6
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It makes her frown, her hand slipping down his hair and to his neck.442Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ3Xxa6wZ2QZ
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“Don’t be stupid, Sasuke. This isn’t about rights—you are the father of my children, whether you like it or not. It’s too late to turn back, now.”442Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡtZWKxtW0NB
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I wouldn’t turn back even if I could, is what remains unsaid, but Karin hopes Sasuke will be able to pick it up from her gaze, from her touch. It is an undeniable truth that Sasuke should know well by now, and Karin is not going to indulge him by voicing it aloud.442Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ2hPO9hhCim
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So focused is she on her thoughts that she misses his movements. When his warm fingers come to lay against her cheek, delicately, as if afraid that she would disappear with the lightest of touches, Karin finds her breath leaving her in the form of a stifled gasp.442Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡQX2JDfyRtA
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“Why…?” he asks, his eyes boring into hers, and Karin finds her edges rounding and becoming cotton-soft under his touch and the urgency behind his gaze. “Why did you give me a second chance, Karin? Why… why do you allow me to stay by your side, despite everything I’ve done?”442Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡmTr67d5Lz7
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“I’m… no saint myself, Sasuke,” Karin finds herself muttering, but anything she may have added slips through her mind and remains forgotten, as Sasuke pushes back the bangs from her forehead and begins to trace the contours of her face.442Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡv19m11zfO9
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“No,” he agrees thoughtfully, voice soft. “You are not, Karin… But you are no devil, and I—”442Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡkymQzuQy0M
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“A man,” Karin cuts in, firmly, and Sasuke’s fingers halt their ministrations. “You are nothing but a man, Sasuke. And men make mistakes.”442Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡfVPfDTezdk
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“…Mistakes that could’ve cost your life, Karin,” Sasuke reminds her, his eyes narrowing. Karin’s mirror his look, faded annoyance beginning to come back to life yet again.442Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ8Y0muZwXRf
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How many times would they have to go through this before Sasuke let it go? When would he learn that clinging onto the past never did any good? All his mistakes—all the pain he caused himself and those surrounding them steamed from that stubbornness of his, from that apparent incapability of living the present for what it was. And Karin—Karin refused to let him continue to chastise himself in her name’s sake.442Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡfPau5ECjWh
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Not when she had already forgiven him a long time ago.442Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡF8xiDiIemD
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She would not play his game.442Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ3xfVzWgsQe
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“If you feel that way, then why are you with me, Sasuke?”442Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡEnJNNEBHwj
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“… Because I’m selfish,” he replies after a breath, and his fingertips are tracing her lips, now, “I’ve always been selfish, Karin. You know that well.”442Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡoD7JypZxXS
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A ghost of a smile curves the corner of Karin’s lips, but she forces herself to hide it before he could have the chance to notice it through his touch. It was no time to humor him; not yet, at least.442Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡaccAcD3yJc
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“Is that all this is to you, then? You not wanting anyone else to have me?”442Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡAsSmjOza6c
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“No,” Sasuke states, and he is frowning, as if indignant by the suggestion alone. “You know that’s not how it is, Karin.”442Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡipI5AsBXjn
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Oh, she knew. Of course, she knew, she would not be with him otherwise. But Sasuke needed to learn how to say it; because while she did not need to hear it, his children would.442Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡtqywWlH9le
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“Then let me hear it, Sasuke.”442Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡkn8pKc1bPH
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There is hesitance showcased in his eyes and expressed through the way his fingertips linger, unmoving, ghosting over her cheeks; but Karin did not allow herself to feel like she was being unfair to him, asking him to say words that she had yet to say aloud herself. But the difference was that Karin knew how to do so; she had not forgotten.442Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡhPs7PjDwps
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But Sasuke? Sasuke had. And Karin knew that was one of the thorns that kept jabbing at him whenever his eyes flickered across her swollen belly. A thorn embodied by the scar that remained as a memento right above her heart.442Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡbO6jAQz2hG
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“Karin…”442Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡEyyIChfZay
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And so, she does not back down.442Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡstyKe5paXc
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“Say it.”442Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡA62DiRjvZd
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Sasuke heaves in a sigh and closes his eyes for a long moment, defeated. Karin reaches out, then—reaches out and traces his face with the same adoration with which he had been tracing hers, using her warm touch as encouragement.442Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡO9kEkh0ymJ
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When his obsidian eyes open again, what she sees in them steals the breath right off her lungs.442Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡE6CQn7MkpC
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“Karin, I…”442Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡJXcvcoAsFz
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His voice fades into silence as the words stumble over each other inside his throat, inexperienced, alien to his lips but overpowering in their truth—and so Sasuke leans in and lets his lips speak wordlessly directly to Karin’s own, which answer their call with a hunger that would never cease to set his very veins aflame.442Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡUJLRAl51Nn
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When they part, Karin’s arms, which were circling his neck, hold him in place; and so he lets his forehead lay against hers, his lips lightly brushing her own with every word he spoke.442Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡEsK4DKSuwM
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“I want you, Karin,” are the words he says aloud, but Karin hears beyond them and into the feelings he expressed through his kiss—through his gaze, through his touch. And it is to them that she replies:442Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ8OZRhTU8YB
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“It’s the same for me,” her voice an intimate whisper meant for him and him only. “Always.”442Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡDdh8CpXAgr
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Her name leaves his lips in the form of a shaky breath, and Karin holds him close, gives him solace in the modest curve of her breasts. “They won’t hate you, Sasuke,”442Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡB9HDrz9Kwj
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“… How can you know that?”442Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡIJ73o1umuX
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“Don’t you trust me?”442Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡQddhdqGSRK
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Sasuke says nothing; he does not need to. Karin smiles. “Then trust me on this, Sasuke.”442Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡCyJwUohOR7
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There is no way they will hate you, is what Karin tells him without words as she plays with his hair. Not if you look at them the way you looked at me just now.442Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ6RyJokS5Tc
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“…Alright.”442Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡovixzTUuct
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Karin’s gaze darts to his face, and she is pleased to see a peaceful expression taking over his features and reflecting on his chakra. The sight softens her smile, and she feels a surge of warmth expanding through her body as Sasuke unconsciously places his palm over her belly, the chakra of the two beings resting inside stirring to answer his call.442Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡd64mRk0y8l
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You idiot, Karin thinks, fondly. They love you, already.442Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡx2alEH97ok
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As did she. And that was all she needed to know to quiet down her own fears; her own insecurities.442Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡzRmqKM7C2q
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We will be fine, she knew.442Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡwdKrLPqD3G
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They would be.
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tags: fanfic, karin, naruto, sasukarin, sasuke
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