Fractured

Bonds

Chaos. That was the only real way Mitsuki could describe the scene that followed. Incomprehension blanketed his mind as he tried to absorb the events that occurred around him.

He didn't even recall rushing to Boruto's—Momoshiki's—side after he was kicked by Lord Seventh. He could hear Momoshiki's howls overlapping with Boruto's own as he tumbled on the ground, blue-marked right hand pressed against his eye. Mitsuki saw blood there, leaking between his finger and down his face. Distantly, he heard the commotion behind him with Sasuke, but Lord Seventh was more capable than himself at dealing with Sasuke right now, he figured.

Boruto though, he thought...didn't he deserve help, too? Not to mention he didn't even know if it was safe to approach Boruto's body yet.

"You think this will stop me?" Momoshiki seethed in his dual voice, murderous indignation palpating through the air. Mitsuki took a small step closer, hand reaching out as Momoshiki's rage subsided, and the creature before him drew haggard breathes between his teeth in quick succession. Mitsuki saw what looked like steam rising between the fingers pressed against his eye. Momoshiki's voice hissed. "What is it with you lesser creatures?" His words were frenzied. "Over and over and over—! Always refusing to just accep—"

"Shut up," Boruto's voice was pronounced.

"Boruto!" Mitsuki called. Perhaps Boruto would be able to hear him.

"You should be grateful I'm—" Momoshiki's voice flowed through a snarl on Boruto's face. Boruto's small body leaned forward as he groaned in an even blend of Momoshiki and Boruto's voices. Steam poured violently between the fingers against his eye.

Mitsuki felt horrified, as though he were unable to do anything. This internal struggle in the small body before him was something Mitsuki wasn't sure he could help resolve, yet he took a step closer, unable to stop the impulse to help his beloved friend.

The sun to his moon. It was hard, even now, for Mitsuki to separate Boruto, the person, from Boruto, his savior—his beacon. Mitsuki had a complicated relationship with both versions of Boruto who were, at once, both true yet flawed sides of a single existence. Boruto: the friendly child, the prankster, the smiling, whiny comrade. Boruto: the dazzling idol, the unbiassed moral integrity, the guiding star. And now, Mitsuki thought, there was a third Boruto in their presence. A Boruto in the making that was plagued with the weight of his existence and the fate of his entire future. A Boruto that was afraid—afraid of losing himself, of hurting those around him, and of being unable to change the destiny thrust upon him.

Mitsuki's hand reached out as if to save every version of Boruto, the good and the bad, and to preserve that future Boruto felt crumbling away. All these versions of him, they were all Boruto, and Mitsuki felt the heaviness of his heart flutter in his chest while watching the pain of the boy before him rip through his throat in wave after wave of agonizing screams.

Mitsuki swallowed and finally touched Boruto's hunched shoulder. A hand shot out unthinkably fast, and Mitsuki blocked it with several snakes as they poured from his flowing sleeves. The blow still pushed him back several feet, however, and a pair of hands from behind stopped him. Mitsuki looked back to find Kawaki holding him by the shoulders, charcoal eyes wide and lips pressed together in complicated emotion. Mitsuki nodded.

"Thanks," he said. Kawaki returned the gesture as they both straightened and looked back at Momoshiki and Boruto. The being in front of them had quietened and slowly lifted his face from his hunched position, right hand still pressed to his eye. From the left side of his face, a brilliant cobalt blue eye slowly cracked open.

Boruto's voice sounded weak. "Get the hell out," he growled feebly, breathes heavy.

Mitsuki and Kawaki thought it best not to approach again yet. Mitsuki saw the same mixed emotions reflected in Kawaki's eyes that he himself felt, and Kawaki took a brief moment to look back at the group within the trees a ways off.