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His death wasn’t anything grand. In fact, it was positively boring in comparison to his youth. He lived until he was old and frail, living with his grown daughter who took care of him. His wife, his beautiful wife went first. Peaceful, asleep one day and dead the next. Saddening but he knew he would see her again. Then went Kakashi. Older than them, retired and happy but still, peaceful. Sai followed. Not peaceful in anyway. He had heart issues, something never caught when he was young and healthy. A heat attack in his home with his wife and youngest child. The dobe was next and his was saddening. Kurama’s chakra was poisonous after all, they found out. Caused a cancer that ended up taking his life. Naruto took it like a champ though. Still energetic and all things good right up until the end. Asked for his wife to be taken care of in his absence and with the many spawns he had, she was well taken care of.
He was the last to go. He thought it was fitting. He was the first to leave and the last to die. Everyone always waited on him and now he was the one waiting to join them. It was a few months after the dobe that he finally could rest. Sarada knew, she was smart and so much like his wife that sometimes it hurt to look at her, but she knew. She was gentle with him, in his old age, careful and a little teary eyed. All his children came to visit. Even the ones that no longer lived in Konoha. Every one of his children wept and hugged him and blubbered when he poked all their foreheads. He was ready to go. Ready to be back with his wife, his team, and his family. He lived a long, peaceful life and he was happy that he managed to rebuild the Uchiha clan with his wife. No stigma, no dark past, all new. Sarada was a wonderful clan head and he was quite happy with how she ran things.
So when he died, it wasn’t anything grand. He was surrounded by all his children and grandchildren when he took his last breath. It was peaceful and while it wasn’t quiet with all his children crying, it was what he would’ve wanted anyway. He smiled in death, welcomed it like an old friend even.
So when his eyes opened and he looked at a younger, teenage version of his wife, he didn’t question it. Those were the years that always haunted him so if he was joining her at that age, he took it in stride. She was beautiful, short pink hair, red headband. Everything he remembered. Her cloak covered her form and that was ok with him. He knew her inside and out. She was tense, standing across from him, but that too made sense. He took longer than the others after all. She was probably worried when he didn’t show up in the afterlife.
He smiled, that was just like his wife. To worry over him even in death. He didn’t look around, didn’t take in the surroundings. He would have plenty time for a tour after he was done holding, kissing, loving his wife. She was much too far from him so he walked over, crossing the distance between them to pull her into his arms.
“Tsuma...” Gods how he missed her. His last few years of his life were pathetic without her. He held her close, one hand cradling her head, the other wrapped around her waist. He didn’t think about having two arms again. It was the afterlife so it made sense that he had both limbs again. She smelled like she always did and that was soothing as it was blissful. Flower petals, honey and something that was uniquely her.
She was still tense in his arms, so he pressed a kiss to her head and squeezed her lightly. “I’m sorry I took so long.”
She squeaked at his kiss and his touch but he brushed that aside. She was probably nervous and shy. She always was when he got affectionate with her.
“S-Sasuke-kun..?”
Ahhh, her voice was lovely. He really, truly, did miss her. She was his other half, his light, his whole world. He hummed, a soft sound she always said calmed her when she was frazzled and pulled back to look into her eyes. She was even more beautiful when her cheeks were pink.
“Aa..” He brushed a strand of hair from her face. “Where's the dobe and Kakashi-sensei? Or Sai?”
Because even though he didn’t like Sai in the beginning, he came around to him. They had regular game nights, team seven did, and there were times where only he and Sai hung out. Two emotionally stunted men learning feelings and how to raise a family. They grew to be close. Not as close as him and Naruto but close. He looked around, trying to spot his team and then he spotted them. Naruto was frozen, eyes wide, not far from them and Kakashi too. It took him a moment before he spotted his pale friend. Everyone was younger but again, they were all dead so it made sense they wanted to look young and not old.
“HUH?! T-TEME?! WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!” Naruto looked shocked. In fact, they all did.
Sasuke blinked and adjusted his hold on his wife. She fit beautifully in his arms and he was not letting her go. He missed her. “Holding my wife..?” he didn’t think it was shocking. They’ve all seen him be sappy with her.
“W-Wife?!” and that voice he didn’t recognize. Not right away, at least. He turned to look behind him and wow. Team Taka stood there, shocked, mouths hanging open. Karin was the one who screeched, hands in her hair. Suigetsu looked like he was going to fall over at any moment and Juugo...he looked the same. A little shocked but the same.
He thought about it for a moment, the fact that team taka was there. They weren’t super close during his youth but they were technically his teammates so he shrugged. They were dead too and connected to him so it made sense they were waiting too.
He looked back down at his wife, who was silent and red faced. He smiled again, a small, soft thing he only showed her. His true smile. “Aa.”
Naruto choked and went red faced at his words. “S-Since when have you been married?!”
Sasuke furrowed his brows in confusion. How did the dobe not remember? He was Sasuke’s best man at their wedding. “We’ve always been married dobe.” He counted the time they were separated by youth and folly. He was technically married to her then too, in spirit, even if his teenage self would deny it.
His wife gently touched his arm, shaky and still tense. That bothered him a little. He pouted when she got out of his arms but he didn't fight her. Instead he took her hand in his, intertwining their fingers. He wanted to touch her in some way.
“S-Sasuke-kun..w-we aren’t” she blushed but didn’t take her hand away. “We haven’t...”
Kakashi moved forward then, headband pulled up and sharingan locked on him. “Who are you?”
Sasuke raised a brow at him, tugging his wife closer. He trusted his sensei not to do anything rash but he would always make sure his wife was safe. Danger or not. “What do you mean? It’s me...”
Then he took a good look at his sensei. After their 25th annual team meeting, Sakura finally managed to get Kakashi-sensei to let her look at his sharingan. She had integrated it successfully to his body and he was able to shut it off after years of chakra exhaustion. He remembered specifically that when Kakashi turned it on, it wasn’t as bright red as it used to be. It was darker, more blended to his normal eye color. This sharingan was bright red. And when he activated his own, he saw the pull on his sensei’s chakra. Something...wasn’t right. He looked at Naruto, still the same but in his old black and orange outfit. Not his older, better chosen colors of beige and white or even his old hokage uniform. It was his blindly bright orange and black outfit. The one he always said he was embarrassed of since it didn’t compliment his skin tone right but alos proud of for his age.
He looked at Sai, at the pale awkward situation he had going. It wasn’t right. Something didn’t look right. He finally looked at his wife. Really looked and while she was still beautiful, her byakugou seal wasn't there. It was missing from her forehead. He knew his wife wouldn’t keep it off her, even in death. So why was it gone?
“Sasuke-kun...?” Her eyes were worried but there was also something else. Something he didn’t like. The tense stance, the kunai he noticed in her other hand.
He looked around them and his breath caught. The rocks, the water, the area. It was a specific piece of memory that he never liked to dwell upon. The time he almost killed his wife in teenage angst and craziness. The afterlife shouldn’t be that place. It wouldn’t be that place...unless he wasn’t in the afterlife. But that was impossible. Improbable. He knew all about crossing dimensions and time travel. Had gone to the past before with Boruto even. But this...this wasn’t like anything he knew.
He had died. Had felt it, lived it, embraced it. There was no way he wasn’t dead. They must all be playing a joke on him. But as he looked at all their faces, even those of team taka, something clicked. Something that made his heart race, made him feel weak and dizzy and slightly crazy. He wasn’t dead. He was, if what he was looking at, was indeed true, alive. Somehow, someway, he was alive and back in his teenage years. Back at the pivotal moment where...
He collapsed and the last thing he heard, and saw, was his wife’s beautiful wide green eyes and her shout of “Sasuke-kun!” Then it went black.