Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto.
Weak…
Weak…
Weak…
Darkness surrounds Ino, as her body shifts on a scale. The darkness blinds her eyes, and the silence is deafening as her breaths echo with disturbing volume.
The ground rumbled before, breaking as I ran and tried to find a place to wake from this nightmare…
Something seems to be fluctuating; it's almost like a record caught on one spot. Her hands grow strong and weak at intervals, strong enough to level a mountain in one moment, and too flaccid to lift even a senbon in the next.
If this is what comes after a heart stops beating, Ino decides she doesn't like it.
I trembled like a coward and attempted to heal my wounds, as the screams rose around me like fire from the underground. I sat on my hands and prayed for the dawn, but instead found eternal darkness when a blinding pain erupted in my back…
She isn't sure how long she wandered that plain. It might have been hours, days, months years. It might have been a few seconds.
Over time, she could start to make out images. It's a moor she stands on, small plants crackling under her feet as she walks. There are no trees; rugged, broken rocks litter the rolling hills of the wilderness. A dark, stormy sky swirls its clouds like stew in a pot.
Ino has the idea that she's not alone, that there are people moving just out of sight…
She wanders listlessly, knowing she's alone, until the ground starts to fade again, and she sees a light before her…
I bled and faded on the ground, and no one could see me or cared. I prayed for help to come, but no one did…
The light is faint at first, flickering like a dying, guttering candle. It hovers at the edge of Ino's sight, teasing her weakened eyes. Then, it grows stronger and stronger, blinding and brilliant white.
Ino isn't sure where it goes, but she's sure that it's a better place than where she is now.
And then I came here, where there is no one and there is no hope, and I was determined to find a way out…
She finds herself climbing and crawling towards that light, though on what her hands and feet are resting on she has no idea. It feels sharp and abrasive, like shattered concrete; it chafes at her hands, but still she climbs.
Ino feels her body begin to grow heavier. She is suddenly aware of a terrible pain in her back and in her left leg, and of a dizzy lightheadedness, but still she climbs.
Her breathing becomes labored; her heart hurts as much as her lungs. It feels like she has breathed in fire, that her airway is scorched and dry. Her breath rattles in her ears.
She is cramped; sharp edges poke, pull and jab at her body all the time. Gradually, Ino is able to see her surroundings again. There are broken concrete slabs, with jagged edges, and iron wiring. Where am I? she thinks in confusion.
Ino feels her body begin to fail her. She is tired, she is bleeding, she is so, so lethargic. She just wants to sleep, to rest, just for a little while…
No. You can not rest now; you're nearly there, just keep going.
That stern, hard voice is what spurs Ino to move again. She climbs desperately, all of the muscles in her slim body screaming for her to stop. Her heart feels like it's dying, but still she climbs.
She bursts through the last of the rubble, and a light gray sky explodes before her eyes.
Ino stares, and pulls herself from the wreckage of a building now gone. The sky is gray, the trees bare and stripped of their leaves. A crow caws in the distance, but apart from that it is all silent. She is alone, among the wreckage.
Her leg was pierced by a blade, her back too; she remembers that now. She has a concussion, her lightheadedness giving it away.
But Ino doesn't care anymore. Struggling and screaming silently, she pulls herself to her feet, and begins to walk.
We are cursed with weak bodies. We are born weak, and to weakness we return.
But I will rise again, for I am strong.
Strong enough to face this evil day.