Disclaimer for rest of story: I do not own Naruto.
Warnings: Suicide, Depression, and will contain more mature themes in later chapters.
"Hello."
"My name is…"
"It's nice to meet you."
In this world where soulmates and their first words are written on our flesh, greetings and introductions are a near sacred thing.
Growing up, almost all children are taught to make their own greeting. Each one individual and unique, as much as they can.
The generic "hello" becomes "salutations", "how d'ya do", "こんにちは", "안녕하세요", among any other multitude of languages out there in the world.
Sanada Hikari learned very early on that soulmates were more a curse than it was a blessing.
"Mom! Mom! Heeey, mom!" A little girl with messy, black hair and scuffed up shoes calls out as she runs into the small apartment.
The girl skids into the kitchen where she sees a figure with their head down on the dinner table. Her mother, usually so beautiful and tall and strong, had her head turned towards the girl, towards the entrance from the kitchen to the living room.
Her eyes were empty and glassy but it only made the little girl falter in her cheeriness.
"...Mom?" She tries carefully, inching towards her mother. "Mom, we made introductions in class today, so that our soulmates can find us easy!"
At the mention of the word, "soulmate", her mother seems to snap out of her daze. Her eyes become razor sharp and glares down at the shabby looking girl. The woman's face contorts as her lips curl and her teeth poke through.
"Soulmate?! You're eleven years old and you still believe in that bullshit?! Well guess what, Hikari?" Her mother yells at her in an exasperated tone, tired and angry and resigned all at once. The little girl curls into herself at her mother's shouting, trying not to tremble in case that it made her mother even angrier.
"Guess what?" Her mother continues, this time in a quieter voice but imploring all the same.
"Your father...your father was supposed to be my soulmate. But he left. That stupid, motherfucking asshole decided to pack his things and...go."
Her mother pulls at her own hair and stands up, pacing around the compact kitchen and mumbling curses at the man who had her words tattooed on his skin, and she his.
The little girl's eyes widen at the realization that, indeed, her father is not here. The apartment, though small and filled with second-hand everything, seemed vast and empty. She runs to the living room, head turning left and right looking for a father that was no longer there. She runs to their only bedroom and sees sheets, clothes, and what little belongings they had tossed around. The bathroom is similarly messy and empty.
She returns back to the living room, climbing up onto their brown, stain-spotted couch and looks at the wall across her, eyes unfocused. The idea that she no longer has a father, her small family growing even smaller with the loss of one, slowly fills her and she's starting to understand that nothing will ever be the same.
Her mother, who's calmed down some, comes in shortly. The woman sits herself next to her daughter, so small and fragile and deserving of better, and wraps her arms around the girl.
The small girl blinks up at her mother and they share an understanding between them, one between mother and daughter, parent and child. In that moment, they release a deep breath of grief and soon the quiet sobs shake out from both figures.
The words "You're my soulmate and I love you!" are never spoken again by that little girl. Her greetings to people from now on are short grunts or just resorting to completely ignoring others.
She decides then that when she meets her soulmate- and soulmates are destined to meet each other at some point in their lives, at least once- that she will yell and scream and tell them all the hell she's been through.
If they cannot accept that then, against fate and the higher beings, they were not meant to be. Hikari will not condemn herself to someone like her father. She will not become her mother. She will not allow herself to be hurt like this ever again.
Hikari releases a small sigh at the memory. The air that comes out her mouth is warm, just like the air around her. July twenty-first in Tokyo was 30°C with a suffocating humidity, the day was muggy and brought the people, plants, and animals down.
Even the old man across from her, who was bent over a cane and a few shopping bags, seemed to wilt with each step. The small potted plants decorating a nearby coffee shop were shrivelled up and the street cats were silent, unable to let out a meow! from dehydration.
She continued walking down the small hill of her street.
Despite the promises her mother made her after Hikari's father left, where Hikari will always be put first because he couldn't do that, their relationship was strained at best. Her mother worked two jobs, one as a waitress at some run-down restaurant and the other a call girl for the sleazy businessmen down at Harada Tourism- their building had a neon, flashing sign like those you see in the older movies, from VHS tapes.
She wasn't home often.
The times her mother was home she was irritable, bitter, exhausted, or more often than not, a mixture of all three and more.
But Hikari loved her all the same. Even when her mother threw dishes at her, called her vulgarities, or told her she didn't love her. Hikari firmly loved in her heart the woman that held her the day her father left, the woman who stayed when he didn't.
When her mother came home with bruises and red-white stains, Hikari held her. When her mother cried because of her job, her life, her pain, Hikari comforted her.
Her mother had Hikari, but who did Hikari have?
At the age of nineteen, Sanada Hikari made the decision of a lifetime.
She dropped out of public school five years ago and worked non-stop herself, doing anything she can to scrape up some money. She drew the line at prostitution however. Her mother had shown her the horrors of that path clearly enough. Odd jobs here and there had to do.
At nineteen, she had saved enough money for her mother to get out of the area. Move out to the countryside, get a new job, see new people, and start over. All this hard work had been for you, Hikari's mother will read after coming home to an empty home and a letter on the kitchen table.
At nineteen, Hikari will have done all she can for her mother and is now ready to do something for herself.
Depression affects people in many ways. For Hikari, it was a slow affair. Her depression lurked in the corners of her life: the empty fridge, the cold winters, the isolation. It grew slowly, creeping up behind her like a shadow fiend preying on small children. It grew and grew until it was right in front of her.
A black, shadowy thing that jutted out in angles and made noise like a broken stereo.
It followed her everywhere and she couldn't stop it. She knew she was a "sad, gloomy girl", as her mother often described her when customers found out she had a daughter, but Hikari knew it was something deeper than that. Something more twisted.
Her depression grew to the size of Tokyo's skyscrapers and Hikari could not ignore it any longer. She had to make a choice.
The young woman, in ratty clothes and messy hair and scuffed up shoes, walks up to a bridge. It was high enough to knock her out unconscious when she hits the water and the water deep enough to drown her out. Hopefully, to drown her depression out along with her.
As she looks down at the water below she briefly wonders if it would hurt. She shakes her head and realizes, yes, it will hurt and it should but it will be okay because Hikari is good with pain and pain seemed to define her life both physically and mentally.
There is no breeze to coax her to the edge, instead it was the rush of the water below and the shadow that lurches above her that makes her take the first step.
The next one comes naturally and before she knows it, Sanada Hikari is falling into the grey-blue of the river below.
She closes her eyes and prays that there is nothing beyond this life. Nothing is better than hurting, after all.
She only regrets not meeting her soulmate and being able to judge them. She hopes they understand.
Hidan, nude and proud, washes himself in the shallow part of a small lake nearby the camp he and Kakuzu had set up. The gore from his earlier sacrifice easily slides off him in chunks but it is the dried blood that clings to his skin, forcing him to scrub away until his skin grows pink like the color of his own eyes.
He does this routine for a few minutes until he considers himself clean enough and steps out of the water, planning to sun dry himself before putting his dark cloak back on.
After putting only one foot on land, something touches the other foot that is still in the water and in a split second the silver haired ninja is jumping back and readying himself into a fighting stance. Nevermind that everything is still hanging out exposed and that he should have sensed anyone nearby.
Hidan scans the intruder and catalogues everything in his mind like a good shinobi: dark hair, pale skin, female, civilian...and unconscious in the water.
The silver haired nin's shoulders sag at realizing that the woman in front of him was literally no threat and was going to drown if he left her in the water. He should probably get her out.
Then again, why should he save her? If anything, he should kill her since if she did come to she would become a security risk for the Akatsuki.
But... Hidan had recently sacrificed someone to his beloved god, Jashin. This must be Jashin's way of telling him that he got his sacrifice right? A new child of Jashin that needs to be guided and cared for because she is His blessing.
The corners of the pink eyed man's lips turn up as he roughly shoves his cloak back on and pulls the woman out of the water.
He sets her down on the grass and pushes her hair away, marvelling at the newfound beauty he found in her after realizing she was Jashin's gift. Her cheeks were slightly sunken in and the bags below her eyes did little to deter the warm, protective feelings that erupted within the man.
He puts his ears on her chest and is happy to hear a slight pulse, even if her breathing seemed a little quiet. Lifting up the edge of the cloak, he brings it up to her face and dries her off as best as he can before hefting her up and carrying her back with his scythe in tow.
"What took you so long?" Came the gravelly mutter of Kakuzu's deep voice.
The stitched-up man lifts his head after receiving silence as a reply and zones in on the woman his partner has draped in his arms.
"What the fuck is that?" He asks another question, wondering what trouble Hidan has gotten up to in the fifteen minutes he'd been gone.
Said troublesome man is looking down at the woman's face with something akin to affection. A face Kakuzu had only seen on his partner's face whenever he was praying or fiddling with his necklace.
"This is a gift from Jashin-sama, you damn heathen." The pink eyed nin says softly, though his language is still coarse as ever.
"Jashin-sama wanted to reward me for all the things I've sacrificed for Him by gifting me His blessing. I know she'll be strong and useful, just like the scythe He had given me."
Kakuzu was getting mildly creeped out. He knew that whatever God his partner put his faith in was not a malevolent entity but something that fed on destruction and bloodshed, so this so called "blessing" may turn out to be anything but. He was also getting the heebie-jeebies at seeing Hidan gently caress the woman's cheek as if she were a baby. Revolting.
"Blessing?" He scoffed, "Where did you find her? You sure she's not just some runaway who had the bad luck of meeting you?"
"Shut your mouth, Kakuzu! As if you'd know anything about Jashin-sama and His plentiful gifts He bestows on his followers."
"As if you would know how to properly answer someone's questions." The tall man retorts back. His partner snaps his head up to give a seething glare with a promise of payback, though Kakuzu just shrugs it off and continues, "I'm guessing that you're planning on bringing her back with us. Since you see her as your God's gift, you're going to fight tooth and nail to keep her. At least, that's what I think would be going through that little brain of yours."
"Of course I'm gonna fucking keep her! She's mine!" The silver haired nin continues on by grumbling to himself about 'Jashin' this or 'my gift' that.
Kakuzu just narrows his eyes as Hidan disappoints him as a partner/colleague/punching bag. Again.
"I'm fucking keeping her! I swear to Jashin that if you even think about taking her away I'm going to leave this damned organization and kill all you unbelieving heathens!" Hidan screams out as he carries the woman over his shoulder, his scythe pointed out at the rest of the Akatsuki.
Kakuzu just lets out a small sigh.
The enraged man keeps to himself the fact that Jashin might also punish him if he lets His blessing go to waste. Jashin rarely praises his followers to begin with so denying His gift would be like sacrilege.
The man with orange hair and pierced skin steps forward.
"Enough, Hidan. I will allow you to keep the girl but you will have full responsibility over her. She is not under the protection of the Akatsuki nor will I stop any of the other members from trying to rid of her."
Pein stares coldly with his deadened eyes at the man in front of him, "As long as she does not interfere with our agenda and your work, I will not step in. But there will be consequences and repercussions should this venture of yours prove to be troublesome."
With an air of finality, Pein and the rest of the Akatsuki conclude the sudden meeting and leave.
Hidan gives their backs a glare before heading off to his room and putting the girl down on the floor.
"Fucking heathens. Don't know shit when it comes to faith. One of these days I'm gonna get 'em. Get 'em all real good."
Unknown to the grumbling man, who was polishing his scythe on his bed, the woman on the ground is slowly waking up. Her eyes flutter open and she takes in one raspy breath after the other.
She finally gains consciousness and takes in her surroundings, idly wondering if this was heaven, or hell.
She concludes it looked too much like some kind of room to be either choices.
Lifting herself up slowly with one arm, she gets to see about one whole leg of a table before a hand comes wrapping itself around her throat and pinning her back down on the ground.
Hikari lets out a strangled sound as she tries to claw the offending hand off her throat.
A deep, if haughty, voice cuts in, "Nuh-uh, I don't fucking think so."
Hikari flashes her eyes to the voice's face, taking in a strong jawline, pink eyes, and grey, gelled-back hair.
She calms herself a bit at recognizing a character from the ratty manga she's read from the used bookstore down her street.
Naruto… her mind echoes.
"You've calmed down, huh?" The man, Hidan was his name, smirks. He takes his hand off her throat and kicks her as if to tell her to get up. She scrambles to sit on her knees because there wasn't enough strength in her legs to support her.
"If you promise to behave I won't have to put a damn leash on ya." Hidan cackles at his idea, finding something funny at his suggestion which the woman just frowns at.
"Get up and take a shower. Don't need you getting sick on me just when I got you." He turns his back on the woman and rummages through a cabinet next to the bed. He pulls out a copy of the same cloak he's wearing and then reaches an arm under her own to lift her up.
"Up we go. If I have to bathe you myself I'm gonna fucking do it." He threatens, though there is a slight leer in his voice.
"I-I.." The young woman stutters, her voice scratchy and breathy.
She continues, "My name is Hikari!"
Though barely above a whisper she says her name hurriedly, not wanting to be called "you" any longer. Hidan just looks at her boredly.
"Okay, Hikari, get in the bathroom before I shove a bar of soap up your ass."
The woman just looks at him incredulously before pulling her arm out of his grip and staggering into the bathroom. Hidan just smirks and tosses the extra cloak in after her.
Where am I? Is this my punishment? What is Hidan doing here?
All these questions zoom through my mind as I scrub myself down from filth and dirt.
I'm in the Naruto-verse. I must be. There's no way Hidan could be here (silver hair, pink eyes, everything!) without me actually being in the Naruto world now.
I finished showering, though the warm water relaxed me some I was still reeling at the revelation that I was living inside a manga now.
Grabbing the towel that hung beside the shower- obviously Hidan's and obviously a little gross and weird and shocking- I dried myself off and then put on the cloak. The cloak itself was a dark fabric adorned with the symbolic red cloud that seemed to glow even redder the longer I stared at it. As if mocking me by cementing the fact that I was still alive.
There was a large mirror right above the sink and I inspected myself then.
I still looked like a mess and didn't really feel much better than that either, what with wearing the same underwear and weakened from…
From jumping off that bridge. From trying to kill myself.
I failed, I thought detachedly, fingering my hair and looking at myself. I failed and now I was here: wearing an Akatsuki robe with a violent, God-fearing shinobi waiting just outside my door.
Suddenly the bathroom door swings open and Hidan comes sauntering in, leaning a hip against the sink counter. Speak of the devil.
"What's taking so long? No need to pretty yourself up for me, I like you enough already, dammit."
"W-what? Why am I here?" I stuttered out, still a little disoriented after waking up.
The man across from me only sighs as he gives me a suffering stare, his hooded eyes unimpressed as he picks up his scythe and leaves the room. I follow him in fear of getting any backlash.
We move through the hallways of what I assumed was the Akatsuki base, Hidan taking long, confident strides while I scuttled behind him, desperately taking in all the information I could.
So far I had this: the walls were bare, a dull beige color, and Hidan made no sound with his footsteps.
The emptiness of the hallways were amplified from each of my own footfalls, making me strangely self-conscious.
We keep walking until finally there's an exit through a doorway leading outside, the outdoors and fresh sunlight were a stark contrast from the dreary inside. I was barefoot and I revelled in feeling the grass between my feet.
I should have died. I shouldn't be here, given a second chance, as if I wanted one!
My brows furrow together as I scowl. This sucks.
"Oi! Hikari, or whatever, we're gonna start now so look over here!" Hidan yells from a distance away from me. How did he get there so quickly and without me noticing? Well, the benefits of an S-ranked ninja I guess…
I could feel that my face was still a little disgruntled but I looked his way anyways, my eyes only registering a glint of silver before a stinging sensation was felt on my right cheek.
"Hmm, guess we got a lot of work to do if you can't even avoid that, seriously."
I lift my hand to my face and feel the small trickle of warm liquid. Looking at my fingers, there was fresh blood on them so I looked back at Hidan with an accusing stare.
"Stop with the fucking looks already! Get over here, will ya? The day is young or some shit but I got plans later on!" The silver haired nin stomps his foot petulantly, and though it was hardly intimidating, the scythe he was swinging around forced me to sprint up next to him.
"I'm here." I huff out. The cloak was a bit all-over-the-place but at least it was lightweight, maybe I could fit it so that it wouldn't be so loose.
Hold on, fitting the cloak meant that I was planning on wearing it for longer. Staying for longer. Which I wasn't, definitely not.
Glancing at the scythe, which had suddenly become very appealing, I gambled whether it would be easier to impale myself on it or use a kunai to slit my throat.
Hidan apparently caught the contemplative look in my eyes because next thing I knew he had kicked me in the gut.
"Fuuuuck.." I groan out, bent over and clutching my middle. A cut on the face and a kick in the gut? Can't this asshole just put me out of my misery and just kill me?
"Whatever you're thinking that's involving my scythe, and I can see those little looks, you better knock it off. You ain't gonna be using it and you damn well ain't gonna use it to kill yourself, either. So get up, I'm gonna try to cycle your chakra and see what's in ya."
How'd he know I was contemplating on suiciding myself with his beloved glorified backscratcher? The guy must be more keener than he looks, then.
I straighten myself before leveling a stare at him. Despite everything, the kick, the botched suicide (which he probably saved me from), Hidan hadn't tried to kill me yet. Which was weird since he was usually labelled as the unhinged mass-murderer by every fan.
"Not much of a talker?" He says offhandedly before putting his palm against my abdomen, his hand surprisingly warm.
"You and that fuckhead Uchiha will get on juuust great, then."
Without anymore preparation, a sudden mild, blooming feeling erupts from where Hidan's palm lay. My own hands jump up to push him away but his hold was firm and my attempts only made his fingers dig into my stomach.
Ouch, as if it hadn't been abused by his earlier kick already.
"Relax, it doesn't have to hurt."
Despite his words I kept my hands gripped around his arm, albeit a bit more loosely than earlier before. The warm sensation soon thrums and thrums before a distinct vibration is felt from below Hidan's palm, up to his arm and into my own hands.
Is that from me? Was that humming noise coming from me?
Just when the thrumming and humming nears some sort of climax, the noise and vibrations the only things bouncing between my ears, it all stops kind of anticlimactically. The silence is there again and Hidan is pulling back his arm.
"What was that?" I whisper out. I unzipped the cloak halfway down to lift up my shirt and stomach to see if anything changed.
Just as I expected, there was some sort of blood red marking right on top of my belly button. The marking was of a small circle that contained a triangle within it and I wondered how Hidan got this on me before realizing something.
This is the same symbol as the necklace Hidan wears. The necklace denoting his religion and faith towards Jashin.
I was brought back because of some kind of death god? My mind questioned, poking at the red marking.
The silver haired nin next to me unzips his own cloak, letting his own abdomen show through.
"Hey look, we match." He chuckles as if it was some kind of joke.
Just as he said the same red mark is on his own belly button, triangle inside a circle and all.
"...You're an outie." I say after looking at his belly for a while longer.
A slight pause goes through us before the man doubles over, cackling and slapping his thigh in a deep baritone.
"I knew there was a reason to like you! Jashin-sama wouldn't give me some boring ass gift anyways!"
Gift? So he thinks Jashin gave me to him? Isn't this more like I was being punished by Jashin?
Well if I am a gift then maybe I shouldn't have killed myself just yet, instead I should have bided my time and waited out the death god's interest in me.
Hidan's chuckling dies down to a smirk before speaking to me again, "Well, good news is that you have some pretty good chakra stores. Bad news, you probably don't know shit how to use it. It's gonna be alright though, my scythe was a bit clunky the first time I got it too. We just need more experience working together, is all."
He's planning on using me as some kind of weapon, I gathered. I guess I have no choice but to play along until I can get the opportunity to try to end it again.
"Glad we got that out the way, now I just need to check you for any nicks or scratches, at least other than the ones I just gave you. Did this with my scythe, too."
He was roughly pulling down my cloak and lifting my arms before I had the chance to protest. His pink eyes skillfully look over my skin, bending my fingers and elbows before noticing the words that scrawl against my wrist.
"Huh? What's this say?"
I couldn't pull my arm away from his vice grip and I was helpless to hear him read aloud, "Perhaps it would have been better if you had just died."
"Another OC story?! Why, Tacchan, it isn't like all your other stories were OCs too!"
I just really, really enjoy reading and writing OC fics alright. Also if you haven't noticed all my OC names start with 'Hi', Hiroki, Hinowa, and now Hikari. Let's just say that my first name starts with 'Hi' as well so in a way all my OCs were also a part of me (or my personality) and if you squint really hard all these fics so far are really just SI fics...hahah...ha...
So why did I write this story? It's been in my "bin of ideas" for well over a year now and I've been thinking about it often lately. Soulmate AUs are super fun to read too, especially the ones where one of them rejects the other (coughforeshadowingcough). I'm planning on making this a shorter story, maybe half a dozen chapters at most because I really don't want to drag this on longer than it has to be.
That said, be warned that this story will be heavily focused on the Akatsuki and Sanada Hikari's love life as in HARDLY ANY MENTION OF THE ACTUAL CANON PLOT LINE. Of course the bijuu and maybe even Madara, will be in this because that's Akatsuki main goal for many years so I can't gloss that over. All I'm saying is that don't go expecting any epic fights or adventure like in my other stories ATDTD or DIA.
Hidan is one of my major favorite characters (alright so all of Akatsuki is) so he's gonna be a big part in the story first and foremost. He thinks that Hikari is a blessing from Jashin so he'll care for her in the only way he knows how: violently yet devotedly. He's rough around the edges but he will try to foil all of Hikari's plans of "escape".
As for Hikari, keep in mind while you're reading that she is a clinically depressed, quiet girl who only knows the basics of the Naruto-verse and thus is completely entitled to being a little weak and helpless sometimes. It's out of my comfort zone to write about more "weak" characters (ahem OP Hiroki right) but I'm really trying to branch out and write more complex, versatile characters who are weak in the body as well as in the heart.
That said, thank you for reading my first chapter on this story about fate, depression, and what it means to love someone.
Reviews = Author Motivation = Faster Updates
