It's been two hours since I jolted awake from a nightmare. I panted, and sweated and grabbed for my bed cover. Did it fall off of me in the middle of the night? I searched more furiously, still refusing to sit up. I forcedly closed my eyes and tried to analyze the nightmare:
Life itself can be a vicious cycle. Sometimes you just need to close your eyes and count to ten. That's what I've always done to calm down. But this was the first time I was so lost in my consciousness that my head tingled, and my senses dulled. This was the first time I actually lost myself.
So that's where I am now, trying to wake up from a dream that's never ending. I sighed.
"Alright, I've been lazy enough for today. I might as well sit up." I thought, rubbing the sleep out of my eyes.
It wasn't just my head that tingled, but now my arm. I tried scratching it, but was met with a solid object instead of skin. You will never know fear until you awake with a large spider crawling across your limb.
"Oh my gosh, get it off!" I screamed while rubbing all over frantically. I decided it still wasn't safe, and hopped around. I alternated between hopping and rubbing, like some sort of elaborate dance. My house has never been infested with tarantulas, nor has my carpet been a forest floor.
"Maybe I'm having a lucid dream? But then, I should be aware that I'm dreaming, and I should be able to control what happens around me." I reasoned.
I concentrated all my efforts into making what I want appear. Nothing. I was not at home on the computer, wasting my day with the TV blaring in the background. Therefore, this was not a lucid dream. And, with those two facts out of the way I can reach a conclusion. I am in a forest, I am alone, I should not be here.
It was "Dusk" outside. That weird moment in the day when the sky looks like it was too tired to make a proper sunset, but hey it threw a little bit of purple and orange out there. I walked over to a small river, whose water slowly ran away from me. I used it as a mirror.
A weary hand slowly rose to my black hair, pulling it apart strand by strand. Yes my hair was still the same color. A misguided finger reached to touch my nose, and jabbed a little too forcefully. I … well still had a nose. I blinked rapidly, preparing my vision to do one last check of the face. My eyes were not the same at all. They were purple, with skinny black rings adorning the inner eye in groups. My pupil was only a black, pencil-dot-sized mark.
This was the Rinnegan! This was a sacred Dojutsu that only belongs in the Naruverse! The last thing I realized was… I'm going insane!
I think every anime fan is guilty of trying to copy characters at least once. When it's broken down, the move "Chidori" isn't actually that hard to sign. I laughed as I sloppily did the signs for the jutsu that I had seen illustrated on a fan-made photo. I stopped laughing when a sharp bird-like noise met my ears. I started losing control of my arm, the blue electricity was itching to connect with something, and I'd rather it not be me.
I pierced a tree trunk with my hand, the wood splintered and shattered around me. For this to be so impossible, it sure was fun!
It's odd; I had now a perfect memory of the entire Naruto storyline every time I closed my eyes. All the way from the first episode, to Shippuden. I vividly remembered the first time that Naruto used the Shadow Clone technique, and mirrored those hand signs. Three exact replicas of me appeared through the smoke, and glanced worriedly at the battered tree behind us.
"So this is real?" The me furthest left asked.
"The mind can make things seem real." The seemingly most deep and philosophical me said, furthest right. I nodded sagely, like I was completely wise too.
"We should spar." My comment repulsed the mood of wisdom that had fallen upon the group.
The middle me spoke up now. "We don't really know how."
The clone furthest left jumped backwards with a stick in her hand, looking extremely ninja-like I might add. I bent down and picked up a flimsy stick too, and watched it slowly droop downward. The clones and I exchanged glances, waiting to see who would make the first move.
Surprisingly, it was the intelligent sounding one that gave a cry of excitement and flung a rock at the middle clone. The replica disappeared upon the rock's impact, and her memories came flooding back to me. They weren't much; just brief confused dialogue and wonderment about the bruised tree.
Just two clones remained, but the rock-throwing one had a playful look of bloodlust on her face.
"Start!" I giggled out, leaping into the air with a satisfying amount of ability.
"Chi-" I almost said, but decided against giving them time to plan how to react to my jutsu. I had the advantage here; I had practiced for all of a half hour.
The clone that had originally picked up the stick became a puff of smoke as I impaled her with my hand. The exhilarating feeling of lightning racing through my hand faded. The feeling of fright I experienced as the last (and probably smartest) clone's Chidori met my ears however, stayed.
For a brief moment, I felt ripped away from my body. Although, that seems like a pretty short version of what death sort of is. Engraved on my tombstone will read:
"Death by her own clone attacking her. The irony will live longer than she did."
When I regained control of my eyes, I saw the clone's hand thrust through a body exactly like mine. Except, it wasn't mine. It was another clone, who was in the exact spot that I used to be in. I started speculating. Maybe when I felt ripped away from my body, I actually was? After a quick pat down I was reassured I still had the same solid vessel.
"I thought clones were created for the betterment of the original, not her be-head-der-ment." I groaned as I sounded out the fake, but called for word.
The homicidal clone looked around like she had heard a ghost. "Who's there?"
There is no way we are going down a paranormal activity road with this conversation. "Me. The Original. The girl you tried to kill…" I said in response.
She stared in my direction, and gasped. Slowly, I noticed that I could not see my nose out of the corner of my eye. I couldn't even see my feet when I looked down. I was—
"You're invisible!" The replica said.
My nose faded into view.
"Aw… now I'm not." I whined.
"Let's go back over what happened. I physically struck you, and you turned invisible and were replaced with a clone. When did you learn that jutsu?" She asked.
I sat down in the dirt. "I didn't, I think I did that automatically."
So, we tried it again, the ordeal getting no less frightening by the twentieth time. "It's a new technique. But an automatic one, like Gaara's sand." The clone smiled.
"We'll call it, Disassociating." I cheesed.
"So that and a Rinnegan." She scoffed.
I smiled even wider, "Let's see what else I can do!"
I put that Rinnegan to work. That black material that Pain used while utilizing the Deva path was easily manipulated into senbon. Those needles were controlled with magnetic energy. I know they aren't conventional, but I prefer senbon to kunai. Especially because only a Rinnegan user could manipulate these. Also, they could explode and create a miniature black whole, engulfing the target in a blast wave of magnetic force.
That seemed pretty useful to me.
I reworked my cloning system, and figured out how to disassociate by will, if I'm ever in an awkward situation or something. Clones that are produced this way are stronger than shadow clones, meaning they don't die as easily. Helpful if I ever need to have a few clones take a few hits for me, or if I need a diversion.
I had my main Justus now: Senbon, Disassociation, and Clones. But I didn't have a name. I mean I had my name, but not a name that people from this dimension would find normal. My actual name means "Sunrise" in Greek, and the word "Asahi" means rising sun in Japanese. It's a pretty close substitute, and even starts with the same letter.
"That was all very… interesting." A voice said.
But I knew that voice. I knew all about the person it belonged too. He confirmed it with a push of the glasses. Kabuto, Sasuke, and Orochimaru were standing before me. Was Sasuke about to speak as well?
"Hn." He said. Well, he spoke a little.