Author note at the end.

Part one: awakening

"There is nothing worse, than knowing how it ends."

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Nine times out out of ten, Nabi was a normal child. She had a hard time reading books that didn't have a lot of pictures. She liked to runny outside rather than stay cooped up inside all day. She played games with the other children. She wasn't particularly bright, not anymore than the others at the orphanage.

But Nabi was not a normal child. Because if one happened to watch her, to see her, to pay attention to her—

Well.

That person would realize that there was something very, very, off about the young girl.

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Nabi was five when she told the caretakers at the orphanage that she wanted to be a kunoichi, (just like Tsunade-sama!), and they giggled with each other like it was a secret to be cherished between friends.

The women hid the shivers and the hair that stood on end when around the young girl.

Because the oldest caretakers knew another child, similar to her, that had turned dark and vile with a soul that was so very rotten.

(don't be alone with the girl, or your hair will fall out!) They whispered to one another, behind wrinkled hands and twisted lips.

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A dream.

A forest, with gnarled roots that grew above the ground, with trees that sprouted into the air and branches that swayed from a ghostly brush of wind. Fog curled itself around everything in its vicinity, becoming a cold blanket that offered no warmth, no matter if it was summer or winter—rain or shine.

This forest was a dead forest, Nabi decided.

A dead land decorated with corpses that hung from branches—a rotten and desolate graveyard that burned her nose hairs and made her eyes water.

It was hard to breathe—her chest ached with something great, and it stung with every molecule of air she inhaled. She swallowed her own spit and the noise echoed in her head, banging against her skull like an unruly child before settling down a moment later.

Leaves crunched in a steady rhythm from someone walking over them and they came closer to Nabi until she couldn't hear her heart pounding against her ribcage. Something flicked across the back of her neck and it tickled the green hair that was cut short. Cold, raspy air fanned against her neck and her heart was beating so hard, it was bruising her.

Shadows danced across her closed eyelids—a tease, a taunt, that she would not answer. Because if she answered—

There would be no going back.

And Nabi was still very much happy with deluding herself of what was to come. She still believed that there was a chance.

She was still naive.

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April is a month for new beginnings. It's when the cherry blossoms begin to bloom and it is the perfect time to start anew.

Which is why, in Japan, the school year starts in April. And since Konoha has such a strong Japanese influence, the academy also starts in April.

Nabi eyes the other orphaned children who were being kept in a line by one of the younger caretakers, a girl named Mimi who was a favorite among the younger children. Nabi would have thought the children would be rambunctious and Mimi would be pulling out her hair to stay in control of so many young children. Nabi was taken out of her thoughts when one of the children commented on the state her hair was in.

A few cherry blossom petals had gotten stuck in Nabi's hair and she was focused on getting them out. The light pink contrasted terribly against her green hair. Nabi was about to leave it be and just accept her fate for the day until a blonde child with barrettes to keep her bangs out of her eyes was in front of her and offering to help.

"If you do it that way, you'll end up getting your fingers tangled in too," the girl teased lightly. Nabi stared, taking in her rather strange features. She had no pupils, for one.

The girl had managed to get the petals out without any further pain to Nabi's scalp and they both watched them float away with the breeze. There might've been something poetic about the scene, and Nabi might have commented on it, if she had cared.

"I'm Yama-"

"I don't care." Whatever the girl wanted to say, Nabi didn't let her. So Nabi turned away, and walked back to the other orphan children.

Perhaps there was something poetic about that too, but Nabi had never liked poetry.

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Ninja school was fucking hard.

When the instructors weren't making Nabi feel like a piece of shit, because she wasn't getting something right the first or seventh time, Nabi decided that wanting to become a ninja wasn't for the faint of heart.

Why?

Because ninja school was trying to kill her. Or the Universe was—but the specifics don't matter, it's just that Nabi feared for her life a lot more often then when she was just a naive little orphan girl who made rice balls with the caretakers.

Do you need an example? Nabi had five.

The first week, she almost got her neck slit by some upper classmen and their wayward shuriken. During a lunch break, a child almost dropped a bucket filled with god knows what on Nabi's head. In the kunoichi classes, her absent minded teacher forgot to tell her that petals of a certain flower was extremely poisonous. A Inuzuka senpai's dog tried (and failed, thank you god) to bite her head off. And then, to top it all off, one of the instructors put too much force behind a new move he was teaching them and had knocked the air (and quite possibly Nabi's will to live) out of her.

The point is, the Universe is trying to kill Nabi, she is sure of it. Which brought her to the current conversation she was having with one of the younger caretakers.

"I'm telling you, the Universe is out to get me," she whispered conspiratorially, like it was a particularly juicy piece of gossip.

"Is it now?" Mimi asked in a tone that very much meant she was only humoring Nabi. Nabi rolled her eyes at the tone but otherwise waved her arms up and down to try and emphasize her point. In the end, it only made Nabi more childlike in Mimi's eyes. The sudden revelation loosened the stiffness in Mimi's shoulders and her smile became more lighthearted.

Whatever the older caretakers thought, surely they were wrong about Nabi. So Nabi was a little more eccentric compared to the other children, that was fine.

"You don't believe me." Nabi's brow pulled into an adorable little pout and it was only emphasized by her crossed arms over her chest. Mimi laughed and squished Nabi's cheeks between her hands. "I'm not a baby!" Nabi pushed Mimi's hands away with a glare.

"You're right—you're five years older than a baby—much more mature." Mimi said with an endearing smile.

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There was something to be said about Naruto Uzumaki.

Nabi watched through a window as Naruto carried a box of things he had gotten during his time in the orphanage. There wasn't much of it. A few spare clothes, a frog wallet that never had any money in it, and his school books that had probably never been opened.

Naruto had never looked more small than when he walked away from the orphanage, in a shirt too big and no one by his side.

There was something to be said about Naruto—destined child of prophecy—yet Nabi didn't know what those words were.

Today was moving day for Naruto Uzumaki. Today the caretakers would have a celebration—in private, of course—because the demon had finally moved out since joining the academy. The other children would follow the example set by the caretakers and would more than likely be more lively since Naruto was gone.

Something turned inside Nabi's chest and she rubbed at it forcefully—maybe if she rubbed hard enough, she'd go straight through the skin and muscles and bone and stop her heart from feeling anything. At least then that was something for her to cry about.

She had already made up her mind regarding the things that have happened, and the future to be.

Nabi wasn't a hero.

It was as simple as that.

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Nabi didn't care much for the kunoichi classes. She didn't like Ikebana or Hanakotoba or whatever it was called. She had enough trouble trying to remember which hand signs went to which jutsu- she didn't have the time or patience to remember what Peonies meant or if the roots of Forget-me-nots were poisonous.

Nabi was not subtle with her anger when she stuffed what she was only partially sure of as Kuroyuri into a vase. They could mean something like lust or gratefulness- the point is she wasn't putting any effort into the assignment and, going off the stink eye the instructor was giving Nabi, she also knew Nabi had no intentions of treating this seriously.

"—Billboard brow!"

Nabi looked over her shoulder to the field of cosmos behind her where a small group of girls were having a stand off. Well, more like it was Ino and Sakura versus the typical girl bullies.

"Oh, I seemed to have mistaken that opening you call a mouth for a vase. Careful—the roots are poisonous." Ino said nonchalantly. The confrontation was over faster than it began with Ino being the victor since Ame and her tag-a-longs had retreated. Throwing the flowers and having them hit their target was a good example of Ino's capabilities and her knowledge of botanical plants with her shurikenjutsu skills—no doubt it was from her training as the Yamanaka heiress.

"A flower is meaningless unless it blooms, right?" Nabi overhead Ino say to Sakura. With the moment over, Nabi turned her attention back to the flowers and stuffed something that might've have been a cactus flower (or just something pointy) into the vase.

If Nabi was correct, the two girls relationship would crumble soon. Sakura finding out that Ino also liked Sasuke would be the final straw on the camel's back so to say. Nabi felt a surge of something hot and painful in her chest at the thought of the two girls breaking their relationship off for something as small as that—Nabi knew that there was a lot more to the girls friendship and it was far more complex than she was giving it credit—but Nabi had already turned away with her mind made up and clenched her teeth until it made her jaw hurt.

She was just an outsider looking in, after all.

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AN: So I wrote this fic during a time when I was a lot more depressed then I would've liked. Point is, I can't really write something that that requires me to be sad. So I guess it's up to you, the reader.

Either I continue this fic, but it's edited and changed drastically (this is the first chapter of the rewrite) …or the fic becomes abandoned and I'll delete it. What would you, as the reader, wish to see?