Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto. This is not for profit.

Chapter 1

"Are you ready ma'am? The drop window opens up in 1 minute!"

I looked over at the sergeant addressing me over the loud white noise and gave him a sharp nod. Turning back I took in the open doorway howling with the wind tearing through into the plane cabin. Down far below the ground stretched out looking as if it could have come straight from sim city while above that only the wing and blue sky to be seen out to the horizon.

This would be my first solo jump here at Jump School. It would be my third jump in total. Both of my previous jumps had gone without a hitch and I had checked over all my gear at least five separate times on the way up here. I looked back at the line of fellow trainees behind me who would be following me out. I can do this.

The sergeant to my left gave a hard slap to my shoulder indicating the drop window had opened. Tensing I dropped myself out the door and curled over into the drop position. Pulling my knees up to my chest, I brought my arms up to cover my ears and tucked my chin to my chest while gripping the release cord in my right hand.

1 airborne

2 airborne

3 airborne

4 airborne

And now pull-

"Shit!"

Pull!

"Shit! Shit! Shit!"

That damn pull cord had to be tangled and stuck on some! Immediately my hand went for the cord holing in the emergency chute and pull- Fuck! That one was stuck as well. Struggling with reaching behind my head and feeling around I couldn't tell what issue was. Maybe they were stuck together or something. Try both and pull! Yes! Behind me I felt as both chutes dropped out of the pack and started to open up.

There was no sharp tug slowing me down. Looking up I saw that the two chutes had tangled together because they were both released at the same time even though the emergency chute was designed to open out above the regular one.

I was falling far too fast still. Damn it! I'm only 30, not even 31 yet. This is far too young to die… I had reenlisted at the start of this year as an officer this time. The fact that this time I had made sure to include all of those schools that I wanted to go through while signing my contract has definitely come back to bite me. Jump School was of course one of those extra schools that I signed up for.

Opening my eyes back up, when had they closed, I took in the rapidly approaching ground while spreading out my legs and arms so that I was laying out horizontally in a vain hope that it would slow me down enough to hopefully not die on impact.

I wonder if anyone will tell Doug…

No, don't worry about random things, even boyfriends. Let's meet this head on!

And suddenly the ground was right there in front of me. The fluttering of each blade of grass in the field standing out sharply to my mind and eyes. I don't want to-

The disorientation was sudden and all encompassing. There was the immediate sensation of pain everywhere though fading fast. Between the disorientation and the pain there were no other senses to register. I never did here the thud of the impact or anything else for that matter.

Slowly, so slowly I never consciously registered it, the pain, along with everything else, ended.

…..

There was nothing. Or rather, there was something, there was me and my memories. However, there was nothing else. No sense of time passing, no hunger, no feelings, no breathing. The only sensation might be that I felt sort of like I was floating, likely a figment of my imagination rather than anything concrete.

Death, for all my thoughts and fears upon the subject seemed to be rather mundane. I had often wondered if our existence simply ended upon death, or if we might end up reincarnated or if we ended up how each individual person subconsciously ended up where they desired and felt that they were meant to go to. It seems that we just end up in limbo or something to that extent. At least there was a sense of dreamy contentment to go along with it. Normally I would imagine this nothingness would be boring me to tears, but nothing seemed to affect my state of mind. I was simply content to reminisce about my life, and death.

At some indefinite point later, the first discernable event occurred. The comforting thrumming through the walls surrounding me started slowing and weakening. Where and when did those walls come from? As the thrumming slowed down further I felt anxious and fearful again for the first time since my death. Something horrible was happening!

The darkness that was only just starting to feel oppressive was rent asunder in blinding white light. Gigantic and rough things secured me and dragged me out into fire. Everything burned! My skin, my lungs when I tried to draw in breath, my eyes at the blinding light around me and even my ears at the cacophony painfully entering them.

Breathe. I need to breathe, even if it's fire. I can feel that. Struggling with the fire flowing in and out of my body as best as I could, I continued feeling the instinctive need no matter how painful. The blinding light slowly darkened around the edges threateningly.

Violently, I felt movement and then hard and unforgiving things were invading all around. Something was attached over my face and with it the fire turned to something more like real air. A rough pressure on my chest brought a cooling wave of relief.

With the sudden end to the agony I had been experiencing, I felt disconnected and fading out into sleep.

A/N: Thank you for reading. The events in this chapter may be rather confusing but it will become clearer in the next couple chapters.