I know I should be working on Akatsuki at Hogwarts, or, better yet, studying for midterms, but when you're an artist, sometimes you can't control your inspirations. I just want to get this out there. This'll probably end up like Spirited, constantly on hold until I get little flare-ups of inspiration. Sorry to all of those who look at this and find it interesting – it's probably going to be a while until I update next. If you're so inclined, you can kill time by checking out Akatsuki at Hogwarts. Or you can bug me. That works too.

BTW, I know for Akatsuki at Hogwarts and Spirited I keep Japanese honorifics to a minimum. That is because Akatsuki at Hogwarts is set in Hogwarts and they're all speaking English, and Spirited is some weird AU world. This, however, is set in the Narutoverse, albeit an AU. Therefore I will include honorifics and Japanese terminology (i.e., in Akatsuki at Hogwarts someone would say 'Fire Release: Great Fireball Technique', in this story it would be 'Katon: Gokakyu no Jutsu')

Rated T for future ninja violence and limited language.

Konoha was in chaos. The Head Ninja of Kumogakure had successfully made off with the Hyuga heiress, three year old Hyuga Hinata. Konoha was trying to make sure that another war didn't start, while the Hyuga clan furiously demanded retaliation that the old Sandaime Hokage, Sarutobi Hiruzen, was hesitant to allow. Fuming, Hyuga Hiashi ignored the Hokage's call for a more thorough plan and took with him several of his family members in pursuit of his daughter's kidnapper.

To his absolute horror and fury, the Head Ninja of Kumogakure had realized that he was more likely to get caught than to escape, and so, in a last ditch effort to hurt the Hyuga and Konoha, he hurled the little girl away into a river, hoping that the strong current in a short time would carry her farther than the Hyuga Byakugan could easily see and drown her. When Hiashi and his companions caught him, he fought hard and died as a ninja. Hiashi and his companions searched desperately for the lost heiress, and were just about to start following the river when Konoha ANBU appeared and took over the search, relaying the message that the Hokage was personally ordering the Hyugas to return to safer Konoha territory. Hiashi knew that he even though he was a clan head and a high-ranking individual from Konoha, he couldn't disobey his leader. That didn't mean he was going to let the Hokage escape his strong opinion on the call, but he and his companions returned nonetheless.

Because the Hyugas left the area, the ANBU lost the use of the Byakugan as a tracking device. Because time was lost when Hiashi and the ANBU argued, Hinata floated further down the rapidly moving river. Because Hinata floated away far and fast, the ANBU had no success in finding her, and because she was so young, her chakra levels were low and hard to trace.

Hyuga Hinata should have died that night, and in a way, she did. The girl was swept away by the river, far from Konoha. By some miracle, she was found by a caravan heading to the Land of Wind to pick up raw materials to sell to the rest of the nations. Moved by the sight of the mostly-dead child, the people of the caravan took pity on her and decided to bring her to their next stop, Sunagakure, and leave her with them. When she woke, the people of the caravan realized that the girl had no idea who she was, where she was, or where she came from. They saw her pale, pupil-less eyes and, being civilians with limited knowledge of the ninja bloodlines, assumed that she had been left to die because of her apparent defect. They also realized that the girl had a very serious ear infection and needed to be treated as soon as possible.

When the caravan arrived at Sunagakure, they sent one of their younger members to take the little girl to the hospital. The nurse who treated her checked her ears and was going to simply prescribe some antibiotics and send her on her way, when the girl, who had been sleeping, opened her eyes. The nurse, who had in her spare time glanced through the bingo books, recognized immediately the eyes of the Hyuga clan. She immediately reported this to the higher-ups, who ordered that the child be more thoroughly examined. When they discovered that the girl was indeed a Hyuga, they were delighted. When they discovered that the caravan had been planning on leaving the girl in Suna, they were thrilled. When news of the Hyuga Affair reached Suna, they realized just who this girl was and were worried.

The Yondaime Kazekage heard of this miracle Hyuga who had survived a river and was fighting a serious ear infection that would ultimately impair, if not cost her, her hearing. He heard that she was the Hyuga heiress who could potentially produce for Suna the Byakugan, or at least some variant. If all else failed, he could arrange for an accident and take that precious pair of Byakugan eyes for his best trackers or for scientific experimentation.

So the Kazekage ordered that the Hyuga heiress' heritage be made an S-rank secret, and that she be raised in a civilian home that had little access to information that could expose her as a Hyuga. The civilian family that took her in were blacksmiths and had two other children, a son and a daughter. They were placed under orders to send her to the Ninja Academy when she was old enough.

The civilian family took one look at their newest family member and knew she was different. Thus, they named her 'Yukiko', which means 'rare child'. Yukiko grew up having no idea that she was adopted, and, when her parents took their son to have his chakra levels tested to see if he could enter the Academy, they tested their other children as well. It turned out that Yukiko was the only one of the three to have adequate chakra levels, and so the little girl grew up with the knowledge that she would one day become the first ninja in her family.

And so events were set to unfold…

And that's the prologue. It's probably going to be a lonely prologue for a while. But now, because I just said that, I probably jinxed it. Oh well.

Tell me what you think!

Until next time :)