There was so much blood, I was struggling to try and keep my hand pressed on the wound. I'd lost so much blood already; my limbs were beginning to tremble. My vision blurred, I slipped from the treetops, and plummeted to the rocky ground below. As I landed, the wound at my side burst open once more, spewing out blood. My head banged against a rock, lulling me in and out of consciousness.
I could hear soft footsteps coming up from the woods behind me. Dreading that my enemy, which I had been fleeing from, had caught up and was going to finish me off, I tried lifting my arms to perform one final justsu. The justsu which would disintegrate my body, along with all the secrets of my village it held. My arms merely went limp and fell back down to the ground, sending shrieks of pain coursing through them. I heard a twig snap close by me. I looked up to see the shadow of a woman overtop of me, and I blacked out.
I awoke several hours later in a daze. My body was numb and stiff, but the pain from my abdomen had relatively subsided. I slowly moved my arm to feel of the deadly wound at my side, only to find it tightly wrapped in bandages, very neatly I must add. As I ran my fingers down where I knew the injury to be, I stuck my fingers into a warm, thick liquid. I lifted my arm slightly and saw my own blood slowly dripping down off my fingers. I must have been restless in my sleep in order to reopen the wound.
Reopen…that's right. I suddenly remembered that someone had to have cleaned it and wrapped it. But who…? I couldn't think of who would have done such a thing. The woman from the woods…but…who was she? An enemy? No. She would've killed me on the spot. A fellow shinobi? Possibly…but it seemed highly unlikely. Surely no one else from Konoha was anywhere nearby. I looked around the room for some sort of sign.
I was lying on a flat in the center of an almost empty room. Someone had taken a great deal of care in order to be sure I stayed warm; I had a mountain of blankets wrapped around me just perfectly as to not come in contact with my injuries. I looked around once more. It was a simple room, wooden floors, white walls, a set of doors leading outside and another set leading to what I assumed was the rest of a house or something of that sort. There were a few tattered books sitting on a lonely bookshelf in the corner, as well as a dresser with a few shirt sleeves and pant legs hanging out. Nothing out of the ordinary. Certainly nothing that could give me any clues as to what was going on.
Right beside me was a lonely bucket of water. Was it for me to drink? Or was it left over from cleansing my damaged flesh? If so, I knew not to take the chance of drinking it, just in case.
What was probably an hour later, I heard footsteps coming from behind the door that led to the rest of the building. Just to be safe, I pretended to still be unconscious, but kept my eye slightly open in order to observe the person coming into the room.
At first, I only saw a small pair of feet walk through the doorway. I looked up slightly to see a young woman walking over to me. She was no enemy that I recognized…but she was no ally of mine either. Could she be trusted? I couldn't tell, but if she was the one who had tended to me, she was obviously doing more good than harm.
She placed her small, pale palm on my forehead, which was when I noticed I was wearing neither my headband nor my anbu mask, nor my shirt for that matter. Feeling my head for a few moments, I could hear her dunking something in the bucket of water beside me. I could not see far enough over to tell what it was, but soon after, I felt a cool wet cloth being placed on my forehead. I must've been running a fever. Most likely, from some sort of minor infection.
I figured that moment was as good of a time as any to make my consciousness known. I pretended that the cold water had startled me awake; I even jumped slightly to amplify the effect. Probably too well, I should add; I accidently knocked over the bucket with my arm, and splashed to poor girl with a bucketful of cold water. Once I had realized what happened, I shot straight up and quickly apologized, only to injure myself further by tearing the infliction open once more.
She instantly forgot about the water, and without any acknowledgment of me, started to wash the wound with the cool water, then applied some sort of herbal remedy she had brought in with her. It stung slightly, but after a moment, it seemed to leach away all of the pain. She removed the careful bandage work, which had been torn apart by my sudden movement, and gently rewrapped my waist.
"I'm sorry about that," I whispered slowly through my now parched lips. I could tell I was dehydrated. How long had I been out? Hours? Days? I thought of asking her, but for some reason, decided against it.
"Don't worry about it," she said back to me in a quiet voice, smiling. I got a good look at her for the first time as she turned her attention to soaking up the mess of water I had made. She was dripping wet, yet again, my fault. Small drops of water fell from loose pieces of her long, black hair which had fallen from her long braid. Her body fit her small voice, even in large clothing; I could tell she herself was quite small. I didn't even notice her big, blue eyes until she turned to me halfway through her scrubbing. She smiled again and asked, "Would you like me to get you anything?"
I felt slightly guilty for being waited on, but I knew I was in no condition to be taking care of myself. So, I gave in. "I…could use a drink of water. That is…" I looked over to the puddle she was soaking up. "if you can trust me with water."
She giggled in an almost childish way. "That's no problem at all." As she finished with my mess, she left with the bucket, now empty, and came back holding a glass of water. She tried coaxing me into allowing her to give me the water herself, but I insisted that I was capable of sitting up now that I knew of the status of my wound.
She helped me slowly sit up, and placed the glass in my hands. I noticed, from her dripping sleeves, that she was still in the same wet clothing. "Say," I begin in between sips of water. "Don't you want to go and change into something slightly drier?"
She looked down, as if she hadn't noticed she was drenched. "Oh my, I suppose so." She went over to the overflowing dresser, and fumbled through the clothing, as if looking for something in particular. She held up a few things, which I didn't pay much attention to, being distracted by quenching my thirst, and she set them to the side, to save them.
"Lose your clothes, did you?" I asked jokingly.
She turned to me and smiled. "Nah, I'm just trying to find something that'll fit me." And she returned to scrounging around.
I was perplexed. "Aren't they yours?"
"No." She replied in a matter-of-fact tone. "This is a traveler's cabin so, all of these are old clothes left behind by travelers who didn't need them anymore. They're just perfect for when things like this happen."
While she left to change, I slowly got up, and set down my glass on a small table by the flat. I walked over to the dresser slowly, assuming my clothes would be somewhere in the drawers. It just about killed me to stay standing for even for that short amount of time. But, after all, I couldn't just go around with nothing on except my pants.
She returned a few moments later, wearing what was obviously men's clothing, even though the ruffled sleeves of her white shirt hinted of a feminine quality. "You shouldn't be standing up so soon." She came over to me and had me sit down on a stool she pulled over from the corner by the bookshelf.
"Just wondering wear my clothes disappeared to." I said, slouching to not disturb the muscles in my side.
"All you had to do was ask, sir." Being called sir, even coming from a woman who I could tell was not much younger than me, still made me feel like an old man. "I washed out the dried blood and hung them out to dry. For now," she handed me a stack of clothes from out of the dresser. "I'm afraid these will have to do."
I took the clothes and attempted to change on my own, but she noticed from the corner of the room, where I asked her to stand, that my muscles wouldn't allow it. So, I had to let the woman change my clothes. Not like it had never happened before, it's quite common in hospitals, but not usually in this kind of scenario.
I must've seemed reluctant to accept her help, even though it was exactly how I was feeling. "No need to be shy," she said quietly, as if reading my mind. "It's nothing that I haven't witnessed before." This didn't really make me any more comfortable with the situation, but I allowed it, while I tried to examine her words. Was she a nurse, perhaps? If so, then it would make sense. I just hoped that I had analyzed her words correctly.
Over the next week or so, I recuperated in that traveler's cabin with who was basically my own personal nurse. She tended to my injuries, and served me meals. I spent my spare time reading my book, which unfortunately I finished and ended up resorting to the lonesome bookshelf, which mostly was comprised of old herb guides and forest maps of the surrounding areas.
I showed her the basics on how to wield a knife. I figured a young woman traveling alone should at least have some means of protecting herself. She seemed interested in learning, telling me how her father was an avid knife collector, but she had never been permitted to wield one. She caught on pretty quickly, though she was squeamish about hurting anything, which I observed when she found a snake in her room and couldn't bring herself to kill it. "Don't worry," I assured her. "If the time comes when you need to really protect someone, you'll find the will to kill." She didn't seem very pleased at the idea, but she accepted it nonetheless.
On the day when I was going to return to my duty, I asked her, "Why did you take care of me in the first place?" This question had been in the back of my mind the entire time, but I figured it was not wise to show distrust towards her when she was the one taking care of me.
"Well," she began, "I found you unconscious in the woods while I was traveling. It was obvious that you were badly injured, so I made sure to tend to your wounds at least. After all," she traced the Konohagakure symbol on my headband and continued. "You are Kakashi of the Sharingan, so I owe you at least that much." I was astonished, not only at the fact that she could tell I was a shinobi, even though I was practically unarmed, but also by the fact that she knew who I was…by name as well. How long had she known? Could she tell immediately just from my sharingan eye, if she had even noticed it at all? Or, had she recognized me from some previous encounter of which I had no recollection?
"You know who I am?" I began to grow suspicious of the woman, although I don't quite know why, I was well known in the shinobi world. But, she at least seemed…to be no shinobi… "How could you tell?"
"Simple." She smiled brightly. "You are well known around my village for the deeds you did for our people." Personally, I had no clue what she was talking about, not that I remembered many of my missions in particular as it was. So, I figured that I should simply leave it at that. The less she knew the better.
We just barely went our separate ways when an icy gust of wind rustled through the leaves of the trees around me. I recognized the bone chilling blast, and I knew instantly…they were back. They had found me, and the chase was back on.
Down the other end of the trail, I heard a recognizable voice scream out. It was her. I sprinted through the treetops as fast as my still recovering body would allow. In a clearing about half a mile away, I found her lying on the ground, unconscious and tied up, with blood down her face from her head, where she must have been struck by a blunt object. Next thing I knew, I was surrounded by a hoard of rogue shinobi. I had fallen right into their trap. They used the poor, innocent girl to lure me right to them.
Before I could lunge at one of them, they all moved to the girl, with one of the big guys holding her up by her limp arms. Their leader, whom I knew of as simply, Kentaro, spoke out to me, "If you want to see the girl alive again, you'll bring us what we want. You know exactly what I'm talking about." And that, I did. This group of rogue shinobi was after nothing but power, often seeking scrolls containing the most forbidden justu. I knew that's what they were speaking of. It was the scroll which I had been sent to pick up for safety, before they tried to stop me by attacking me.
"And if I don't get the scroll to you?" I asked in a monotonous voice, trying to prolong my time for thinking, because I already knew the answer.
"It's simple." The big guy holding the girl said. "If you don't give us the scroll…" he pretended to slit the girl's throat. "Get it?"
"Got it." I said, not entirely paying attention to the conversation; I was already deep in thought of how to tackle the situation. Was that one girl's life worth the chance of them getting their hands on a forbidden justu? What was I thinking…she had just as much of a right to live as anyone else. It wasn't her battle. "Leave the girl out of this." I said, a bit more demandingly.
"Ha!" One of the women stepped forward. "This guy thinks he's in control of the situation!" They all chuckled to themselves.
"The girl has nothing to do with this!" I lashed out at that, growing angrier each passing second.
"But," Kentaro spoke again. "You obviously don't want to watch the girl die." He got a twisted grin on his face. "How about a deal? If you bring us the scroll, you and the girl both get to walk away and keep your lives. But, if you don't…" he held up a knife to the girl, "she dies, and then we hunt you down."
I sighed, realizing I wasn't going to get any better of an agreement out of the likes of them. "Very well."
"In that case, you have 12 days. If you're not at our doorstep with the scroll by sundown of the 12th day…" he snickered at his thought "…off with her head…" And then, like the wind, they were gone.