Summary: When a lost civilian child stumbles across an Akatsuki base, what terrible fate will befall her?
Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto or any characters from the manga. I do however own my OC in this and the plot.
Enjoy the story.
. . .
The little girl sobbed as she stumbled clumsily through the forest, tripping over tree roots and skidding across mossy stones.
She had gotten lost again, her mother had told her she shouldn't go wandering outside of the village alone.
She had been playing hide and seek with her friend Yuki on the outskirts of the village but while her friend didn't find her she managed to lose herself in the process.
She squealed as she lost her balance and collided hard with the damp forest floor and went careening down a small rocky hill in the process.
She slowly picked her, now very bruised, body off the ground and dusted small rocks from her grazed knees.
She had gotten herself even more lost, she should have just stayed where she was but she panicked and tried to find the village again.
The sun was setting now and she jumped as an owl hooted in the tree above her and the forest rustled with the sounds of nocturnal critters waking from their slumber.
She started sobbing again at the thought of being eaten by some large forest animal.
"What if nobody finds me this time?" she thought, terror etching itself into her face.
She was only 7 years old she didn't want to die yet.
Why couldn't she just listen to her mom? She paused for a second as she picked up the smell of smoke in the air, it was from quite a distance away but made her cough as it entered her lungs.
Fresh panic made her sob harder as she now imagined dying horribly in a forest fire.
Why did she have to stumble away from the village? She was such an idiot.
She shrieked as she went tumbling down yet another hill.
This time she sat there where she had landed and decided that she would wait until someone found her. She just didn't have the navigational skills to get home and she was just getting further and further away from her warm bed.
She was in a small gap at the bottom of a hill. The area was almost completely hidden from view by the trees above her. She hadn't seen it before she had slipped and she doubted she could have even found it if she didn't.
Perhaps this wasn't the best place to wait after all, she was scared nobody would be able to see her.
She turned around and stared at what seemed to be a giant boulder lodged in the entrance of a cave. There was seal taped on it in kanji that said "six".
Strange, she had never seen anything like it before. Was it a shrine of some sort?
She didn't know but somehow she doubted it.
She noticed a path up the side of the hill in the dim light and stood up to follow it.
She pulled her fingers through her midnight purple shoulder length hair, pulling out leaves and twigs in the process.
Her baby blue dress was dirty and stained and she had broken one of her sandals running, and it now hung strangely on her foot.
She had just reached the bottom of the path when she froze, her ears pricking at the sound of talking ahead of her.
She debated whether she should ask them for help or hide.
She didn't recognise the voices but when she caught some of what they were saying she decided on hiding.
"...did you see...when I killed that lady… hilarious…" followed by deep rumbling laughter.
"Hnn," another voice said, in a tone that lacked expression of any kind.
The voices stopped and the hairs on the back of her neck prickled. Had they seen her?
She had hidden behind a bush in the clearing and prayed they wouldn't come down this way.
Her breath hitched in her throat when she heard them walking down the pathway.
She screamed when she was suddenly grabbed by the back of her dress and lifted high into the air.
"A child?" the voice from behind her asked. She couldn't see who was lifting her up and she was too scared to look around.
There was a boy in front of her that she was being held up in view of. He was not too much older than herself, probably in his early teens. He had cold red eyes and long raven hair tied back in a low pony tail.
She was trembling now, she didn't know what these men wanted with her.
"She found our lair, what should we do with her?" the voice asked from behind her again.
The voice was deep and amused sounding as though he said it with a wide found herself too scared to speak and tears started welling up in her eyes again.
"Kill her?" he asked again after receiving no response from his companion who was looking at her intensely with his scary eyes.
"Just let her go, it's not like she knows us," Itachi said expressionlessly. They had just wiped out a nearby village that had not paid their debt to the Akatsuki and he didn't want to spill any more unnecessary blood than they already had that day.
It was just a small civilian village that had sought their skills, offered a price and then couldn't pay.
Their leader had sent them to make an example out of their village to show others what happens when you cross the Akatsuki.
She froze when she heard him ask if he should kill her, not believing her ears and could have almost sighed with relief when his companion told him to let her go.
She could hear the man behind her was now frowning as he said "You know what the leader said about keeping the bases hidden Itachi-san."
They both looked up as they heard the rustling sounds of multiple feet not far in the distance.
She debated whether she should scream. If she did maybe they would hear her and come save her from these men.
"We can decide what to do with her later for now let's get inside before anyone else finds our base Kisame-san," Itachi said in a voice surprisingly deep and velvety for an adolescent.
With that she was pulled closer to the man and held there with one arm, any protests or screams muffled by a large hand covering her mouth.
She had really messed up this time and she swore she would never play hide and seek again.
That was if she would even be alive to not play hide and seek again.
Itachi performed a hand seal in front of the boulder and a few seconds and a dim red glow later the boulder rolled to the side and parted for them to pass through.
It stunk of mould and there were dripping sounds as they walked down a long dark tunnel.
He had removed his hand from her mouth now but she dared not make a sound.
They continued walking for a couple minutes before she was dropped to the floor in a large almost circular area within the cave. She was near the edge of the room and pressed her back against it hoping she would somehow pass through it and be free.
Their attention was no longer on her however and she jumped when a man appeared out of nowhere in the centre of the room.
"It is done," Itachi said evenly. He was holding his hand up in a hand seal. She had seen ninjas that visited her village do similar things.
When she looked closer the man was not a man but a shadow. A shadow with piercing ringed purple eyes.
"Excellent," he replied in an eerie voice that made her hairs stand on end.
She froze when he's piercing eyes connected with hers. It felt as though they were pinning her to the spot.
"The child, why is she here?" he asked, his eyes not leaving her scared ocean blue eyes.
"We found her outside the entrance to the base," the man that had been carrying her spoke.
Even in the dim light she could tell he was off colour by a few tints and decidedly blue.
"I see. Do with her what you please but make sure she doesn't tell anyone where the base is," he replied, finally removing his piercing eyes from hers.
Pein didn't care what his members got up to in their spare time as long as it didn't put the organisation or their goals at risk.
Her eyes widened, she was going to be killed, she just knew it.
The shadow flittered out of view and much to her displeasure the men returned their attention to her.
Kisame looked over at Itachi and after receiving a nod from the younger man, pulled a large wrapped sword from his back.
He didn't want him to kill the child but she had most definitely seen too much now.
Her eyes widened and she backed further into the wall, shaking her head.
No! She didn't want to die.
Her wide ocean eyes connected with his small golden ones for a split second as he swung his sword towards her. Her eyes squeezed shut not wanting to witness what would happen next.
Much to her surprise nothing happened. She looked back into his eyes and he looked as confused as her, almost looking as though he was straining to finish the blow he was planning.
"Itachi-san, I can't hit her," The shark-like man said with a toothy frown, pulling back his weapon. Itachi had begun walking away not wanting to see what his partner would do to the child but upon hearing that turned around.
What did he mean he couldn't hit her? He had killed kids her age and even younger; they both had just earlier that day.
He walked back towards the frightened child and pulled a kunai from his weapons pouch. If Kisame could not, he would be forced to.
What else could they do with a child who knew the location of their base and had just seen too much?
He found himself stopping mid air, his arm shaking with the force he was exerting trying to move it forward.
What was this child? He analysed her with his Sharingan, her eyes seemed to be emanating a strange chakra glow.
She looked at him in shock, watching black spots in his glowing red eyes spin around the pupil as he looked into hers as though he was examining her.
What the heck was going on? She had been sure a guardian angel, namely hers, had been taking a day off today but now she wasn't so sure.
Itachi had thought killing her was the best option but now he was pondering her usefulness to the organisation.
A girl that nobody could hit?
If they trained her she could be an asset to the Akatsuki.
And with that thought her life was spared. Itachi pulled back the kunai he had been straining to kill her with and rose to his feet.
"We can use her Kisame-san," he said to the large man next to him before walking in the direction of a hallway that spiralled off from the entrance room they were in.
Kisame shrugged nonchalantly and followed after Itachi.
When she didn't make a move to follow them he called back to her.
"Come."
She hesitated before slowly following after them. She didn't know what they meant by use her but if it meant she wouldn't be dying then that was good enough for her.
They walked through a series of maze like tunnels before they forked off into different rooms. She stood there for a few moments not knowing which she was supposed to follow.
"You wanted to keep her, she's your responsibility," Kisame chuckled from the room he had entered before shutting the door.
With that she hesitantly entered the room Itachi had gone into. There was a single bed and a door that led to the bathroom. The room was otherwise bare apart from a scarcely stocked bookshelf, a cupboard and a wooden desk.
Upon entering the room she found him sitting on the bed, unbuttoning the long black and red cloak he had been wearing.
Underneath he was lean and muscular, especially for someone who was only a few years older than her.
He watched her every movement as she appeared in the doorway, entered the room and slowly sat down on the floor after finding no other available place to do so.
She almost jumped when he spoke.
"What is your name?"
She hesitated to answer wanting nothing more than to just disappear and not be in her current situation.
"Hinami Mai," She finally replied in a soft voice.
"Where are you from?" He asked her another question. She wasn't comfortable with this stranger knowing anything about her but she replied anyway.
Her village was a small village in the Land of fire called the village of Long Grass.
His eyes seemed to change expression for a moment as she told him.
It had been the village they'd destroyed earlier in the day. She had been lucky she got lost in the woods, or perhaps unlucky if he thought about how everything she knew was gone.
"We're leaving early in the morning, sleep," He said finally.
She wondered how she would be able to sleep on the floor, it was cold and hard. She rose to her feet and went to inspect the bathroom.
There was a natural hot spring conveniently placed to be in the room as well as a toilet and sinks, a slightly misty mirror rested against the wall behind the sink, inconveniently too high off the ground for her to look into.
There were towels on the counter and she looked back at the stoic adolescent still sitting on the bed. He seemed to understand her gaze and gave a single nod of approval.
She closed the door and removed the dirty clothes she had been wearing. The water was warm and scented like herbs, she couldn't quite place the smell but it was nice and decidedly male smelling.
She got out a good thirty minutes later feeling a lot cleaner and smelling just like the spring she had been in.
While in there she had been crying thinking about how she would never see her mom again. Her dad had never been in the picture since he left her mom when she fell pregnant but her mom did the best she could alone.
Her eyes were slightly puffy and as she had expected she was covered in cuts and bruises which had stung when she got into the hot spring.
She pulled her fingers through her hair once more, disappointed that she wasn't tall enough to use the mirror.
Once wrapped in a towel she faced a dilemma. She didn't want to get back into her dirty clothes but she didn't have any others.
She pulled on the only clothing item that had survived the falls, her undies, and wrapped herself in a towel. She opened the door to find the teen in the same position as before except he was now staring at the silver and crimson ring on his right ring finger.
His had was held up in front of his face and it fell to his side when she continued to stare at him.
"Um, mister?" She said, trying to get his attention, his face turned to look at her, cold eyes connecting with hers.
She continued, "I don't have any clothes…" she said, her voice quivering at the end trying to fend off the impending tears. She wasn't usually such a cry baby but she'd had the worst day of her, thus far short, life and he scared her half to death, especially his cold crimson eyes that bore relentlessly into her large watery ones.
He fluidly moved into a sitting position and walked over to the wooden cupboard across from them. He didn't have clothes for a little girl as obviously he had not intended to ever bring one into his quarters but he opted for handing her the smallest shirt he had. It was one with the Uchiha emblem on the back that he brought with him after massacring his whole clan and left at this base, not planning to ever wear it again.
It was still way too big for her, being long enough for a dress but she didn't complain. She somehow reminded him of his brother. She was about the same age as him and had the same doe like eyes and childlike roundness to her face.
Her shoes were broken but he decided they'd stop in a village and get her clothing when they left in the morning.
To her absolute surprise he let her sleep on the bed and went to take a dip in the hot spring himself. He hadn't slept properly in half a year since he had killed his family and scratched a line through his Konoha head band.
She fell asleep easily enough however, feeling absolutely exhausted after the days events.
She didn't sleep for long when her dreams turned from an innocent game of hide and seek to a nightmare about her village burning, her mother screaming in agony from within their house unable to get out while she watched helplessly from the tree line of the forest. Disembodied red eyes stared back at her from within the village.
She shot up from the bed, breathing hard and came into contact with the same red eyes from her nightmare, they glowed in the dark as if belonging to a demon.
He sat on the desk waiting for the sun to rise so they could leave, he had given up on sleep at this point and looked over with interest when Hinami shot up his bed and looked at him as though she had seen a ghost.
"You," She accused, pointing a trembling finger in his direction. He had no idea what she was on about until she said something else in a quivering voice.
"My village."
She looked down at her hands with a crestfallen expression as she said it.
His eyes widened a fraction. She had somehow found out about what happened to her village and knew he had played a role in its destruction.
She just kept on surprising him.
. . .
I hope you enjoyed the chapter, I am so bad with starting new stories all the time but like I said I am working on chapters for my other stories so fear not I will try update those soon too.
Please let me know if you liked the chapter and if I should continue, I really appreciate any feedback on my stories. :)
Also I will probably jump years into the future in the next few chapters, she won't stay a child throughout the story.