Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto and anything associated with it. I just write about it. I don't make any money off it. All characters except for my original characters (Kinenbi, Hakai, etc, etc) are the property of the Masashi Kishimoto.
A/N:The first scene might be a little too bloody, but it had to be done for the sake of the plot. It won't be done anymore, however: my point would have been made. (The Point? you'll have to find out...)
Note on Update: Major Revisions! I advice you to read the first two chapters again if you read it before the third chapter went up. The chapters in some parts have been re-written, along with different characters- although Naru/Hina will still be on. Also, there will be NO self-insertion- so if you see a original character, don't worry. Also, the plot has been changed! Read the first two chapters if you read it before the update!
-The Hidden Void: Under the Waterfall-
Shoshinsha was never that smart; intelligence seemed to have escaped him entirely, at least to those who saw him trying desperately to figure out the difference between a horse and a donkey. But he was good at killing; quick, efficient, and brutal, he enjoyed what he did, and although he was no sadist, if the situation required for some pain inflicted, he never shirked to do so.
And it appeared to him that day that karma did in fact exist; that what comes around goes around. He lay upon the ground, his tendons ripped, chakra bound and bleeding from several gashes... His legs lay flayed, blood oozing out from the expertly peeled skin.
"I say it again... Where did you find it?"
"No- argh...! I...-don't- know!...!" Shoshinsha cried, attempting to twist his body around, his instincts crying out for release from the pain. But he was pinned, too; several spikes were driven into his hands and legs.
"Really... how about this?" The torturer, dressed in a dark hood, took out what appeared to be a kunai, dripping with a dark liquid foul-smelling. "I remember what you did to that farmer... and his wife... and his little girls. Surely you didn't hear their screams, and think, 'wow, maybe I should just stop now and let them go, even though I've broken their backs and raped all the women?' Maybe, if you had stopped for a second to consider that someone might do to you what you did to so many others..." The man said, laying the blade of the kunai upon Shoshinsha's leg. "You are finished, anyways. You'll never recover... and even if someone comes for you, they'll be more likely to finish you off anyways. Tell me of what I seek, and I might give you the mercy of death..."
Shoshinsha screamed again as the man drew the blade slowly across the exposed muscles of his leg. "Alright- alright! Agh- oh gods...! It's in the waterfall, the void that which appears, oh god! I don't know what it is- they just made me memorize it...!"
"Thank you, for the information... And as for the mercy-" The torturer stood up, and looked at Shoshinsha, looked into his pitiful eyes, begging for reprieve from pain. "It's a just punishment, really; a thing like you deserves only to be in the belly of some lucky jackals." As the man left, he heard the wailing coming from behind, Shoshinsha's last scream.
-------------------
The man wiped the poison-stained kunai on a leaf, then pocketed it. He drew off the hood, revealing a shock of spiky blond hair- and around his neck, concealing his throat, hung the forehead protector proclaiming him to a shinobi of the leaf.
Naruto walked over to a distant tree, and vomited as the memory of the man writhing under his blade came back to him. Throwing out half-digested ramen noodles, he told himself that he had to do it... and that man had been evil. But nothing helped. He was beginning to turn like Orochimaru and the rest, he thought. He was beginning to care nothing for the lives of others. And he had left that man there, to be eaten alive, a carcass left for the crows...
"Are you okay?" A soft voice asked him, softly touching his back. "Take- take this." A pale hand offered him a small, chipped pewter cup filled with some green liquid. Naruto took it gratefully, and gulped it down. He handed it back to the woman, and said as he met her pale, almost corpse-like eyes, "Thanks, Hinata..."
"It's okay..." Hinata said, and again Naruto felt a rush of gratitude for her, caring even for a monster like him... A demon within and a demon outside also.
"Thanks, Hinata." Naruto said, and stood up straight once more. "So, we should go on now... no time to lose, you know."
"What was he, do you know?"
"I don't know. He had the sigils of the Hidden Void, that weird sign- but he was also a foreigner."
"What... did you learn...?" Hinata asked cautiously.
"Nothing... just a weird phrase, 'the void that which appears.' Supposed to be under the waterfall." Naruto picked up the canteen, which sounded of water. "And... you heard... him, didn't you?"
Hinata winced as he spoke. She could hear the raw pain hidden within- the former heir to the Hyuuga Clan knew that the things Naruto had to do in order to save those he loved tore him apart; this was one of them. She had heard the screams, awful pain-filled sounds that rang through the air, but she decided not to tell him for now... "No, I didn't."
He brightened... a little. "We'll stop by dusk, and Kinenbi should've went into town by now- I asked him for some ramen, and he better have got some."
---------------------
They trudged along for some time, six hours at least. Their destination was the nearest waterfall, the Rainbow Falls; it lay somewhere to the south of their location, Naruto knew. For now, however, they were waiting for Kinenbi.
They stopped on a hill, overlooking the river and more importantly the surrounding lands. It afforded them a fantastic view and also made sure that no one would sneak up on them, and also would bait any nearby void ninjas who would be searching for them in to a battle- a battle Naruto was confident he could win, with Hinata's help.
Hinata watched the sunset. The sun seemed to be covered in blood, falling slowly through the air to shatter in pieces as it died on the hard, hard ground. The clouds nearby were dyed in brillant orange, and the air itself seemed to shimmer with light. And as she saw all this, she found herself glancing at Naruto... Who was currently trying to take a nap on the grass, a arm overthrown over his eyes for cover from the sunset light. She found herself smiling a little; although her childhood crush and hero-worship of Naruto had worn off as time went on, something else had taken place... a gentle longing for something more than friendship.
He looked... handsome, she thought. His hair had fallen back, revealing his forehead, a pimple rising on the side; his arm covered his brillant blue eyes and his mouth hung open, drool slowly making it's way out- his curious whisker marks sunk in a little. Although, she thought, he wasn't the most graceful, the most handsome, he was still her dream... He had grown over the years, from a short, stocky boy to a, well, not tall, but still, of average height and a slender, lean build... His hair had grown, and now hung in unkempt, spiky locks over his ears and draped the back of his neck, while he parted it from the front of his face... His face had thinned out a little, and with his whisker marks he almost looked feral, like a fox or a cat. But his eyes remained the same, a mischievous shade of blue with a wide, laughing mouth that shouted a little too much.
He was different, she knew, from the boy that she had secretly obsessed with back in Konoha. He was gentle, true, a prankster still... but he was also a killer, a assasin. She knew that he was what some would call a monster, from what he had done. But they had never known the trials that he had to go through, the aftermath of those deeds... of his increasing revulsion for himself, his self hatred, his longing for affection, all those which Hinata saw and felt as if they were her pain. And what he did was justice, in some weird way: an eye for a eye. The man that he... interrogated had been a monster, who had wrecked a farmer's home, raped and pillaged their hard-earned keeps just because the farmer had refused to tell him of where he kept his non-existent gold.
If only, she thought, if only life had been normal... if only Konoha hadn't been ravaged by those that called themselves the Hidden Void, then maybe she might have told Naruto her true feelings, and maybe, since they were seventeen now, they might have married and had a dozen kids... She smiled as the fantasy took ahold of her. 'Then a yellow-painted house with a ramen cupboard...'
--------------------------
'Where the hell is Kinenbi,' Naruto wondered. Hinata appeared to be taking a nap, her blue-black hair fanned out on the grass, the sun almost gone from view as night started to creep back in. He had gotten up, after failing to fall asleep for a short time; he worried a little about Kinenbi, but decided that the overly active former Chuunin would be able to take care of himself.
He found himself looking at Hinata. He knew that he should wake her up now, but he found himself studying her instead... Her face, pale and nearly porcelain-like in the absence of light, was framed by long blue-black hair; Naruto knew that Hinata was... pretty.
. Not that he felt any deep feelings for her- of course he didn't. Of course not. She wasn't his type- no, no, she wasn't his type. She was his friend. That was all.
--------------------------
Kinenbi was a ninja of the Stone village, son of a Jounin who owed his life to one of Konoha's shinobis. When the Konohagakure was destroyed by the Void-nins, the Kage of the Stone village decreed that they couldn't afford a all-out declaration of war with a power of unknown strength- although the Void-nins were certainly strong enough to have taken out Konoha, home to some of the most famous ninjas of the land. However, when Kinenbi's father heard of this, he had ordered Kinenbi to aid the survivors of the battle in whatever ways he could- "upholding the family honor," he called it. And Kinenbi, strictly loyal, obeyed, and by the next day, had left for what was left of the Konohagakure village.
He had found Naruto and his band of weary survivors north of the wreckage- he had been horrified on the way, for he had seen corpses stacked on sides of roads- and had offered his aid immediately. They hadn't trusted him, but then, who would trust a complete stranger right after their home was completely destroyed? However, after a while ( for Naruto, after Kinenbi whipped out a sack of ramen) they had begun to trust him, and now, he was a part of their little team... And he enjoyed it. In fact, should Konoha be rebuilt, he was thinking about settling there, instead of going back to the Stone village.
Right now, however, he was coming back from a nearby village, after receiving a letter from one of Shikamaru's familiars- more specifically, hawks. He had received a bad scratch from one of them, and now he had finished reading the notes. One couldn't be too careful, and if the note fell into wrong hands... He would tell Naruto and Hinata about the contents of the note when he got there, and destroy the note now. He stuffed the paper into his mouth, and chewed it all up. It tasted horrible. He grabbed the ramen box again, and was about to leave when-
"You there! Relinquish your valuables in the names of the Ameratesu!" A man in dark cried. Kinenbi looked up in interest, and saw that he was surrounded by five men, all similarly dressed.
"You didn't even get her name right, you fools..." Kinenbi sighed, and readied himself into a fighting stance. "Talk about dumb bandits..." He dropped the ramen box by his feet. "I don't want to kill you people..."
A/N: Kinenbi: wedding anniversary (he was conceived on the night of his parents' wedding anniversary...) Shoshinsha: Beginner
2nd A/N:Destruction of Konoha will be explained slowly throughout the story. I don't like lumping it in one, dull history-book type paragraph.
Author's Note: They are all seventeen. Kinenbi is a original character: (dodges shurikens).
A/N:The first scene might be a little too bloody, but it had to be done for the sake of the plot. It won't be done anymore, however: my point would have been made. (The Point? you'll have to find out...)
Note on Update: Major Revisions! I advice you to read the first two chapters again if you read it before the third chapter went up. The chapters in some parts have been re-written, along with different characters- although Naru/Hina will still be on. Also, there will be NO self-insertion- so if you see a original character, don't worry. Also, the plot has been changed! Read the first two chapters if you read it before the update!
-The Hidden Void: Under the Waterfall-
Shoshinsha was never that smart; intelligence seemed to have escaped him entirely, at least to those who saw him trying desperately to figure out the difference between a horse and a donkey. But he was good at killing; quick, efficient, and brutal, he enjoyed what he did, and although he was no sadist, if the situation required for some pain inflicted, he never shirked to do so.
And it appeared to him that day that karma did in fact exist; that what comes around goes around. He lay upon the ground, his tendons ripped, chakra bound and bleeding from several gashes... His legs lay flayed, blood oozing out from the expertly peeled skin.
"I say it again... Where did you find it?"
"No- argh...! I...-don't- know!...!" Shoshinsha cried, attempting to twist his body around, his instincts crying out for release from the pain. But he was pinned, too; several spikes were driven into his hands and legs.
"Really... how about this?" The torturer, dressed in a dark hood, took out what appeared to be a kunai, dripping with a dark liquid foul-smelling. "I remember what you did to that farmer... and his wife... and his little girls. Surely you didn't hear their screams, and think, 'wow, maybe I should just stop now and let them go, even though I've broken their backs and raped all the women?' Maybe, if you had stopped for a second to consider that someone might do to you what you did to so many others..." The man said, laying the blade of the kunai upon Shoshinsha's leg. "You are finished, anyways. You'll never recover... and even if someone comes for you, they'll be more likely to finish you off anyways. Tell me of what I seek, and I might give you the mercy of death..."
Shoshinsha screamed again as the man drew the blade slowly across the exposed muscles of his leg. "Alright- alright! Agh- oh gods...! It's in the waterfall, the void that which appears, oh god! I don't know what it is- they just made me memorize it...!"
"Thank you, for the information... And as for the mercy-" The torturer stood up, and looked at Shoshinsha, looked into his pitiful eyes, begging for reprieve from pain. "It's a just punishment, really; a thing like you deserves only to be in the belly of some lucky jackals." As the man left, he heard the wailing coming from behind, Shoshinsha's last scream.
-------------------
The man wiped the poison-stained kunai on a leaf, then pocketed it. He drew off the hood, revealing a shock of spiky blond hair- and around his neck, concealing his throat, hung the forehead protector proclaiming him to a shinobi of the leaf.
Naruto walked over to a distant tree, and vomited as the memory of the man writhing under his blade came back to him. Throwing out half-digested ramen noodles, he told himself that he had to do it... and that man had been evil. But nothing helped. He was beginning to turn like Orochimaru and the rest, he thought. He was beginning to care nothing for the lives of others. And he had left that man there, to be eaten alive, a carcass left for the crows...
"Are you okay?" A soft voice asked him, softly touching his back. "Take- take this." A pale hand offered him a small, chipped pewter cup filled with some green liquid. Naruto took it gratefully, and gulped it down. He handed it back to the woman, and said as he met her pale, almost corpse-like eyes, "Thanks, Hinata..."
"It's okay..." Hinata said, and again Naruto felt a rush of gratitude for her, caring even for a monster like him... A demon within and a demon outside also.
"Thanks, Hinata." Naruto said, and stood up straight once more. "So, we should go on now... no time to lose, you know."
"What was he, do you know?"
"I don't know. He had the sigils of the Hidden Void, that weird sign- but he was also a foreigner."
"What... did you learn...?" Hinata asked cautiously.
"Nothing... just a weird phrase, 'the void that which appears.' Supposed to be under the waterfall." Naruto picked up the canteen, which sounded of water. "And... you heard... him, didn't you?"
Hinata winced as he spoke. She could hear the raw pain hidden within- the former heir to the Hyuuga Clan knew that the things Naruto had to do in order to save those he loved tore him apart; this was one of them. She had heard the screams, awful pain-filled sounds that rang through the air, but she decided not to tell him for now... "No, I didn't."
He brightened... a little. "We'll stop by dusk, and Kinenbi should've went into town by now- I asked him for some ramen, and he better have got some."
---------------------
They trudged along for some time, six hours at least. Their destination was the nearest waterfall, the Rainbow Falls; it lay somewhere to the south of their location, Naruto knew. For now, however, they were waiting for Kinenbi.
They stopped on a hill, overlooking the river and more importantly the surrounding lands. It afforded them a fantastic view and also made sure that no one would sneak up on them, and also would bait any nearby void ninjas who would be searching for them in to a battle- a battle Naruto was confident he could win, with Hinata's help.
Hinata watched the sunset. The sun seemed to be covered in blood, falling slowly through the air to shatter in pieces as it died on the hard, hard ground. The clouds nearby were dyed in brillant orange, and the air itself seemed to shimmer with light. And as she saw all this, she found herself glancing at Naruto... Who was currently trying to take a nap on the grass, a arm overthrown over his eyes for cover from the sunset light. She found herself smiling a little; although her childhood crush and hero-worship of Naruto had worn off as time went on, something else had taken place... a gentle longing for something more than friendship.
He looked... handsome, she thought. His hair had fallen back, revealing his forehead, a pimple rising on the side; his arm covered his brillant blue eyes and his mouth hung open, drool slowly making it's way out- his curious whisker marks sunk in a little. Although, she thought, he wasn't the most graceful, the most handsome, he was still her dream... He had grown over the years, from a short, stocky boy to a, well, not tall, but still, of average height and a slender, lean build... His hair had grown, and now hung in unkempt, spiky locks over his ears and draped the back of his neck, while he parted it from the front of his face... His face had thinned out a little, and with his whisker marks he almost looked feral, like a fox or a cat. But his eyes remained the same, a mischievous shade of blue with a wide, laughing mouth that shouted a little too much.
He was different, she knew, from the boy that she had secretly obsessed with back in Konoha. He was gentle, true, a prankster still... but he was also a killer, a assasin. She knew that he was what some would call a monster, from what he had done. But they had never known the trials that he had to go through, the aftermath of those deeds... of his increasing revulsion for himself, his self hatred, his longing for affection, all those which Hinata saw and felt as if they were her pain. And what he did was justice, in some weird way: an eye for a eye. The man that he... interrogated had been a monster, who had wrecked a farmer's home, raped and pillaged their hard-earned keeps just because the farmer had refused to tell him of where he kept his non-existent gold.
If only, she thought, if only life had been normal... if only Konoha hadn't been ravaged by those that called themselves the Hidden Void, then maybe she might have told Naruto her true feelings, and maybe, since they were seventeen now, they might have married and had a dozen kids... She smiled as the fantasy took ahold of her. 'Then a yellow-painted house with a ramen cupboard...'
--------------------------
'Where the hell is Kinenbi,' Naruto wondered. Hinata appeared to be taking a nap, her blue-black hair fanned out on the grass, the sun almost gone from view as night started to creep back in. He had gotten up, after failing to fall asleep for a short time; he worried a little about Kinenbi, but decided that the overly active former Chuunin would be able to take care of himself.
He found himself looking at Hinata. He knew that he should wake her up now, but he found himself studying her instead... Her face, pale and nearly porcelain-like in the absence of light, was framed by long blue-black hair; Naruto knew that Hinata was... pretty.
. Not that he felt any deep feelings for her- of course he didn't. Of course not. She wasn't his type- no, no, she wasn't his type. She was his friend. That was all.
--------------------------
Kinenbi was a ninja of the Stone village, son of a Jounin who owed his life to one of Konoha's shinobis. When the Konohagakure was destroyed by the Void-nins, the Kage of the Stone village decreed that they couldn't afford a all-out declaration of war with a power of unknown strength- although the Void-nins were certainly strong enough to have taken out Konoha, home to some of the most famous ninjas of the land. However, when Kinenbi's father heard of this, he had ordered Kinenbi to aid the survivors of the battle in whatever ways he could- "upholding the family honor," he called it. And Kinenbi, strictly loyal, obeyed, and by the next day, had left for what was left of the Konohagakure village.
He had found Naruto and his band of weary survivors north of the wreckage- he had been horrified on the way, for he had seen corpses stacked on sides of roads- and had offered his aid immediately. They hadn't trusted him, but then, who would trust a complete stranger right after their home was completely destroyed? However, after a while ( for Naruto, after Kinenbi whipped out a sack of ramen) they had begun to trust him, and now, he was a part of their little team... And he enjoyed it. In fact, should Konoha be rebuilt, he was thinking about settling there, instead of going back to the Stone village.
Right now, however, he was coming back from a nearby village, after receiving a letter from one of Shikamaru's familiars- more specifically, hawks. He had received a bad scratch from one of them, and now he had finished reading the notes. One couldn't be too careful, and if the note fell into wrong hands... He would tell Naruto and Hinata about the contents of the note when he got there, and destroy the note now. He stuffed the paper into his mouth, and chewed it all up. It tasted horrible. He grabbed the ramen box again, and was about to leave when-
"You there! Relinquish your valuables in the names of the Ameratesu!" A man in dark cried. Kinenbi looked up in interest, and saw that he was surrounded by five men, all similarly dressed.
"You didn't even get her name right, you fools..." Kinenbi sighed, and readied himself into a fighting stance. "Talk about dumb bandits..." He dropped the ramen box by his feet. "I don't want to kill you people..."
A/N: Kinenbi: wedding anniversary (he was conceived on the night of his parents' wedding anniversary...) Shoshinsha: Beginner
2nd A/N:Destruction of Konoha will be explained slowly throughout the story. I don't like lumping it in one, dull history-book type paragraph.
Author's Note: They are all seventeen. Kinenbi is a original character: (dodges shurikens).