Hello and welcome to my new story. While I am still working on my other story, and so may not be able to update in a timely manner, I hope you will enjoy reading it and offer your support.
I do not own Naruto. As if that needs to be repeated at this point.
Enjoy, and review!
Something poked him in the face. Deidara frowned and tried to push it away. It came back, more insistent. Poke, poke, poke . . .
Couldn't they see he was trying to sleep? That's when he realized something strange. He was lying neither on a bed nor on the forest floor, but on something very hard and very cold. And he was warm. This was strange. Poke, poke, poke . . .
"Hey mister? mister?" A small voice came from somewhere close to his ear. Poke, poke, poke . . . "Niisan, wake up!"
"Go away, hm . . ."
"Niisan!"
"I said . . ." he sat up suddenly, wide awake, eyes blurry. He rubbed them, confused, and looked around. White, stainless walls, rows of fluorescent lights, rooms numbered randomly, a cart filled with medical odds and ends, needles, tubes and the like, met his rapidly roaming eyes. He was in a hospital, and it was night time. The lights were off, but he could still see his surroundings clearly. Everything was slightly tinted in pink. The atmosphere was quiet and still, nothing moved.
Then something poked him again. Deidara frowned, getting more irritated by the second. 'Where in the hell am I, hm?' His only visible eye rotated around the hall, searching for the source of the annoyance, and widened when he found it. Crouched next to him was a small girl, wearing pink pajamas and no shoes, her stark-black hair tied in pigtails, her large, dark blue eyes staring at him curiously. She clutched a pink stuffed bunny in her arms.
He was about to yell and demand that she explain what was happening, but she opened her mouth first.
"Hey niisan, what'cha doing here?"
"What am I . . . listen, brat . . ." Deidara stood up, dusted himself off, in the process noticing that he still had his Akatsuki uniform on, and stared down at the girl. She was about three and a half feet tall, and looked to be about six or seven years old. With her sweet smile and big eyes, she was the very picture of innocence, and that was what made her suspicious. Deidara had not survived so long in the ninja world by being fooled by an appearance that could be simply achieved with a transformation jutsu.
"Who the hell are you, hm? What is this place?"
"I'm Chizuru! Nice to meet you, what's your name?" she straightened up, still holding her bunny. It was missing an eye and had a round pocket watch tied with a white ribbon around its neck.
"Huh, I'm Deidara. Where am I?"
"You don't know?" She looked around. "Well, I'm not sure either. But every time I go to sleep, I wake up and the hospital is like this. It's kinda sad 'cause their's no one to play with me here. Except Usagi-san, but he doesn't wake up very often."
"Usagi-san, hm?" Deidara was growing more confused, and thus irritated, by the minute.
"Yeah. Say hello, Usagi-san!" She held up the bunny and made it wave. Its head flopped to the side in a rather gruesome manner.
"Right . . . You don't know where I am?"
"Nuh-huh." she shook her head. Deidara took one last look at her, and took off. "Hey wait, niisan!"
He explored the place a little more. He seemed to be on the third floor of the hospital, but there was no one around. Everything was dead quiet, completely and unnaturally still. The silence was about to drive him insane. He ran down the stairs, intent on getting out of this place, and arrived at the lobby. It was a large area, with comfortable chairs and a playpen for children that had no toys in it. The front desk was unoccupied; there were no papers or phones. The television screen hanging on the wall was dark. He rushed to the front door and opened it. There was nothing beyond it, just pure darkness. He checked the windows, and it was the same.
"Damn it, hm!"
"Deidara?" He turned around at the familiar voice.
"Itachi? What the hell are you doing here, hm?"
"I might ask you that same question." the man said calmly, blinking once and regarding the younger shinobi with unreadable eyes.
"Well I don't know!" Deidara sat down moodily on one of the chairs. "How long have you been here, anyway?"
"Roughly one hour. It is difficult to tell how much time has passed in this place. The clocks are all broken."
"Great! We're stuck here, hm."
"I assure you, I have not been sitting idly by. I have gathered some intel."
Deidara looked up, interested. Itachi showed no emotion, even at such a critical time. They were stuck in this weird place where time seemed to stand still and no sound could be heard, yet he had been level-headed enough to make observations. Deidara nodded curtly.
"There was little I could glean. For one, we are unable to leave. I tried walking out through the front doors, but I was turned around and walked right back in. Similar results were observed through the windows."
"I could have told you that, hm. It's like there's nothing beyond this place."
"Perhaps. The second thing I noticed is that that the doors to the different rooms on each floor cannot be opened."
"Didn't you try blasting them, hm?"
"This leads me to the third thing I have noticed. Look closely." Itachi went over to a potted plant standing close by. He nudged it with his foot, and it crashed to the ground, spilling dirt and pottery shards over the pinkish floor. The noise was strangely muted, as if someone had filled the air with cotton.
"Now, look away from it, just for an instant." Deidara grumbled at this silly exercise, but did so, and jumped to his feet in surprise.
The pot was standing. Unbroken, as it was before. No cracks, no dirt, just a plain old fake plant in its garishly colored pot.
"What the . . ."
"I have tried this with many things, but the result is always the same. Things are set in a certain way, and are not subject to change."
"What the hell is this place? OY! Is this some kind of genjutsu? Who's doing this?" Deidara yelled.
"I have already explored that possibility. My Sharingan would have detected a genjutsu."
"Then how do you explain this, hm?" Deidara was getting riled up, both by the unnerving atmosphere and the calm demeanor of someone he hated to begin with.
"I am at the moment, unable to explain this. I did, however, meet an anomaly."
"That brat . . ." Deidara murmured.
"Yes. She might be our only clue. We must find her."
Deidara grumbled a bit, but agreed. He had his clay with him, at least. In fact, he was wearing his usual outfit, his cloak, and even his scope. Whoever had put them here obviously wasn't all that careful.
They went looking for the girl. It wasn't very hard to find her.
She came running up to them, holding her bunny, a beaming smile on her face.
"Hey!"
Deidara was shocked to see a small, kind smile paint itself on Itachi's face as he knelt down so that he was at eye-level with her.
"Hello. My name is Itachi. Could you tell me your name?"
"I'm Chizuru! Nice to meet 'cha, Itachi-niisan!"
"So . . . May I call you Chizu-chan?"
"Yep!"
"Chizu-chan, do you know what this place is? We woke up here, and we have to go back home."
She thought about it, one finger on her chin, eyebrows screwed together and nose slightly wrinkled. "I don'know. I just wake up here sometimes. I don'know how to leave, it just happens."
"I see." Itachi said. "How long have you been here this time?"
"Let's see . . . Usagi-san?" She held up her rabbit, and checked the pocket watch around its neck. "See, when I wake up, both hands are on twelve. I leave when they are on twelve again, see?" She showed it to Itachi. Sure enough, the hands were moving. The watch currently indicated twelve past twelve.
"You stay here twelve hours?"
"Nah, sometimes more, sometimes less. The hands don't move at the same speed all the time."
Itachi was deep in thought. This watch was the only thing moving around here. Could this girl have some sort of ability . . .
"What do you do when you come here?" he asked.
"I run around, play with Usagi-san, and when I get too bored I get him to open a door for me."
"This is getting annoying, hm!" growled Deidara. "Who the hell cares . . ." he was silenced by a withering glare from Itachi.
"We have companions that may have come here with us. Could Usagi-san help us find them?"
"Sure! I just need to wake him up."
Deidara looked on, an eyebrow raised, as Chizu-chan proceeded to shake the rabbit, telling it to wake up. There was no frigging way that was going to work. It's a stuffed animal, for crying out loud!
"Uuuusaaaaagiiiii-saaaaaan . . . . WAKE UP!" she yelled. For a moment it stood still.
"Stop shaking me! Damn brat!" The rabbit jumped out of her arms and walked several steps, chest heaving. "Damn, stop waking me up like that! You give me a scare each and every time!"
"A t-t-t-talking rabbit?" Deidara stuttered, one finger pointed shakily at the little creature. Itachi's eyes widened. Chizu-chan made a pouty face.
"I am so out of here!" Usagi-san stomped off, not getting very far on its tiny legs before Itachi caught him and lifted him up. "Hey, hey, hey, hey! Get your mitts of me, you creep! Haven't you ever heard of personal space? I'll sue you for harassment, buddy! Let me go! Too high, too high! PUT ME DOWN!"
"For a stuffed animal, he sure is noisy, hm." said Deidara, having regained control of himself. He was half convinced this was all a dream, anyway.
"You have something against stuffed animals, punk? I'll sue you for discrimination!"
"This is certainly odd . . . is this some kind of jutsu?" Itachi pulled at the thing's limp arms, legs, and ears, holding it closer to his face so he could examine it easier. The rabbit jerked its arm out of Itachi's grasp and smacked him in the face. Stunned, he let go. The rabbit attempted to flee again, but was caught by Deidara, who held it carefully at arm's length as though it might explode.
"Put me down, brat!"
"Where are we, hm?"
A conspiratorial look appeared on the rabbit's face, as it crossed its arms.
"Ooooh, is that how this is? Well, I'm not telling you anything, buddy! 'Cause I don't know! No one knows! I just do my job, alright?"
"Which is?" pressed Itachi. The bunny beckoned them closer.
"What-e-ver, Chizu-chan, wants. You want something, ask her. I'm clamming up now. I know my rights!"
Deidara glared down at the little girl. She appeared not to notice.
"Don't worry, I'm sure your friends are around here somewhere!" she said. "Usagi-san, can you open a door, please? I want to go look for their friends! It sounds like fun!" she hopped up and down. "Can we go? Please, pleeease, Usagi-san! We still have a lot of time left! Pleeeeease?"
The rabbit stared at its watch, frowning. Itachi and Deidara said nothing, hoping that the little creature would consent.
"I suppose . . . since we have so much time left . . . it should be alright . . ."
Chizu-chan squealed and hugged her stuffed animal tightly, much to its protest.
"Alright, lemme go! Lemme go, or I'll sue you for . . ."
"Yeah, yeah, get on with it, hm." Deidara grabbed the bunny out of her arms and nudged it towards the nearest door. "We don't have all day here, hm!"
"First of all, that's the wrong one. Leave it to the pros, buddy. Second, don't boss me around, or I'll kick your sorry behind into the next world! And the next! And the next one after that!"
"Oh yeah? Try it, you overactive ball of fluff! I'll blow you into a thousand pieces, hm!"
"Why you . . ."
"Usagi-san, let's hurry!" Chizu-chan called out. Deidara and the bunny looked up to see that Itachi and the girl were already at the staircase. They both ran to catch up, the latter keeping up easily on his stumpy pink legs.
I hope you enjoyed it! Leave a review if you did.