Title; Witch
Disclaimer; Nope I don't own any of the Naruto characters.
Chapter - 1;
The year is…unknown to most, the act of keeping a record of a societies years has ended among the common population, history is instead measured in ten year chunks now before the cycle is refreshed, once the cycle begins again all dates and information from the former's first five years are removed and at the halfway point the second five years and erased.
History has been removed.
Few however care for their history given the culture of fear spread throughout the population; the paranoia stems mostly from left over remnants of the last great war, human beings altered into something both less and more than they had been for the purpose of winning the war; the process was experimental and the results volatile.
The creations were known as Rake's after the first scientist to undergo such experiments Professor James Rake.
Their descendants were better known as Freaks and a multitude of different less polite titles, given the volatile nature of such people those with too pure blood lines were strictly monitored and often times imprisoned simply as precaution by the government.
I awoke with a start my mind aching and feeling uncomfortably loose in my skull, as I tried to open my eyes I found the right socket too painfully swollen and could only crack open my left eye; the white light blinded me for a moment before I blinked away the black spots with some difficulty.
I expected to see a crack team of kidnappers before me, tools and equipment for interrogation at the ready to steal information from me…I had not expected to see a scrawny teenager.
The boy was a too neat looking youth hanging in the background wearing starched pressed black pants and an immaculate white t-shirt, the rest of his uniform lay on a nearby table, he held a poorly faked expression of disinterest that clearly distinguished him as a regular teenager not some bizarre professional assassin.
"Matthew Fletcher?" he asked his tone impressively even, I didn't answer right away just stared the punk kid down, he pulled a stool over towards me straddling it and I guessed did his best impersonation of someone actually intimidating.
"Never mind, that's not the important one, water?" he asked switching to a more kindly demeanour- well perhaps not kindly- I stayed quiet deciding to tune out the boy, whoever the real boss was would show himself in due time; I tried to recall what I'd been doing before I lost consciousness grasping nothing but treads of air.
"You can't remember what happened? She did something…I'm not sure what but I guess memory loss is a side effect." He mentioned, it drew my attention quite quickly away from testing my binds, I growled out a 'what' in question; a glint of victory entered his eyes at finally drawing a response from me.
"You seem confused. That's not good, we thought you were something of a specialist." Answered the boy leaning forward conspiratorially, his brown eyes flickered with an intelligence I hadn't noticed earlier and I drew back with a newfound caution of the youth.
"And just what do you know of my profession?" I shot snidely, I had no feeling in my hands or feet and I felt a tremor of disgust rock my stomach at the thought that one of those creatures had used their abilities on me.
"Mostly first hand experience." Answered the boy, I narrowed my eyes at the youth, he appeared human enough but that only boded for the worst; the more capable they were of passing as us the more dangerous they were.
"You a natural boy?" I asked, he could lie but they were bad at lying; it was too complex, too human a process for their alien minds to mimic.
"I am, what does it matter?" he answered no trace of deceit in his voice and no tells in his body language.
"Then let me free you idiot, if any of those filthy things are he-" he cut me with a glare and an obscene take on the sentiment that I should be quiet.
"She is neither a thing nor filthy asshole." Defended the kid and for a moment I blinked at his share stupidity until an answer clicked in my mind.
"She huh? Quite pretty I'd guess, fused perfectly with you I see." I commented, the youths brow furrowed and he repeated the word 'fused' in question; I sighed but decided to answer the brat anyway, explaining his condition to him wouldn't alleviate it but it was worth a shot anyway.
"Some of them, the high end ones are quite symbiotic. They attach themselves to some loved up idiot to serve as their conscious, keep they're psychopathic tendencies at bay for a while. It always ends the same though." I answered, I could already see the news flashes a couple of weeks from now- they'd use words like young and innocent to downplay the kids stupidity and raise sympathy and support when he became nothing more than a messy blood stain.
"And how does it end?" he asked almost bored…maybe the brat really was just innocent.
"You violently murdered. They're not human kid, they get bored of pretending to be after a while; all of them eventually." I answered honestly saddened by the thought, no doubt whatever master had enthralled the boy would kill me but if the kid saw some sense he still had a chance to make it.
"She's different." He grunted with all the pig headed nobility of youth, I considered responding but abandoned it as a clatter behind me announced a new presence in the room.
"Fletcher?" asked a surprisingly soft voice, neither the voice or figure that stepped into view would have alerted me to the fact that I now shared in the company of a Freak.
The girl couldn't have been more than sixteen, she wore a baggy school uniform that hid most of her figure from scrutiny but the attires skirt still only hung slightly lower than her cascading ebony locks revealing more than a sliver of skin between it and her black boots; as her bright blue eyes blinked at me from behind her thick round spectacles I found it hard to believe my own conclusion that this person was in fact less and more then she appeared.
The boys bewitched smile at her was enough confirmation.
"He hasn't said yet." Answered the dark youth before turning his gaze back on me, I began to wonder what exactly they hoped to learn from me; I was low in the chain of command, there would be no prying military or genetic secrets from me, even within my team I wasn't a crucial member…as depressing as I may have been to contemplate I was little more than a drone.
"Oh, I thought I heard you speaking." Mused the girl displaying a cute tick I suspected she'd practiced thoroughly in her own time, she pouted tilting her head to her right slightly; I gave a snare at the trick as she sat on a stool of her own crossing her legs in a dainty fashion; there was several dull moments where the boy offered her a crooked I almost thought reassuring smile and she offered her own soft one in kind, then her gaze directed itself toward me and turned icy cold- she clicked her pale white fingers and electricity sprung to life between her index finger and thumb, it danced between her appendages like a snake at its masters beck and call.
"Matthew Fletcher?" she questioned her voice disturbing in a gentle threatening manner, I gulped aware of what this thing could do if she wished it, I steeled my nerves and nodded.
"In that case, 8-9-14-1-20-1, tell me everything you know about that code." she commanded rolling up the left sleeve of her shirt, she passed her blazing fingers over her forearm and I was shocked for a moment to see the same numbers appear into existence upon her smooth skin.
"You're first generation." I whispered my mind having trouble processing the reality before me; the great war had been decades before, Rake's these day's rarely passed over twenty percentage purity and any above ten percentage were considered of highest danger, a new Rake shouldn't exist.
"The numbers don't mean anything to you?" asked the boy, the girl though didn't seem convinced, she pressed the question once more.
"First generation…" I whispered again, the girl had begun to speak but my mind had fled the situation, I raced through the implications of this revelation; someone was creating new Rake's, for what purpose, a war, an uprising…what possible reason could anyone have for reintroducing such a horrid plague back into a still incompletely healed society.
I felt a furious pain explode in my chest and the world spiral as I coughed harshly the air driven from my chest, I starred wide eyed up at the girl from my new place on my back; her eyes had blanched to a pale furious white and her black tresses too had faded to a shimmering gold, the light crackling sparks had flared into raging bolts of vicious lighting dancing all along her forearm.
And then it had passed; her ragged breathing had faded to shallow even breaths, her hair regained its inky dark tone and her eyes their bright cerulean hue- the boy stood next to her a hand clasped over her shoulder and whispered softly into the shell of her ear.
A volatile one indeed.
"He knows nothing Hinata, not about that anyway." I made out of his whispering, Hinata huh, the bloody thing had a name apparently.
"Can you erase his memory?" asked the boy, Sasuke, hefting me back into an upright position, I glared at the both of them; I'd rather a quick death then having that creature do anything to me, hell I'd rather a brutal painful death than that damned things touch on me again.
"Yes, but I've got more questions for him first." Answered the Rake stepping away slightly back to her overturned stool, I tried not to be grateful that the boy stayed close to her watching her carefully.
What was it they called those Rakes again; the ones who bond themselves to a regular human, Witches that was it- seemed appropriate.
"I'm sorry." She apologised that night, it was the first thing she'd mentioned since our interrogation of the scientist.
"It's alright Hinata." I comforted her, she was playing with her food dejectedly swirling the plain noodles with her chopsticks, I glanced around the rest of the shop relieved to note that apart from the elderly waitress lingering near the end of the counter we were alone- I took a sip of coffee as she frowned at her food.
"I thought I had gained more control." She muttered with a hint of self-consciousness, it was my turn to frown.
"And then what would I do?" I asked drawing a small smile from her, I returned it, in honesty that I could calm her down when she entered those moods was a source of more than a little pride to me.
"I could think of a thing or two." She answered and I made a mental note to limit the time she spent with Naruto in the future, the blonde airhead had taught her far more raunchy jokes and one liners than was strictly necessary.
"How long has it been since we met?" I mused aloud- despite myself Fletchers warnings still rung piercingly within my mind- of course I knew it had been about three years but…
"Three years, two months, six days and seventeen hours." She answered with a grin, of course she had another reason for the detailed count; she remembered nothing before those three years.
I still recalled how I found her those years ago, the deafening noise of the storming rains to match my own grief, the passing of speeding vehicles ignorant of pedestrians, the neon glow of clubs and bars lining the downtown streets and of course the pale wheezing girl wearing nothing more than a medical gown passed out on a plastic green street bench.
I returned to my current surroundings as my companion finally set down her utensils and pushed her bowl away.
"We'll catch a tread eventually Hinata." I offered, it was strange playing the optimist with her but todays failing had clearly effected Hinata- it wasn't hard to tell she had about as much skill in the art of deception as Naruto in subtlety.
There was a couple of minutes silence as I withdrew a couple of crumpled bills from my pocket from the food, then Hinata made a suggestion.
"We should have sex tonight." I think the waitress heard her as she half coughed, half choked and shot us a withering glare.
"Okay..." I answered, still unused about how to react to this recent development in the girls nature, every couple of months a new quirk seemed to enter her nature as she discovered something she liked about modern culture.
After she gained a love of Italian food she spent three months near living in the kitchen, the results were mixed, while it would be safe to say she became quite skilled at what she practiced she did in fact only make the same two or three dishes with a religious loyalty; an interest in botanical life lead to the sorrowful death of more than a few innocent plants until I'd bought her a cactus.
But even after each passion faded she never abandoned them instead simply scheduling them into her week, almost as if she were building a personality, habits and interests acting as the blocks.
"It makes me feel good, I want to feel good." Of course when Hinata had discovered sex I hadn't exactly complained about it.
I couldn't tell you if I loved her, when her anger over powered her she lost the side of her I knew and for days afterwards would be like this, blunt, emotionally detached, empty.
If the real Hinata was the kind girl I knew between those times, the playful sweet girl who couldn't bring herself to hurt a fly then yes I loved her; if she was the vicious creature with glowing features that would flay a man's skin on a whim and couldn't process things past repeated speech, hunger and a need for sex then…I probably still bloody loved her, I was just a whole lot less happy about it.
"You're still angry, about me losing control again?" she questioned standing with me, I raked a hand through my hair and sighed.
"I'm not angry, I just…there's always a wall between us after..." I answered, for a moment Hinata appeared confused and I suspected as her gaze focused on the space between us she was searching for an actual physical wall.
"I'm sorry." I sighed again.
And that's the teaser for my newest story, hope I've got at least someone hooked.
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R&R