Author's Note: Well… as you can see, this is a Naruto fanfic. But… there's one problem. I actually have not watched that much of Naruto. (CURSE YOU, HOMEWORK…!) But, I DID watch a chunk of Shippuden. Almost an entire arc, I think. And there was one character that caught my eye and intrigued me. This character… was Deidara.
And so, I will try my hand at writing a Naruto fanfiction. I will probably make some mistakes, despite the awesome power of Google, so… DON'T GO CHEESE ON ME, OKAY? I appreciate corrections, though. Just leave em in the reviews or something. ANYWAY… this is the first chapter. If you likey, don't hesitate to review. If you no likey, don't hesitate either. I WANT TO KNOW HOW I CAN MAKE THIS BETTER. And, if I get enough reviews, I will continue. I have the entire thing planned out already, really. So… I hope you enjoy this! Rate and Review, please! Thanks!
Disclaimer: I DONT OWN NARUTO
Chapter One
When Deidara opened his eyes, he was tied to a tree.
It was somewhere in the middle of a forest.
"What the…?" he muttered. Upon closer inspection, he realized that the thing tying him to the tree was no rope, it was the tree itself.
Deidara closed his eyes. What had happened?
He had been fighting that Uchia, Sasuke… and he had…
Deidara's eyes widened.
"But… didn't I blow… myself up?" he said to himself.
"You did." He heard, and turned his head.
There, sitting on a log, was a person. But this was no ordinary person. This person had big, black eyes that were all pupil and huge, stretching across his face. That was the only color on him apart from the glowing, gold aura that Deidara had to squint at to see.
The creature turned and blinked.
"AH! AH!" shouted Deidara, struggling. The tree held firm. "Wh-what are you, you FREAK?"
"I am no freak." said the creature, standing up without a sound. "I am a keeper of balance."
"Yeah, and I'm a penguin, yeah!" Deidara shouted. His eyes glowed in anger. "What the heck are you really?"
"Ah, and there it is." Said the creature, shaking it's luminous head. "The anger."
Deidara stopped. "Th-the anger?" he asked, confused.
"Yes." said the creature. "I am sorry to say this, my friend… but you are not really yourself right now."
"I'm… I'm so confused, yeah." said Deidara.
Is this a dream? He thought.
"This is no dream." said the creature. Deidara gasped.
"What happened is this." The creature went on, smoothly. "There was a disturbance in the balance of this place. I came to investigate… and you, my friend, are the cause of the disturbance. I got here just in time to collect your particles.
"Wait." said Deidara. "So… you saved me…"
The creature nodded.
"Just so you could KILL ME?" he shouted in disbelief.
"No, no, no." said the creature, and he sighed. "I want to fix you."
"Fix me, yeah?" said Deidara. "There's nothing wrong with me!"
The creature turned to him. "Is that right?" he said, walking up to the restrained blonde. "The anger… joining the Akatsuki, the love of explosions, the need for revenge…"
And then, whispering into his ear. "The overpowering desire to kill…"
Deidara tried to thrash and rip free. He couldn't.
"What are you saying?" said Deidara, gritting his teeth. "I've been like this all my life, yeah!"
"No, Deidara. You haven't." said the creature. "This is the work of something darker than the Akatsuki. There is the group… the Maika…"
But then, it was like the creature stopped himself. "But, this is another matter. For now, I need to right the wrong that was caused when your mother died…"
Deidara breathed in sharply.
"Of course, you won't remember it now. There's a block, isn't there? You can't remember anything before your corruption."
"My… m-my corruption?" whispered Deidara. He tried to pull away from the tree.
"Stupid tree!" he muttered. "You… YOU did this, didn't you?"
"Yes." said the creature, simply.
"Let me go this instant!" growled Deidara, his eyes glowing fiercely.
"I will, in time." said the creature. "For now… you have been lied to. Even your age is wrong. It's all wrong. The Akatsuki have changed you for their own benefit. Deidara… you're only fifteen. You've still got a chance to change everything."
"F-fifteen?" stuttered Deidara, lost in his thoughts.
The creature walked up to Deidara. "Now… what I will do right now will reverse all the bad effects brought onto you."
The creature sighed.
"I must warn you, thought… this will not be pleasant." it said.
"What? N-no!" said Deidara, afraid.
The creature reached up to touch his forehead.
"No! Don't touch me!" shouted Deidara. "Help, help, somebody help me!"
"I am helping you." said the creature. It's eyes started glowing gold.
"No, get away…!" said Deidara, turning his head away from the reaching golden hand.
And then he cried out as wood shot out from the tree and wrapped itself around his head, restraining it.
"That was no Jutsu!" he shouted.
"No." said the creature, closing it's eyes. "This is… deeper than chakra. Now, close your eyes."
"Never!" he shouted.
He tried to get away. The tree didn't budge.
And as Deidara's eyes widened in fear… the creature's hand touched his forehead.
What followed was an explosion of pain unlike anything Deidara had ever known.
"YAAAAAAAAAAAH!" he screamed as electricity ripped through his body. Not one quick bolt, but many, many, of them, shocking his entire body.
And it didn't stop. It just kept going.
The creature suddenly pulled back it's hand and thrust it deep into Deidara's head. Then, it pulled.
Deidara felt a great dizziness, followed by a horrible aching everywhere, and the electricity intensified. He gasped, breathing in and out quickly, and screamed again.
His vision went black as his mind spun.
A few minutes passed, but for him, it could have been hours.
Deidara squeezed his eyes shut as he shook, and tears streamed down his cheeks. "No…!" he sobbed. "Stop it… stop it…!"
Because what was happening at that moment was more than physical pain.
It was mental pain.
"I can't stop." Deidara heard, as if through a wall, muffled. "You will be grateful when it's over."
"Kill me!" he cried.
"No!" said the creature sternly. "Just wait it out."
And then another scream ripped through his throat.
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After a while, the screams stopped, replaced by convulsions of pain. Screaming did no good, it seemed.
Many images came to Deidara's mind.
A woman… with blonde hair, smiling at him…
My… my mother. he thought. Why… why didn't I remember what she looked like?
And then, another. A man, with tousled brown hair.
My… my dad.
That was when another image came to him. A horrible, horrible image, printed on the back of his eyelids… a monster, and- and his mother's dress soaked in crimson…
That image disappeared and many others ran through his mind. A woman with long brown hair. A boy with black hair with two others behind him. So many people… forgotten…
Deidara, his back against the tree, felt every shock that went through him, the pain that rested in him. His mind fumbled for answers.
And then, mercifully, his thoughts slowly dimmed and he sank into unconsciousness.
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Deidara opened his eyes and looked up.
He was lying on the ground.
He blinked lazily, as the light of the sun shone across him.
But… he didn't feel like he needed to escape. Or bring horrible revenge to the one that had captured him.
He just felt peace.
And then, he gasped and shot up, panting. Still sitting on the ground, he lifted up one shaking hand and looked at it.
It was as if he was seeing it for the first time.
His thoughts, clear and organized, slowly loaded. He felt no anger, no need to kill.
"Why… how… what…?" said Deidara. He looked around him, and saw the creature, sitting and watching him from a log.
"Hello." it said, tilting his head. "How do you feel?"
Deidara stood up, swaying for a minute, then steadying. "I… I feel… incredible!"
He smiled. The first real smile to have risen on his face for years.
"I… I can think again!" he said. "Well, I could always think, but not like this!"
The creature stood up as Deidara gazed around in wonder.
"Now, Deidara." it said. Deidara turned.
"Yeah?" he said. "What is it?"
"You must listen to me." said the creature.
Deidara blinked and nodded. "So? What do you need to tell me?"
"You have been insane for seven years." said the creature.
Deidara opened his mouth, closed it, then opened it again.
"Insane?" he whispered.
"Yes." said the creature. "You have been literally insane for seven years. You have not been able to control yourself, to form logical thoughts. You were programmed only to kill. Try to remember anything from your life in the Akatsuki. Anything."
Deidara's closed his eyes in concentration.
"Yes… I remember them, but they're all hazy… like seeing them through smoke, almost like it's not me!"
"And it barely was." said the creature. "The story of how this happened will come back to you eventually."
"Yeah, I hope so too-" suddenly, Deidara stopped. He blinked and gasped softly.
"Or, it can come back now." muttered the creature. "That's alright too, I guess."
Deidara stood in place, his eyes looking into the distance.
"How many people?" he whispered. His heart thumped in his chest.
"Hm?" said the creature.
"How many people… did I kill?" asked Deidara, shaking.
The creature looked down.
"Oh, Deidara…" he said, closing his eyes.
"I… I was in the Akatsuki. I killed people." he said.
"Yes." said the creature, looking at him in sympathy.
Well… I knew this would happen. he thought dismally. I should just leave him for now.
Deidara leaned against a tree, looking forward, but at nothing at all.
"I… I killed…" he whispered.
The creature stood and grew big golden wings.
"I will be back when you need me again." it said vaguely, and flapped his wings as he flew away and disappeared in a flash of gold.
Deidara was shaking wildly now, the memories of all the wrongs that he had done pouring into his mind. Everything.
His eyes, before a brilliant blue, died down to a light, softer sky-blue color.
He sat down and pulled his knees up to his chest. His clothes, he noticed, seemed bigger now. Much bigger. Almost as if he had shrunk.
Deidara put his hands over his ears and squeezed his eyes shut as the memories came back.
But this time, he could just stand by and watch himself do horrible, heinous things. There was nothing he could change.
All the villages hated him. He was wanted, pursued. A traitor.
But… he didn't want to be in the Atuski. He never wanted to kill. Not with clay birds, not with anything. He never wanted to hurt anyone. He had just wanted to stay in his village and become… become an artist…
It was his past.
I understand. he thought.
And his eyes softened and his facial features shifted slightly as the world turned back the clock within him, restoring him to where he had left off seven long years ago.
And he was a different person.
The other him that had joined the Akatsuki, that hadn't really been him. Just a sick, twisted shadow of himself.
But still… he couldn't help feeling like it was his fault…
And then he was fifteen. Not the fake age that the Akatsuki had told him. He was fifteen.
Not an assassin, not a killer, not a lunatic. Just a fifteen year old boy that sat in the shade of a tree, sad and alone, remembering.
And as the world that he resided in spun, as time went on as usual, as the birds sang in the green, rustling trees…
Deidara cried.