Chapter 2: Wishes and Dreams
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Don't cry when the sun is gone because the tears won't let you see the stars. – Violeta Parra
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'Oddly enough, eighteen doesn't feel any different than seventeen, hell; it feels no different than sixteen. The only good thing is that I'm finally considered an adult and am out of high school. Whatever.'
The newly-eighteen-year-old woman flopped on her bed and closed her eyes, falling into a dreamless sleep.
-=-=-=-=-=Flashback=-=-=-=-=-
It was the middle of June, shortly after the end of school.
"Happy birthday to you! Happy birthday to you! Happy birthday dear Kenzie! Happy birthday to you!!"
The song was followed by clapping and cheering as the grey-eyed brunette known as Kenzie thought of a wish before blowing out the candles.
'These things never come true so I'll wish something impossible. Hmmm… I wish… I wish I was in the Naruto world with some sort of special ability, Kekkei Genkai, a natural talent for shinobi-related stuff, or something else along those lines, that I was younger to give me more of a chance to train, and that I'd have a chance to meet at least one of the main characters, meaning the Konoha Twelve or the Sand Siblings. Well, that's my wish.'
Kenzie then proceeded to blow out the eighteen candles on her birthday cake. If you can't tell, she was a fan of Naruto. She adored both the anime and manga though she preferred the manga. Why was she so specific with her wish? She didn't want to tempt fate too badly. If she had just said "I wish I was in the Naruto world," that might have ended up with her as some random person in some non-shinobi village with an inability to use chakra. Or some person that was doomed to die when a random town was destroyed just a day after she arrived in the Naruto world. She didn't want that.
Kenzie was a realist, (and a full-scale pessimist, but we won't get into that right now,) so she knew that wishes just don't come true, not that kind of wish, anyway. Dreams, they can come true. Wishes, not the magic-wanting birthday wishes. Wishes that come true are either pure chance or the doing of a kind person, and she was pretty sure nobody had the ability to send her to a fictional world.
The cake was then dished out to all of the guests which included her parents, older brother, grandparents, and uncle. Her brother, Kris, was two years older than Kenzie having turned twenty just a few days prior. He was funny and fun-loving, but he and Kenzie weren't that close. She wasn't that close to her parents, either. She was always more of a loner, not caring much for the company of other people. Because of this trait, Kenzie never made any good friends, only a few she wasn't that close to.
After everyone had eaten their cake it was time for Kenzie to open her presents. Most of them were money or gift cards along with one or two more expensive gifts that she had been wanting. All in all it was a good birthday considering Kenzie wasn't much for parties of any kind.
Getting bored with sitting and talking, she bade good night to her family and headed to her bedroom, not bothering to take off her jeans and purple t-shirt with a swirly pattern on the front, which gets us to where we are now.
-=-=-=-=-=End of Flashback=-=-=-=-=-
When morning came, instead of waking up to find herself on her bed in her bedroom, Kenzie looked around to see a relatively empty space. The endless expanse of grass under the cloud-spotted blue sky had an unrealistic feel to it. Her gaze passed the occasional tree and every now and then flitted over a patch of colorful flowers. After a time that was both eternally long and infinitesimally short, a figure appeared out of nowhere about twenty feet from Kenzie. It was a woman whose age was impossible to guess. She looked young, maybe twenty, but impossibly wise and knowing. She had long, straight blond hair and green eyes, and was wearing a flowing green dress which stopped just above her bare feet.
The woman made her way towards Kenzie who stood up, green eyes locking with grey.
"Do you know why you're here?" The woman's voice echoed all around.
"No." Her own voice seemed to fade into the distance.
"Really? You're a logical thinker, haven't you come to a conclusion? Ah, perhaps you focus too much on what you know, what is certain."
"Where am I?"
"Hm? Oh, that's right. You're in a different realm, similar to the one which contains the place you would call Heaven, but this is a solitary realm, only used when I choose to meet someone, or when there is to be a transfer of a soul from one world to another."
'Is this a dream…?'
"Nope, I can't say that it is. You made a wish and I'm going to see to it that it happens. But that doesn't mean you'll get to have your little wish without a price. No, there's got to be something that you pay to get what you want. And I know just what that thing is. But that doesn't matter, you'll still have your shinobi talent or whatever it is you wanted. Just so you know, the world you're heading into only speaks Japanese, but that shouldn't be a problem for you, right? And I'll grant the other part of your wish and make you five years old. Around the same age as the 'rookie nine' or whatever you people have dubbed the three Konoha teams. Don't worry about meeting the 'main characters' as you call them. You'd have to try painfully hard to avoid them." The woman smiled in a way that hinted something was going to happen.
Shortly after she had time to let the woman's words sink in, the world seemed to blur around her, and Kenzie's vision darkened.
Don't worry; I plan to make the next chapter longer. This was just the perfect ending spot for this section. Be glad I didn't cut off before the other-world part. Hopefully I'll start writing more now. :) Please review!