Chapter Three
A few days after he'd left, Hidan cursed and stomped his feet. It had been nagging him again! Stupid conscious! Gah! He swore some more and turned around, trying desperately to pick up Zetsu's trail. Yeah. He owed Konan big time! The ass-kissing little chit! And he sort of owed Zetsu too. Well….Zetsu's nicer half anyways. Damn plant man better not forget this! Because after he paid off his little debts, he was coming home from wherever the hell this Scotland place was! He'd convert some heathens there too and Konan and Zetsu wouldn't dare tell him no!
Konan was meditating when she sensed something. Instincts told her that it was an intruder, it could have been one of the children running around, they often did flout the rules but her instincts prodded at her and so she got up, ghosting out of the room, feeling every bit a kunoichi. Still she had to hold back, just in case it was one of the little brats.
She saw a man, dirty, disheveled, half-crazed and stiffened. Her persona of kunoichi taking over completely. She made a few clones and threw a few shuriken hitting the unaware fool, one embedding itself into his back.
The man turned around, stifling a cry of pain with his hand to find himself staring at a devastatingly beautiful blue-haired woman, whose eyes were as cold as ice.
"You do not belong here." She said and Sirius turned to run, trying desperately to ignore the awful pain in his back, only to find himself face-to-face with the strange woman. She kicked him hard and Sirius found himself on the ground, the strange star digging deeper into his back and a handheld knife pressing against his throat.
"You don't understand! I'm innocent!" He pleaded.
She shrugged, "Innocent. Guilty. It doesn't matter. You're trespassing and you must be eliminated."
Sirius was staring into those mesmerizing blue eyes of hers and felt a chill creeping up his spine. In Azkaban, he'd witnessed several kinds of killers. Most of them were either passionate killers, who let their emotions get the better of them, or killers who plotted things out, eyes shifty and plotting. Some were total lunatics who enjoyed killing. (His cousin Bellatrix came to mind) She was none of these.
Her eyes were blank and cool, he'd only seen a handful of those kinds of killers and he was inclined to believe they were some of the worst kind because they could not be manipulated or bargained with. She seemed more like a robot then a human being and Sirius knew that this was no threat she was issuing but a promise. He threw a small smoke bomb and Konan was momentarily blinded, Sirius ran for it dodging a few of those strange knives and ducked into a secret passageway.
Konan cursed under her breath, angry that she had let the man get away by such a cheap trick, but then again, perhaps it wasn't so cheap because her heart began pounding painfully against her chest and she became very dizzy and lightheaded.
She heard the commotion made and began slipping past them quietly, pocketing the smoke bomb. Poisons weren't her specialty but perhaps the school nurse would know.
"His eyes were like the devil sir!"
"Yes but her sir, she chased Black off before he could do anything!"
"That's roight, she come in like an avenging' angel she did!" Said another portrait with a thick cockney accent pointing at the new teacher.
Konan froze in momentary shock.
Multiple pairs of eyes turned on Konan expectantly.
"Angel." She murmured. It seemed that the nickname followed her wherever she went. She had been daddy's little angel as a child, she had been the Angel of God to Hidden Rain and Deidara's sweet angel.
Albus didn't fail to notice the brief flash of pain on her face when she whispered the word angel to herself.
Konan's chest was really hurting now and she couldn't entirely blame the smoke.
She saw Deidara's lips quirking into that lazy Cheshire cat grin the first time they'd made love.
"You really are an angel yeah. Pity Leader tries to keep you all to himself."
Deidara had been wrong of course, Nagato was like a brother to her. They'd never even thought of each other in any other way then as siblings and he hadn't fully trusted the rest of the Akatsuki not to hurt her. He had been taken by surprise when she'd told him she was with Deidara but he didn't kick up a stink about it.
Deidara had died two years later and it had broken her heart. She'd never gotten to tell the blonde Rock ninja that she'd fallen desperately in love with him.
Then of course the last time she had seen Nagato. "Run Angel! My time is done here. I need you to live!" He'd pleaded.
But she'd shook her head, intending to go down with her best friend.
"That's an order Konan!" He'd growled harshly. "It's my dying wish."
And so she had been forced to leave a dying friend for the second time in her life. But not before taking out some of the enemy. And Nagato had laughed as they found not a weak kunoichi who used her looks to get by, but a fierce fighter with razor sharp focus and a slew of jutsu used only by the Akatsuki's lone female. A few tears trickled down her cheeks, as she relived that awful memory.
After being checked out and treated by Madame Pomfrey, Konan began her lonely walk back to her room.
Professor Lupin seemed to be moving something with magic. It was fascinating that he got that big trunk to float in the air.
"What's in there?" She asked.
"It's a Boggart." He said.
"A what?" She wondered,
"It's like a boogey man, it hides in dark places and frightens its victims by taking on the shape of their greatest fears. Mostly goes after children. It's for class tomorrow." He tripped a little and the creature was released, a dark spot floating right in front of Konan.
Staring at it with a sense of detached fascination, she wondered what her own worst fears were. She'd already lived through several of her worst fears and she had to admit that she felt no stronger because of them. She felt…hollow inside. Everyone she loved was gone and Konan saw herself painfully alone, with no one to care, no one to mourn, just a faceless shell of what she was in a faceless crush of people.
Professor Lupin was about to dispel it when she moved her hands in a strange position and said.
"Kai!"
The creature returned back to its shapeless dark mass and Professor Lupin herded it back in before he looked at her with a puzzled expression on his face.
"What kind of spell was that?" He wondered. "I thought only Riddikulus worked on Boggarts."
Konan seemed lost for a moment. "It's used to dispel illusions."
"Locomotor Trunk." He said, deciding that this would be a better way to get the trunk there, even though it would use up more of his energy then the simple levitation spell in one go.
"But where was your wand?" He demanded and realized she had disappeared. Remus was confused, but he also realized that he had just found his substitute teacher.
"Are you quite sure Professor Nakamura is up to the task Remus?" Albus asked.
"Yes. I saw her defeat a Boggart using magic. The strange thing was, she had no wand with her and it wasn't the Riddikulus spell. She called it…Kai."
"Interesting. I've never heard of wandlesss magic before." Said Albus, stroking his beard. "Well, I'll call her in at break and ask her if she would like to substitute for you."
The students, Konan thought. Were doing coming along nicely. There were quite a few who had difficulties, not so much with the words, but with the order of the words in simple sentences. There were also quite a few that struggled with the written language. But Konan, as strict as she was, was turning out to be a surprisingly patient teacher. She was also beginning to realize how much she enjoyed teaching even though it was something as mundane as foreign language. Perhaps instead of trying to find her way back home she could stay on?
Nearly a month had passed by for her in which she had found out that she was on a continent called Europe and that this magical community was every bit as secretive as a
shinobi's. There were many people here who seemed to hold the civilian community with low regard and treated many of them as some strange, less intelligent alien species. Yet they were not above teaching some of their children.
The pureblooded families were nothing like the clans at home, it was true that they were better inclined to magic but they possessed no special abilities, no kekkai genkai, no nothing that would set them apart to cause that superior belligerent attitude of theirs. Let the snobs meet up with the likes of a blood lined clan, like the dreaded Gouryuu clan who could merge their bodies with their opponents and kill them from the inside out cell by cell, or the nearly extinct Uchiha clan of Konoha and they would not be so stuck-up. She thought with a quiet chuckle as she made her way over to a student who needed help.
A small piece of paper made its way over to her. She unfolded it and read the message. Professor Dumbledore wanted to see her at break. Hmm.
Sibyl sighed, she knew that the other teachers thought her an old fraud and for the most part they were right. She had the gift there was no doubt about that, but she had tried and failed countless times to use other methods to make herself look legitimate simply so she could keep her job.
Unfortunately she wasn't joking when she told her students that the gift of seeing could not be brought on by command. Most of the time, her true sight lay with seeing what was around people, it was invisible to all eyes but hers. They came and went forcing her into a state of temporary hysterics. Giving her colleagues cause to believe that she was play-acting.
But none of them saw the King's Crown on Dumbledore, golden and powerful, or the black cross of betrayal, heavy upon Severus Snape's back. She had been delivering paperwork to the Headmaster when someone entered the room and she turned around to face their newest teacher.
"Good evening Shiori." Albus greeted cheerfully.
Professor Nakamura was the most horrifying sight Sibyl Trelawney had ever seen. Two white wings protruded from her back, ruffled and rustling in a non-existent breeze, they were also flecked with blood. She was covered in it. It soaked her clothes and ran down her face in rivulets that dripped from her hair. It splashed against her porcelain skin like spatter s of paint and Sibyl knew that this blood was not hers but the blood of countless others she had killed. Behind her was a grim reaper, staring at the woman with blank, ghoulish eyes, lips twisting into an expression of manic glee, prayer beads clinking gently around its wrist. The woman was chained to the specter, signifying that she was both death's agent and a closely hounded target. The sun was slowly rising behind her, bathing the woman in a ghastly red light. Sibyl let out a shriek
Konan's eyes widened in surprise and her left hand twitched towards her kunai holster.
"No! Get out! Get away! Blood! You're covered in it! Can't you see it?" Sibyl pointed at the blue haired woman with a shaking hand. "How the Grim Reaper stands next to her?"
There was no mistaking the smile that flickered across the woman's face like lightning as Konan was instantly reminded of Hidan.
"Send her away Headmaster I beg of you!" Sibyl stumbled and fled from the room.
The Headmaster let out a sigh, his patience clearly strained.
"Well Shiori, it seems that you have impressed our Defense Against the Dark Arts Teacher and he wants you to sub for him. You see he is not in the best of health and there will be times when he will be indisposed. "
That would be most interesting. Thought Konan.
"Of course." She said.
Zetsu was getting frustrated. Some time during the week of painfully slow tracking, he had lost Konan's trail and if there was one thing that Zetsu hated more then anything in the world it was getting lost, his frustration was nearly overwhelming him at this point.
"Her trail's gone cold…why has her trail gone cold?" Zetsu's Darker Half asked for the hundredth time.
"Zetsu calm down. We'll pick it up again." Said Kisame soothingly. He'd quickly learned that a frustrated freaked out Zetsu was dangerous to be around.
"Don't patronize me!" His Darker Half grumbled.
Authoress:
Aww. Poor Zetsu. Who knew the guy could get lost?
I know the feeling, I hate being lost! It drives me nuts!
And how do you think Konan will handle teaching DADA?
I've also decided there will be no pairings.
Will Hidan catch up? Hmm. He never
struck me as much of a tracker.
And yes, Trelawney does have a part to play
Till next time.