Shadow Man
Koomahana
Chapter 4: Armageddon comes in all forms
Disclaimer: Naruto is not mine
Plus all is written on my cell phone, so please inform me of any mistakes! :)
...
...
She panted heavily, one knee and hand braced on the ground, her other hand gripped the katana with bruised white knuckles. She was sore, her body ached with a pain slowly numbing her mind, her mind slowly blurred in the growing darkness of the training room. She hated these people, these shadows, these mindless machines designed to battle and die by her hand. She hated the one-eyed old man the most. She didn't know why he took her away, why he designed these 'games' for her to participate in but she knew he tricked her younger self. Four years ago she met the one-eyed man, she became interested in the strange but simple games he liked to play. She wanted to play too, finding his riddles and games interesting; all too soon she was trapped in his web of lies and games that slowly revealed themselves as training regiments for assassins. She discovered his lies during a game once, she had been participating in a fun game of tag-and-dodge, accompanied by three other children her age. She didn't understand the severity of the situation until one of the boys pushed her out of the way of a trap, allowing the large blade to cleave him half and douse her with his blood. That had been the first time she realized just how dangerous the one-eyed man was. All too soon she noticed the patterns, heard the whispers, felt the inconsistency of every riddle and game presented to her. They'd spend a few days dedicating her to a specific art and then at the end of the week she'd be tested with the other kids.
Who ever failed died
Once she realized what was happening she tried to talk to the old man, tried to tell him that there were other ways, better ways, to teach them that didn't involve their deaths. Her efforts were rewarded with seven broken bones and the merciless restraint of her elders as her group of classmates were sentenced to go through an obstacle course too advanced for their smaller bodies.
...
"Now any of you who make it to the end will be Mei's personal guard, understand?" she struggled in her elder's arms, tears rolling down her cheeks as she tried to scream through the gag in her mouth. For some reason the other children in her class followed her words like they were law and right now the one-eyed man was using that blind faith against her. Out of the twenty kids who hurried through, only two made it to the end. One had been severely wounded, hanging on by a thread. She could have saved him, she knew it.
"Ch, you're too weak," the boy coughed hoarsely, blood splattering his lips as he fell to his knees and braced his hands into the loose soil of the forest. the one-eyed man glanced back at her, she thrashed in the restraining hold, trying to break free so she could heal the boy. Her own wounds were already numbing, her chakra habitually working to numb and heal. "Boy! end him." Her tears and stiffed scream were ignored as the other boy gave his comrade a quick painless death; the only mercy he could provide to either of them. She slumped in her elder's hold, her head bowed as sobs wracked her body. "But..." that single simple word felt like a blade to her neck, a cold frigid feeling of dread filled her. "According to your ethics... a shinobi who kills his comrades is a nuke-nin," he looked down on her, seemingly thoughtfully and taking great consideration of her earlier words but she knew there was no consideration for her words: he was mocking her.
"Aren't nuke-nin... to be exterminated?" She screamed shrilly as one of the older ninja relieved that surviving boy of his head; nothing in the world would ever erase that boy's last moments. She would remember that heart broken smile until the day she died.
...
"Mei-sama!" She swung without thought, sparks clashed in dark, a lighting two shapeless porcelain masks. "You're forgetting your purpose! Focus!" She struck out with her free hand, the smell of copper and salt her only warning, and then too fast for her to register she was battling the darkness like a whip. She weaved and danced between their numbers, glowing palm and glinting blade her only warning before her opponents laid helplessly on the ground. A siren sounded, a flash of blinding light pushed her back, and then the feeling of thick sturdy chains wrapped around her, restraining her at the tip of their master's merciless blade. Through her shapeless porcelain mask she glared into his narrowed coal eye. Nothing he did would ever erase the fire in her eyes and he's killed plenty of her classmates in the attempt to stifle that ever present flame. Her face could be as dead and blank as a mask of new snow but her eyes always shown with the fury of hell's emerald flames.
"Do not forget your purpose Mei," his voice was cold and low, a silent promise of the punishment to come. "It could save the other's you hold so close to heart." Her breathing slowed gradually, her body stiffening in the tight hold of the chains, her eyes glowing in unabashed hatred behind her shapeless mask. "Do not forget your purpose, Mei-"
"That is not my name," she snarled the words out without thought. Her mask was removed and his fist was crushing her cheek, there was so much force behind his sudden attack that she was impacting the stone ground before reacting to the reveal of her identity. Her sight swam, her hearing rang, the cool stone beneath numbed even her soul... or at least, what little was left of her soul. Through her dimming, blurring sight she could see the one restraining her with the chains. The only other girl in the organization, a red haired stranger with the power of chains, whimpered on the ground; her arms full of a bleeding little boy. She watched as their master walked past her and approached the sobbing little girl.
Don't touch them, she thought, her eyes closing slowly. They... they didn't do anything...
...
...
"Hello kiddies!" The lady had a big smile on her face and a blush on her cheeks, her uniform simple and implying her boring desk job responsibilities.
"RUN BASTARD RUN!" Naruto ran away with a pale horrified face, not even bothering to explain as he ran away for everything he was worth. Sasuke watched the retreating dust cloud of his teammate before turning towards the jonin they were supposed to be apprenticing under.
"My name is Chouko Ishikawa!" The woman said cheerfully, going so far as patting Sasuke's head. Ignoring his irritated look, Chouko's midnight violet eyes drifted in the direction ran away. "Now you stay here cutie-pie," Sasuke stiffened as he felt a subtitle shift in the woman's smile, his sixth sense told to him to run and don't look back. "I have to go catch a twit." She was gone before he could blink, leaving him alone at the entrance of the academy grounds with a black bracelet I hand. Not knowing what to do with the sudden appearance of the mysterious object, Sasuke stuffed it in his pants and walked towards Inari. The jonin in had a 'i pity your misfortune' kind of smile but when Sasuke gave him a questioning look, the man simply shook his head and began the wall back to their compound.
Whatever, Sasuke thought, sighing as he followed his elder's lead. Halfway home they came across a dango stand operated by a cheerful Akimichi, inside they found Itachi and Shisui enjoying a large platter of tango and a pot of steaming tea.
"Nii-San," Sasuke called out without thinking. His brother greeted with a smile around his favorite pink can go and a tip of his head. Shisui waved excitedly at Inari, his mouth still full of his ginger and jasmine tea. "Whose Chouko Ishikawa?" In Sasuke's mind it was a simple question with a simple explanation. The response was the equivalent of the announcement of Armageddon. Shisui began choking only to collapse on the ground laughing hysterically. Itachi however, turned into a statue. His teacup slipped from his fingers to spill across his stack of uneaten dango, his half finished stick of dango slipped from his mouth to tumble down his chest and pants to land on the ground. Even his normally pale face became a unusual shade ghostly-white and his were a little wider than usual.
To Sasuke it was like announcing Armageddon
...
...
Alright! XD I finished spell checking and everything! XD XD
if I accidentally switched two similar sounding words around (like pale and pail) please let me know! :)
I hope you all liked this chapter!