Kami, Comas & Kunai
Prologue
(A/N: Hermione and Ginny have swapped injuries in this; Hermione only broke her ankle but Ginny took the flame curse.)
Agony. That was all Harry could comprehend as he mentally begged Dumbledore to kill him.
"Just kill me…" he thought, "This is worse than death!" His thoughts drifted, flicking past images of Ron… Sirius… Remus… and finally settling on Hermione. His heart swelled and the snake that had him locked in its coils flinched away.
"I… I wish… I'd had the chance to tell her… how I felt…"
The snake's coils loosened and disappeared, and Harry dropped onto the floor and passed out even as he heard Hermione's voice scream, "HARRY!"
-KC&K-
"Madam Pomfrey!" cried Hermione as she sat upright, prompting the woman to put a restraining hand on the girl's shoulder.
"Calm down, Miss Granger. Your friends are all fine…"
Hermione felt a lead ball drop into her stomach as she noticed the hesitation in Madam Pomfrey's tone and the sadness in her eyes, "Where…"
Madame Pomfrey helped her up and let her run across the room to Harry's bed. Hermione reached the bedside and covered her mouth, "Is he…"
Madame Pomfrey put a hand on Hermione's shoulder, "No, just unconscious. According to the Headmaster, You-Know-Who tried to possess him, and his attempt to throw off the possession put him in a coma."
Hermione broke down entirely at the last word. Her composure shattered like glass and she slumped over on Harry's chest, crying.
Madame Pomfrey allowed her the moment of grief, knowing the girl needed it. "How irritating," the stray thought crossed her mind before her sympathetic side banished it, "Nobody will get any money from the pool now."
-KC&K-
Harry was transported to St. Mungo's the next day and put in a private room by the Long Term Care Ward, while Hermione pretty much moved into the Restricted Section and began researching methods of getting him out of the coma.
The one time Ron came in and told her to take a break, she screamed at him that he was a disloyal friend before chasing him out of the library with assorted curses and hexes sailing past his head. Madame Pince wisely stayed out of the girl's way, not wanting to get involved and possibly injured.
After that, Dumbledore got an elf to bring her meals and forbade Madame Pince from interfering with her, citing that Hermione knew not to eat near books.
Things progressed in this vein for at least a month before tragedy struck. A Death Eater got into Harry's private room and poured poison into his mouth, killing him in a matter of minutes.
When Dumbledore found out, he made sure Hermione didn't know out of concern for her sanity. She had lost it enough when Harry had gone into a coma; if she found out he was dead she might just become grief-stricken enough to kill herself.
-KC&K-
Hermione sat back and smiled; she had finally located the ritual that would help Harry come back from his coma.
As she began setting everything up on the floor of the library, she didn't realize she had misread the description. Under the name of the ritual, which could barely be deciphered through the age-spotted paper as being "Kuchiyose no Jutsu", a smudge made the word "Kami" look like "Coma".
Blissfully unaware of her error, Hermione set the book on the floor in front of her, bit down on her thumb as the book instructed, and flashed through the odd handsigns the book told her to use. Finally she slammed her bloody hand against the floor and recited the name of the ritual as the book indicated, "Kuchiyose no Jutsu!"
A shimmering pattern of odd characters spread out from the point of contact in a weblike pattern, there was a flash of light and a puff of smoke… and Hermione Granger disappeared, never to be seen again.
-KC&K-
My name is Harry Potter. Or is it Jade? I don't know… since I arrived in this place with the beautiful woman I don't know, I'm not sure who I am anymore. She told me I had some kind of "blood seal array" on me, which made me look like a man when I'm actually a girl… but that makes no sense. I've been a boy all my life; I've been Harry Potter all my life. So who am I now?
The woman spoke to me. She said her name was "Kami" or something, that I had been manipulated and lied to all my life. Hell, even the gender-changing seal array was apparently because somebody, Kami suggested the Headmaster but I'm not sure, thought that a "Boy-Who-Lived" was a better sell than a "Girl-Who-Lived".
Anyway, I've been talking to her for the last few days and she explained that I have a choice. She can let me pass on, which I'm tempted to do because I want to see my parents again. However something holds me back; Hermione. I don't want her to be sad.
Kami also told me that I can be stripped of my magic and put in another world, but again the problem of what would happen to Hermione arises. I don't know what I should do, but hey; they say everything works itself out eventually, right?
-KC&K-
Hermione opened her eyes to find herself lying on a perfectly manicured lawn in front of a building she knew to be a Japanese-style pagoda. As she sat up, she heard laughter coming from the pagoda.
Her heart leapt as she recognized that laugh; it sounded oddly feminine but it was unmistakeably Harry's laugh. Leaping to her feet, she ran up to the pagoda and pounded on the door, "Harry? Harry! It's Hermione! Open the door!"
There was a pause and then a voice said, "I'll get it, I know her." The door opened and Hermione tackled the person on the other side in a hug.
"Oof, that's something I missed," muttered the person below Hermione, "Hermione-grade flying tackle-hugs."
Hermione raised her head and said, "Oh Harry I missed you so much after you went into… that… coma."
She trailed off as she stared at the girl lying on the floor underneath her. She had untidy hair which was spread over the floor underneath her in a halo of black, a very faint lightning-shaped scar on the right side of her forehead, and two vivid emerald-green eyes that sparkled up at Hermione. "Yes, I missed you too Hermione."
Hermione's eyes widened and she jumped up, "H-Harry? W-What happened to you?"
Harry grinned, but before he (she?) could speak, a second voice broke in on Hermione's stunned shock, "I'm partially responsible for this. I didn't do whatever it was that made Jade here a guy, but I am responsible for breaking it."
Hermione looked around and saw an unspeakably perfect woman kneeling on a cushion beside a low table, smiling over at her, "It's nice to meet you, Hermione. Jade has told me all about you in terms so glowing as to be blinding. I see now that her compliments fell far short of the truth. And my name is Kami, by the way."
Hermione blushed and turned on "Jade", who didn't meet her eyes. Hermione could see that her cheeks were darkening slightly.
Hermione frowned, "Hold on, how did I get here anyway? I was trying a ritual which would have brought Harry… Jade… back from the coma, but I ended up here."
Kami smiled benignly at Hermione, "What you used wasn't a coma-reversing ritual. You misread the word "Kami" as "coma". What you thought would bring your friend back to you didn't do anything of the sort; instead it summoned you before me."
"But then…" said Hermione as her brow furrowed, "…Why is Jade here now?"
Jade gave a sad smile, "According to what Kami here told me… a Death Eater snuck into my hospital room and poured poison into my mouth. From Kami's description it might have been one of the Carrows. That was about four or five days ago."
Hermione's eyes widened, "I went to Dumbledore two days ago and asked to be allowed to go see you. He said you were fine, but the Healers weren't allowing visitors! He lied to me!"
Flashback Begin!
"Professor Dumbledore, I'd like permission to Floo to St. Mungo's to visit Harry. I want to tell him I'm almost done with finding some way to get him out of his coma!"
Dumbledore frowned, knowing he couldn't let Hermione find out that Harry was dead. Forcing a benevolent smile onto his face he said, "I'm afraid the Healers are refusing Harry visitors while they consult a Healer who is skilled with comas of this kind. As such I cannot grant your request but I can assure you that Harry is fine."
Flashback End!
Jade gave a derisive laugh, her pretty face developing a faint sneer that looked very out of place, "What a surprise. He'd been lying to the magical world for years."
At Hermione's puzzled expression he jerked a thumb at Kami, "Kami here's omniscient. She can see everything, and I mean everything. "
Hermione sniggered, "Good one, Ha… Jade. Omniscience is a myth."
Kami smiled, folding her hands in her lap and giving the girl a thoughtful look, "Omniscience is a myth you say? Alright, I will pick something from your past and you can verify if it's true."
Hermione nodded and crossed her arms as Kami closed her eyes. A few seconds later she reopened them and said, "Let's see… you broke your arm at five years old falling off a swing… your mother and father run a successful dental practice… ah! Jade, when she was still Harry, saved you from a troll!"
Hermione shrugged, "I don't know how you knew about my breaking my arm, but you could have found out the other two things from Ha… Jade."
Kami's smile widened, "Could Jade have told me that you nursed a small crush on Harry ever since the troll incident, when he himself didn't even know or realize?"
Hermione's jaw dropped and Jade blushed even deeper, but Kami wasn't done. "Let's see… End of second year, after you discovered Harry was responsible for slaying the Basilisk, you ran to hug him first because you saw it as him saving your life… again. Third year, you turned in the Firebolt because you were worried for his well being, at that point believing that it was a present sent with intent to harm. Your other friend Ronald did not think about that, he simply wanted to ride it, effectively putting his own pleasure before the possible safety of his apparent "best friend". Fourth year, you believed Harry about the Triwizard Tournament and went out of your way to help him prepare for the tasks. You were disappointed that he didn't ask you to the Yule Ball, so you took Viktor Krum's offer when it came up hoping that Harry might then notice you at the ball. And this year, your feelings were starting to develop into something more so you pushed him as hard as you could to make sure that he could pass his O.W.L.s with passing grades."
Hermione's jaw dropped even further at the end of this monologue and Jade was now watching her with a face so red it looked like a tomato. Finally she managed to speak long enough to whisper, "I… I believe you…" and ran out of the pagoda.
Jade moved to follow her but Kami held up her hand, "Wait. Let her work through it on her own." Then she smiled, "This rather puts paid to your little qualm doesn't it? The only problem with you choosing either to pass on or go to another place with no magic was that you were worried for Hermione. Now she can join you either way."
Jade frowned, "What do you mean? Can't she go back to Hogwarts?"
Kami shook her head, "Not after exposure to me directly. I don't quite know the technicalities of it…"
Jade frowned, "You're Kami, how do you not know the technicalities?"
Kami smacked the girl upside the head, "Just because I'm a goddess doesn't mean I know everything!"
"You're omniscient! Of course you know everything!"
Kami frowned, "All the same… this is one of the few things I don't know; why people who are in my undiluted presence die immediately after returning to their physical realm."
Jade sighed, "Alright. So Hermione can't go home. That'll devastate her, I think I've only met her parents once and I know she loves them dearly."
Kami looked sad, "I would help them… but I can't bring them here. It doesn't work that way. I can modify their memories however so that they will move out of the country and not remember Hermione at all."
Jade nodded, "That would be the best solution. Death Eaters might target her family. Oh and there is one more thing I'd like to be able to do before I move on…"
Kami frowned, "What?"
Jade whispered something into her ear and an evil grin crossed her face, "I really shouldn't abuse my divine powers to do this but… ah what the hell."
-KC&K-
Tom Riddle was coming up with a plan of attack against the Ministry inside the Malfoy Manor when there was a sudden skittering noise and he turned around, only to be swamped by a tidal wave of fire ants.
As he felt their tiny stinging bites all over his body the Dark Lord yelled and tried to escape. But as quickly as they'd come, the fire ants were gone, leaving his skin red and raw.
Riddle staggered upright, cursing to himself before he heard a loud buzzing. He only had time to turn before he was attacked again, this time by a swarm of locusts which crawled inside his clothes and caused him to flail about on the floor, screaming in horror.
Again, the locusts were gone just as quickly as they'd come, but then an even louder buzzing drew his attention.
Riddle just had time to shout, "WHY IS THIS HAPPENING TO ME? FIRST FIRE ANTS, THEN LOCUSTS, NOW WASPS AND HORNETS?" before the swarms of wasps and hornets were upon him, stinging him over and over again.
As their master shuddered on the floor, numerous Death Eaters stood around him. Finally Yaxley muttered, "Er, why is he doing that? There aren't any wasps or hornets around here, and I'm fairly certain there are no locusts or fire ants either."
Riddle's eyes widened at that moment as he screamed, "Why am I naked… AHHH! FANGIRLS!"
The Death Eaters recoiled as their master drew his wand, levelled it at Yaxley and shouted "AVADA KEDAVRA!"
Yaxley was dead in seconds as the curse hit him squarely in the chest. The others turned and ran, assorted Killing Curses and dark hexes and jinxes missing them by inches and they dived for cover.
Suddenly the firing stopped. Lord Voldemort was suddenly spasming on the ground, before he finally dropped his wand and gave one long and high-pitched scream.
Riddle stared at the sight in front of him. Two men who looked almost identical were hugging in front of some kind of sunset on a beach, crashing waves and gleaming sand all around them.
Their chant filled Riddle's head:
"Gai-sensei!"
"Lee!"
"Gai-sensei!"
"Lee!"
"Gai-sensei!"
"Lee!"
"Gai-sensei!"
"Lee!"
Riddle covered his ears, "STOP! PLEASE STOP, I'LL DO ANYTHING YOU WANT; JUST MAKE IT STOP!"
It didn't stop, instead the two men suddenly ripped off the green spandex they were wearing before the older one shouted, "I must teach you a new method of stoking your flames of youth Lee! Now turn your back and bend over!"
(A/N: The author would go into detail about the method by which Lee can stoke his flames of youth even higher, but it would appear that keyboards disagree with massive quantities of vomit.)
At that last sentence Riddle's mind broke entirely. By the time the Death Eaters were brave enough to come out of hiding; Riddle was curled into a ball in the corner, clutching his knees and rocking back and forth, all the while muttering, "Flames of youth… all those flames of youth…"
-KC&K-
Back at the pagoda, Jade and Kami were laughing themselves sick.
"Where…" gasped Jade, wiping tears from her eyes under the glasses she no longer particularly needed since the seal breaking had corrected her sight (yet another side effect of the seal being that her sight wasn't worth crap at the best of times), "Where did you come up with that last part?"
Kami grinned, wiping tears from her own eyes and clutching a stitch in her side under her kimono, "One of the other worlds I regularly view. Well, all but the yaoi bit. That I came up with because I thought that he just needed one last poke and his mind would break."
Jade grinned and high-fived the older woman, "Well it worked."
"Hello?"
A quiet voice from over by the door drew their attention, and they saw Hermione standing in the doorway looking unhappy. "Hermione? Is something wrong?" Jade stood up.
Hermione swallowed, "You… you mentioned a choice?"
Kami frowned, "You were listening."
Hermione nodded meekly, before she repeated, "You mentioned a choice?"
Kami nodded and returned to her cushion next to the low table while Jade fetched another from the cupboard off to one side, "The choice I gave Jade on her arrival was this: pass on or be stripped of her magic and be placed into another world entirely."
Hermione twisted her hands together, "And I can't go home?"
Kami shook her head, "I'm afraid not. I can protect your parents though. Change their memories so that they don't remember you; change who they think they are and make them want to move elsewhere."
Hermione nodded, "Can you please do that? Please? I'd feel much better about not being able to go home if I knew they were safe."
Kami nodded, "Well then? Do you two want to pass on, or be stripped of your magic and placed elsewhere?"
Hermione turned to look at Jade, who had returned with another cushion and knelt beside Hermione. Jade smiled and reached for Hermione's left hand with her right, giving it a comforting squeeze.
Hermione swallowed and said, "I'll take the latter option."
Jade nodded, "Likewise."
Kami nodded and held out her hand towards them, a small ball of power coalescing in her palm as a soft undertone of power filtered into her voice, "Your new names for your new lives are Senna and Shiori. I will also give both of you unique abilities to help you set yourselves up in the new world. You will also lose your magic and any knowledge of such magic, but you will maintain your memories of each other and be able to speak the normal language there. As far as the two of you will be concerned, you'll have been friends since you were little kids."
She split the orb into two, holding one in each hand before thrusting both forwards into Hermione's and Jade's chests and sending both backwards off their cushions onto the floor, unconscious.
By the time they woke up, they would be in a completely different world, with completely different abilities and completely different friends.
Chapter One: Meeting Naruto
Senna stirred.
Rolling over, she saw her friend lying beside her, eyes closed and breathing steady. "Shiori?" Senna croaked, crawling towards her friend.
"Hello?" said a male voice. Senna stopped and rolled over.
Before them stood a boy of about six or seven, with vivid yellow hair and blue eyes and wearing an orange jumpsuit. Senna gave a small smile, "Hello. I'm Senna. And you are?"
The boy grinned, "Naruto Uzumaki, future Hokage!"
Senna frowned, "Ho…kage?"
Naruto walked over and held out a hand, which Senna took and allowed herself to be pulled to her feet before she turned and helped Shiori upright. Once the brunette was on her feet, Senna turned back to Naruto, "So what's a Hokage?"
Naruto gave her an odd look, "Aren't you from around here?"
Senna shook her head, before noticing for the first time that something was amiss. Both she and Shiori had seemingly regressed back to being about the same age as the boy in front of them. Recovering, she said, "No. My friend Shiori and I are from elsewhere; we decided to move here together."
Naruto grinned, "Okay! You'll want to meet my jiji then! Come on!"
Senna and Shiori nodded and followed the excitable blond down the path.
-KC&K-
Senna dropped onto the settee in their new apartment. They had been startled to discover that Naruto's jiji was in fact the 'Hokage' he had mentioned earlier, and apparently 'Hokage' was the title given to the leader of the village.
He had asked them a lot of questions about where they came from and had seemed discontented with their story that they couldn't remember where they came from. Senna suspected that the only reason they hadn't been arrested was because Naruto had vouched for them and they were kids.
Finally the man had set them both up in an apartment next door to Naruto with a cat-masked woman on guard who was apparently in something called "ANBU". Naruto had finished doing whatever in his own apartment and then come over to fill them in on what he knew about the mechanics of the village.
"So," said Shiori a little while later, "There are four ranks of ninja in the village… genin, chūnin, jōnin and ANBU. The Hokage is the head ninja, and only the five major villages can have them. Do you know what the others are called?"
Naruto shrugged, but the ANBU at one side of the room spoke, "I can answer that. Suna, to the west of us in the desert, has the Kazekage. Kiri, in the sea to our south-east, has the Mizukage. Kumo, in the far north-east has the Raikage and Iwa in the far north-west has the Tsuchikage."
Naruto's lip curled, "And I sometimes wonder whether they might be more inclined to give someone like me the benefit of the doubt."
Shiori's eyebrow quirked up at the sudden venom in the previously-chipper Naruto's voice, "Is something wrong here?"
Naruto opened his mouth but the ANBU cut him off, "Young Uzumaki is not well-liked in this village for certain reasons that I am not at liberty to divulge."
Senna frowned before saying, "Okay… You got any ideas though, Naruto-kun?"
Naruto frowned, "I don't know, but I think my being called a "demon", "monster" and "freak" may have something to do with it."
Senna's eyes softened. Without even thinking about it, she stood up and walked over to Naruto, giving him a tight hug before returning to her seat.
Naruto blushed as Shiori smiled and joined the hug, Naruto's blush getting steadily deeper until the two girls broke away and returned to their seats, Neko smiling at the heart-warming scene.
-KC&K-
Two weeks later.
"So, Yūgao-chan, what's this I hear about you being in charge of two girls who just moved into the area?" asked a woman with red eyes and wild black hair. This was Kurenai Yūhi, one of Konoha's foremost genjutsu experts and soon to be a jōnin.
Yūgao smiled, "It's true. Their names are Senna and Shiori."
"And what do you think of them both?"
Yūgao tapped her finger against her chin for a moment before she smiled, "They're excellent. If I wasn't perfectly happy in ANBU, I'd take them on as a genin team when they graduate from the Academy. They're smart, eager to learn, and they don't judge people by what others think. I know that Naruto Uzumaki was the one to first meet them when they arrived, and they did actually witness how the villagers treat him. Even so, they still want to be friends with him. Hell, the girl Senna seems to relate to him somehow; I just can't work out why or how."
Another girl in the group, who had brown hair and red fang-markings on her cheeks, smiled, "Isn't your jōnin exam coming up soon, Nai-chan?" This was Hana Inuzuka, a chūnin vet and partner of the Haimaru siblings who were sleeping under the table.
Kurenai nodded, "Yes it is. I'm hoping to be a jōnin-sensei."
The last woman at the table, who had violet hair tied up into a spiky ponytail and brown eyes, took a bite from her stick of dango and smirked, "Eh, I don't see the attraction of taking care of a group of brats."
Yūgao grinned, "If you met these two girls you wouldn't say that. As I said before, I'd take them on if I wasn't happy in ANBU."
Kurenai smiled, "If I pass my jōnin exam, maybe I could make an all-female team."
Hana chuckled, "I think I know who the third girl would be. Hinata Hyūga, correct?"
Kurenai nodded, "Yes. The girl I've been on a mission to look out for."
Yūgao grinned, "Well, I would recommend you keep a close eye on those two. They'll be excellent kunoichi in a few years."
Hana smiled, "How about we make a deal now? If Nai-chan gets them, why don't we share? I must confess I'm now somewhat interested in these two."
Kurenai frowned, "What will we teach them though?"
Hana smiled, "Teamwork. The Inuzuka are one of the best examples of that, aren't they?"
Anko smirked, "Hmm… torture and interrogation methods?"
Yūgao chuckled, "Maybe later, Anko-chan. As for me… I think I'll wait until I see what they're capable of later on before I decide. I have a feeling that we haven't yet seen all they have to reveal."
To be continued...
(A/N: Yeah, so this idea occurred to me a pretty long time ago and as usual I started writing it so the plot bunny would shut up. Now, before anyone remarks that I'm bordering on yaoi with this I wish to point out that I'm trying to remove "Harry" from the equation as quickly as possible so that people will only see "Senna", regardless that "Harry" never actually existed as anything more than a mask. I really do like people to enjoy what I write and I don't feel like I'm doing it right if they don't. As for why I cut it here, think of it as a hint as to what's coming later. I hope you enjoyed this and as always, read and review. I'd like to hear what you liked and what you hated. Until next time folks, this is Leonineus saying GOODNIGHT!)
(A/N: Oh, and for those of you who read my other works; I'm a little further along with the ROOT fight but not by much. Odds are this next chapter is going to be much longer than I originally believed it'd be.)
(A/N: Oh and one more thing. Do you guys think I should change the title? I'm not sure but it just doesn't sound quite right to me. Any thoughts, drop me a review.)
