A bag of rations from a nurse, a cheerful wave and a joke that is totally missed... A younger me shakes his head incredulously and sets off to check on his traps. What's going on, didn't I...? Damn it, I know what happens next! Why can't I do anything but go where my feet lead me and say what I said before? Not again, no not again. Why do I have to go through this again?

I pass a hollow tree stump, my first marker. It takes me half a second to locate the older trap. I take the new replacement from my pack and begin to replace the older version, noticing how springs have become rusted and how wood has rotted. The trap is in desperate need of replacement. It takes me about seven minutes to fully replace the trap, and I take the other trap a little way away from the other before discarding the useless components and placing the redeemable parts back in my pack. I then set off to the east.

I scream inwardly at myself. Go north, south, west, anywhere but east. I want to beat myself into unconsciousness. Why do I have to see this again? Before, I had the ability but not the knowledge to stop what was about to happen. Seeing myself move obliviously towards my fate is torture. I now have the knowledge to stop myself, but my limbs won't listen. Maybe it was better being oblivious... For all of my skill, for every step that I have made in growing stronger since then, I can't even stop a scrawny twelve year old from walking down a path. I want to sit down, cry, and maybe shake in fear. But all I can do is place one foot in front of the next, and whistle. I don't remember whistling, but I guess I must have. Was I really that oblivious to what could happen? Yes, yes I was. I was a seeker without knowledge, and an inexperienced, young one at that.

Another trap, another seven minutes of focus to dismantle and replace it before salvaging it for reusable parts. Why can't I make myself move, why can I only do what I did then? I have seen creatures with hypnotic stares, causing their victims to be totally enthralled and often oblivious as they are swallowed whole. Hell, I've even been on the receiving end of one of them once. This is even worse. Rather than screaming at yourself to move, I am screaming myself not to do things, yet all I can do is to move one foot in front of the next, not even able to overcome myself with willpower, because my thoughts keep getting confused with my younger self. Young, inexperienced, yet familiarly curious thoughts. Dreams of the outside world, a longing to know everything. "You don't want to know! You don't want to pay the price of that knowledge!" I cry inside my head, but my younger self dismisses these thoughts as vague fantasies and continues onwards.

I was once paralysed by a man showing me visions of my death, but then I could shiver and sweat in fear. I could let my eyes go wide and I could silently scream with my jaw slack. Now I can only watch my body being overly cheerful. It's a hundred times worse. The gut churning wrongness just makes me want to throw up or do something even more disgusting. Yet I can't. I hate this, really hate it. Yet my twelve year old mind continues to think cheerfully about the future. "Don't you see? There is no happy ending out there? Don't start to play the game, you won't like the rules!" I dismiss these thoughts as soon as I have them, of course the outside world will be harsh, but there must be something out there worth finding. Maybe I'll find something to explain the shades. Now that would be awesome. Nothing bad can happen whilst I have my left hand and half a handful of trap components. I continue to whistle, a cheerful tune filled with hope and wonder. That's all I can take. My older consciousness sinks into a wave of despair.

Finally, I'm done with the traps and I can get on with my real purpose for coming out. Now I come to it, I'm really not that certain of how to start. Do I just pick a direction, or do I go to the furthest point I know and start from there? Hmm, maybe I should go back to the village and consider this a little bit more fully "Yes! Do that!" yells one part of my mind, but my logical side tells me that if I go back, I may never get the opportunity to come back again. "So, what have you lost?" says that annoying voice in the back of my mind. The answer of course, is clear. If I don't go, I will spend the rest of my life wondering what may have been outside, and that distraction may be a larger threat than whatever lurks outside. With this argument, my mind is set on this course of action. I'm left handed, and west is the left point of a map, so I may as well go west. For some reason, I feel like crying for a moment. Probably the magnitude of what I am about to do just caught up with me. I scratch my nose, and head west, fatally unaware of what lies beyond the relative safety of the village. Now where did that last thought come from? I may not know for certain what lies outside the village, but those creatures must come from somewhere. What if I find where the people they drag off are now? What if I am able to save some of them? Won't something like that be worth the risk?

For some reason, for half a second, I feel like emitting a noise of despair, but the urge quickly passes. Note to self, have one of the asylum caretakers diagnose me again when I get back to the village. I think I might be going even more insane. It takes me a good few minutes before I reach the edge of the area that I know. I set up a trap here just in case things go badly. "It won't work." Again, I dismiss the negative thoughts. Creativity has always been my weapon, and it doesn't come from thinking negatively. It takes me a minute to set up the trap, and so I reason that I have abut twelve minutes to explore around before I have to head back or else have people in the village grow a little suspicious.

I steel myself, and then walk forwards. One way or another, I am not going to be going back until I have learned something worth knowing.

It takes me barely two minutes to clear the swamplands around the village. Surprisingly, the wet earth gives way directly to a cracked, dry ground. Hmm, something to think on later. For now, I spare it a curious glance and then carry on. I don't have much time out here, and there is still so much to find out. Why can't I stop this? Why do I have to... hmm, I definitely need somebody to diagnose me again, preferably sooner rather than later. Anyway, there's nothing of real interest here. I stand up from investigating the ground, and head out again.

It is another t minutes before I notice anything else beyond how much hotter it is here. My water ran out a little while ago, but if things get really bad, I can just head back. Heading back is the furthest thing from my mind though, especially as I have just seen a speck in the distance. Now I know that the creatures that attack the village must come from somewhere, so I draw a knife with my right hand, and a throwing spike with my left. I then proceed slowly, cautiously. My heart is beating at a rate I have never felt it go at before. Being simultaneously nervous, excited and terrified at the same time is a weird combination. Also, for some reason, my fear is not accompanied by an equal amount of resolve as normal. Usually when something scares me, I simply become resolved to beat that ting to a pulp for scaring me like that. Now... for some reason, I don't even feel resolved to find the truth again. Why is that? Is it that stupid voice in the back of my head again?

Four shades run past me at an alarming rate, arms reached behind them. I watch for a moment as they move off into the distance, and spare them a wondering glance. Gosh, everything seems so new today. I wonder where they're going in such a hurry. It doesn't really matter I guess, although it would still be interesting to know. Anyway, back to the matter at hand. I slowly advance on the speck in the distance.

The screams strike me first. Desperate screams of agony that leave my ears ringing, and my teeth grinding. For a second, I pause again to consider the wisdom behind my curiosity, but ultimately I know what I did, and I know what I must do. Slowly, I carry on, with just a little more caution. There is no cover out here, so the trick to getting close to the speck without it noticing me is going to be to hope that it hasn't noticed me yet, and then to come up behind it when I get close enough to distinguish just where behind it is. The screams still continue every step of the way.

The speck is actually two figures. One is on the ground writhing and screaming. The other is hunching over the first, doing something that causes blood t fly every so up often. I decide to come up behind the second figure for the time being. As I get closer, I notice features. Both figures are human, although one of them wears normal survival gear, (a loosely fitting set of clothes to allow for maximum movement, reinforced with a layer of leather underneath). The other, the one seemingly torturing the other is wearing a white knee length coat, and a white mask splattered with the first figure's blood. The man on the floor screams one last time as I approach, then lays still. The white figure wipes his bloody hands on his coat, and then pulls out some weird looking utensil from one of the coat's many pockets. I strafe around to the side, making sure that I can see what is happening without being seen. I am just off being directly behind the man. After all, if he gets an inclination that he is being watched, that will be the first place that he will look. Not only that, but I don't need him obstructing my view of what is going on. I feel the other part of me tremble in fear at the white man, but the rational part of my brain again tells me that there is no chance that he has seen me.

I watch in fascinated horror, as the white coated man opens a gash in the man's chest and then reaches into the wound. I stifle a scream as his victim struggles slightly. Finally, the white coated man withdraws his hand and skilfully sews up the wound. I should have gone ages ago, but I want to find out what happens next. This is the first chance of any of us finding out what happens outside the village, and when I return, it will no longer be without information that could be useful to our survival. The white coated man stands up, and once again wipes his bloody hands on his lab coat.

"Rise eight three nine, your troubles are over." He raises a hand dramatically towards the sky as he says this. His victim, in response, sits up and in a voice that sounds like two large rocks grinding together, he says,

"Eight three nine... Is that my name? And who are you?"

"I am your creator, and your future master. Obey me, and you will help me to change this world."

"Master? I have no master."

"No, I created you eight three nine, and I can undo you just as easily. If you will not follow my cause then you will at least follow your own. I take it that you do not wish to leave the world so soon after coming into it."

I notice only now that the man is in fact Gaara. He was a man from my village, but until now, I hadn't recognised him behind the mask of blood and stitches. I again only just stifle a gasp of panic He pauses for a moment, and then replies, "Very well... master. May I enquire who your young apprentice is?"

" Apprentice? I have no apprentice. What are you talking about eight three nine?"

I have already begun to creap away. Any moment now, I will have to run for my life. For a second, I realise that I quite possibly could have placed a blade between the shoulder blades of the white coated man and then told Gaara, no eight three nine, that he was free if he did not attack me. But I am only twelve. Since when was a twelve year old able to think of every option in the span of a few seconds?

"Then who is the boy behind you?"

That's my cue. I don't bother to listen to the reply, I simply begin sprinting back towards the swamp, towards safety and towards home. Something stings my leg as I run, but I ignore it. To hell with my curiosity. I will never leave the village again. I've seen more than enough.

"It's not over" speaks the negative part of my mind, and for once, I listen to it. A jackal like howl echoes behind me, and for the first time in my life, I know real fear. There is no resolve with this fear, just a mind numbing terror that lets me do nothing but run.

"Too late" mutters the negative part of my mind. "You can't change the past," and then after a sort pause, it mutters, "I'm sorry." For half a second, I feel like crying, and then the fear comes again, and my world becomes a whirl of boggy ground, long grasses and a longing to be home.

A/N: wow, this chapter was done quickly, and I really should be doing other things, but I can't help it (meh, it's not like I can be doing anything else in the time that I use to write this). Anyway, please rate, comment and review. Also, just to let you know, Gikyo did not recognise the man in the white coat that he met in the earlier chapter.

P.S. If you are interested in betaing this, pm me.

P.P.S. Due to the good response to this story (compared to my other tales), I am going to be focusing on this more than the others for a while. If I get any more feedback for them, then I will write a bit more of them, but for the time being it is getting a little difficult to write them without any feedback at all. Anyway, hope you enjoyed this tale so far.

P.P.P.S. and with this, we break the 10000 words barrier. Now on to the next search criteria.