A/N: Thank you readers, reviewers, favoriters, alerters. All you guys. Big thanks. Only after finishing this chap did i realize that it's all one big scene. And then i didn't think i could break it up into multiple ones, so i left it. It's rather long... Hope you enjoy!

Let the Last Tear Fall

7. Sinking

"Neji, what's happening?" Tenten asked cautiously, back stiff and straight against the wall. She hated to admit it, but she was afraid. She knew something was wrong because of the sound of alarms, she just didn't know what.

And to make matters worse, Neji looked extremely troubled, which was not normal at all. His pale eyes were wider than usual, and they had a more hectic gleam in them. And he had pleaded with her to listen. Neji never pleaded, he demanded.

"…What's wrong?" she asked, reaching a hand out but immediately freezing when she realized what she was doing. Her arm fell limp to her side again. She was confused, he was making it worse, and she had no idea what to do. "Neji?" she tried again.

He opened his mouth and said slowly, "I shouldn't tell you this." She could see in his eyes how true the words were.

"What –"

"They're going to kill you."

A small chill ran down her spine, but she said in the calmest voice she could muster, "But we already knew that, right? With my disobedience and –"

"No. Listen to me."

Tenten shut her mouth at his forceful voice, teeth clamped together in an invitation for him to continue.

"Your dream –"

"It was real, wasn't it?" she asked suddenly. Neji looked surprised for a moment, but then nodded. The truth didn't surprise Tenten as much as she expected it to, and she found herself easily grasping the idea of some unnamed men pushing a needle into the back of her neck while she was off guard. "Okay, so what was the needle for?" She was having trouble keeping her voice even.

"It's… supposed to modify the way you think. And act. And feel."

Tenten swallowed. "Oh. I see." What a lie. "And what exactly does that –"

"My uncle wants to control you and force you to become one of his soldiers, and with the injection given to you it's supposed to make doing that a lot easier. It supposedly allows him to make his own will your own, since you will have forgotten your own values and…such."

The words flew out of Neji's mouth quickly, and a tense silence stretched out afterwards as Tenten's brain struggled to catch up to the news she was hearing. Her mouth was suddenly very dry; she wished that she had not dropped the glass of water on the floor only minutes before. She opened her mouth to respond, but nothing seemed appropriate to say. She tried to swallow, but her throat was like sandpaper. Finally, the only thing that came to mind passed through her lips, very quietly.

"But, I thought you said they were going to kill me."

"Well, it's not for certain." A brief glimmer of hope sparked in her gut, but Neji hardened his gaze. "But, there is a good chance that you won't be able to handle the injection. It has only been used once before, and the last recipient died not long after."

The hope was crushed, and despair was left. Dying suddenly seemed a lot more frightening to Tenten, who had up until then asked Neji to kill her already, since there was no way she would help his uncle. But she didn't feel ready to give up her life just yet.

A stunned "Oh," escaped her lips. She begged Neji with her eyes to tell her that he was kidding, just playing a cruel joke on her. She wouldn't be surprised if that were the case. But the only answer she got was silent, stoic, and barely counting as remorse. His face was as composed as ever, most likely because he had gotten the weight off of his chest. Why that was so important to him, she couldn't fathom.

Something inside her broke then, and she brought her hands up to her head, clenching her fingers in her wild hair. "Oh god, I'm going to die. I don't want to die, I'm not ready. I'm not… I'm… Please, no."

The tears were already trickling down her cheeks, in clear view of Neji, but she paid him no attention. Her knees buckled and gave away, and her back slid down the cold wall until she landed on the floor, knees bent up close to her chest. She couldn't see past the blurring tears clouding her vision, it was all a confusing jumble of unfriendly colors.

"Tenten!" Neji's alarmed voice barely registered in her mind, and she shut her eyes tight, sending a flood of hot liquid down her face.

"No… Mom! Dad! Please, help me. Don't let me die, not here. Not in this place, not alone. Please. Please... Please…" Her voice died into a whisper.

"Damn, you're in shock. Tenten, get a hold of yourself, this is not the time for your emotions to get in the way like this!"

"Go away! Leave me alone! This is all your fault. You killed me! I'm going to die because of you…you…you monster!"

"Tenten!"

"Shut up!" Her cry surprised even her and she silenced for a half-second, but then her hold on her hair tightened and choked sobs racked her throat and she bowed her head under the emotional trauma.

She would die. She didn't even know how or when, didn't know if it would be painful or slow or filled with despair. She just knew that there was nothing she could do to stop it.

She was too young to die. Her life had been too short. There were so many things she hadn't done: she had never bought a hammock and looked up at the stars from atop it without any fears, had never felt the soft sand and smelled the salty air of the ocean, had never mastered the shepard's pie recipe her foster mother had taught her, had never fallen in love…

"Tenten!"

Her arms were jerked away from her face and the force pulled her forward onto her knees, sobs and thoughts silenced in shock. Her watery eyes were round and wide, fearful, as Neji looked down at her with irritation etched into his features. All she could do was blink – vocal cords dead – back at him, acutely aware of the iron grip he had on both of her wrists.

Her tears seemed to have disturbed him, and he quickly let go of her arms and looked to the side – in disgust she assumed. But still, he spoke to her again, though his words were clipped and rough.

"The entrance will be unguarded, all prisoners locked in their cells, and all guards towards the back halls."

She didn't understand. She didn't care for the words coming from his mouth and didn't know what they meant. She just stared at his face as he avoided hers.

"Would you like to know why that is?" Neji asked, evidently aware of her confusion. His voice was prodding; he would tell her no matter what her response was.

"Sure." It came out as nothing more than a whisper, because she didn't really care. Her brown eyes traveled down to the floor, head bowing and hair veiling patches of her face.

"Because that's where the Drones are."

Her head snapped up immediately. "What?"

Neji looked back at her. She couldn't read what was in his eyes. "That's where uncle keeps the ones that are… on his side. In the deepest rooms at the end of the farthest halls."

Tenten's hands clenched involuntarily. "So close…"

"The alarm is because something has happened with them. Most likely they have broken out of their rooms and are making a scene. It's nothing new. They are impulsive and take little into consideration before actually doing anything." He rubbed his forehead roughly. "And because of this they are dangerous and destructive, which is why all guards have to make sure that nothing gets too out of hand. There have been many casualties in situations like this in the past."

Tenten's heart skipped a beat, and then a cold prickle trickled down her spine. "Why are you telling me this?"

"Think about it," Neji said coldly, and then bent down and pulled her up by her elbows. "Hurry up. I'm supposed to already be with the rest of the guards."

He turned his back on her and headed for the bathroom door. Shaken, Tenten followed on unsure feet, making sure to always stay a few steps behind as they traveled through the echoing halls, loud with the whine of alarms. Neji came to a sudden halt when they reached an especially wide hall – the main hall that the others branched out of.

"I will go right to join the others. I'll be leaving you here."

Tenten stared at his back, expression something between shock and confusion as she tried to decide whether or not to believe the conclusion that had dawned on her as they had been walking.

"Are you saying…what do you mean?" she stammered just as a nearby alarm rose to its highest pitch. She wondered if Neji heard her.

She heard his low chuckle and saw his shoulders bounce briefly. A torch crackled, warping the arrangement of orange light and gray shadow strewn across the back of his white shirt. His voice was tinged with his laughter when he spoke.

"It is pretty obvious, I'd say. If you can't figure it out, then it seems that I have overestimated you." His voice suddenly turned very serious, and he took a few steps to the right before pausing again. "Goodbye, Tenten. I hope that we do not cross paths in the future."

"Wait!"

Neji stopped again and let out a loud breath of air. He turned halfway around and fixed Tenten's wild stare with his own impassive one, white eyes like curtains, nothing showing around them.

"What?" And now his voice was wary, and Tenten opened her mouth just enough to take a few short, hectic breaths.

"What do I do now?" she asked, and found her tone pleading. "What am I supposed to do? You know, don't you? Tell me what I'm supposed to do."

Neji's expression did not waver as he held her gaze for an excruciatingly long minute. Tenten felt her mind racing and her heart hammering away in anxiety, but she bit her tongue and didn't make a sound as she stared back.

Finally, he sighed again. "You decide for yourself." Though his voice was smooth, it came out like an order, and then he added under his breath as he turned to walk away once more, "That didn't used to be such a problem for you to do."

Tenten didn't have anything to say to that. She was rooted to the spot, watching his form shrink as he got farther away. The alarms were mere background noise now, and the whirring of her brain was suddenly quiet. Her head was filled with a deafening silence.

Prisoners in cells. Drones at the end of the hall. All guards fighting them off. Main hall empty.

It was like a punch to the gut, when the pieces of the puzzle finally flew together and the fuzzy thoughts at the edge of her brain suddenly became clear and blinding. Her heart jumped into her throat and she forgot how to breathe. The gears in her mind started spinning overtime.

Main hall empty.

She gasped and remembered that oxygen was important, and took in several rattling lungfuls of air.

Guards at the end of the hall, Drones at the end of the hall.

Her hands were clammy; she clenched them into shaking fists. It was too good to be true.

Prisoners in cells.

When she realized that her eyes were out of focus, she quickly blinked and squinted down the main hall to her right. She couldn't even see Neji anymore. The alarms came back full force, their moans suddenly much more menacing, and she turned her head to the left –

Main hall empty.

– and ran. Her feet slapped the hard ground violently, soles slowly becoming numb despite the rubber shielding them, and her arms pumped fervently at her sides. She wasn't aware of her lungs burning or her muscles screaming in protest. All she could feel were her feet and the adrenaline pulsing through every single one of her veins.

Her hair was wild and untamed behind her, and her eyes were narrowed and hardened in determination. The alarms seemed to be screaming at her, telling her to stop, warning of her escape. She ran faster. The orange-tinted dirt walls were nothing but a blur to her, the dark hallways stretching away to the right and left invisible.

But then she heard a roar, and her blood ran cold. She almost tripped as her feet stopped for a split second before running faster. The roar got louder, and terrifying images of Drones and unnamed, ferocious monsters with hideous fangs and treacherous talons invaded Tenten's mind, but she couldn't look over her shoulder to see what was on her tail.

The alarms were gone, the hollering of the beasts much louder, which meant that she would be caught at any time. There was a light ahead, not bright, but vivid enough for Tenten to know that it came from something besides the dirt cavern she was in.

She couldn't feel her feet anymore, and was afraid that if she stopped running she wouldn't know how to support herself, so she sprinted on. The howls multiplied and grew louder still. They sounded like they came from all around her, and she could imagine monsters lurking around every branching hall, ready to pounce and tear her to tiny, bloody shreds.

She was through the light, and then she fell.

Icy water closed in on her from all sides, and her head barely broke the surface in time for her to take a rattling gasp. She had a half a second to figure out where the roaring was coming from before her head bobbed under the water again, her legs utterly exhausted.

A waterfall. Of all the possible explanations for the monstrous noises, it just had to be a waterfall.

Tenten was disoriented and had trouble keeping her head above the water, but she knew that there was only one way out: through the fall. The spray assaulted her eyes and tried to fill her mouth, and she felt herself being pulled closer to the curtain of water, almost as if they were the two poles of different magnets.

All too soon she had been dragged under, the force of the pummeling water pushing her deeper into the dark depths. Her eyes were wide open but she couldn't see anything; it was all a single shade of black. She was vaguely aware of her arms and legs flailing to all sides as she tried to swim up, wherever up was. It felt like there was a one hundred ton blanket weighing her down and squeezing in on her.

Her lungs were about ready to burst, and her hair floated around her face like a net as she twisted around in the cold water, all her hope quickly seeping away as she prepared herself for the worst possible death.

Drowning.

A bubble of air escaped her mouth and the water rushed down her throat, choking her. She was shutting down, she could feel it. There was a light, much brighter than the one she had seen before. Death was just around the corner, and she was tired and not about to fight her fate. Her whole body was numb and unfeeling; the only pain came from the frigid water filling her lungs.

And then her back rammed into something bumpy and smooth. A bunch of somethings, she realized dimly, as the foreign objects rolled over her spine, obviously more than a single entity. The most amazing thing happened, however, when her face broke free of the water and she felt the air skim over her cheekbones.

Her eyes snapped open – she couldn't remember when they had closed – and a fountain of water erupted from her mouth, followed by heaving gasps and splutters as more water lapped gently by her ears.

There was green overhead. Green and blue and brown and white.

Trees and the sky.

Daylight.

Tenten turned her head to the side slightly, too exhausted to do much more, and saw the wooded forest stretch out into the distance. Her right hand clenched around one of the funny-feeling objects underneath her, and she sluggishly brought it up to her face with blue tinged fingers.

A stone. She was lying on countless stones that lined the bank of the… lake, as she assumed it was.

She tipped her heavy head to the other side and noted without much reaction that the waterfall was roaring away in front of what looked like a solid stone edge of a cliff that stood a good twenty feet away. It was strange… she remembered the roars to be much louder. And how had she gotten so far away?

She coughed weakly; a few dribbles of water trickled down the corners of her mouth. She was so tired.

The sound of pebbles mashing against pebbles caught her attention and she swiveled her eyes upwards. She could see a person – a young woman by the looks of it – running in her direction with a frenzied look on her face. Tenten wasn't sure why the girl's jade eyes were so wide; there wasn't anything exciting that she knew of anywhere nearby. Just a waterfall acting as a door that led to some twisted prison. That was all.

"Oh my god!" the girl stammered, falling to her knees at Tenten's head. "Are you okay? Miss?!"

She put a hand on Tenten's cheek and gasped at the temperature. Tenten thought that she had rather pretty hair… the color of cotton candy and cherry blossoms. Her mind flashed back to a happy summer day spent at the fair when she had been eight years old. The sun had been so warm and the air had smelled to sweet, and it had all been so relaxing…

"No, don't close your eyes! Kiba, come here, I found someone!"

Why was she being so loud? It annoyed Tenten; all she wanted was to sleep and dream of that happy innocence of her childhood, and yet this strange girl was screaming at the top of her lungs, which was very distracting and not at all soothing for someone who had just narrowly escaped drowning.

"Shit," she heard the girl curse, and then her voice reached a high pitch again. "Kiba! Kiba, where the hell are – oh my god, finally! Help me with her!"

It sounded like a muffled earthquake as a second person ran across the rocks to his frantic friend. "What the hell? Did you just find her like this?" a masculine voice asked, and was answered with a throaty confirmation.

"Damn, we have to bring her back, and fast." It was the male who spoke again, and he sounded like he was in a rush.

A large, warm hand closed around one of Tenten's – the one still holding onto the stone – and for some reason it made her feel so comfortable that she was finally able to slip into the beckoning darkness.