This is so not fair. I'm pretty sure when you die your meant to have no pain. Then why is my body screaming in pain all over? Again this is so not fair. Then a flash back of an early memory popped into my mind.
The sky was a sliver grey; it added to the gloomy atmosphere that had all ready surrounded me.
"Come on mum this is boring!" A young me cried out as I had ran to the top of the tree and back five times now. My mother was leaning against a tree with a book in front of her face; her face showed a slight smile on her cherry pink lips, her long pink hair fell into curls down her back and her green eyes sparked with a glint of laughter. I stared at her big beautiful eyes. Why didn't I inherit her eyes? I wonder to myself. Why did I have dark ones instead?
"You may whine all you want." She commented "But how else are you going to get prefect charka control useless you don't practice controlling it." With that she lifted her book up in front of her face again and started to read again.
"But I've already be up and down the tree five times without fail and on my first try." I shouted back, getting annoyed with her. She was only doing this so she could read her stupid book instead of teaching me a new medic justu. "Plus my feet are starting to hurt." I complained, sitting down and trying to get out all the pieces of tree that had got stuck to my feet.
"Pain is a good thing." She commented, as she walked over to me and started getting the bits of wood out of my other foot.
"Why is pain a good thing mummy?" I asked confused. She looked at me and gave me one of sweet sad smiles.
"Because my little firefly." She started, kissing the top of my head and started to pull out the twigs and leaves that had got stuck in my hair. "Pain, shows us we are still alive."
I relaxed for a minute, thinking of the last bit over and over again. If what my mum said was true, I stated to myself. Then am I still alive. It was impossible, I thought. I had already lost too much blood already, the last thing I remembered I was laying on the cold ground dying after my fight with the masked man. Anger flash through me as I finally remember him. Well he can't harm anyone else now, not even take a mothers life from a child. This thought made me a little better, but I was still sad, even though I had killed the man who had killed my mother she still wasn't here. I guess she's never coming back. With that last thought I drifted into a dream like state.
When I first released I was still alive, was when my brain started to absorb the surroundings around me. It was a plain white room with a single bed that I was laying on in the middle of the room. The beeping sound from a monitor beside made me realise I was in a hospital room. I tried to move my body but it was so painful and stiff.
"I see you've finally awake." A voice snapped from the other side of the room. Despite my bodies protests I forced my body to sit up. I looked to see the woman with the light blonde hair that had been with Minato, standing in the doorway. "We were starting to get worried that you wouldn't wake up." She commented, as she walked in and started checking a clipboard on the end of my bed.
"Where am I?" I asked trying to figure out where I was.
"You're back in Konohagakure." She replied, placing the board back on the bed. "You lost a lot of blood and haven't eaten in three days. I'll send someone to bring you food." And with that she left, like she was trying to get out as fast as possible. I tried to reach the end of the bed to see what condition I was in, however, my body screamed and shouted at me to stop moving. After fives minutes of pure torture I had managed to unclip my charts from the end of the bed and began to read through. Oh well, I thought, as I flipped through the pages. It could of be worse I suppose. I was so absorbed in my reading that I hadn't notice someone watching me from the doorway.
"Uuumm excuse me." Whispered a small voice. I looked up from my charts to Jiraiya standing in the door way with a plate of food in his hand.
"Oh, hello Jiraiya." I called to him reaching back to the end of the bed and placing the charts back. "Please come in." I said kindly, patting the side of the bed to come and sit. Slowly Jiraiya walked through the room and placed the tray on my lap.
"Grandma Tsunade is going to be angry that you've been moving around when you should have been resting." He indicated, by pointing to the sweat drops on my head, which had developed when I had forced my body to lean over and grab the clip board.
"Well, let's just call it my personal work out for today then." I smiled, starting to eat one of the sandwiches that I had on my plate. Jiraiya watched me eat my food in silence, probably there to make sure I ate all my food. I wonder why he was so silent compared to his other siblings.
"Nariko-san." Jiraiya muttered suddenly.
"What?" I stammered with a large spoonful of yogurt in my mouth. Jiriaya stared at the ground not saying anything. I hope I didn't sound mean, I thought.
"Did you kill Madara?" Jiraiya cried suddenly. I was so shock by the question that I nearly choked on my own spoon.
"Did I kill who?" I stuttered out, patting my chest, trying to get the yogurt down.
"Madara, the Akatsuki member with the orange mask." He commented. I didn't know who was talking about until he mentioned the orange mask.
"Eeeeerrrr..." I was stomped, how do you tell a ten year old that you killed someone. "Yeah." I answered, hey it was either a yes or no answer. How else was I supposed to tell him? No Jiraiya I didn't kill him but I did smash a ball of spiritual energy into his face and burn him until he turned to dust. I thought a short answer with no description was a better answer. Meanwhile, Jiraiya was silently taking this into consideration.
"That is totally awesome!" He shouted, jumping out of his seat. Wow! He actually was like his brother and sister, just a little bit shy. A sudden pike of a familiar charka that had just entered the building had just entered the building. Uh oh! How am I going to get out of this? Maybe I could make a run for it.
Oh yeah cause that went so well the last time.
What are you doing back?
Just reminding you that last time you ran away, you ended up here.
Oh, yeah.
So, you might as well talk to him.
I hate it when you're right.
Really because I love it when I'm right.
While I waited from him to appear, I tried to distracted myself by asking Jiraiya questions about his training and himself. I actually enjoyed talking to Jiraiya because he didn't have a boring voice and was very enthusiastic about talking about his training methods he, Minato and his father had come up with. In fact I was having such a good time that I forgot about the reason I was so nervous in the first place, until he spoke.
"So, how are you feeling?" Minato asked, leaning against the door frame. I said nothing; I couldn't bare to even look at him because of the pain I had caused both him and his family. Instead I stared at my hands laying on my lap. There was silence in the room, neither I, nor Minato or Jiraiya spoke. "Jiraiya, can you excuse us for a moment." Minato requested. I was hoping Jiraiya would say no but instead I heard his little footsteps walk through the room and echo into the hallway. As soon as Jiraiya had left, Minato walked over and sat on the edge of the bed. "You know you haven't answered any of my questions from the other night." Now usually I would come up with some sarcastic joke about how I was knocked out for three days but I wasn't in the mood today. Plus it wasn't really the time to be joking around.
"Has does I'm a very sorry selfish, big-headed idiot who's head should be used as a toilet brush because I'm completely useless to even exist." I replied, still staring at my hands. I suddenly felt a warm gentle hand on my face, lifting my chin up so both our eyes met.
"Well that explains a lot." He chuckled, letting his hand drop from my face, a strange warm tickle was still were his hand had been. "Except that description doesn't fit you at all." His warm smile spreading even further across his face.
"Excuse me..." I began before Minato put up his hand to stop me.
"You see your not big-headed because I never seen you go around saying everything you do is right, you're not an idiot because you are really smart and you're not selfish because you threw yourself in front of five shurikens for me."He finally finished, waiting for my reply.
"Well you may think that but that still doesn't make me feel better, since I always seem to hurt people no matter what I do. I. Am. A. Monster. If you don't think I'm like that then what the hell am I" I snapped back, tears running down my face from the anger I had kept in me for so long. I knew I shouldn't have snapped back like that but I just felt so angry. I quickly regretted what I said since I saw the sad look in Minato's eyes. How could I be forgiven so easily? I don't deserve this, I should be force to run around the village with 500kg weights to drag me down for a week with no food or water. To make sure I didn't shout at Minato again I buried my head in my pillow, shouting every curse I knew that existed, then I tried saying every curse I knew backwards. After that my body calm done, but I still kept my head in my pillow so Minato couldn't see me weeping into it. Suddenly I felt Minato's firm hand gently grip my shoulder.
"Nariko, you want to know what I see." He emphasized, lightly rubbing my shoulder for comfort. I wanted to say no because of what he might say but I didn't want to be mean to him. "I see a beautiful, intelligent, independent young woman who has had a lot of pain and loneliness in her life." I turned to him, not sure I was hearing him correctly. He was smiling at me, making more tears flow out of my eyes. Minato started wiping the tears away from eyes with his thumb, however, he was far from finished. "Despite what you might think of yourself, you are a good caring person who always puts people first, whether it's you healing someone with no food in your stomach to putting yourself in front of five shurikens to save someone you just barely met. Now it's time for someone to be looking after you." There was silence after this as I tried to process the words that had just been spoken through my head.
"Thank you." I whispered, not sure what else to say. Minato leant forward and grabbed my cold hands into his warm one, sending a electric spark up my arm.
"Anytime." He smiled back squeezing my hand a bit more. A cough from the door way made me and Minato jump apart quicker than you could say 'Marshmallows.' My hand suddenly felt very lonely with Minato's hand gone. I turned to see who rudely interrupted us. It was the Hokage and he wasn't alone.
