RW, here again. Sorry I haven't posted, but not to worry, there's more chapters I'll probably post today. As usual, all credit goes to Ashen Rose's awesome beta-ing, more angst (ahh... everyone should have an angst fic, it's a wonderful stress relief), and all that's left is for said beta to get back to me on chapter 10. That's right, folks, the other chapters are already written! Rejoice!
---silence---
Or weep, you know, whatever floats your boat. As I realized that I have not put a disclaimer for this fic, to hold back the evil lawyer-nins, I declare painfully: Naruto is not mine. Anything in this that is licensed to someone else is, obviously, not mine. The only thing that is MINE is Kaida-chan and the loose plot.
Anyone daring enough to do fanart, I give a go-ahead to (hint, Ashen Rose...) just lemme know so I can squeal myself into oblivion.
----tiredly,
RW
Guardian
These paper wings of mine will not fly
I will never see this blackened sky
Broken from its star-ironed chains;
In this earthen despair I am forced to remain.
Gravity forces me to reality,
Once again trussed from originality.
As I weep for the joy of flight,
Realizing how small is my might,
I begin to understand;
These paper wings, stained with blood and ink...
Are not so steel-heavy as I may think.
For if the pen is mightier than the sword,
And the universe created with a Word--
Then these paper wings of mine will bear me yet,
To worlds I have never met.
For paper is the currency of the world, and ink its blood--
My paper wings... my heart... my soul... my flood...
I stand here unafraid.
She played in the dirt, moving the twig like a doll. Besides her, Kabuto and Orochimaru watched her, one scowling and the other highly amused.
"I see that you are recovering," Orochimaru snickered. Really, he found the entire situation too funny; of all people she should fear most, he was at the top of the list, and yet his right-hand minion, his spy, had become her friend...
It was really too amusing.
"Yes," she said softly, glancing at him out of those deliciously rebellious eyes. Those eyes were steel in that little-girl face; he was not fooled by eyes like those.
After all, he knew exactly where she had gotten them.
"Someday, little one, you will have nowhere to turn and you will need me. Will you come to me then, I wonder?" he mused.
"I will stand on my own and fight until my death," she replied firmly.
"So saith the tragic martyr," Kabuto muttered.
"He has a point, you know, Kaida-chan. There are few people in this world who could take me on and live—nearly none who I could even seriously consider a threat."
'Although... there is him...'
"And what would you ask of me?" she arched an eyebrow, voice cool.
"Everything. Sell your soul to the proverbial devil, and I will give you your heart's desires," he smiled wickedly, arms spread widely, his eyes like molten gold.
She was quiet for a long moment, leaning against the trunk of a dead tree and staring into a bleak sky for answers that would never come. Kabuto watched her with a wistfulness and regret that Orochimaru did not fail to catch, and silently filed it away to mull over later.
"But... in losing one's souls, then any other desires are lost as well. It is from our souls that we derive the strength to stand defiant. To lose that... is to lose the will to protect those who are precious to us, because nothing is precious to us anymore. We become wraiths, in a shadow world of aborted dreams and regretful memories, until driven insane into hell. I... would rather die on my own, horribly and alone, than to let down the ones I love most."
He clapped quietly, lips quirked up into a smile.
"So saith our tragic heroine," he smirked.
She blinked, startled, for a moment before bursting out into laughter.
"There is nothing at all tragic about me. The path I have chosen is just that—the path that I chose. I have no right, no wish, to complain about a life no one forced upon me."
Kabuto smiled at her, pushing up his glasses, and she answered it witha smileof her own.
"I think Naruto-kun's examination is over. Yakushi will come looking for you soon," he cocked his head, indicating for Kabuto to escort her back to the house.
Following his master's unspoken command without hesitation, he cast him a look that was thoughtful. Orochimaru knew what he was trying to figure out: why was he letting Kaida live, knowing what she did?
It was quite simple: the girl was interesting. When one got to the Sannin's age, one tended to find less and less things (or people) interesting. No, when Kaida ceased to interest him, he would kill her. Or not. He was sure that one day, when her back was up against a wall with nowhere to go, she would come to him.
All she had to give him was Kyuubi.
She shoved Naruto out of the way, taking the brunt of the jutsu herself. Grabbing his hand and running away from the chuunin, she darted down a back alley, twilight settling itself over the world like a gentle lover.
Huddled behind a dumpster, back bleeding and torn with only bits of flesh barely hanging on over bone in some places, she felt her head spinning in the beginning of shock. Naruto's gulping breaths were barely keeping him from screaming in horror. The world (whether from her injuries or from night falling) was turning black, stars winking at her in misery...
That was how he found them: a little boy covered in her blood and the stench of filth, sobbing in his sleep and tightly holding onto a stained plush frog, and a girl dying in the dark.
"GET ME A MEDIC-NIN!" he screamed at the top of his lungs, barking out orders, hands shaking. If they lost her... if she died...
Hell to pay did not begin to describe their fate.
"I WANT AN ANBU MEDIC HERE YESTERDAY!"
One immediately appeared, Raven Mask. He remembered that the last Raven Mask had mysteriously disappeared, and barely repressed a shudder of horror.
Hands flying through seals, already burning with the bright-blue glow of chakra, he wondered what she—the medic—was thinking of as she fought desperately against time for Kaida's life.
Umino Iruka realized he didn't want to know.
Miyoko wandered through the empty halls of her family's home lifelessly, eyes dull and hair greying. She felt like she was dead already, yet condemned to remain in the mortal realm.
"My love... my beloved..." she whispered.
She felt a cold wind sweep past her and turned slowly, and gasped. A ghostly figure stood behind her, beckoning, and she felt her heart leap, tears springing to her eyes.
"It's you--!" she whispered joyfully.
Putting a finger to the mouth carved on its mask, she wished with all her might to embrace the man in ANBU uniform before her, ghost or not.
"What is it, my darling? What do you want me to do?"
He cocked his head, spreading out his arms. She smiled, a smile so strange and cold it defied the sun, and nodded.
"Of course..."
Walking over to her rooms, she carefully put on her best kimono and obi, taking the time to brush her black hair until a bit of its former life gleamed in it again. Putting on her makeup, staining her lips scarlet, she looked once again like the woman who had been called the "Flower of Konoha." Smiling at the reflection in the mirror, she brought out a beautiful, ornate obi and a handcarved wooden chair that must have been worth a fortune.
Smiling widely at the apparition, she gently pushed the bench out from under her, the obi tightening around her neck. In her last few moments, her eyes widened in horror; this was not her beloved, this was not the man she lost! Where--!
"Wh—why--" she struggled to ask.
The figure stood there, mute, and somewhere someone was laughing...
When the maid came in, screaming at what she found, her eyes were still black pools of terrified horror forever frozen in the moment of her death.
Whatever the answer to her question, if there ever was one, she kept silent to the grave.
---owari---