Chapter 3: A Light in the Darkness
Hinata could see everything now… she started to struggle madly, trying to free herself from whoever was holding her… the warning she had received earlier still stood stock still in her mind… but she didn't really care about it… and then, she felt a lurch from behind… and she was thrown unto the crowd before her, who roared in glee…
Hinata thought she was home free, and that she could jump away and free herself from the bounds… but then she realized that someone had grabbed her by the hair, and had started to pull madly at it… as though he was trying to pull everything off… and then, everyone started to do the same thing… they tore, they bit, they punched and kicked… it's like they thought she was just some expensive dress or something…
They tore off her clothes, they tore off bits of her hair, they took her shoes… they dug their nails into her bare skin, ripping and tearing off small bits… they took her hands and bit her fingers… they broke the bones on her toes… they all screamed and laughed and pushed and punched each other, each wanting a bit of clothing or skin… each wanting blood or a piece of her shoes…
Hinata felt every little thing they did… she struggled to free herself… she screamed whenever someone took her by the hair… she cried whenever someone ripped some skin off… and it wouldn't stop… it wouldn't stop… she shut her eyes, like all the other times, and she wished for it all to end… it wouldn't stop… "Please make it stop…" she thought… "Make it stop… please… make it stop…"
And then… it stopped. Hinata opened her eyes again… and she realized she wasn't being torn apart by an insane crowd of people… she was lying on the cold, hard concrete ground of a hay-strewn round cell. There was only one window: a small, barred hole on the wall. Green lit sunlight brayed its way in, illuminating Hinata where she lied on the ground, and reflected off her pale eyes. There was dead silence…
"It was… not real?" she asked herself… and then, the stinging of hundreds upon hundreds of cuts, scrapes and scratches, the swelling of a few bruises, the numbness of some of her fingers and toes, and a headache returned faster than a flash of lightning…
Hinata realized that whatever happened had really happened… this wasn't a dream… this was really happening to her. "But… the hospital… what… where am I?" she said out loud, "HELLO?" she called, and the call echoed upon miles and miles of emptiness through the open door of her cell that led to a hall…
Hinata stood up and checked herself: her clothes were in tatters, revealing her privates and her bare, destroyed skin. Her shoes were missing, and a couple of bruises lined her legs and her arms. She then looked around her cell, making sure she was alone… there was a chair next to a table, where a piece of bread rotted on a plate, a cot and then… a cellmate, his right arm missing, his face grotesquely disfigured, matted blood decorating his red hair, and his torso opened up, lying in a pool of blood a few feet away from Hinata…
"Predictable…" said Hinata grimly as she caught the whiff of rotting skin as she looked at the body… then, she saw something glint… a katana was in the remaining arm of her dead cellmate, rather clean, shining in the green light of the sun. Hinata walked over and picked it up, wondering whether her cellmate had killed himself... and then wondering who or what could have killed him if he didn't.
The sword clinked as Hinata dragged it along as she walked to the open door ahead… the halls twisted and turned, empty, the occasional window barred and so flooded with sunlight you couldn't see what was on the other side… Hinata thought about her situation… now was a time to think… it's good to think and relax once in a while. She thought whether anyone had noticed whether she was gone… and if so, could they find her? She missed everyone already… Naruto especially…
But then, a strange, gut wrenching, deep feeling infected every corner of her body, corrupting and sickening her to the core……… a strange feeling… hate. She hated them… she hated Naruto… she hated them… she envied them… Sakura, she was so pretty… and Sasuke, so patient and so cool… and Naruto… Oh Naruto… she hated Neji, that son of a bitch… she hated herself… such a weak bitch… she HATES them all… she hated that whisper that came… she hated the pain in every one of her wounds… SHE HATED THEM ALL… and then there was the voice…
"There's a time to discriminate… but…"
And soon, Hinata realized she was engulfed… engulfed in the darkness that came… just like the darkness that blinded her life… it seeped in, corrupting and eroding her soul…
"Hate every motherfucker that's IN YOUR WAY!"
And then, just as sudden as it had iced her soul… it blasted her mind away, destroying what sense she had… and making her look… raising her head… in front of her…… there, smiling garishly as they always were… were the people she hated the most… Naruto, Sakura, Sasuke, Neji… they were all smiling… and they all had a bloody kunai in their hands.
And then, Hinata realized that they had started to walk toward her… the kunai were being raised… everything was going darker… and she tried to concentrate on the only thing she could think of: run.
She turned around, tripped a bit and she ran; she didn't care where, she didn't care why, she just wanted to run… run from the retching yells that came… They were chasing her… they were laughing…
"HEY, YOU, WHAT DO YOU SEE?
SOMETHING BEAUTIFUL, SOMETHING FREE?
HEY, YOU, ARE YOU TRYING TO BE MEAN!"
Hinata tailed behind her… the darkness blinded her… but she could still make out the ghastly features of the people chasing her… they had started to change… or was it a kunai headed close to Hinata's hair? She didn't know, but she didn't really care… They had started to rot… their eyes started to fall off, and their hands became skinny and stick-like.
"WHEN YOU LIVE WITH APES, MAN, IT'S HARD TO BE CLEAN…"
They were so ugly now… they had pale, gray-lavender eyes that shined eclectically in the little sunlight… they were like headlights pointing Hinata out… Their hair was sown on, and it was black and short… they were so tall now… they stared down at the simple girl below them… there was a light in the horizon… it was so pretty… and then it was so bright… and then it was dark again.
Hinata stared, not daring to blink… not believing with every inch of her mind what had happened… the darkness was there… but the light was gone… no more… no more… she wanted it back… and so it was. She looked at herself: she was glowing with an eerie light… and so was the guy standing a few feet away from her.
"You're Hyūga Hinata, aren't you?" he asked; he was Hinata's height, skinny… his eyes were blazing red like fire, and so was his short hair… "What's going on… why… who are you… what do you want from me?" thought Hinata, only able to squeeze out a few whimpers through her mouth, her teeth chattering really fast…
"Hinata, this same thing happened to me as well" said the person there, "and me too" said another voice, "this is what has developed in your mind because of all of those negative emotions… hate, anger, fear, despair… and now it's coming after you, as it did to me" he said, pointing at a sewn part on his forehead…
Hinata thought… that's all she could do… it's good to think and relax once in a while… and then, it became rather obvious… and then it was completely obvious: Neji. That hit… to her head… had screwed her up… real bad… "And it's unleashed the evil in your mind" said the person there, "listen to me Hinata" he said, standing inches away from Hinata…
"You have to fight them, you have to conquer your fears and your angers… it's the only way… oh, and when the time comes, aim for your forehead".
"The light at the end of the tunnel shines for those who want and hope for it".