Alright, hi guys and welcome to my first fiction, Alessandria. I'm so happy that you decided to check it out, and I won't make any promises, but I hope that you will like this fan fiction, almost as much as I enjoy writing for you guys … and girls.

Chapter One, Happy Birthday Alessandria!

The sun is bright, no clouds, and only a fair breeze blows … why I do believe that today is going to be just shy of perfect. On the other hand, maybe not s much, you see today is my birthday. I'll be ten you know, and not a single person has wished me a 'Happy Birthday' or even given me a second glance for that matter. I know what I am going to wish for, if and when I get my cake. I'm going to wish that someday, I'll grow up to be the strongest ninja in my village. Which village? Why, Hidden by a Dream, we are located 23 days due north of the Village Hidden Leaf, the cherry trees are most nice this time of year … oh! Here comes my mother!

"Alessandria, what on earth are you doing over here? You must come inside so you can get ready for the party" the woman teasingly scolded as she shook her finger,"But mama, how am I supposed to get ready for something that isn't happing?"
"What on earth are you talking about?"
"It's my birthday, mama. And not one single person has wished me a 'Happy Birthday'."
"Well, I'll be" her mother said with her all knowing smile, Alessandria really hated that smile, because it let her know that her mother knew something she didn't. They had a race back to the village, and when they returned, they rushed into the house.
"Now, Alessandria, what are we going to dress you in?"
"I was thinking I could wear my nice blue kimono," she replied looking around her room, "I wanted to wear it last year, but it didn't fit, so I thought maybe I could try it this year."
Her mother laughed, "Alessandria, dear. That kimono isn't going to fit you, it is but a wedding kimono, and it is your birthday, not wedding. You can wear it when you are ready and not a moment before."
Alessandria lowered her head and shook it, drying her eyes she looked back up, "How about my pink kimono with white and lavender flowers that you and grand-mama made me for my last birthday?"
Her mother smiled the same one she had been flashing all day. Alessandria wondered what was going to happen, and the suspense was getting to her. While she was changing, and her mother baking, she thought up ideas. Maybe her mother was with child? Or perhaps, Father and the men were back from battle and were joining the celebration. All different ideas swam in her mind as the smell of her mothers baking flooded their small house.

"Are you dressed yet?" her mothers voice came from the other room,"Yes mama!" she shouted back.
Walking into the kitchen slash sitting area, she saw that people had remembered her birthday. All her friends and their mama's, as well as some of the older men watching and having a grand old time. She thought on her second idea of why her mother was smiling so, but did not see her Father or anyone else's fathers, so she slumped her shoulders, but picked them back up when Old Man Gerardo walked up to her.
"You know, Alessandria, that this birthday is a most special one, and that you have to make your wish count."
"What do you mean, Gerardo-sensei?" even though he had not been her sensei sense she was eight, she still felt the same respect for him now as she did then,
"I mean, child, that the same as your fifth, it is a crossover birthday, from a child to a pre-young woman, in just five more short years, you will have another crossover birthday, to be a young woman."
"So what you're saying is that I have to make it count, and not wasted it on some childish dream?"
"That depends on the dream. What is your dream child, I promise that telling me won't jinx it."
Alessandria hesitated for a moment and then leaned in and whispered in his ear, "My dream is to become the strongest ninja in the village, so I can protect the people I care for."
Gerardo smiled, "and that my child is a wonderful dream, don't you lose it"
Alessandria smiled too; glad she had finally told SOMEONE about her dream. She was pulled out of her thoughts and conversation with Old Man Gerardo when her mother walked into the room, carrying her cake, with ten little candles placed evenly on the top.
"Make a wish, and blow them out" her mother urged as everyone held their breath, Alessandria looked over to Old Man Gerardo and he winked at her, she closed her eyes and made her wish,
My wish to be the strongest ninja in the Hidden by a Dream village so I can protect the ones I love, family and friends.
She opened her eyes and blew out the candles; she managed to get them all. She was pleased and very happy. She smiled and laughed; as she helped her mother cut the cake and pass it out to everyone that wanted a piece.
After the party, and she had opened her presents, the children had played all the games and eaten their fair share of next years harvest, it was getting late, and people where heading home.

It was late into the night, when they came. Clad in blue, they clung to the shadows and made not a single sound. Quiet like the trees on a windless day, they crept through the sleeping village, entering each house one by one. There were ten moving shadows in total. Each as deadly as the one before it, where they came from is still a mystery, and why anyone would attack them was beyond any history text. Maybe it was the fact that they aided Hidden Leaf in the battle against Hidden Sand. But these shadow ninja were not from Sand.
The first kill, was on Old Man Gerardo, silent like the death that had been brought upon him, had anyone looked at him after, they would have thought he had died in his sleep, but he had not, poisonous gas had been rubbed into the space between his nose and upper lip, he breathed in his death, with out the realization.
But that was the only silent kill. The rest were hungry, merciless, cold-blooded killings. Each shadow ninja had a different way of making their target scream in pain.
Alessandria was awakened by a scream in the room next to hers. As soon as she gained her full sense of awareness, she could hear, smell, see and even taste, the blood and heart wrenching screams that where coming from every direction.
The last words, she heard come from her mothers room before the scream was,

"My babies, please, leave them alone …"

Babies, that was plural, Alessandria wanted to let out a wail but she knew she could not cry, it would only let her attackers know she was there.
Slowly the door to her room started to open. Quietly and fast, as she had been taught, she hid under her bed, as he did when she was young. Surprised and thankful she still fit, she held her breath and slowly counted to ten. When she had reached 9 ½ she heard the door close and footsteps retraced out of the house. She stayed under her bed, holding her breath, eyes shut tight, until morning.
She awoke the next morning under her bed, she gave a puzzled look to her floor. Getting out from underneath the bed, she peered out side the window. Bodies, dead bleeding, decapitate, sliced, punctured, bodies littered the streets. She could recognize some, and others were so mutated that you could no longer tell the male from the female.
"Mama?" she yelled as she ran through the house, until she found her.
Her head was turned back, face frozen in a state of horror and shock, tear steaks fell down her cheeks and blood pooled onto the hardwood floor, staining it crimson. Her gut was slashed open, and what looked to be an unborn child laid next to her.
"Mama … " she whispered approaching the still figure before her, "mama …" she said a little louder, she willed her self to clam down, but nothing was working, she ran out of the house into the street.
"Millie, Gerardo-sensei, Aunt Patch … can anyone hear me!" she shouted running through the streets, flies swarming the bodies, and wolves entering from the woods to fest on the fallen.
Unable to take anymore of the scene before her, she closed her eyes and forced memories of Old Man Gerardo's many spouts of wisdom, manly for when she was in danger,

"If anything happens, no matter what it is, and your live is in danger, and there is no one you can turn to, run. I want you to run as fast as your legs can carry you."
"But Gerardo-sensei," a seven year old Alessandria asked her aging teacher, "where will I go, if I am to run and I have no one else to turn to?"
All Gerardo did was smile, and point to a tattoo on the left side of his neck,
"This," he explained, "is the symbol of Konoha, the Hidden Leaf Village, my sons, first founded the village 30 years ago. If ever the need should arise, run their, and tell the hokage that Old Man Gerardo told you to go there."
Alessandria nodded her head as she looked over the pictures of a younger looking Gerardo and his two sons.

Summoning the courage to walk through the now fly infested streets, she found her way to the south gate, from there she would run for 23 days, and after that, she would collapse at the north gate of Hidden Leaf.
Alessandra was running for no more then an hour, legs and arms getting cut but pickers, and she was tripping over everything, when she heard the sound of wolves. She remembered that there were wolves back in her village, eating the rotting flesh of the dead villagers, but she thought nothing of it, or at least tried not to. But the image of her mutated mother, and unborn sister or brother was haunting.
"Don't worry mama," she whispered as she ran, "I'll find who did this to you and the village. I made a wish that I would be the strongest and protect you. And if training so that I may avenge your deaths, so that your souls will remain unharmed, then I shall … I may be only ten. But I know what I must do."
With that thought fresh in her mind, she found new strength in her legs and ran well into the night. Where she stopped at a stream for a drink, washed her face, and ran some more. Until she heard the wolves again, except this time, instead of calling each other because food was near, it was a yelp of pain, a call for help and warning of danger.

Alessandria stopped, frozen in fear as she felt all the eyes of the forest on her. What ever had attacked her village had found her.

Phew, well here is chapter one, I hope you liked it.