Hinata's POV
A dream, a place where I would escape. A picture, a new world to be immersed in. Escape has always been the path I have chosen, and even if I regret it, what has passed, had passed. Yet somehow, in some way, that one dream contantly lingers in my mind. Why? Is it true? Was that not a dream?
A nightmare that slowly sets in, awakening more regret and sorrow. The term 'if' became the deciding factor, the term that always instills regret, instead of enlightenment and understand. If I had spoke to Naruto those years back, would he leave, and get killed by some accident? If... I hate it. The term, the meaning, it makes a person regret. If... The term is a chain, a wall, a barrier that cuts me away. I should look forward, forgive my own undoing, and forget it all. But such moral philosophies could not help me escape, because my own guilt, my own regret. So, be damned, the term of IF, because you are the seed of regret.
Die, all of you. Suffer, the creators of languages long past, for creating the term, 'If.' They who have unleashed the pandora's box of regret and guilt, they who have awakened sorrow and it's cohorts.
IIII
Naruto's POV
A strange feeling, a new way to see the world. Now I am a spirit whom everyone but Hinata could see, now I am something intangible, a ethereal being who's existence is not known. A spirit who could pass through walls ever so easily, feels no need for walls. A unique insight towards ideals and the concept of privacy.
Here I am, returned to the world, yet not wholly returned. This isn't the world I know of, as I could not touch.
The sun lies above the mountains, it's evening gaze offers vision, it's rays of light offers a life to the plants and beings.
Life... ah, the term is somehow arbitrary, yet isn't as well. There she is, once more, lying on the table. Alone in the shop, she watches people pass her, she watches and thus the role of an observer is taken up by her. Now, whether I like it or not, I have to make amends.
So, I approached her slowly, her eyes hovering over the crowds.
Soon, I was next to her, yet she did not seem to notice.
"..." I watch her reactions to the passing crowds.
"Hinata."
In a moment's warning, she turned and quickly asked, "What?" I could sense her hostility, and perhaps she enjoys dreaming, thus did not want to be interrupted. But her eyes swiftly interpreted the situation, and a more polite response came. "...What can I do for you?"
I smiled, "Do I not seem familiar?"
"... You're... you're that person in..."
It feels strange, trying to reach out again after the link was broken so long ago. To rebuild something that crumbled to the erosions of time and fate, and I find myself slightly... sad.
"... the dream..." She reached out to touched me, but it just went through my body, and so, somehow, she fell to the floor. Then, she started to laugh, not a form of cheery laughter, but one that is more sinister, and snide. I found myself speechless and at a loss.
'What is this?'
"...HA.. HA... Ha. So, this is a hallucination. A figment of my soul's desperation and collapsing sanity."
'What?'
"Is this a dream?"
What in the world...
"I'm going nuts, ain't I?"
Oh no. She's slipping...
"The wall between dream and reality seems to have crumbled." She then laughed some more, hysterical. "I can't even tell what is real anymore..."
"No. This is not a dream. It isn't." I answered stern, trying to snap her out, pull her away from the abyss that she seems to slip further into with each passing day.
"Then, why can't I touch you?"
I closed my eyes for a moment, trying to find an answer. Really, at this moment, I wished I never existed at all. Entrusted to guard her, yet my presence kills what I am supposed to guard...
"So, this is a dream. Isn't it?"
"No. It's isn't. You can't touch me because I am a spiritual being. Things that exists in every being, things that some ninjas even learned to wield.
A silence that dwarves the noise of the crowds seem to surround us, like a bubble. But it lasted only for a moment.
"Spirits are real. They exist. That's why you can't touch me." I have encountered spirits of many kind in my vagabond years, but being a spirit myself is... strange. "You used to be a ninja. You should know."
But the use of the term, 'ninja' seemed to only worsen to case. "What has passed, has passed. I'm no longer a ninja."
"So... You're okay?"
Her eyes searched everywhere, scanning every corner for something perhaps of some importance, looking for something I know not. But finally, her eyes returned to mine, and softly she replied, "Yes." Then, a person walked pass me, and then her expressions changed again. "Why didn't he avoid you? This is a trick.. you're pulling a trick again."
"Hinata. Only you can see me, and only you can hear me. No one else, it's a power of mine."
"No... Why?"
"Finally. Back to why I came. I'm your guardian angel from now. I can warn you of things and stuff, but you'd have to handle the rest on your own."
Silence... An assassin that kills life, sometimes. Inside I knew she still doesn't believe in my existence, the fact that remains to her, that I am a mere fabrication of her mind, a hallucination at best, and somehow, I feel a part of that thought is correct. In fact, my doubts are emerging, as problems and questions to add to my own confusion.
'How am I going to help her? Talk? Just by talking, there is not much I could do...'
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The next update will come when the blood moon rises.