Hi guys. The story is starting to pick up again after almost a decade and understandably everyone who's reading is starting from chapter 1 again so it'll be a while until you see this. All Constructive criticism welcome. Thanks
Kokoro slowly woke up, a throbbing pain in her skull. She opened her eyes, and looked around the room she was in. 'Where am I?' she wondered.
She was lying on the floor of a prison cell, bars blocking her escape. Light filtered through a small window on the wall of her cell.
She felt empty, hollow, as though half of her was gone. Kokoro slowly twitched everyone of her limbs, feeling that every single one was there. Her mind cast about for a reason for that feeling, and then she realized with a start that she couldn't feel Luna.
She could always feel Luna, her presence in the back of her mind, comforting, there. Why couldn't she feel her? Was she-dead? No. Kokoro knew somehow that she wasn't dead. She wasn't. She had to be near. Kokoro just wasn't trying hard enough. She closed her eyes and searched hard with her mind. 'Luna. Luna. Where are you?' Then she felt something. It was faint, but it was there. Luna! She was alive! Kokoro searched for her exact location. She was seven cells down on the right from Kokoro, and unconscious, barely alive. But, Kokoro could feel the strength growing in Luna, and smiled happily. She was alive.
Then, Kokoro reached out for Okumaru. He was there, three cells to the left. He was conscious, and strong, much stronger than Kokoro.
Kokoro tried to get up, but a bolt of pain shot through her body, and she stopped. If she stayed still only her head hurt. She drifted back to sleep. When she awoke once more, she was warm, and she could feel something on top of her. She opened her eyes, the first thing she saw was a man staring down at her. He was wearing a doctor's coat, and had glasses. He was bald, and he smiled when he saw her open her eyes. "Hello Kokoro."
Kokoro looked down at her body, and saw that she was attached to a sort of platform, her hands and feet bound to it by chains. Kokoro could see tubes in her arms, connecting her to various machines, beeping randomly. She still had her training clothes on, but her weapons and her sword were gone. Kokoro glared at the man, and said through gritted teeth, "What did you do to me? Where are Luna and Okumaru!" The man looked over at her and said, "My men captured you and your friends, and drugged you, using a drug called Weracid. This drug is of my own invention, something no other medic has discovered."
His smile was so self absorbed, Kokoro rolled her eyes. This guy was obviously a narcissistic who had no greater love than himself.
He paced to the end of the room, and turned around, leaning against the wall. "It has a very bad effect on animals. It makes them go in a coma and, in most cases die. The only way for the animal to survive is if its will is strong."
"Not surprisingly, it had this effect on the tiger but, surprisingly it had this effect on you. Now, you are human, so why would this drug have this effect on you? I ran some tests on you, and got some very interesting results. You, it seems are half tiger."
Kokoro just glared at them man, thinking that, if he found out about 'the jutsu', it would be very bad. She thought back to a time when, tired of calling 'the jutsu' 'the jutsu' all the time, she had asked the Wise One it's true name.
Flashback
Kokoro grunted as she did some mental exercises with Luna. 'What's the use of this again?' she asked Luna, straining to remember all the items spread out in front of her. A comb (where had the Wise One gotten 'that'?) , 4 blades of grass, an acorn, three hazelnuts, bird dropping (or was that already there before?), tree bark, a twig, etc…
Luna growled, 'I have no idea.'
The Wise One stood up and stretched, and Kokoro asked him, "What does any of this have to do anything with 'the jutsu'? I mean, it's not like I'm learning some sort of jutsu that will help me with the jutsu that will help us with 'the jutsu' or- what did I just say?"
The Wise One shrugged ( or at least that's what Kokoro thought he did) and Kokoro sighed. "Doesn't 'the jutsu' have a proper name?"
The Wise One thought for a moment then said, "No. Once it did, but dreadful things happened, so we gave it no name."
"Dreadful things?" Luna said, interested.
"What dreadful things?" Kokoro asked, even more interested.
The Wise One sighed at their enthusiasm, he couldn't get out of this question, and said, "Long ago, when the jutsu was first invented by tigers, we gave it a name. The name is now forgotten, but, once, my father and his companion were captured by some of your 'healers' or medicine people, or whatever you call them. They pried the name of 'the jutsu' out of my father's companion's lips, and did many tests on both of them. They researched 'the jutsu' and found out things that even us tigers did not know, and used those things for their own evil and corrupted means, killing many humans, and testing on them and animals. Before things got out of hand, the head of the clan took the clan and attacked those so called 'healers' wiping them out, and destroying every bit of their research. Afraid that if we kept the name of 'the jutsu' one day if humans heard it they might dig up some overlooked record of it and start secretly doing those things once more to humans and animals we destroyed it, and ever since then 'the jutsu' has never had a name."
"Oh." Kokoro said thoughtfully. Luna asked, "But what would happen if a scientist, for that is what I believed those 'healers' were called, caught us and did tests on us? What could we do?"
The Wise One was silent for a while, and then he said gravely, " Then, you must never tell of the jutsu, how it was performed on you, that the tigers did it, of your special abilities like mind touching, nothing at all of that sort. If you do, then everything will be revealed, and our tiger kind would be captured, and your human kind would be tested upon secretly, and many would suffer."
"What if we are tortured?" Kokoro asked, thinking of the worst.
"Then," The Wise One's voice turned even more grim. "You must bear with it, and if you die, you must make sure that your body never lands in their hands. Understand?"
Kokoro and Luna both nodded grimly. "Good. Now, continue with your lesson."
Twin groans.
End of Flashback
Kokoro was jolted out of her remembering as the man started talking once more.
"How could you be half human, I wondered. I ran some more tests on you, and your friends, and found out that the tiger has your blood in it. Now, there must be some hidden jutsu involved in all of this, so I did some research. Nothing. So, little girl, it is up to you to provide me with the answer." He walked forward and stopped by her .
"Oh, how rude of me. I forgot to introduce myself. My name is Dr. Kane."
Kokoro frowned. "What a weird name. Why did you capture us in the first place?"
The doctor's eye twitched, and he said, "It is 'not' weird, you buffoon. We captured you because I needed a medicine from that man."
"That man?"
"That man you call Gramps."
Kokoro sweat dropped. It seemed no one knew Gramps' real name. "But now, I have found something a bit more interesting. You. Tell me what the jutsu that made you half beast is, and I'll let you go."
"No."
"Very well then. I will have to force it out of you." He walked out of the room, beckoning to a man as he did so.
"After I am done with my fun, torture her any way you like, but don't hurt her 'too' much. If she dies, I need her body intact."
He then walked back into the room, and picked something up from his desk. He walked over to her, smiling in the most cruel way, and pressed the device to her skin. The cool metal made Kokoro shiver, and she closed her eyes waiting for the pain that would surely come. Remembering the part about torture, she braced herself. Pressing a button, he let loose an electrical charge through her body. Kokoro bit her lip until it bled, fighting pain, and then screamed with agony, tears coursed down her face. And thus, her nightmare that was real, truly began.
Okumaru looked up from the floor when he heard her scream. Kokoro! He would know that voice anywhere. He had been stuck in this prison for five days. He had tried to reach Kokoro, and found her, barely alive a few cells down. Yesterday she had awoken, and then today she had been carried past him on a bed sort of thing, her hands and legs chained to it. The bed thing was upright, and it had been as though she was standing. When he had looked at her feet, he had seen a sort of metal thing supporting them. She screamed again, and Okumaru's heart tore. She must be feeling great agony, Kokoro would never scream or cry otherwise. He banged his hands against the cell bars, and screamed her name over and over. "Kokoro!"
Eventually his cell guard knocked him out and draped him on the floor with his last thoughts being that of Kokoro.
Dr. Kane pressed the device upon her skull once more and another scream was ripped from her lips. Kokoro bit her lips once more, fighting tears again, and remembered a rule she had learned at the Academy. 'No expression. A ninja never reveals his emotions. Never.'
The rest was all a haze. When it finally stopped, tears of pure anguish had coursed down her face, and blood dripped from her mouth, but she hadn't told
"Tell me!" Kane barked, slapping her furiously across the face, bruising her.
Kokoro looked at the Dr. Kane through half closed eyes, breathing heavily. "No." she said weakly. Terrible things would happen if he knew. She couldn't..let…him…know.
Kokoro passed out her head hanging weakly. Dr.Kane looked at the pitiful body, and turned aside, scoffing. "Take her to her cell. We'll try again in a week. Get the boy. He is that man's student. He might know of the medicine. If not, write a ransom note to the old man in three weeks. By then, he'll be worried enough to give up the medicine quick."
Okumaru was roughly shaken into consciousness, and taken to Dr. Kane. Dr. Kane introduced himself, and told Okumaru off the reason of his capture.
Okumaru denied knowing of the medicine. As he was taken away he called to the man, "What were you doing to Kokoro? Where is she!?"
He just smiled.