Author's Note: OO AAAAAHH!! RYU!! And that's all I will say... Happy Reading!!

- Ryu

Awakenings: Part One

Ryu screamed as she was held by her shoulders by this strange person with his white hair and red eyes. She continued to scream as she was dragged downstairs, absorbed in her terror until she was thrown down on the ground outside. She heard someone else shouting and looked up. Her mother had turned into a whirlwind of steel. Slicing, cutting, spinning with the sword in her hand, she cut down every Sound ninja that dared to come within arm's length of her.

A man with pale skin and black hair suddenly dared to defy her blade. He grabbed the sword and yanked it out of her hand, a blade coming out of his own mouth. He plunged it into her chest. Ryu screamed, but was quickly smothered as she saw her mother hit the ground. The man with the pale skin pulled her mother up by her hair, her mother screaming curses as he did so.

"YOU DAMN SNAKE!! YOU MONSTER!! YOU VILE, COLD-BLOODED FREAK!! I HOPE YOU BURN IN HELL FOR ALL YOU'VE DONE!!" She howled with so much rage the other ninja took a few steps back from her.

Her eyes were burning a vehement purple.

The pale man looked at Ryu. She had started to cry in her terror. She was petrified for her mother. She didn't want her to die!!

"What a beautiful daughter you have, Shana," the pale man said. "She'll be a wonderful addition to my village."

"SHE'LL NEVER BE YOUR'S OROCHIMARU!! DO YOU HEAR ME?! NEVER!!" her mother screamed at the top of her lungs so whole world could hear her proclamation.

"We'll just see about that,"

Orochimaru took the sword in his hand, and turned it so he was holding it by the hilt. He held the sword up above her neck. Ryu stood frozen while the person with the china white skin and red eyes held her fast. She thought she felt his hands tremble. With what?

Her mother looked to her, her lips moving. Ryu couldn't hear her but she knew what she was saying.

"I love you."

The sword swung down. Ryu screamed.

"NOOOOOO-"

"-OOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!"

She screamed herself awake, terror griping her with a vice hold. She looked wildly around herself. Trees. Grass. She as in the forest still!! Those two-! Kabuto!!

She tried to move, but found herself tied to a tree. In a blind panic, she desperately pulled against the rope that tied her to it, panting with fear. She looked again about herself and shreiked when she suddenly saw Kabuto standing there.

"Well, I see that you're awake." he said.

"You bastard!!" she shouted at him. "What the hell do you want with me?!"

Kabuto faked a cringe. "Oof, such language. How old are you?"

"What's it matter to you?!"

A Sound ninja clothed in winter camoflage appared next to Kabuto, and whispered something in his ear.

"Good," he said. "So long as he gets here, that's the important thing."

The ninja disappeared, and the silver-haired ninja looked at her, a cruel smile spreading across his lips. Ryu's hands and legs suddenly ached with remembered pain. She tried not to whince; she was determined not to show any emotion besides rage in front of this scum. She looked around.

"Where's my cat?" she demanded. Kabuto waved to the forest.

"Somewhere. We left him where he was."

"Why you-!!" Ryu started to scream as many curses at him as she knew.

Kabuto turned around, not listening. He jumped into a tree, and pulled out a pair of binoculars. He looked into the distance, searching for the signals. He paused in his search when he saw a glimmer in the distance. He was coming.

He jumped down from the tree. The girl was still glaring daggers at him. Ryu was thinking like a mad woman. She had to think of a way to get out of these ropes without that boy noticing. She had to do it slowly too, and then quickly get away before he had the chance to use that crossbow strapped to his back.

It was obviously meant for her if she tried to fly away. She sighed inwardly as Kabuto took a seat right in front of her. He sat cross-legged against a tree, his dark eyes not moving from her. She had to concentrate. Focus.

Focus on the air around the rope so it could slowly heat and sharpen into small air blades. If only she knew how much time she had before whoever they were waiting for showed up.

Scores of birds took off into the sky. There were predators in the forest. Orochimaru moved with the ease of fluid as he walked among the trees. He had requested that he walk alone; he could take care of himself. Even if Kabuto hovered about him like a mother hen, he demanded his privacy when it came to matters like this.

He walked into a small glade and stopped.

"Well," he said with his liquid mercury voice. "This is quite a suprise."

Gaara stood on the other side of the glade, arms folded and a death glare on his face. He merely blinked at the statement, his light green eyes boring holes into the man.

"You," he said, his voice soft but with a line of steel in it. " will leave Ryu alone."

Orochimaru smirked, amused at the quiet demand.

"I'm sorry, but I can't oblige with that request. Now, if you excuse me, I have no use for you anymore, and I must keep an appointment." he said. He started to walk across the glade in a different direction.

A inverted whirlwind of sand, and Gaara stood in front of him again.

"If you will not leave her alone, I will kill you." he said, his voice toneless.

Orochimaru looked at him with disdain.

"Oh, is that all?"

He then sank knee deep into the ground suddenly and was then swarmed with crushing sand. The man grunted, trying to move. Gaara didn't even blink.

"I warned you," the red-head said.

To his surprise, Orochimaru laughed. The laugh echoed around him, foreboding and malicious. He grinned at him with fanged teeth.

"You're as much a fool as your father was!"

The man suddenly puffed up like a balloon, and exploded in a cloud of smoke. It started to rain snakes, Gaara shaking them off where they landed on him and crushing them with the sand when needed.

Damnit, he thought angrily. It was a clone!

Ryu ground her teeth as she concentrated on grating the wind against the ropes that tied her to the tree. She had to get out of here! It had nearly been half an hour since that ninja had come to talk to Kabuto, or so the shadows claimed. She continued to glower at the silver-haired boy as he stood across from her. He sighed.

"You could lighten up. You're not going to be eaten, you know." he said.

"I can be in any mood I want, four-eyes! You kidnapped me, remember?!" she snapped at him. She thought she felt the ropes slacken by just a milimeter.

She tried not to smirk. All she had to do was keep him occupied and he probably wouldn't notice. She saw him look back into the forest behind her him.

"Who the hek are you waiting for anyway?" she asked him. "This guy better be important for you to have dragged me in the middle of nowhere."

Kabuto smiled at her malisciously. "You'll find out soon enough."

Ryu smiled back, the Akihara grin laughing at him. "No, I won't!"

She sprang from the tree, the ropes cut in half and took off into the air as quickly as she could. Kabuto swiftly whipped the crossbow off his back and started to shoot at the girl. She laughed as she turned in the air, deflecting the arrows with her wind barrier and air control. It was so easy to dodge weapons when

It was easy to dodge things when you could direct where they went. This didn't seem to phase the young man at all as he kept methodically firing.

A blur of black and blue flew past her and she spun quickly only to see Sasuke put his fingers to his lips. A fireball was produced so quickly she couldn't dodge it. She shouted as the flames licked her body, losing her balance. She fell, trying to create a whirlwind as she did to cushion her fall. She hit the ground covered in fire like a phoenix, but blew it off once she got to the ground.

Kabuto leapt on her, the girl shouting in rage as he did. She gathered her chakra in her throat and screamed as loud as she could as Sasuke jumped in front of her. The sound echoed for miles. Kabuto shoved her head down into the ground, forcing her to swallow dirt. She growled as he pulled her back up, holding her arms behind her back.

Sasuke was wobbling uncertainly as he got up. She had blown him into a few tree branches with her scream. Kabuto rolled his eyes.

"This is exactly why he didn't want you to come," he told him, ignoring the struggling girl beneath him. "You'd be better off training at the village."

Sasuke could only glare at him, and Ryu felt Kabuto flinch.

"If I could hear what you were saying, I'd probably tell you to shut the hell up." the boy said louder then he usually talked. Ryu would of laughed if her mouth wasn't full of soil.

She spat the mud out and started to shout curses again, mostly directed at Kabuto. Her wind powers suddenly burst around her, Kabuto finding it hard to hold on to her. She started to fly up again, if not weighed down by the unwelcome passenger.

"If you think I'm just gonna stand here and wait around to be dragged back to that god-forsaken hell-hole of a village," she roared, her eyes turning a shade of yellow. "You and your damn leader have another thing coming!! I'd rather be dead then go back to that heartless bastard!!"

"Oh, Ryu, do you really hate me so?"

The mercury voice slid easily into the dark blonde's ears. She dropped to the ground, unable to move from shock. Kabuto couldn't stop her from shakily turning around to where the voice had come from. The pale man with the black hair stood there in flesh and... She didn't think he had blood.

Her lungs suddenly convulsed in panicked lurches. She couldn't breathe. Her hands and calves burned in supreme pain. She wanted to make some kind of sound, but her voice was frozen with fear. Pricks of ice traveled through her veins as she shook with terror. Her body was screaming in horror for her as she couldn't move.

The snake laughed quietly.

"The poor little dragon. She must have missed me."

He said this more to himself then anybody. He then turned his dagger eyes on Kabuto.

"What did I tell you about touching her?" he nearly snarled. "Hands off! Now!"

The silver haired boy immediately obeyed, letting go of her so quickly that his flesh slapped against his clothes. He then looked to Sasuke.

"Good lord, Sasuke, you look horrible! What did she do to you?" he said.

The boy went to open his mouth to refute that Ryu had done nothing to him, he wouldn't of allowed it, but Orochimaru waved him off. He then walked over to the shaking Ryu and bent down to look at her. He smiled, closing his eyes.

"Hello, Ryu," She flinched as he said her name with a sickeningly sweet voice. "It's been a while, hasn't it? Since I let you go that is..."

She squeezed her eyes tight, her eyelids hurting with the strain. She clapped her hands over her ears. She violently shook her head.

"N-n-no!!" She stumbled over the word then hung onto it with a feverent passion.

"Nononononononononnnonono!!"

She spoke so quickly it was like listening to a fast-forwarded tape-recorder. Orochimaru blinked, wondering what was going on. Ryu shook her head, her brain practically shutting down with terror.

"You're not here!!" she practically moaned. "You're not here!! You can't be here!! It's not possible!!"

She couldn't think. It was all just a stream of consciouness pouring out of her mouth. She couldn't think for the terror that seized her. All the memories had rushed forward in a horrifying rush and she could barely breathe because of it. It was overwhelming her senses and her body was acting with the simplest answer: denial.

"You're in that rotten stink-hole of your's doing who-knows-what to kidnapped chidren with kekkei genkai so you can get your greedy, dirty mitts on their jutsus and tear their familes apart and kill them and torture them and do whatever the hell occurs in that psycho mind of yours!! But there's no way you're here right now!! I'm probably dreaming!! I should be dreaming!! That's what always happens this time of year! I dream about what you did! What you did..."

Kabuto stood there, listening to it all. He hadn't been there when his master had kidnapped this child. What he done to her? She was practically having a mental breakdown at the very sight of him. He looked at Sasuke, who stood listening as well.

"Sasuke," he said, getting his attention. "I think it's time you get back to the others."

The boy hesitated, listening to Ryu as well. He couldn't get his eyes off her as he heard the snippets of maddened whispers that were coming out of her mouth as she described what he had done to her in the past.

"Sasuke," Orochimaru said, not looking at him but keeping his eyes on Ryu. He broke himself out of the foreboding trance. "Go to the other group. I want to have some alone time with our little lost dragon here."

He then looked up at Kabuto. "Once she realises I'm actually here that is."

Sasuke frowned then disappeared in a flash. The man turned back to the girl to try an convince her that he was real.