Me: OK, HERE'S THE NEXT ONE!
Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto, only the remaining members of the Kimochi clan.=) They kick ass.
Chapter Three
Kenisha was pacing around TenTen's bedroom, waiting for the bun-wearing kunoichi to get back up with whatever surprise she'd bring her. TenTen's bedroom was painted light brown with bamboo all over, and in the morning light it looked like Kenisha was in a bamboo forest. 'Where is she?' The door opened and TenTen came in with a gallon of chocolate cookie dough ice cream, two spoons and a smile.
"Yay!" Kenisha's eyes got glittery as TenTen handed her a spoon. After a couple spoonfuls, Kenisha stopped eating and got brain freeze. "It's chilling my brain and any brain cells I have left!!"
TenTen laughed. "So, do you like it?" Kenisha nodded, holding her head in pain. TenTen put a hand on Kenisha's forehead and Kenisha stopped rolling in the ground.
"Whoa, thanks TenTen. How do you do that?" Kenisha said, picking the spoon back up and putting it in her mouth like a 5 year old. Her wounds had healed nicely so all she had were faint scars on her arms from where her burns were.
"It's a secret; just like the fact that Lee thinks you're cute."
Kenisha choked on her ice cream until it melted down her throat. "He thinks WHAT?!" An embarassed blush crept to her cheeks. "What would my mom say..." TenTen shook her head. 'This kid...'
"You need to tell me about this dude, TenTen." Kenisha was in her face. TenTen shoved her onto the bed.
"Jeez, why are you asking?" she asked suspiciously.
"Because if the dude who saved my life thinks I'm cute then he could've done more than just give me CPR up there!" TenTen gasped.
"Lee would never do that!! You need to lighten up and take it from someone who has known him for 6 years!!" TenTen looked offended that she'd even think such a thing and Kenisha faltered and hugged herself, looking down at her bare feet.
"I'm sorry, I shouldn't have assumed. I guess that losing my family's changed me a little bit, cuz I never used to act like this…all the time, anyway. My older brother James used to calm me down all the time when I got hyper…" TenTen's expression softened.
"I guess that makes two of us. I don't have a family either; my parents died in a war a while back. They used to calm me down too…" There was an awkward silence until Kenisha spoke up.
"So…am I going to have to be a kunoichi for you guys now? I already know a lot of water-based jutsu, and I'm a pretty decent fighter and all. I just thought since I'll be here from now until some other time I should work for you guys; especially since I did a lot of damage to your monument." TenTen nodded and smiled.
"Yeah, I guess you're right; you really did break off a bunch of the monument, and we're running low on capable ninja nowadays...Okay, I guess we can talk Tsunade-sama into it."
"Yay!! I'm gonna be a Leaf kunoichi now! Yay!!" Kenisha was hopping around the room until TenTen growled and took out a kunai.
"Stop running around!" She threw it and it pinned Kenisha's shirt to the wall. Kenisha gasped and squirmed in delight.
"Your aim is awesome!! If Emily tried that, she'd have killed me!"
"Who's Emily?" TenTen asked.
"Well, Emily is my cousin, and she's twins with Katie. They're two of the people that survived. The only other one is Hermione, and she was good at everything."
"So you four... you're the only ones, then?"
Kenisha nodded sadly. "Mhm.... Guess I never really thought about how much I'd miss them until they were gone..." TenTen nodded with her.
"You try not to think about it, but you can't avoid it: It's how life is here, in the world of Shinobi and Kunoichi. You just have to grit and bear it when the time comes. Some people, like me and you, try to live on the best we can, respecting their memory. And then there's people like Sasuke, who wants to kill his older brother Itachi, because he massacred the Uchiha clan--"
"-Yeah, but I want to kill the Tsuchikage too-"
"And then there's people like Neji, and he just let his heart freeze over, becoming unemotional, cold, distant, and most of all uncaring. That is, until Naruto changed him. He helped change Sasuke too, and now they're doing fine. I'm even with--" She stopped herself and blushed faintly. Kenisha didn't catch this, for she had went back to the ice cream again.
TenTen sighed. 'Thank God she didn't find out...'
"Hey Temari, why do you have that fan on your back all the time?"
"It's my weapon," Temari replied and went back to polishing her fan. Emily raised an eyebrow.
"So you're a wind user?" Temari nodded.
"Very good, Emily! That was smart," Katie said with sarcasm.
"I'm going to ignore that. Now I see, that's why you act like Hermione all the time," Emily yelled. Katie covered her ears and sighed.
"Damn twin..."
Temari was finished polishing so she put the fan back on her back. "So, how is it used," Katie asked, eager to do something other than lay in bed all day. Temari's face looked wary.
"First, may I ask why you're so interested in knowing about me?"
"Because I'm bored and you're the only other person in this room apart from me who's sane, so continue."
"Hey," Emily yelled. She was ignored.
"Well, I first focus my chakra into the fan, and then swing it, creating a blast of wind. Then using the chakra in the fan, I can make the wind razor sharp and slice people with it: thus creating the Wind Scythe jutsu." Emily applauded her.
"Emily, stop," Katie said with a sigh.
"Fine, lil' miss I'm-so-f*cking-awesome-I-can-tell-Emily-to-shut-up," Emily said, sticking her tongue out and throwing a pillow at Katie. Her twin caught it and sighed.
"Emily-nee, what have I told you about your rash mouth?"
"Nice catch, Itachi! Can I play with her?"
"No, Sasori. She is going to be my new partner, so you will not make her one of your sick puppets." Sasori sighed.
"Does no one see that my puppetry is art?" He stalked away, mumbling to himself. Itachi then continued to his quarters in the Akatsuki base, hoisting Hermione back on his shoulder from her place on his arm. After a couple minutes, he reached his quarters and opened the door.
He threw Hermione on his bed, thus waking her up. She got a good look at her surroundings and growled. "What the hell--where the hell did you take me, you bastard?!" She tried sitting up, but her body wouldn't let her; she was out of Chakra.
"You are in my living quarters; soon to be ours."
Hermione's eyes widened. "Uh-uh, HELL NO!! I am not living here with you; you may be hot, but I'm not ready to live a life of servitude to you or the Akatsuki!!" Itachi sucked his teeth.
"Tsk, tsk, Hermione-chan. I thought you would at least see reason. Now I must force you." Hermione's gaze never left Itachi's as he repositioned himself in front of her.
'What the fuck is he going to do now,' she thought.
"Mangekyo Sharingan!!"
His eyes turned blood red and had crossing symbols in them. When she saw them, her mind went blank and she fell into a pit of darkness. She was reliving the attack on her village all over again: the flames, the upturned houses, the screams of the villagers.
She couldn't believe it. She shook her head and shut her eyes tight, trying to get the image out of her mind. She opened, and it was still there.
She was re-living the Kimochi Massacre.
"You will be in this world for 4 days."
"No...no, this can't be! Where are you, Itachi?!" He chuckled, and Hermione followed the sound and witnessed her mother and father getting slaughtered by Iwa shinobi, then get their bodies crushed by earth. She held back tears and ran around, trying to find a way out. Her family was being killed left and right, blood getting on her clothes and their screams and gurgled cries of pain in her ears. She jumped onto the burning buildings and searched again for an exit.
There was none in sight. She screamed into the sky,"Damn you, YOU F*CKING BASTARD! GET ME OUT OF HERE!"
Then the world warped and she fell to the ground. She was now at the instant when they fought the Tsuchikage. Hermione tried to tell Kenisha to stop fighting, to come to her, but she didn't seem to hear her. She just kept slashing at the old man with her katanas, only to find him above her, crushing her with the earth, until she ran away, biting her lip. Her tears were running down her face, because behind him were the almost unrecognizable bodies of her mother and father.
"Kenisha, get your ass over here right now! Do you hear me?!" A blast of fire swelled inches away from her and she spun to see who it was from. She saw Katie and Emily fighting side by side, throwing flaming rocks at the old man, who just dodged them like they were throwing peanuts at him. Hermione ran toward Katie and Emily and tried to hold onto them. They faded away. The scenario warped again, this time to the time of the explosion.
"Now, by my hands, the Kimochi clan will be destroyed," she heard the Tsuchikage screech into the night.
"No you fools, don't go toward him!!" Her cries went unanswered as her cousins closed in on the one who took everything away the next instant. The flash left her blinded as she was flung back, scraping against the ground. She lifted her head, and instead of finding an empty crater as she had in the actual event, she saw the three charred bodies of her cousins and the Tsuchikage standing above her.
"You're next, pretty one..."
"NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!"
Hermione's eyes shot open; she was sweating all over, her salty tears leaving sticky trails her cheeks..
"Three seconds," she heard Itachi say from somewhere beside her.
"What," she asked in a raspy voice. Her mouth was dry from screaming so much.
"What you just lived through was three seconds to me. But to you, it was an eternity, wasn't it?" She stiffened.
'How does he know that?'
"You need to choose: Join the Akatsuki or experience the same pain until you do, which will slowly escalate until you go insane. What will you choose?" Hermione's eyes watered up and tears began to fall down her face. The images of the attack were burned into her mind. The thought of losing it all again, and reliving it... Then she thought of what would happen if she joined. He would stop. And then, eventually, she would find a way out and find her cousins. She weighed the two choices and decided joining was best.
Now time to sap it up.
"Alright, I'll join you. Just no more...no more pain." Hermione cried even harder, though this time it was fake. Itachi smiled, immediately seeing through it, but not letting on.
"Good choice. I'll give you the antidote for the pain now." He put a bottle to her lips and she drank from it. The liquid inside tasted sweet and seared down her throat. She felt her Chakra regenerating inside her body and ease her tired limbs.
"Thank you, Itachi-kun," she muttered, though it sounded strained. Itachi smirked.
"Itachi-kun? I like that. You're even better than I thought." His expression softened. "You probably need some comfort." Itachi held Hermione as she began crying again, but Hermione was actually faking. Her mother had always said that she was a beautiful actor...
"I--can't- 'sniff'-thank you any more for sparing me, Itachi-kun!" Again with the "Itachi-kun". Maybe it was just an effort to keep from getting hurt again, but he didn't care. He was being shown an honorific of affection and that was enough for him.
"Shh, shh, you'll be fine. You won't cry anymore when I'm here." The two sat there in silence until darkness fell on the outside world. But to Hermione felt like the sun was shining. Not only was she going to see her cousins, but with the way he was treating her, she'd have a precious person coming with her.
She'd just have to act through the organization first.
Me: Oh. My. God. Is she falling for him?
TenTen: I don't know, but this is getting good!!
Emily: Why is Hermione hugging Itachi?
Me: You're supposed to be in the Sand Village!!
Emily: Fine, don't greet me with open arms. I'm leaving!
Katie: You did it now.
TenTen and Me: JUST GO!!