Kyoko's mother had often told her that the night she was born was both the best and worst night of her life. It was the best because Kyoko had been born and her mother had always wanted a daughter. It was the worst because it was in the middle of a power outage during a typhoon. Labor had been hard on her mother, and they almost didn't make it, but they did.
After that night, Kyoko's life had been easy. She was well cared for and loved by both of her parents. Her life had been so easy, that the worst night of her life was the night she was born, and she didn't even remember it.
But life has a funny way of keeping you humble.
The last thing she could remember clearly was her own face. Which, in hindsight seems like a pretty vain and useless memory.
She had just finished her first year of university and had come home for a visit. She wasn't the only one, most of the people she'd grown up with had come home before their second year started. This included, of course, her childhood best friend Toshiro.
When Toshiro suggested they go to a party to celebrate the end of a successful year, she hadn't thought twice about it. She'd studied so hard this past year; didn't she deserve a little fun? She could remember the blur of getting ready and driving over with Toshiro. She could vaguely remember some small talk and the first drink or two. And then… she was dizzy, she remembered being a little lightheaded. She excused herself to use the bathroom... washed her hands... checked her makeup… With clarity, she could remember inspecting herself in the mirror. Her hair was as dark as it had ever been with eyes to match. She looked a little tired and her eyes were a little glassy, but overall, she was a pretty girl that took after her mother.
That was her last coherent thought, how pretty she was and how much she looked like her mother.
Kyoko was sure she must have grabbed the handle to the door and left back to the party, but she couldn't remember it. It was as if her memories were buried under a thick gray fog after that point.
Because at this precise moment, all she knew was excruciating pain.
Before Kyoko had even opened her eyes, all she could register was pain. Her body ached in ways it had never ached before, but it was nothing compared to the brutal aching in her hands. There were no good words to describe it, it just hurt. She had never broken a bone before, but she was pretty sure it felt a lot like this. All she could feel was a white-hot pain and the moment she opened her eyes the tears sprang forth.
Thick leather straps bound her wrists to the arms of the chair, and she didn't have to look to know the same straps were around her legs. She could feel them digging in, too tight against her skin and she was quite sure her toes were numb. Or maybe the pain in her hands was too great to feel them, she couldn't really tell.
The skin on her hands was angry and raw, and she choked on sobs as she saw the fingers twisted in unnatural directions. She swore there was a fingernail missing from one of the fingers on her left hand. A wailing cry ripped from her throat, and she felt sick as she sobbed in despair.
"I thought you said she was dead?!"
"She was!"
Kyoko whipped her head away from her hands to stare at the men in the room she hadn't noticed. She'd been so consumed with the pain to even try to look where she was. She couldn't even think, she just started begging. "Please, please let me go. Please."
The tallest of the two men, a blonde with sweeping bangs covering half his face, sneered at her. "Seriously? What kind of self-respecting member of ANBU begs for their life?"
She pulled against the straps fruitlessly, "Please, I won't tell anyone. Please!" The tears just kept coming as kept pulling against the straps, hoping that maybe they would let her go from… wherever this place was.
The walls were dark and reminded her of an unfinished basement, with the wet smell of mildew to match it. The party had been at a house she'd gone to several times throughout high school, and she had never seen a basement there. There was no way she was still at the house, but maybe somewhere on the property? It did border a dense forest, maybe whoever these men were had taken her to a neighboring property? But when? How had they gotten here? She had just been in the bathroom, hadn't she? Did she blackout? Her thoughts were desperate and chaotic, full of questions she couldn't answer.
She couldn't remember.
The blonde man turned and stared accusingly at the other. "You said she was dead. You said that poison worked within a minute."
"It does. It did. She was dead, her heart stopped," the shorter man responded gruffly.
The two men looked so… odd. That was the only word she could think of, though Kyoko couldn't think much beyond the painful heat radiating from her hands. She gave up on tugging at her bindings because it only hurt, and they weren't giving way any time soon. The pain was radiating out and she could feel the bile rising in her throat. Had they kidnapped her? But why? Her clothes were still mostly intact so they couldn't they probably didn't…
Except these weren't her clothes.
Her heart raced even faster, and even more, tears started falling. Kyoko didn't think she'd ever cried this much. "Please," she begged, "I won't tell anyone. I won't call the police, just let me go home." She could hear the hysteria in her voice and could feel the desperate panic closing her in. They were the only things she could feel besides the pain.
"Would you shut up," the blonde snapped at her. "There is no way in hell we are sending you back to Konoha."
Konoha? Maybe that was a smaller village further out in the country? Maybe they had confused her with someone else? Maybe, she could convince them? Or maybe the pain and the panic were blocking out all rational thought and any memory of how she got here. "Please, please, you've got the wrong person! I don't even know where that is! I live west of Tokyo, please, you've got the wrong girl."
"Are you fucking kidding me? You're wearing a damn Konoha headband, yeah! I don't know what you're playing at, but this isn't going to work."
The shorter man moved forward, she wondered briefly if he was as short as he looked or if it was just the fact that he was hunched forward. As he moved, she noticed a… well she wasn't sure what it was, but it looked like a giant metal tail. It looked like something from one of those American superhero flicks. Were they cosplayers in a gang? Did cosplay gangs exist? If it was cosplay, she had no idea what they were cosplaying, but they were wearing the same black cloaks decorated with red clouds. It had to be a gang, right? Maybe they were after money?
As the man came towards her, she fought against the bindings holding her again, "Please! These aren't even my clothes! I don't why you did this, but I swear I won't tell." Was this working? The blonde one had clearly had enough of her, he was only seconds from killing her and he wasn't making a secret of it. But maybe, the other one? His face was half covered by a bandana but maybe he would listen, maybe he would see reason. "Please, my parents have a savings account, they'll give it to you! Just call them! My cellphone was in my pocket! It must still be there! They'll give you what you want, just let me go!"
He was right in front of her, just a few inches away and he just… stared at her. She couldn't even guess what he was thinking. "Please," she whispered. "I just want to see my parents again, please."
"What is your name." He said it flatly, more of a statement than an actual question.
"Kyoko Nishikawa." She tried not to hope but the steady stream of tears pouring down her cheeks eased just a bit.
"Where were you born."
"Tokyo."
"Where is Tokyo."
Where is Tokyo? Any semblance of hope was clearly misplaced. He was screwing with her, this was just a game before they continued their torture. She hoped they'd just kill her.
He moved so quickly that she didn't even know what he did until she felt the pain in her hand climb to new heights. It felt like he'd broken another finger. It had never occurred to her that something could hurt quite so badly. She felt the bile rising again and her body jerked forward. She retched in her lap before she could stop herself. It's not as if she could move enough to get sick anywhere else anyways.
"Where is Tokyo." His voice was angrier than it had been, impatient.
"Japan! Tokyo is a city in Japan!" She gasped out, her throat and nostrils burned, and tears continued to pour down her face with renewed fervor.
"Where is Japan."
He was insane. This was insane. Torture combined with, what, a geography quiz? Was she going to die reciting all the regions of Japan? Or maybe all the countries and their major cities? Why not just, kill her?
"It's a country in the Pacific." No matter how insane this was, she learned her lesson the first time. Maybe, if she just… answered, then he'd get it over without any more torture. She knew it was a foolish hope.
"Get out a map, Deidara."
The blonde man threw his hands up in outrage, "You've got to be kidding me. She's making shit up, yeah! Your poison didn't work and now you want to entertain this? She's either doing a piss poor job of manipulating us or the poison is rotting her brain instead of killing her!"
The man never even looked away from her as the strange metal tail whipped around and was directly in front of the blonde's face. "Get out the map, Deidara."
Deidara grumbled and stomped his way to a bag hanging on the far wall, muttering under his breath about impatient puppet men.
Her eyes darted desperately around the room, looking for a door, a window, anything. There was nothing, if there was a door it must be behind her, probably to keep in check any fantasies of escaping. She could feel a mix of panic and desperation rising up and she imagined this is what being a caged animal must feel like. She had no idea how she was going to convince these psychos to let her go and if she couldn't convince these men to let her go, she was going to die here.
Deidara shoved a map roughly in her face. "Here. A map. Go ahead, tell us where your make-believe country is."
Her eyes had trouble adjusting to the bright colors in shapes she didn't recognize. What kind of map was this? She couldn't recognize anything on the map. Not the shapes, not the names of the countries. No bodies of water. Nothing. Not a single landmark was familiar to her.
This was the most elaborate form of torture.
"It's… I don't recognize that map. I don't see Japan." She could barely whisper the words. This wasn't an answer they wanted to hear.
The blonde turned smugly to his partner, "See, Sasori? She's making shit up. Probably trying to buy time hoping someone shows up."
Sasori's eyes narrowed at her, and she wasn't sure if it was in anger or suspicion or both.
"Send a message to Leader."
A/N: So this is going to be INCREDIBLY self-indulgent. I wouldn't call this a self-insert because this isn't in any way how I'd categorize myself at all. I've always loved the idea of inserting a character I made up in my head into a world I loved and just having fun with it. Now that Isekai has gotten popular, I think I have a better idea of how to make the mechanics of it without the story being too horrible. It's still gonna be pretty self-indulgent though.
Every time I read this type of fic though, the people KNOW they're in that universe and that seems so boring to me, no offense at all, just not my vibe. Like I want someone to be so confused not only on how the fuck did this happen but like where am I who are you. Anyways, read this or don't. I've got a general idea of how I want this to go with no real specifics on how to get there.
Anyways, this first chapter is very short and mostly, sets the stage I guess? Have fun. Or don't. This is mostly for me.
Edit: Now that I've slept, I combined some things and ran it through some spelling and grammar checking.