A/N: Some questions are answered in this chapter, but most of these answers just lead to more questions. Don't say I never give you anything. Let the speculations and fan theories begin!

Chapter 14: The Madam Arrives

Mia stumbled through the sparse undergrowth of the forest outside the entrance to the hideout. It seemed as though she had been running for ages, but she couldn't get far enough from that place and its eyeless inhabitants. And Ayaka… Mia had heard the older girl shout out for C to keep going without her. She had sacrificed herself so that she and C could escape.

C…

He had been the one to suggest that they split up. That they had a greater likelihood of escaping if they separated. Mia hadn't wanted to—she still didn't want to—but what he said made sense. And he was the reason why she had managed to escape at all. He and Ayaka both. Ayaka had delayed their captors long enough for Mia to reach the exit and C had remembered the hand seals needed to open the door to move the bed of rock that covered the hidden entrance. And then he had suggested that Mia run south, whilst he would make his way northeast.

And Mia hadn't hesitated. Because she knew that she could not afford to.

She pumped more of her chakra into her legs to wipe away the fatigue that was building up. She had no idea where she was going—but she based her trajectory on the direction that C had pointed her in. Hopefully, by running in a straight line she would eventually reach a town, or a camp or landmark.

Mia hurdled a fallen tree and skidded to a sudden halt, dirt spitting up in front og her.

A small shape was observing her from the middle of patch of the woods ahead of her clear of any shrubbery. Mia felt her heart speed up at the sight of… a puppy dog?

The dog held up a single paw, as if waving. "Hey," it said, its voice gravelly and deep and very undoglike.

Mia screamed.

I trembled as I was dragged roughly by the wrist down corridors; trying too keep myself together even though I felt like I was mentally splitting apart at the seams. My head was spinning, everything hurt (mostly my face) and blood was still dripping from my mouth, leaving a small, ominous trail in our wake as Shin dragged me further and further away from the exit.

Weirdly, the trail of blood reminded me of the story of Hansel and Gretel. I wondered if I would be able to follow my own trail of blood back to the exit, much like they had followed breadcrumbs back home. Or tried to, at least. Instead, much like Hansel and Gretel, I found myself about to confront a woman infinitely more sinister than simply being lost in the woods.

"Ayaka-san!" A familiar voice shouted as Shin dropped me to the floor and stepped away.

Tenzō hurried towards me, helping me sit up. His dark eyes were wide, whether it was with relief or worry, I couldn't tell. But his left eye was starting to swell and darken from where someone had hit him, and he limped on his leg awkwardly. The rest of the children were behind him, clustered together into a large huddle, unwilling to look at me. Unwilling to see that I had not been able to make it out of the compound to get help.

"You're hurt," I said, reaching out to touch his eye softly. He winced at the light touch but didn't move away. "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. This is all my fault."

Tenzō shook his head wildly. "No. This is their fault. They did this to me, not you." He trailed off. "Look what they did to you…"

Something tickled the inside of my head and I tried to focus on it, hoping it was the Hands. But it vanished as quickly as it had appeared.

"Where… where are we?" I asked, trying to twist my head around to see even though my entire world felt like it was already spinning.

"I don't know," Tenzō answered. "They brought all of us up here after you left. They said that the—"

"I see we have quite a few candidates today," a high, feminine voice said from behind us. I jumped in surprise at their proximity and my whole body throbbed painfully at the action. With some difficulty, I managed to turn around and look at the speaker.

A woman, clad in thick-voluminous blue robes, strode towards us, having entered through a pair of large stone doors on the opposite side of the room. They remained open behind her, showcasing a large bare stone chamber. A large Seal was written on the floor within it. The woman, meanwhile, moved towards us with a boneless, sinewy grace that was both lovely and unnerving. Every inch of her skin was covered within her blue robe and her head and face were covered in a thin, blue veil that showed the outline of a face, but betrayed none of her features to our scrutiny.

I knew who this was. There could be no doubt as the acolytes around the room all sensed their mistress and inclined their head in respect.

The Madam.

I was startled away from the Madam as another of her eyeless acolytes dragged something into the room from the same door that I had been dragged through. He harshly threw the body towards us, and it was only when the bundle had been laying there for almost a full ten seconds that my brain was able to comprehend what my eyes were seeing.

It was C.

They had caught up to him and beat him, almost as badly as Shin had beaten me. He lay prone and unmoving on the ground for so long that I grew concerned. Then fearful.

I crawled towards him, ignoring the aches of my body and Tenzō's quiet protests. I had to know if he was alive. If he were dead… that would be all my fault. I had made the plan that had caused this to happen. As I reached him, I pressed a trembling hand to his neck, checking for a pulse. I breathed out a sigh of relief.

Alive.

I looked around. Expecting them to bring Mia in too, but they didn't. No one else entered the room and hope blossomed unbidden in my chest.

"Yes, Madam-sama," Shin said, bowing to the blue-cloaked woman. "All the children here passed the preliminary test. They all have matching chakra signatures to the one you're looking for."

Preliminary test? I thought. Matching chakra signatures? What is he talking about?

"There is only one complete match, Shin," she said curtly. "But I must thank you for all the hard work you have put into finding these children." She reached out and stroked the top of his head like he were a dog. Shin lowered his head and accepted the touch with a look of eagerness.

"Sweet children," the blue-cloaked woman said, turning to face us. "Do not fear. I am the Madam. I will not harm you as long you do not disobey me or try to run. Do you understand?"

All the children – myself included – nodded vigorously in response.

"Excellent. Now I have a small test for you all. It's very simple. I just need you to touch a small rock for me and then you can leave," the Madam said. "How does that sound?"

"W-we can g-go home if we help you?" A boy of about ten years of age asked from the front of the main group of kids.

The Madam turned and fixed him with what I assumed was an appraising look. "Come here," she beckoned to the boy. "Come. Don't be shy."

The boy swallowed but approached the Madam.

"Shin, bring me the box with the charka stone in it," the Madam gestured with a lazy wave of her hand.

Shin moved towards her, holding a simple, waxed wooden box with a lacquered lid. He held it out to the Madam almost reverently.

A long, spindly hand reached out from within the Madam's robes and opened the lid. Blue light flooded out of the box from within and I covered my eyes as it began to pulse slightly, as if in time to a heartbeat.

It wasn't until I saw the look on Shin's face that I knew something was wrong. He was surprised. The Madam seemed frozen too, staring at the insides of the box. I couldn't see her face of course, but I somehow knew that she hadn't expected this.

"She's close…" I wasn't sure if the whisper was in my head or if someone had said it aloud until the Madam said it again. "She's close. So close…"

The ten-year-old boy in front of her backed away slightly, suddenly – and understandably – very nervous. The Madam's pale hand shot out and clasped around the boy's throat, pulling him closer to her as her other hand reached into the box and pulled out what seemed to be a chunk of quartz about the size of two of my fists. It glowed an unearthly blue in her hand.

"Is it you?" She hissed at the boy, suddenly the complete opposite of the properly spoken woman she had been a minute before. "Are you her?"

She pressed the quartz to his head, expecting something to happen and when nothing did, she threw the boy to the side with a sound of disgust. He scrambled to his feet and hurried to rejoin the group but was grabbed by a nearby guard and dragged to the other side of the room.

Meanwhile, it was as if a madness had overtaken the Madam as she whirled with inhuman speed towards us, pulling children out of our group and pressing the quartz against them before throwing them aside as well.

"She's here…" She muttered again and again under her breath. She was mad, I realised. Uncontrollably obsessed with finding whomever she was searching for. "She's here… So close… She's here…"

Goosebumps broke out over my skin as she approached, viciously ploughing through the children. Many cowered away from her and tried to run, but her acolytes were always there, stepping in to ensure that none of them got away.

Finally, she stood over the three of us—Tenzō, C and I.

I need to do something, I thought.

The Madam reached for me first, but Tenzō pushed between us, edging in front of me protectively.

"Stay away from us!" Tenzō yelled. His voice trembled as he said it, betraying his fear.

I need to do something.

The Madam said nothing. She was solely fixated on her task, which was pressing the rock against our skin. Her pale – almost clawed – hand snapped out and grabbed Tenzō by the hair, physically tearing him away from me.

Do something, you coward!

The look of terror and pain on his face opened something within me, making time seem as if it were slowing down. I found myself climbing to my feet, an unnerving and alien sense of calm settling over me. I wasn't sure where it came from but I was glad it was there. It made me feel braver than I actually was and I clung to that feeling of composure, hoping that it would get me through this. Whatever this was.

"Stop," I said weakly, unable to get enough air into my lungs.

Leaning over Tenzō like a spider about to devour its prey, the Madam paused, her veiled face turning slowly towards me. And suddenly she was before me, her movements as delicate, fluid and boneless as a dancer—beautiful but wrong.

"Who are you to command me?" The Madam said. She towered over me causing me to lean back slightly.

"Nobody." I gestured at all the kids around us. From the ones being physically restrained by her acolytes, to the ones cowering on the floor. "We are all nobodies. Please. Please just… let us go."

"'Nobodies'?" The Madam repeated, her voice a hiss of cool air in my face that made me shudder. "We shall see…"

She pressed the piece of quartz against the fevered skin of my arm and…

Nothing.

"See?" I said weakly, knees sagging in relief. "Nobody."

And then everything happened at once.

The quartz exploded in a blast of heat, knocking the Madam and I apart from each other at the same time as my world imploded. Chakra flooded into my body from where the quartz had been pressed against my skin, making me feel too hot and too cold at the same time. The world spun around me wildly, the floor tilting and the walls becoming a blur of grey as my eyesight faltered. The deluge of chakra inundated my chakra reserves, and I felt suddenly overwhelmed and bloated and… strange. Some subconscious part of my brain recognised that this wasn't foreign chakra invading my chakra system and tenketsu—it was mine.

Except that I had never stored my chakra in a piece of quartz. In fact, I didn't even know that that was possible.

My head swam as I stumbled backwards, feeling nauseous and positively dizzy with the mass of the chakra that I had just received. The walls seemed to spin further and further away. The sudden taste of bile and blood in my mouth made me want to be sick even as the walls folded in on themselves and—

I was in the familiar form of an adult, with blonde hair and a lab coat. 'Chelsea', my nametag read. A microscope sat in front of me and I looked through it to see how the epithelial tissue was responding to the drug I had treated it with.

The piece of epithelium twitched sporadically under my administrations. A researcher walked past with a dead mouse in a cage. He sighed as he picked up the mouse with a glove and placed it into a biohazard bag.

"Another failure?" I asked.

He nodded. "We'll need to repeat the experiment."

I nodded in agreement. There could be no discovery without experimentation and—

I was a red-haired boy, sitting on a pebbled beach, throwing rocks into the water. The tide washed over my feet as I glumly watched, not paying attention to the weather as it started to rain lightly.

I looked at my hand, wondering why I looked like this. Usually I was a girl. It felt like it should be weird to be a boy, but it wasn't. It was the body I had been born into, after all.

The elders said it was odd that I remembered so many of my past lives at the age of eight years. My past incarnations concurred. Normally, they only remembered the past life immediately prior to their own.

Staring out into the bleak horizon, I abstractly wondered if I would still be attracted to boys, or whether my body would be physically attracted to girls now. I was only physically eight years old, so I wouldn't know properly for a few years yet, but I suppose it would be interesting to see if sexual preference was influenced by genetic or psychological factors—

I was a young woman, with dark olive skin and black hair. And I looked at the white-haired man in front of me as he approached with half-lidded eyes.

I placed a hand on his chest. "We can't," I protested.

"I don't care about what my brother or your Village will say," he growled, pulling my hitai-ate embossed with the Kumogakure symbol off of my forehead and onto the ground. He pulled me closer and I couldn't stop staring into his red, red eyes.

"You know that it's not just them," I said gently, heart thumping wildly at his proximity. "You know that he won't ever let me go. Won't ever let me be with someone else."

"Let him come," he said. "We can beat him. Together."

And as he drew me forward into a kiss, I allowed myself to believe. Believe that this was real. That I could end the constant cycle of suffering that had—

I must have blacked out because next thing I knew, I was on the ground, the Madam leaning over me, stroking my hair with long, sharp, cold fingers. Her grip tightened painfully on my scalp as I tried to get up.

"Shhhhhh," she hushed softly, resuming her stroking of my head. "Stay down, or I will tear out your soft, pretty hair, Kyūna." Her mild manner suddenly took a darker tone. "Kyūna. I've found you at last… He will be so pleased to see that I have found you."

"'He'?" I rasped quietly, my voice husky from disuse. How long had I been unconscious? I thought it mere moments, but my body somehow told me it had been much longer. We were still in the same room as earlier but the other kids were no longer here. Where were they? Were they okay? Would the Madam keep her word and allow them to leave?

"Your master."

"I… don't have… a master."

The Madam laughed, it was a harsh, grating sound that made me twitch and want to clasp my hands over my ears. "You said that too," she said. "When you were Kyūna. You were so much more troublesome back then, and that's saying something since you did try to burn my servants' face off… and with a smokebomb no less! It was why you had to die."

"D-die?" I echoed, my mind trying to make sense of what the Madam was saying. What did she mean? She was insane… right? She must have confused me with somebody else.

The Madam chuckled. "That's right. I watched as he ripped your heart right out of your chest and slit your throat for good measure. And then when you returned as a boy—well, I got a little carried away before the master arrived… I forget how fragile children can be sometimes." Her nails dragged deeply over my scalp, making me wince. "But don't worry, my dear Kyūna. I remember just how fragile you are. How deliciously breakable."

My heart was beating wildly in my chest and I was grateful for the distraction as I heard someone approach. It was short-lived, however, as I listened to what the acolyte said.

"We have transported the children to Orochimaru's laboratory, my Lady," the acolyte said, bowing.

"Good. All of them?"

"All but one, my Lady. The blonde boy that tried to escape was beaten so badly that Lord Orochimaru didn't want him. He claimed that the boy wasn't a 'viable test subject'," the acolyte reported. "We've put the boy in a cell until you provide us with further instructions."

The blonde boy? Was it C? It had to be C. He was the only one that had been beaten worse than I had been.

And they mentioned Orochimaru—

Shit.

This was how it happened. The laboratory experiments. I remembered that much from the anime. I had always wondered how he had managed to steal so many kids away from their homes without anybody noticing or connecting it back to Orochimaru. It was because the Madam had been collecting them herself and giving the rejects to Orochimaru. By giving the children to Orochimaru, the Madam eliminated the issue of having to kill children and hide the bodies, whilst Orochimaru gained test subjects to experiment on.

This was all my fault. They were taken because of me… All of them. Tenzō…

Tenzō…

Wait, wasn't that the alternative name of Yamato? The future leader of Team Kakashi after… something. My mind was fuzzy with the details. Damned stupid memory. Why hadn't I realised sooner? I could have done something—could have—

This was supposed to happen, a small voice said. No matter what. Tenzō is obtained by Orochimaru and gets Wood-release and survives to do better things.

Except, I couldn't believe that. I couldn't just abandon a young boy to suffer sadistic experiments at the hands of that snake. I couldn't remember much about what went on in Orochimaru's laboratory but I did know it had something to do with the First Hokage's DNA, and that the experiments conducted were inhumane.

I closed my eyes. Right, I thought. I know. I have my own problems.

"And the preparations?" The Madam inquired mildly, her hand patting me like my head was a cat sitting in her lap.

"The Seals have been restored and are ready for use, my lady."

"Excellent. Go now. We will begin shortly."

The acolyte bowed again, then left.

"I've sent word to your master that I've found you. He will be so pleased," the Madam said, her nails digging into my scalp mid-stroke. "Did you know that he gave this temple over to us? Killed all the priests and priestesses inside it and handed the place over to us… They used to worship some sort of a messiah. A supposed god or goddess among us regular mortals, who would die—but wouldn't stay dead. Did you know that? Of course you didn't. Because 'you don't remember'," she said mockingly.

A sudden chill fell over me and I wondered what she was getting at by telling me this. There were so many things that I didn't understand. Gods and goddesses? Not being able to die? A 'master'? Was he a master of me? What did that even mean? Why did he want me captured?

"I-I don't remember."

"Oh but you will, my darling Kyūna."

"My… my name isn't Kyūna…" I said weakly, my voice coming out breathy and weak.

"Oh my… You really don't remember do you?" The Madam chuckled. "How could I have known? You remembered me the last time we met. Perhaps you don't remember because you're still so young at the moment… Still so naïve…"

"I don't know what you're talking about…" I began, but the Madam hushed me silent.

"Hush now, my dear. That's why I'm here. To help you remember. Or rather… to make you remember." Her veil shifted slightly over her face as she leaned over me and I caught sight of something. Just a quick glimpse before the veil obscured my view again. I wasn't sure what it was, but it was something that did not belong to a human face. It was a ruined face.

"You didn't actually think that you were reincarnated by accident, do you?"

The Madam laughed as I glanced at her sharply, my body twitching, not sure that I had believed my own ears. Had she just said…? How did she know about my past life?

"You do think that!" The Madam exclaimed, delighted. "Wonderful! Allow me to enlighten you, because it seems that your memory is failing you. You have lived many lifetimes, trapped in a constant cycle of death and rebirth since before written history—and your master has stalked you in each life."

How could she…? How could I…? This was… impossible, right? Insane? But perhaps the idea wasn't as outlandish as it first appeared. I had already reincarnated once, after all. And I was already gradually losing my memories of my life as Chelsea. Who's not to say that I couldn't have reincarnated before Chelsea? That I might have lived previous lives? That as I grew older and made new memories, that they replaced the old ones until I forgot my past life entirely?

Did it make sense? No.

But did it also make sense? Yes.

"I… I don't… How could you know that?"

"Because I know more about you than you do yourself," the Madam said, pushing me off her lap so suddenly that I hit the floor hard enough to make my brain rattle around inside my skull. She rose to her feet with a single swift, sinewy, boneless movement. "But that's why I'm here. To make you remember."

I sat up slowly. What was left of my brain was still swirling around inside my brain. I felt the walls closing in around me and I couldn't breath properly.

"Remember what?! I don't know what you want from me!"

"You did something when you were alive as Kyūna. You stole something from you master," the Madam said, tilting her head to the side. "He wants to know where it is. Where you put it. And he's willing to let me tear you to pieces again once I have the information from you. You have angered him immeasurably."

Tear me to pieces… again?

"Who is 'he'? How does he know me?" I asked, desperate. Maybe if I knew who he was, I would get answers. I would know what he wanted and I could construct a deal to make him and the Madam leave me alone. Forever.

"Oh he's known you for a very long time, apparently. Your fates have been intertwined for centuries," she said. Reaching down, she grabbed a fistful of my hair and forced me to my feet. "You are his, now and forever. His to toy with. His to hunt. His to kill. And he has killed you many, many times, throwing you into the depths of death and waiting for you to swim back to shore to him."

"But why me?" I gasped out, tears blurring my vision as my scalp screamed in protest as the Madam pulled, forcing me to move. "Why me?"

"Because you are his obsession. His soul mate. Not even death can keep you apart."

His soul mate?

"Now," the Madam said, pushing me towards the doors—her grip painful and unbreakable. "I've given you answers. I believe it's time for you to give us answers."

Kakashi, Sakumo and the rest of the squad from Konoha arrived shortly after the screaming began, finding a five-year-old girl with short dark hair screaming her lungs out at the sight of Pakkun, who was trying to calm the girl down in his own unique way.

"Feel my paws! Stop screaming and feel my paws! They're really soft…"

Sakumo jumped, twisted mid-air and landed behind the girl before she could blink, clasping a hand over her mouth and muffling the scream. Kakashi looked on with some relief as the screaming stopped, probably more from surprise than anything else.

The echoes of her scream bounced off of the trees around them and Kakashi scanned their surroundings, expecting more hostiles to jump out at them. None did.

"Stay quiet," Sakumo said restraining the girl with his other arm as she began to struggle. "We are not here to hurt you."

The girl stopped struggling.

"If I take my hand off of your mouth will you promise not to scream again?" Sakumo asked.

She nodded quickly, eyes wide. Kakashi watched as his father released the girl and pushed the girl away slightly. She stumbled but retained her balance. She looks so thin, Kakashi thought. A strong breeze could snap her in two.

"I-I need help—they took us—I escaped—need to help us!" The girl began rambling quickly, not able to get the words out fast enough.

"Woah, woah! Slow down, girl," Chōza said, holding his hands out in a placating gesture.

"I…I…"

"Take a deep breath," Inoichi said, approaching the tiny girl and kneeling down in front of her. He had a warm smile plastered on his place. "Start from the beginning."

The girl took a deep breath and Kakashi rolled his eyes. This was a waste of time. Inoichi should just dive into her mind and take a look at her mind himself. It would be so much faster.

"I… I'm from Kirigakure…" she said, staring up at the Konoha-nin with some small amount of fear. "I was k-kidnapped and brought to an underground… place. By someone called the Madam. There was a whole bunch of other kids with me there too! Y-you have to help them!"

"We are looking for a friend of ours," Sakumo said, squatting down next to the girl. "Her name is Ayaka Yūhi. Do you know her?"

The little girl's eyes widened even further if that was possible. "Ayaka-san… she helped me escape!"

"What happened to her?" Guy asked from where he was hanging upside-down from a tree branch above the girl. The girl jumped at his apparent sudden appearance.

"S-she didn't make it out…" the girl said. "She nearly did, but I think someone w-was catching up to us, so she stayed back to keep them distracted so we could escape…"

"We?" Shikaku asked.

"C and I," the girl explained, swallowing audibly. "I'm not sure if he made it out. I hope so. But he might have been caught too."

"Where is Ayaka now?" Sakumo asked and Kakashi rolled his eyes again. All he cared about was saving the girl. He didn't want to ask how many enemy combatants they might encounter. Or what the layout of their base was. He just wanted to have his hero moment.

"S-she must still be in the base."

"C-can you take us there?"

The girl physically trembled at the question. "N-no! I can't go back there! I need to get as far away as possible!"

"You should touch my paws. They're really soft," Pakkun said, approaching the girl, his tail wagging.

"Not now, Pakkun!" Sakumo scolded.

"I was just trying to calm her down…" the pug grumbled, making a face.

"Ayaka-san helped you escape, didn't she?" Inoichi asked gently.

"Y-yes…"

"Then shouldn't you help her escape? And all the other kids?"

"I-I guess but… but if they catch me… I—they can't catch me—"

"What's your name?" Sakumo asked, kneeling down beside Inoichi and the girl.

"M-Mia…"

"I need you to be brave, Mia. Ayaka needs you to be brave," Sakumo said. "We promise to keep you far away from the violence. We just need you to take us to where they are being held. After that, Pakkun here can escort you back home, or at least to the coast where you can meet up with another team from Kirigakure so you can go home."

Mia bit her lip but nodded. "Okay."

They all stood up and prepared to move out. Finally, Kakashi thought. They were finally making some actual progress.

A/N: Past lives? Soft paws? A mysterious woman with a deformed face? This chapter had it all, didn't it? Haha. I'd really like to hear what you think! Please review.