A/N: This has not been abandoned, we actually have a full outline for this thing now and I just had to deal with my depression. We are back in therapy, on new meds, and it's definitely helping the depression. Still have INTENSE anxiety, but if I can only treat one rn, the depression was def more serious.

ALSO. I HATE OUTLINES. Hate them, hate writing them, and I still am incapable of doing it properly, but this story officially has a written-out outline instead of just existing in my brain. This thing is gonna be a BEAST. When I first came up with this idea, I was like, ha it'll be like 25, 30 chapters TOPS. It's definitely 50 chapters, give or take. The outline has definitely helped, it helped me realize the chapter I was writing was super filler, and literally nothing interesting was happening. That being send the next bit is important.

IMPORTANT!: This is gonna get moved to an M rating, not for this chapter, but for the next chapter. I was trying to avoid it with some of the topics coming up, because I didn't know how specific/graphic it was gonna be. It still won't be, in my opinion, but it could be triggering! I'll also put a trigger warning for it at the end of this chapter before so people know exactly what they are getting into before they go to the next chapter, in case you skipped this. I'll also trigger a warning around the actual scene itself for those that want to skip. More details about it at the bottom, because this is getting too long. I just really want to address any potential concerns.

Chapter Eleven

There were hands everywhere, touching, grasping, clawing at her in the darkness. Kyoko could feel them, it was the only thing she could feel besides cold. She was so cold as if she had lain down in a snowbank for a nap. The hands were cold too and they were grabbing at her, holding her down while she kicked and screamed. She cried out, desperate, and felt the hands wrap around her throat and suddenly she couldn't breathe. She kicked and punched wildly, hoping to hit something but was met with nothing. The hands got tighter around her throat, and she couldn't scream anymore, couldn't breathe and she was dying and –

And she woke up feeling cold and clammy, a scream dying on her lips. It was dark, too dark and she was tangled in the blankets. She still felt panicked from the nightmare, and she couldn't think clearly, couldn't realize that it had only been a nightmare and she was safe. It was only when the lightning from the storms that never seemed to end filled the room with light that she could feel herself calming, remembering where she was. There was no one in this room with her. She was safe.

Well… maybe safe was the wrong word because she was still here at Akatsuki but… no one was trying to kill her at this very moment.

Kyoko finally managed to kick off the blankets and tugged at the collar of her shirt, it was that ridiculous sleeveless turtleneck again and it must have been the reason she felt like she'd been choking. It must have been. It had to be. There was no one there and she had never been choked before and so it must have been the reason she dreamed it. It had to be. Didn't it?

In the nightmare… she'd felt like… she'd felt like she was dying, and she hoped it was just this body. That this body remembered kicking and fighting and dying and that it wasn't her subconscious. It made her feel sick, to hope that this girl had suffered just so she wouldn't have to face what the nightmare might mean.

She took off the shirt and threw it in the corner because clearly that was the reason for the terrible nightmare and there was no other option. Or at least none that she felt like entertaining. She stood and walked a few steps to the desk to grab a clean shirt from the meager stack of clothes she kept there. As she slipped the shirt on, she tried desperately not to think about the grasping hands and where they had touched her. It was just a dream, and it wasn't real. Just a nightmare.

Kyoko wanted her mother. She wanted her so desperately because she hadn't had a nightmare in years and nothing ever so… physical. They'd always been normal, vivid but normal, about falling off a tall building or a spider the size of a house coming to get her. When she did have nightmares, her mother was there, to hold her hand while she cried. A few months she would have believed she was too old to need her mother to hold her hand after a nightmare but right now that was all she wanted. She wanted her so badly that her chest ached and there was no solution for it. All she wanted was to see her face again and –

For a second. Just for one second, she couldn't picture her mother's face. Not clearly at least and that was worse than missing her because while missing her ached, not remembering her mother's face would be devastating. She'd been here a little over a month now and she was already starting to forget. A part of her knew that wasn't the truth. People didn't forget things that quickly. She was just feeling panicked from the nightmare and her brain was still moving sluggishly, it was nothing to get worked up over.

But eventually… eventually she would forget if she was stuck here long enough. Eventually, she would struggle to remember the sound of her mother's voice and the smell of her perfume. It would fade, eventually. Who knew how long it would take her to get home? She had about five months left until this mission, and then she would start looking. How long would it take? She didn't even know where to start looking and Pain said they would help but what did that even entail? She should have asked more questions and –

Kyoko was spiraling, which was not a good thing to do at who knows how late into the night. She was still standing at the desk, paralyzed by the thoughts swirling in her head. She glanced at the stack of books and journals on the other half of the desk; she'd made herself bring them back after Deidara had left.

If she was going to be awake and her thoughts were going to be rambling, she might as well find something to occupy herself. She grabbed the spiral sketchbook from the pile of books and a pencil and flicked on the lights before she sat back on her bed. It was still disheveled from her fighting her imaginary attackers but that was a problem for later.

Trying to sketch something from memory was always so much harder than using a reference, but it was the only way she could draw her mother. It was terrifying, the idea of forgetting anyone that she loved. It was lucky that she'd drawn her mother so many times, it felt familiar to draw her. They looked so much alike that it had always been like drawing her own face. There were differences, small ones that you had to look for. Kyoko had her father's chin and when she was especially upset, she got the same crease between her eyes and their noses crinkled the same. The rest was all her mother, the hair, the eyes, all of it.

Her mother had always sat very well when Kyoko wanted to paint her or draw her, and she never complained. Kyoko's father didn't complain but he always looked extremely uncomfortable, he didn't like being stared at and was often trying to fade into the background. She didn't subject him to it often and usually drew him from old photos instead.

It didn't take long to finish the drawing, or it didn't feel like it at least, she still had no way to judge the passing of time. There were no clocks or calendars and with the constant rain and dark skies, it was difficult to tell. It wasn't her best, she felt like she was missing details she couldn't remember but it was something. She turned the page and jotted down a few things on the back, simple things she didn't want to forget. Her mother's name, her birthday, her favorite song, the perfume she wore, every little thing she could think of that she didn't want to forget.

Maybe that's how she would cope because trying not to think of home wasn't working. Wouldn't remembering everything and being in pain be better than forgetting? Or maybe she would never make it home and she'd be constantly reminded of what she lost. She felt trapped in this room, in this place, and she wanted to go anywhere else. Anywhere but here.

She flipped to the next blank page and started on the next. She would draw everyone, while she could still remember their faces.

'A few hours.'

That's what that lying bastard had said.

After the nightmare, she had stayed up all night drawing everyone she could think of. Everyone that had ever meant anything to her. When saw the sun start to peak behind the clouds, she went to the kitchen and fully expected to see Itachi there before her. When he wasn't, she sat and waited, not eager for a repeat of when she had made breakfast.

She waited for him until it was abundantly clear that he wasn't showing up. She had even been bold enough to knock on his door, but either he wasn't there, or he wasn't answering. It had almost been funny considering how he'd reacted when she said she needed a break. It was a little less funny when she realized he might make her double up on everything to make up for his absence. She refused to deal with his patronizing tone when he somehow turned it around on her and made her seem like the lazy one. She could do most of the routine on her own, but she wouldn't learn anything new. All she really knew so far was how to throw and catch kunai and shuriken. Kyoko half-expected Itachi to show up when she had finished training on her own or when she was making lunch, but he never did.

It had been the first day since they started training that she hadn't seen him at all. Maybe he was telling Pain she was a lost cause or maybe he was testing her to see if she would fend for herself. She didn't really know what to make of it and there wasn't much she could actually do about it, so she went to bed, thinking he would make an appearance the next day.

It had been a week with no sign or word from him, he had left her to fend for herself without having the courtesy of letting her know. What kind of errand took a week? And what kind of person disappeared for a week without saying anything? At least when Deidara hadn't been around she knew it was because he was avoiding her, but Itachi had no reason to avoid her. She hadn't done anything. Part of her knew she shouldn't be complaining, even if it was only to herself because there were obvious perks to not having Itachi there. She didn't have to deal with his attitude and she was getting a lot more reading done than usual since he wasn't stopping her to ask her questions about it all.

Deidara was around more. She still wasn't sure if it was a perk or not.

Deidara was a great distraction, and he was… well she was thinking of him like a friend. A friend she couldn't share her feelings with or be vulnerable with, but a friend. It helped more than it should have, and it made her feel almost normal because he was funny, and he smiled like Toshiro. But he wasn't Toshiro. Comparing the two of them felt like a betrayal as if it would diminish her friendship with Toshiro, but it didn't stop her from doing it.

"You should take a break today, yeah."

She sighed heavily and tried not to lose her place in the book again. It wasn't the first time the blonde had suggested it, but he wasn't the one that was going to have to deal with Itachi when he came back. If he came back. "I'm trying to get ahead while Itachi's gone," she repeated.

"Oh, who cares about Uchiha? I don't even understand why he makes you read all that, yeah," Deidara said. He was busying himself looking through her sketchbook, flipping past the things he'd seen and taking time to look at the new ones she'd drawn. "Who's this?"

She glanced up briefly, "That's Toshiro's mom. Her name was Noriko." Talking to Deidara about home had gotten easier the more time they spent together. He didn't want to hear the whole long emotional story, he was just… curious.

"What happened to her?"

Or at least, usually, he didn't ask about the long emotional story. She thought he would have dropped it when heard her use the past tense and she kept her eyes on the page, not looking up at him. "She died," she said flatly, because of all the subjects he could pick, this wasn't one she was willing to discuss.

"I figured, yeah. How'd she die?"

"Deidara. Can I just get through this chapter?" she leveled a blank look at him and kept her tone flat. He would get the hint, eventually. It just might take him longer than it should.

"What are you even reading?" Deidara rolled his eyes at her, with Itachi gone he had felt comfortable enough to take off his scope. His hair was down today and with his bangs shoved to the side she could see his whole face. She had a feeling the scope and the bangs had something to do with his reaction to Itachi's eyes, but she wasn't going to ask about it after the last time.

"Third Shinobi War," she mumbled as she looked back down.

"That's stupid, yeah. You won't need to know about that," he argued.

She didn't respond or look up at him because she knew he was probably right. Kyoko doubted anyone in Konoha was going to quiz her when she got there about Konoha's founding or any of the wars. She assumed that a long time ago, but… well she didn't want to assume but it felt like Itachi was trying to give her context. She knew next to nothing about this world, or the way it worked, so reading about some of the history gave her some context for the structure of it. It felt like a backup plan for if she never made it home, but she didn't feel like sharing that with Deidara.

"So… were you close?"

He was worse than Toshiro had ever been. Kyoko and Toshiro had often studied together, which usually meant she studied while he got distracted. He'd often tried to get her to take breaks with him every half hour or so, but he hadn't bombarded her the way Deidara was now. It was all made worse that he was picking the most sensitive topic when they had agreed not to do that.

"We were very close, now stop asking about it." She could feel a slight pressure building behind her eyes and she hoped desperately that it wouldn't become a full-blown migraine.

"Fine," he flipped to the next page. "Who's that?"

She groaned and shut the book because he wasn't going to let her get any more done today. She had gotten a good bit ahead and at least he had moved on to something else. She glanced at the page and blushed lightly, "That's Hajime."

"Who's that?" Deidara looked at her as he asked, his eyebrows raising slightly. "Was he your boyfriend?" he flipped to look at what she'd written on the back.

She felt the blush intensify and was thankful she'd had the foresight not to write much about Hajime. She figured Deidara would look through the book, she just hadn't expected her own reaction to it. This was still better than talking about Noriko. "No, it wasn't like that. He was Toshiro's friend, and I was just around them a lot because we both had the same friend. I mean, not that we weren't friends too, but we sort of became friends because of Toshiro and we were all in the same year so…" she was rambling about nothing. "We were just friends," she said firmly. She hadn't thought too much about Hajime since she'd been there, she didn't have the capacity to give it much thought on top of everything else. It was silly to even draw his picture, but the nightmares had continued, and she was sleep deprived so… she had indulged herself in reminiscing in a silly high school crush.

"You can just say you liked the boy, yeah," Deidara laughed. "You make everything so weird."

"Well… it was, uh, complicated, sort of."

"I'm sure you think it was," he rolled his eyes and shut the sketchbook, "You're done now, yeah?"

"I, uh, yeah I guess so. Why are you so impatient today?" she turned it back around on him, ready to abandon their previous topic.

He grinned mischievously and it made her more than a little nervous. "Leader's back today."

"So?"

"That means the rain is going to stop soon, yeah."

"You don't mean that… he controls the rain?" She shouldn't be shocked, she had seen Kisame use water from the lake when he had fought with Deidara. But controlling the weather? It seemed outlandish, too epic even with what she had seen so far.

Deidara's face fell, and his eyes darted at the doorway, "Eh… sort of."

Clearly, she wasn't supposed to know that, but she didn't really understand why. So, what if he could make it rain? Maybe it was how they stayed hidden; she had thought it was odd that a bunch of criminals were hiding in the tallest building in the middle of a village. Even if the village was in on it, wouldn't someone eventually notice they were coming and going to such a central place? There had been a few maps in the books she had, and Ame was a little village in a small country, but it was in between some of the largest nations. It seemed like a terrible hiding place… unless the rain helped hide them.

"Okay… so it's going to stop raining today," she offered when he didn't continue. She wanted to know, but if he had already slipped up by telling her then he wasn't going to tell her more. And… well she didn't want him to be in trouble, and she certainly didn't want to end up dead for knowing why it rained.

"So, we can go outside again," Deidara elaborated. "I can't fly in the rain, yeah. The clay doesn't hold up long enough and you can't run on water."

"Deidara, I can't. Itachi's not here."

He grinned smugly, "He never said you couldn't go without him, yeah. You just can't go alone, and you won't be."

"I really don't think that's what he meant," she rubbed at her hands, tracing the thin scars. No one had hurt her since that first day, but for the most part, she had been cooperative since then. She didn't like the idea of skirting the only vague rule she had been given.

"Come on, yeah! It'll be fun, don't you want to draw in the sky?"

Well… that did sound enticing. She had drawn from tall buildings before, looking outside a window as far as she reasonably could. But up in the sky? On the back of a giant bird? How many people would ever get to do that? Overall, she resented the situation she was in, but she had to appreciate the silver linings where she could.

"You swear that it will be fine? That I won't end up with my hands broken or dead in a ditch somewhere?"

"Of course not. I'll make sure we bury you somewhere nice, yeah," he laughed at his own joke.

She glared at him, "That's not funny."

"You need to relax a little, yeah. It's just a joke," Deidara rolled his eyes again.

Kyoko looked away from him, staring pointedly at a chip in the wall. "It's not funny when it's an actual possibility."

"You're way too serious. No one is going to kill you for going outside." He sighed when she still refused to look at him, "I swear, yeah. You're not gonna try to run away, right?"

Where would she go? How far would she even get when they could fly on clay birds and make clones of themselves? She didn't stand a chance. "No."

"Well, then let's go. The rain stopped while you were throwing a tantrum, yeah."

Her eyes snapped to him, "I am not throwing a tantrum!"

"Sure, you're not," Deidara shrugged and waved his hand at her dismissively. "I'm going with or without you, but it'd be more fun if you came," he stood to punctuate his point and crossed his arms across his chest. "Are you in or not?"

"I thought I was too serious," she muttered, but she grabbed her sketchbook and pencils.

"You are," he was grinning again, and he turned towards the doorway, "but sometimes you're interesting, yeah."

As she followed behind him, Kyoko's irritation dissipated, but she could still feel the beginnings of a migraine. She knew Deidara hadn't meant anything by his comment, but she still didn't know what had happened to her for certain. This girl having died wasn't exactly comforting, and she was only really going along with it all because she didn't want to die. Her whole refusing to eat dramatics had been born out of a desire not to be stuck here, permanently cut off from her life, rather than the actual desire to not be alive.

Deidara's life had been different though, and she had to remind herself of that. She didn't know the specifics, because she didn't want to overstep by asking and he wasn't exactly sharing. From everything she had read so far and the fact that Deidara was only eighteen and Itachi couldn't have been much older… shinobi started young. She wasn't sure how young exactly, but far too young. They had probably learned to accept the possibility of dying and fighting for their lives very early. Combine that with the clear dose of insanity they all had and well… you had a boy that joked about burying her 'somewhere nice'.

Deidara stopped at a door near the elevator and started rummaging around in it, cursing under his breath as something clattered to the floor. He kicked whatever it was back into the closet and pulled out a cloak that wasn't unlike the ones they wore, it was plain black instead of red clouds. He tossed it at her unceremoniously and she managed to catch it while holding onto her things. Itachi had been trying to teach her how to use the instincts that her body already knew. It was starting to pay off.

"It gets cold when you're up too long," he explained.

She smiled, "Thank you." It really was hard to stay mad at him for too long.

He waved her off and continued towards the elevator and she smiled at his back. Deidara might not be considerate with the things he said but… he had cut her hair for her and made sure she wouldn't be cold. He spent time with her when she was quite sure he had other things he could be doing, probably should be doing. She wondered if he was just as lonely as she was.

It was a short ride up to the roof and she'd managed to shrug on the cloak by the time they made it up. Deidara made only one bird this time, and he helped her up just as he did before. She really was getting used to the way his hand felt. It was still odd, how did mouths on hands even work? Did he brush their teeth? Was it connected to the digestive tract? Did he taste the clay? She was curious, but not as horrified as she had been that first day. Though, to be fair, she had been strapped to a chair the first time.

Being in the sky was no less amazing than it had been the first time around. The view was just as breathtaking, and they went far higher than they had the last time. She could feel the cold against her cheeks and even with the cloak she could feel the chill in the air, but it was bearable. The sky was still filled with gray storm clouds, but they were starting to break apart and the late afternoon sun could be seen peeking in the gaps.

Deidara was practically vibrating with excitement, his hands already digging into the pouches at his sides. She shook her head and hoped he had the sense not to accidentally blow them up. There wasn't much else she could do at this point; they were already here. He seemed like he knew what he was doing. For the most part.

His energy was contagious, and she flipped open her sketchbook eagerly as she heard the boom above their heads.

Her hands were aching from the cold a while later, but she refused to stop too soon. When would she get to do something like this again? If Deidara had any say, they probably would but she didn't want to count on that. He had said before that most of the time they weren't all here, she wondered why Deidara still was. Who knew how long he would be?

"You almost done?"

She ignored him, focusing on the tree line and the distant mountains to the north. Deidara had gotten bored of simply throwing bombs in the air, he said he wasn't allowed to drop them on the buildings. That seemed like a fair boundary to her, but he made a sour face and complained that there were several abandoned buildings that would make for the best explosions. They had since moved on to fly over the lake where he could delight in creating craters in the earth and dropping them in the lake itself. She had expressed concern for the fish, it seemed a little cruel, but he had rolled his eyes and said it was a manmade lake. If there were any fish in there, it was probably Kisame.

She glanced at him because she could feel him peeking over her shoulder. He had put the scope back on once they were in the air and was staring at what she had drawn.

"It's pretty, yeah. It's not true art but it's… respectable," Deidara nodded approvingly. The wind had died down and they no longer had to shout to hear each other.

"That's a backhanded compliment. What's your deal with this whole concept of true art?"

Deidara scoffed, "True art is something that only lasts for an instant. That's when art is most beautiful, yeah."

"That doesn't mean it has to be an explosion. There are art installations that only happen once, and interactive art where it's always different because the audience interacts with it. No person sees it the same way, so they affect it differently. Some people even make pottery and then destroy it, never put it in the kiln they just smash it," she looked at him to see his reaction, but she had never seen him look less interested in something she had said. Kyoko rolled her eyes and closed the book, "Okay, I'm done. Are we heading back now?"

"Not yet, I'm sick of being cooped up in that fucking building, all the time."

"Okay… so, what are we going to do?" she rubbed her eyes, the pressure hadn't gotten worse, but it still hadn't faded. As long as it didn't build into a full migraine, she could deal with it. Besides Deidara was right, being outside was much better than being stuck inside.

Deidara shrugged, "Sit by the lake. Being in the village is too depressing, yeah."

She nodded in agreement and Deidara brought them in for a landing, they were in the same general area as they had been that first time. The blonde sat in the grass and started using his clay to make different clay creatures and inspecting them for imperfections. Deidara muttered to himself as formed them the figures, the tongue on his hand poking and prodding at the clay.

Kyoko sat next to him on the grass, setting her sketchbook on her lap on a clean page. Over the past week, she had drawn everyone that had really meant something to her. It wasn't a particularly long list, but it had always been enough. She figured it was about time she should draw her own portrait. It would be easy enough and Deidara had been curious what she looked like. Besides, she had done self-portraits before, and she could still clearly remember her own face. She sketched the familiar outline of her face, humming to herself as she did. It was nice to sit outside and just draw next to Deidara while he experimented with his clay. There was something almost normal about it all. If she ignored all of the obvious.

As she drew, she realized the easiest way to do this was to draw the last memory she had before she ended up here. The memory hadn't faded, it didn't have the fuzzy quality that most memories did as time passed. She could still see it so clearly that it hardly felt like an actual memory. Even now, she could see every detail down to the tiles on the walls and the spots in the mirror. She frowned to herself; she still didn't understand why she couldn't remember anything beyond this moment. She didn't stop drawing, it seemed harmless enough and who knows, maybe it would jog her memory.

"Who's that?"

Kyoko winced a little at the sound of his voice and stopped drawing to rub her temple, the migraine had gotten a little worse after they had settled in the grass. The pressure behind her eyes had spread and now her temples were aching. She hadn't really noticed until Deidara's volume made it flare painfully, though he wasn't being any louder than usual. "It's me," she answered and continued.

"Your head hurt again?"

"A bit," she mumbled.

"We can go back, yeah," Deidara moved to stand but she shook her head at him.

"Not yet, who knows when we'll get to come back," she paused, "you probably will, but who knows when I'll get to go again."

He shrugged and continued staring over her shoulder, "Where is that?"

"It's the bathroom at Hajime's house, it's the last memory I have from home."

Deidara frowned at her, "Why are you drawing the background? You didn't do that on the others, yeah."

She didn't answer, she knew that she should stop, her head was pounding painfully, and she was starting to feel like the migraine was related. It had gotten worse as soon as she started drawing this but… well what if it really did help her remember? What if that's why her head hurt so badly? A part of her was afraid to remember, what if something terrible really had happened to her? But then… what if she remembered something that helped her get home? If she did, then maybe she could go home without Pain's help, without having to see any of this through. Or maybe her head just hurt, and she was trying to make it mean more than it did. At this point, it could go either way and it was worth a shot.

"I think Pain is leaving again," he said. "We should head back, yeah. The rain will start up again."

"I'm almost done," she objected.

After a few minutes, she finished and… well her head hurt but nothing happened. That was… well now she had a migraine for no reason. That was rather anticlimactic.

"Are you done now?"

She nodded and passed the sketchbook over to him; she really had expected… something. Now all she had to show for it was a migraine, but at least Deidara wouldn't ask her again what she looked like.

"You look so different, yeah! Not in a bad way," he defended immediately, "just… different."

Kyoko smiled because she did look so different. "You know the one thing, that's really weird? My eyes are the same. The color, the shape, everything. I don't know if that's what her eyes looked like before or if it's a side effect of whatever caused this."

"Her eyes are the same, they didn't change after she died. I might have believed you if that happened, yeah."

She sighed as he passed the sketchbook back, still wishing that he would at least pretend to be apologetic. But they had had a good day and she wanted it to end that way. She was about to flip it shut but she looked at her self-portrait again, she really did miss having her own face, and something just clicked. The pain skyrocketed suddenly, and it felt like her head was splitting apart and then she remembered. She remembered how she died.

Kyoko wished desperately that she had left it alone, but the curtain had been pulled and there was no going back.

TW FOR NEXT CHAPTER: Next chapter has a r*pe scene. You can entirely skip Chapter Twelve if you like. There will NOT be another scene like it, and as it is, it is a FLASHBACK, sort of. It is NOT a smut/r*pe scene. That's not what this story is, and personally I've never been a fan of that. I like smut, and I don't mind a r*pe scene if it's relevant to the plot or character's story, but the combined has never been my style. It could still be traumatizing to read, so I want to give fair warning.

If you don't want to read chapter Twelve, then please don't. Skip to the next. I'm posting 12 & 13 at one time, so that you can skip ahead to the next without feeling traumatized. Chapter 12 is already finished and 13 is started. Maybe 1/4 - 1/3 of the way done.

I want to be clear, that that was always part of this story, unfortunately. Before I even realized who Kyoko was as a character, I knew this was how she got here. I also want to be clear, I wrote this as a person who has experience r*pe. Mine was different in how it played out, but it was still something I experienced and I did not write this lightly. This is the only scene of this nature that will be in the entire story. Also, this story will eventually have a happy ending.