Hello dear readers,
Welcome back to Hogwarts, School of Witchcraft and Wizardry for this fourth year ! That's what I would have wanted to tell you if my story hadn't taken such a dark turn at the end of the third book. You've got the spoiler of what happened in the description of this fourth story as well as in which mindset is Akira - our now sad medical ninja from Konoha - after such a loss.
This year will be a real challenge for her as she isn't sure anymore on what to do with her life and her personality will change drastically. You won't recognise the hard working, courageous and troublemaker student/ninja that she was as she's gone perhaps for ever.
I don't own Harry Potter or Naruto.
Chapter 1 : Why them and not me ?
Akira found herself in a dark place from which no sound was reaching her. She couldn't even move as her mind slowly came out of what felt like a deep sleep. But gradually, sensations returned to her as she began to hear a distant beep and smell a familiar odour. Light was also shining through her closed eyelids and her body was aching before the pain escalated until it was barely bearable.
It even woke her up completely as she tried to find a more comfortable position to fall back to sleep as she was exhausted. Realizing that she wasn't in her bed at home as the beep and the smell similar to the one of the hospital became more and more present, she made an effort to open her eyes but only managed to open one of them. Intrigued by this fact, she raised a hand to put it on her other eye and discovered that it was covered with a thick bandage according to what she felt under her fingers. Her hand wasn't in better shape as Akira saw it also bandaged despite her vision made a little blurry by the time she spent in what seemed to be a coma state.
Considering her condition – she felt as if she had fallen from the roof of a building, with bruises and itching injuries all over her body - Akira was only half surprised to wake up in her family hospital but she tried to remember the reason that had led her here. Among her confused thoughts, she managed to extricate a memory that was so nightmarish that she doubted that she had actually lived it. But her bandaged eye was the proof she needed as it was the only injury that she remembered receiving.
A deep cut over her eye, got during a simple item-collecting mission on a deserted battlefield that turned suddenly into a manhunt as Akira, Matsuo and Tatsuno had found themselves pursued by ninjas who wanted to kill them. This last memory acted as an electric shock to Akira whose brain jumped directly to the excruciating turn that the mission took when Tatsuno and Matsuo had their throat slit in front of her eye.
This conclusion made her sick before she regained her composure to scan the surroundings in search of the twins despite the throbbing pain that was crossing her whole bruised body. Because deep down inside her, she was convinced that the twins had come out of this mission alive just like her as she had also been injured by a cut at the throat as the latter's skin was tingling under a bandage. However, Akira noticed no one on the other beds that were in her room. This emptiness worried her as her heart started to pound more quickly on the monitor that was checking its rate.
"Tatsuno and Matsuo must have already been released from the hospital. After all, their wounds were fewer than mine." She thought to restore her hope.
But she wanted to be sure about it and the only way was to see them both with her own eye. So despite the little doctor's voice in her head that was telling her to stay in bed to heal completely, Akira ripped off all the wires and tubes that were connected to her and jumped out of her bed before collapsing to the ground while letting out a cry of pain as her still relatively fresh wounds awoke. This pain was awful but not as much as the one of not knowing what was the fate of the twins so she got back on her feet the best she could and dragged herself out of the room on one leg as the other was a bit stiff.
She walked along the hallway in a pitiful state as some of her wounds reopened themselves from her sudden agitation and began to stain her bandages with blood. Being bent over with a limp also caught the attention of patients and doctors who were wondering what she was doing there in a crowded hallway rather than in her room.
However, Akira didn't care about what others might think of her as she had only one thing in mind : get the twins' whereabouts information. She thus headed towards the reception in order to obtain their medical files to see if they were still treated at the hospital or if they had already been released from it. But when she finally saw the stairs leading to the ground floor – that she was about to use despite her inability to put one foot in front of the other one without wincing in pain – the last person she wanted to meet crossed her path.
"What are you doing here Akira ? Go back to your room immediately !" Her father ordered after rushing to her side as soon as he spotted her.
He tried to take her arm to bring her back there but his daughter broke loose of his grip.
"First, tell me where Matsuo and Tatsuno are. Are they fine ? Their injuries weren't that bad, isn't it ?" Akira asked him hopefully as there was a high chance that he knew about it as he was aware of everything that happened in his hospital.
"You should better go back to your room." Her father repeated in a strange paternal tone while gently taking her by the shoulder.
"Answer my questions first. Where are the twins." Akira insisted while taking a few steps back.
"They're not here."
"Are they at home then ? I'm warning you, you won't stop me from going to see them. I won't allow you to separate us ever again like you did for the past few days." Akira told him fiercely.
"We buried them yesterday. I'm sorry." Her father advised her in an empathetic voice which was unfamiliar to him.
"You're lying. Matsuo and Tatsuno may have been injured at the throat and then by their fall from their tree but it's not different from what happened to me and I'm still alive." Akira replied as she refused to hear such horrors as her slashed throat and the bruises on her body caused surely by the fall were aching like never before.
"No, I'm formal. We were able to save you just in time thanks to the quick action of the team of guards who organised to go after the three of you when they spotted you leaving the village but it was too late for Matsuo and Tatsuno. They had lost too much blood."
"THAT'S IMPOSSIBLE !" Akira shouted at him as her throat was tightening and tears were rolling down her cheeks. "They were only injured… a few seconds… before it was my turn. It wasn't... long enough for them... for them..."
She couldn't say the word "to die" as she fell to her knees in despair, with her head in her hands as she was now crying her heart out. She only looked up when her father tried to come closer to comfort her.
"You did everything… to save me because… I'm your daughter… but I'm sure that you… didn't give the same… treatment to the twins that you… had always hated." She threw at him between two sobs as her father froze in place at such accusations.
"I do everything I can to save all my patients, whoever they are."
"THEN, WHY… AM I STILL ALIVE AND… NOT THEM ? AND IF THEIR STATE WAS SO... SERIOUS, WHY AM I... NOT DEAD TOO ?" His daughter screamed at him as sadness was overwhelming her. "It should have been me… who should have been buried, not the twins. I… lured them into an ambush despite… their reluctance to accomplish this mission and I can't… live with that."
"It's not your fault." Her father told her softly despite her outburst of rage against him. "I felt the same guilt when your mother died and I wondered how I was going to live without her but time does its work. Not to mention that I had you."
"It's not… the same. I could have prevented their death… from happening by refusing this mission that appeared out of nowhere… and you could have healed the twins if you had… really wanted to. But it suited you better… if I didn't have any more such… type of friends... and because of that, I no longer have anyone… in this world." Akira replied as she was having a lot of trouble to forgive her father as well as herself for what had happened to Matsuo and Tatsuno who hadn't deserved to die in such an awful way when they were so nice. "Mom would have done anything to… save my two best friends and she would have… succeeded no matter what. Why did she have to die… instead of you ?"
Akira had just crossed the line and she knew it but she didn't care. All the resentment that she felt towards her father, who was always absent, who denigrated and hindered her achievements, was coming out in this moment of despair. And now that it was done, she only wanted to flee from the family hospital that she resented for having stolen so many years of her life only to take the twins away from her.
Akira got back on her feet while ignoring her pain and started to run in the hallways at full speed despite her injuries that were bleeding profusely. But she didn't care. She didn't care about anything, her worrying state, the days to come and even her entire future. Because losing Tatsuno and Matsuo was much worse than everything that could happen to her. Her wounds were going to heal, time was going to pass but she wouldn't see the twins ever again.
This prospect pierced Akira's heart as she shoved anyone out of her way to the exit. Her father was on her heels to persuade her to stay until she fully recovered but he didn't manage to catch up with her as she was already running through the front door to find herself under a grey sky that heralded a storm.
Akira continued to rush headlong through the village even though her father had given up trying to reach her. With her teary eye – and the other one being covered by a bandage - she couldn't quite see where she was going but she went on until her lungs were on fire and her stiff leg couldn't carry her anymore. She stopped and realized that she was near the cemetery where all the ninjas who died in battles were buried. This horrible place where her two acolytes were buried…
Akira nevertheless took its direction to see with her own eye the graves of the twins. She passed tirelessly between the stones until she found two side-by-side clods of earth freshly turned over. The names of Matsuo and Tatsuno were written there and a ninja headband had been put on each tombstone as they had only been buried the day before according to Akira's father.
This vision utterly crushed Akira who fell on her knees again and leaned forward while clutching her T-shirt where her heart was. The latter had been broken for the first time at the death of her mother and it was destroyed again by the tragic death of the twins for which she considered herself entirely responsible.
"I'm sorry." She said softly between sobs as tears were crashing on the ground. "So, so sorry. I... should have died that day instead... of you. If only… we could go back in time."
It was impossible, however, just as she couldn't prevent the rain from falling from the threatening clouds that had gathered over Konoha. So she just stood there, crying uncontrollably as an icy rain was crashing down on her.
From then on, Akira was acting like an undead. She was doing things mechanically and without really realizing it as her grief was still consuming her. She ate when she remembered to do so, fell asleep after spending several hours crying silently in the dark and had decided to work again at the hospital to make her days go by faster by doing the only thing she was good at, namely healing people.
Going in a place that contained so many memories of the twins gave Akira some panic attacks, especially when she imagined that the twins were eventually standing where she was when they were still alive and it was worse when she entered a room after wondering if that was perhaps the one where they died. During this difficult time, it wasn't uncommon for her to isolate herself for several minutes while she was calming down out of sight. But her depressed look and her red eye that she was displaying all day long were enough to show to everyone how sad she was. However, when someone tried to comfort her, she would become mad and told him to mind his own business before storming off.
This behaviour made everyone leave her alone in her despair, except her father. For the first time in his life, he was present and supportive for his daughter as he made every effort to cheer her up even when Akira was throwing hurtful remarks at him. He was even taking an interest in her return to Hogwarts for her back-to-school as he knew that his daughter was fond of this school no matter what he said. He was therefore the one who gave her her letter containing the list of school supplies that she would need for her fourth year. It was during one evening, after Akira shuffled through the door of their house with the intent to isolate herself.
"September 1st is coming soon. When are you leaving Konoha to catch your train in time ? I think that I can come with you this year." He offered her kindly while giving her the letter that she took mechanically.
But instead of answering to his question, Akira tore the whole envelope in half and then in four before throwing the pieces on the ground.
"I don't want to hear any more about Hogwarts, nor about things related to ninjas and nor about the hospital if I didn't have to work there like all my predecessors before me." Akira threw at him angrily. "You should be happy with that ? Isn't that what you've been wanting to hear since I enrolled in the Academy and started my first year in this wizarding school ? Now all I want is to be left alone !"
Thereupon, Akira climbed the stairs leading to her bedroom with the intention of not leaving it for the evening - not even for dinner - as her father sighed with despair at seeing his daughter so depressed. He nevertheless didn't lose hope of cheering her up by giving her all the other letters that arrived but they were destroyed by Akira with just as much hatred than the first one.
Indeed, she no longer wanted to return to her former life as if nothing had happened when the twins no longer had this chance. She wanted to stay as unhappy as possible, hoping that one day she would have paid for her fault by living a miserable life. It was her destiny now but people closed to her didn't agree, especially not Dumbledore who ended up going to her house after finding out that she still hadn't read her letter four days before back-to-school despite his numerous attempts to send it to her.
At that time, Akira was sitting at the kitchen table and was staring in the void without even making the effort to turn her head when she heard the front door being opened. It wasn't until she recognized the voice of the Headmaster of Hogwarts who greeted her that she slowly reported her attention to him.
"You shouldn't have come all the way here. I won't go back to Hogwarts. Never." She advised Dumbledore without even greeting him in return.
"I understand. Your father told me what happened." Dumbledore replied in a soft, compassionate tone as he remained standing up in the kitchen.
"He did ? So you know that it's because of me that Tatsuno and Matsuo died ?" She asked him as this question was tightening her throat unpleasantly and bringing tears in her eyes.
"This isn't how he described this tragic incident to me but I know how you feel nonetheless. I also lost a family member by letting myself be blinded by my ambition. It was a terrible event that I would never have wanted to experience but it was also what made me realize that I was on the wrong path and that I had to show more humility. This has been very beneficial to me for the years following this loss."
"But I don't want to change ! I just want Tatsuno and Matsuo back so that everything is like before again. And I won't go back to Hogwarts until then, not as long as I'm attacked by dangerous Death Eaters that might also kill my classmates because of me. So now, get the hell out of my house !" Akira ordered him before jumping up from her seat and going to her room like a fury as this discussion was over for her.
Dumbledore didn't insist and left the house as he was asked as the letters also stopped coming in the following days. That was everything that Akira wanted but when September 1st finally arrived, she was more discouraged than ever. She even spent the day locked in her dark room, lying on her bed and staring at the ceiling. She imagined her classmates walking happily to Platform 9 ¾ with their freshly bought school supplies, getting on the train before it was eleven o'clock and then crossing England while telling each other what they had done during their summer holidays before attending a sumptuous Feast which would announce the start of the school year.
"I should have been there too. If only nothing happened, I would have enjoyed all this. I didn't know how much I was lucky the last years to go to Hogwarts with the thought that I would see the twins again during the summer holidays." She whispered while turning over in her bed as burning tears started to roll down her face.
Footage from the previous year when she discovered that Matsuo and Tatsuno had infiltrated Hogwarts to find out where she was studying resurfaced without warning and Akira cried louder until she finally fell asleep from exhaustion.
However, her tiredness didn't prevent her from being woken up in the middle of the night when she heard a noise at her window.
"What now." She muttered while getting slowly out of her bed.
She reached the window and was surprised to spot outside an owl that was looking directly at her under the rays of the moon.
"Dumbledore's surely sending me again one of his letters. He doesn't know when to give up." She thought bitterly before opening the window, grabbing the letter that the owl had on its paw and then moving her arms to make it leave right away.
Once the owl was gone, she closed her window abruptly and was about to destroy the letter the same way than the others she received when she realized that it was Arcturus' writing on it as she read her name on the folded paper. Wondering what he might want, she unfolded the letter and started reading it.
"Hi there,
I hope this letter finds you well. I panicked when I didn't see you in Diagon Alley and I just told myself "I'll see her on the train" but after spending the whole travel going back and forth in all the wagons looking for you, I became really scared that something wrong might have happened to you.
I went directly to Dumbledore before the Feast began and he announced to me that you were fine – what a relief ! – but that you didn't want to go back to Hogwarts anytime soon. He didn't want to tell me more about it so I'm writing you this letter to know what happened. Can I help you with something ?
Let me know rather quickly because I don't like to think that you're in trouble. I hope to see you again rather soon and don't worry, I'll tell you what you missed during these first days of school.
Arcturus"
"Trouble ? I'm rather living in a nightmare." Akira sighed with sadness.
She didn't intend to respond to his letter - being not in the mood to do so - but instead of ripping it into pieces like all the others she received, she simply put it on her desk before letting herself fall on her bed as she buried her head in her pillow.
What a sad chapter. I was attached to Matsuo and Tatsuno after writing so much about their adventures with Akira and describing their graves was rather heartbreaking for me. Akira is now in such a state of despair that life seemed to have stopped for her and even Dumbledore telling her about the death of his sister Ariana - congratulation for those who guessed it as I mentioned it rather vaguely - didn't manage to bring her out of her torpor.
However, she's not alone - despite what she thinks - and Arcturus isn't the kind of guy to let her down after such events. He'll want to see her again, cheer her up and help her deal with her sadness, no matter what Akira says. But it won't be easy, as we'll see in the next chapter that I intend to publish at the end of the month.
