AN: haha... Imma back? (more at bottom)
Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto
Warnings: Panicking, extreme bullying-ish behaviour (near life threatening), threat of drowning/dying, etc
Reviewer replies (Sorry couldn't get to them, and then it seemed to award to reply months after they were written)
lizyeh2000: Yup! and sorry for the wait again... /o.o\
ProTaggingProperly: Thanks for thinking so! lol you guessed right, and sorry for the late update...
Yuki Suou: Thanks! Glad to know my humour works!
skidney: Thanks for reviewing!
donstehly2: Thanks so much!
NatNicole: omg thank you!
RamenKnight: Thanks! I am trying to give the snakey pals more characterization but they keep running away from me whey, and the details are generally what I obsess over the most, because there's so much and I don't want to omit anything, and then it becomes very cluttered. Suijami didn't respond to Tobi and Mito's chakras much because when she focuses with certain senses or is distracted, the other senses are sorta... shot. Thanks for the advice too btw!
atenaincarnate: yup! It's him! and uhh, I'm not even sure what the pairings gonna be yet whoops?
4everfictional: thanks for the trail of reviews! Regarding the brain part, Suijami was just extrapolating from her knowledge, which is incorrect given having never been in an actual biology class before, thanks for pointing it out though!
kuchiyose: Thanks! more is here!
Miyuki: lol sorry about the AO3 version, and thanks for the Merry Christmas!
chochetispretty: thanks! :)
Saterra3950: is now continued, thanks for reviewing!
si: i loved their clan too ;-;
Thanks to you all for reviewing, they sincerely made my day!
Chap 17 Adjustments and Discoveries
Kinme tip #31: When in a battle against an opponent who is underestimating you, allow them to keep their assumptions until they make an error of judgement regarding that assumption.
(–anonymous Kinme that forgot he didn't have a broken leg half-way through a battle)
Aside from the smidgen bit of panicking done along with a suppressed spit-take when I discovered that Jiraiya was our new neighbor, all went… more or less well. First impressions with that kid were rather interesting, as he had seen the snakes poking their heads out before screeching and careening back to his room, arms pinwheeling like a particularly rattled fan. From the sounds that came out of his room, his roommate probably wasn't pleased with his behaviour either, which was temporarily amusing.
At least the wolf dog (apparently named Kibamaru because what is my life even–) allowed us temporary use of another unoccupied room for the first night to air out our actual lodgings.
If the smell persisted any longer with us in the room, Sugiryuu and Dōsukēru committing a homicide where Orochi and I will have to ditch the body in a hole later would've been a legitimate fear. Of course, that's only if I didn't get to throttle the brat first. What can I say? Our noses are rather sensitive, and our first impression of Jiraiya quite literally stinks.
During the night, I got up to to use the washroom only to hear the sound of nasal-sounding cursing floating through the walls from our actual future room. A more conscious probing using my chakra sense revealed that there was what could possibly be a genin team– three small flighty chakra signatures– in the washroom with their jounin sensei– a rich earthy undertone in a human-shaped package– lounging in the furthest possible corner of the room from the washroom that can be achieved. Any further and I would've been concerned that the person was stuck to the outside wall of the building.
Dōsukēru was rather amused when I whispered my observations to her after I returned to the futon that all four of us were sharing, and replied something along the lines of how the matron was probably notified to make our stay comfortable, as our status as Kinme could be quite beneficial later on. Possibly.
As long as we get a room larger than the quite literal abandoned bedroom-converted-storage room that the lady had us stay in for now, everything would honestly be alright.
On the second day living in the orphanage, a ninja lady popped by and gave me a scroll, which informed me that someone will pick me up in a few days time for a tour of the academy and associated facilities, followed by registration. She left after making sure I had no questions, only bewildered silence.
How the hell did they trust me enough to stick me in a building where all the tiny future ninjas are training when a bare decade ago children my age were commonplace on the battlefield? Aren't they afraid that I might be a spy or a sleeper agent or something?
(Or perhaps the fact that only I was addressed the scroll and not Orochi was their way of holding a hostage?
…
Pleasant.)
Anyways, everybody in the orphanage lived on the rough approximation of a schedule which we managed to determine pretty much by the end of our second day here, an accomplishment mainly due to what seemed to be habitual whining done by some of the orphanage's more… interesting individuals.
Breakfast is served when the sun is completely above the treeline, and then we are to sit in one of the larger repurposed rooms to learn basic things that I've understood since before this birth. Granted, that was probably some random benefit from living once, dying once, and living once again, but it was made even more boring by the fact that Orochi also knew most of the material due to our previous teachings, of this world or not. Our partners knew the material as well, mainly due to osmosis and some of my mindless ramblings.
This was after we filtered out all of the propaganda though, otherwise the knowledge that could've come through was probably only every other sentence. Well, unless it was the class that dealt with numbers and factual knowledge, which they dubbed "Numerical and Natural Knowledge", but Orochi and I just called math and science (which can also be separated into so many fields that it will hurt ninja brains). Propaganda is just a bit harder to stick in classes where bias is not as applicable.
My little brother's attempts to pass me notes written in English was also rather entertaining, but failed a bit. The passing the notes part didn't fail, it was the vocabulary and written form of the other language that he couldn't really finish well.
I passed his notes back to him with crosses and lines and commentary of red ink, it made me feel like a teacher (like I'm actually passing on something more beneficial than grief).
Unsurprisingly, the orphanage didn't teach chakra use, which can be easily explained by how when most times the kids are adopted, their future parents are civilians, and nobody with actual power in the village wants a budding chakra-user that might not become a ninja among those who cannot access this weird type of energy.
In other words, loose cannons are not appreciated (and must be eliminated or folded into the troops)
This 'class time', however, gave my little family ample time to read from other sources, namely the booklet that was stored in the storage seal somewhere along our collarbone. It held some basic info on how to stay alive, random safety lab procedures, and other bits of knowledge labeled point-form that occasionally could be more beneficial to a Kinme than others. Some of the information was more wishful thinking, but there was genuine tips that could be useful in life or death situations.
However, it also held a guide for our clan traditions, along with a timeline for our clan's milestone habits, such as when a child is summoned out from the snake's realm, when we are first trained, etc, etc. Currently we were simultaneously a bit behind and a bit early on Orochi's milestones, as he had decided that he was also to use a katana like our kaa-chan but haven't gotten around to Takumi Village for obvious reasons.
Looks like we'll need to commision an escort mission to the village of artisans in the near future, preferably within the next month or so.
Anyways, the booklet is useful for continuing our culture if permitted, but otherwise more of a memorial-like piece of history that brings more tears than knowledge. Talking of traditions, despite having been working on a prototype-esque model of another stringed instrument since Dōsukēru and I first went to Suna, Orochi has abandoned the unfinished project and decided to just follow in kaa-chan's footsteps and play a flute. According to the handbook, some of the milestones could be pushed up in unusual circumstances, hence why Orochi simultaneously had to find a weapon and build an instrument instead of leaving the instrument part to after he was five. The clan definitely noticed something wrong before going to Suna, but… well.
That might've only been the second day in Konoha, but when I got back to our actual-non-death-smelling room from an errand to a stench of smoke, a scorched bathroom, and a guilty looking Orochi and Sugiryuu duo, it was somewhat obvious. The mass of tangled iron wires among burnt and charred wood was also rather a pointing finger of what had become of the prototype.
He didn't use kaa-chan's flute though, probably because it was too long and just generally not in the right dimensions for a four-year-old to play (and also too many associations and grief and all the emotions that we need a therapist to even poke with a ten-foot pole), but instead got a smaller bamboo one that I helped find the very same afternoon. The merchants of Konoha have most of their business done in different sectors of the village, but the more expensive, frivolous things were a bit closer to the center of the village, ie, easier for ninjas to get to in case of a robbery.
Our trip to and fro rendered us with chattering teeth and a sense of our blood cooling in our veins because we are young with stubby legs, miniscule chakra-pool be damned. So, not pleasant at all.
At least we figured out where the merchants that sold livestock did her business, otherwise Sugiryuu might've had a bit of a problem with his dietary requirements. The old lady that somehow chose to breed mice, rabbits, and other small prey animals seemed quite delighted to discover that she will from now on have another loyal customer.
Thankfully she seemed to be at the very least mildly short-sighted, so us overdressing to disguise out traits went more or less unnoticed. This would be probably one of the few instances that I'm guiltily glad that the technology to construct glasses for those of every social class didn't exist, as glass and metalworking was expensive and could only be afforded by the wealthy.
A couple extra, somewhat larger prey mammals were also bought and taken to the back of an alleyway, and sent to their doom by summoning the messenger cobra and giving him the tribute. Orochi was utterly fascinated by the proceedings, but my little partner was watching Sugiryuu with a critical eye to make sure that the food didn't wake up from its trauma induced unconsciousness and try to thrash around. Poor Sugiryuu was too hungry to pay the right amount of attention.
Due to most of the merchants being civilian, however, it was only by wearing far too much to be comfortable, via scarves and gloves and sunglasses that are large enough to cover our entire eye-markings, that we seem relatively normal in this chilly winter season. (That, and having our scaled partners hiding inside our sleeves where they wouldn't be stifled.)
Even then the low temperatures were rather hard to endure, clan biology having rendered some of our human traits a bit more muted. Or something. I dunno, there's no one to ask now.
These disguises will only work for a period of time though, while snow is still falling and the temperatures are still rather low, but spring and summer are going to open a can of discriminating worms that may be rather… annoying to deal with. In fact, it's already annoying to deal with, what with our fellow orphans giving us either scared, disgusted, or downright hostile stares whenever they thought we weren't looking. Granted, some of them seemed like a combination of amusement, curiousity, or even a bit of morbid fascination, but being gawked at was never on my list of accomplishments and will never earn its way on it.
Nearly being pushed down the stairs once during a morning rush is enough to keep a permanent guard up as well, as the sensation of two hands between shoulder blades applying pressure out of nowhere is rather obvious. I was able to maintain my balance and Orochi could probably do so as well if such a thing was to happen to him, but from then on I made a habit of walking behind him down the stairs.
But how foolish they are, to think that a clan child would not be capable of retaliating, or give a rat's arse about how some orphans with little to no background sees them as. If they try something else though… the only one with the guts to clean up the mess would be our matron.
Bad mindset, bad mindset. No need to antagonize people right from the get go, not when there are other, more useful places to vent out frustration. Especially not when some of these orphans could eventually become our comrade in arms.
Unless they die sometime before from an unfortunate accident…
Ahem.
Hopefully I'll be able to figure out how the frick to use the makeup stuff that my clansmen would get smeared with while on the road before then. Or maybe I won't and two lonely Kinme's will just be one of the other, odder and smaller clans that Konoha has claimed for its own.
But I digress, Orochi now has a rudimentary flute, and he's learning how to play it. Perhaps in the future he can become an amazing flute player, but currently the stick of bamboo sounds like a screaming piccolo begging to be released from this hell. Our neighbors have made their displeasure known for quite a while now via loud incessant banging on the thin walls, so we decided to put off instrumental practice while in the orphanage.
It's not like Orochi doesn't have the means to carry it around either, as our clan may have been a tad bit extra that day when giving the lot of us tattoos.
Well, more things to remember our roots by.
Anyhow. After classes, there's a brief period of free time before lunch that we may eat at the dining hall in the orphanage or go out and find ourselves some decent grub. The early afternoon is free time for us all, but the lot of us are required to be back by supper, where the matron and her partner are to take attendance and make sure that everybody found their way back relatively safely. After supper we are given little things to do, such as the older kids sharpening kunai, and the younger ones helping along with less… limb-risking chores, basically piecework for midgets. I suppose this is how the orphanage makes a part of its living, as so many mouths cannot simply rely on charity alone.
I currently live for that free time in the afternoon, which is thankfully enough to do...stuff.
Example: as with a lot of skills, Orochi will probably become better at flute playing if he starts young. However, his… dissonant harmony results in more conflict than necessary with our fellow orphans. A logical conclusion to this would be to either ignore the others and pretend we live in a bubble of isolation (our communication skills were already at least minorly stunted, so that wasn't a good idea), or find somewhere else to practice.
Therefore, four days into our stay in the village and subsequent explorations, when Dōsukēru realized that the building nestled in the side of an alley two streets down was a bar via shift-stepping, drunk smelling ninjas who occasionally blurred and smashed into rooftops, we decided to use that free time to check it out. The only excuse I have for not realizing sooner was because my face was wrapped up and a running nose did not make for a good sniffer. Perhaps also because of the faint ripple that tugged on my chakra when I wandered close, that urged me to step away, look elsewhere, this is not somewhere you want to be.
Thankfully, it was a (somewhat) friendly bar once we got past the initial disconcerting experience, with a Uchiha bartender and his also Uchiha wife serving (gracefully depositing) the drinks when I peeked in. Why Uchihas would choose to work in a place like this, well. I sure as hell don't know. The point is, their bar also had the little stalls where it's a little region cloaked via a silencing seal, which can perfect for horrid instrumental practicing. How I knew? There was a little sign at the front that offered customers "soundless privacy" if an additional cost is paid.
On second thought, that's probably why the two Uchihas work here, so discreet glances even with their peripheral vision can be reviewed later and lip-reading can occur to decipher whatever people didn't want other people hearing.
Sneaky ninjas, very sneaky.
So here I am with Dōsukēru, fifth day in our stay in Konoha, Orochi and Sugiryuu left at the orphanage with sufficient reading material (our trek to the library ended up with ANBU dragging us out near closing time the day previous), and trying to look over the countertop for the barkeep. Honestly though, Orochi's near extreme distaste of the cold is a bit alarming, but hopefully it will dampen with time and more memories of the cold not associated with death and dying and near-death experience via bear. Or hypothermia. On second thought, his profound hate of the cold can actually be easily understood.
Anyways, there were other ninjas here in the bar, their chakras melding together and apart and everything like a particularly ambitious palette with water sprayed over it, except for where the sound silencing seals muted their signatures a bit as well. Interesting.
I don't think any of them are paying me any attention? Or if they are, then I'm just very good at ignoring them.
Apparently I'm also very good at ignoring people trying to talk to me as well because only the tail end of a question made its way to my brain, and two seconds after giving no indication of hearing, Dōsukēru ended up slithering out of my fluffed-up collar to rest her head on mine (to see higher, probably), and replying "my human wants to know how much a half-hour stay in a silenced booth costs."
Whoever was on the receiving end of my partner's statement must've had a funny expression to go with the funny twist in their chakra. It would've been even more entertaining if it didn't attract the attention of what appeared to be half the populace of the bar. Honestly, having ninja attention directed to a sensor is a bit disconcerting.
Normally when a person is just not focusing their chakra, there's just little wisps of their chakra floating out of their tenketsu, a bit like an intangible, invisible chakra shroud that's only barely there, which then dissipates into the atmosphere and can be picked up by most sensors in what can possible be described as "halos" around a person. Due to the distribution of the tenketsu not being very even on any living thing, the halos are also a bit lopsided instead of an exact mold of the person it came off of, hence extremely skilled or experienced sensors being able to tell what direction a person is facing, or their posture, or whatever. Up til now, it's been pretty much "scientifically" determined that everybody senses at least a bit differently, basically the variety of sense perception except more. Perhaps like having synesthesia as a sixth sense?
So, I'm only a decent sensor at close range, but becoming the sudden epicenter of a lot of focused attention was… a touch overwhelming. Thankfully Dōsukēru noticed and a little squeeze of rubbing scales on my shoulder reminded me that she was here, I wasn't alone, and that she can talk for us both when required.
Calmer now, I tried to gauge the reaction of the probably Uchiha behind the counter by drilling a hole through the floor with my eyes and focusing on their chakra signature. Or at least, tried to before an amused voice said "What would be your human's name? Or yours for this matter." Good grief, how much of this conversation am I missing?
My little scaly pal seemed pleasantly surprised that she was being addressed directly, instead of merely as a mouthpiece, which occurs much too often for any of our comforts. It comes with the territory of not a lot of people realizing that the Kinme snakes human-relationship-wise placed somewhere obscure between Inuzuka dogs and summons of any other form, and not being all that communicative about clan secrets.
"Isn't it a common courtesy to give your own name before asking for another's?" she asked innocently.
The cozy-cat-fire chakra behind the counter was definitely amused now, and I could nearly feel the shrug when the reply was simply a slightly singsonged "ninja~".
I snickered, and Dōsukēru patted the side of my face with her tail. "If you want to do the talking, then speak up–" she hissed at me in a low amused tone, to which she was answered with a very rapid, yet small amplitude of head shaking. Nuh uh, like hell I'm talking to someone I can't even see.
Satisfied, my partner said "ignore Suijami here, she doesn't really have a logical amount of common sense, my name is Dōsukēru, and yes, the person that named me was high when he did so." She gave a little huff. "And if you can't tell, we're Kinme."
Hopefully the combination of being more or less upcoming with information would give us a better impression, and allow us the use of a sound-proofed stall if we bring something good to the table.
Then the person behind the table said: "Just Uchiha-san will do for now. You can ask around later if you really want to know my name." My partner nearly bristled at the words, but calmed down after a quick breath in and out. At least just Uchiha-san would be easier to remember though?
"Wouldn't we mix them up by accident though?" I muttered to Dōsukēru, who parroted it to the Uchiha.
"That's only if you choose to stay around, which a children like you really shouldn't."
That's pleasant and all, but– "my brother is trying to learn to play an instrument, but our neighbors in the orphanage are not very appreciative of his attempts at music." I said.
"So you can speak." The Uchiha remarked, a touch of smugness evident in her voice (I'm quite sure she's a her, considering the only other Uchiha was a man that had just entered my field of vision from the back), and earlier reconnaissance revealed that there was only the two of the working at this bar.
"Of course my human can speak!" Dōsukēru said, posture defensive and just the tiniest bit appalled. Since I knew her sometimes literally better than the back of my hand, it was easy to hear the hidden humour in her voice. Then she had to rain on my parade by continuing "it's just sometimes better that she doesn't."
This time it was my turn to give a look of faux horror and clasp my hands above my heart. "Why would you wound me so?"
"Because your reactions are amusing." Her deadpan reply shouldn't have been as funny as it was, but well, a skewed sense of humour tends to run in the family.
At least it amused the Uchiha enough for her to give a little chortle. Then she leaned forwards over the counter and –ho shit she's too pretty this isn't fair – uhh, smiled? "If I allow two orphans and their snakes to use specially prepared and highly in demand booths–" (whoops shit right they're called booths not stalls what is this a bathroom?) "–what could they possibly pay instead of the money that they couldn't possibly have?"
And as occasionally stupid little shit that I am, looked at the very deadly Uchiha lady in the eyes and blurted out: "I can play music as entertainment for your bar."
From the sound of a scaled tail slapping over an equally scaled head, it was slightly evident that Dōsukēru did not agree with my tact, and that I probably signed my future musical career off to a bar.
Lovely.
She wanted a demonstration. Of course she wanted a demonstration, what else could I reasonably expect?
Despite my fingers being almost numb enough to fall off, a couple of warm-up exercises with scales and other technical techniques later, I could actually say that the demonstration went quite decently, if the pieces played were a bit simple. Frankly, my hands just aren't big enough to play some of the chords I could Before, and trying to attempt something like that during a demonstration just wasn't a good idea.
It was also unfortunate that the events from around a week or so ago might've damaged my continued inclinations to play Christmas pieces for who-the-hell-knows-how-long as they used to be my default go-to pieces, but it could've been worse.
The random person that passed by the piano and dropped a few ryo on the top of the piano was welcome, as were the few others after him. I could tell that Dōsukēru was cackling at my silent bewilderment, equally silently, across our bond.
All and all, Uchiha Mysterious-Name-san has accepted being the temporary employer of moi, paid with tips by the other customers and minutes in a sound-sealed booth, huzzah.
This would've been so much easier if one of the seals that we got from our clan was a sound-proof one, but noo, we get a mountain of storage seals, a few blue-print seals, and some other miscellaneous ones that currently help us nada.
Orochi was happy and sad and slightly constipated looking in equal measures when I later informed him that he was going to have to practice at least once every two days from now on, probably because he doesn't want to leave the warmth of the orphanage just to practice an instrument. But he will, his already present pride and eagerness for learning won't let a little cold get in the way.
Sugiryuu however, might just overall looked a bit constipated, considering that he'll have to listen to every attempt while I get to be outside the range of Orochi's practicing with Dōsukēru.
That night at dinner in the dining hall, we all "feasted" on the dissected, quartered, and over-roasted corpse of a giant-ass kangaroo that a battered team of chunin had dragged in. Apparently the Forest of Death is the unfortunate home to many good sources of protein and extermination missions were as common as food runs. But despite my distinct disadvantage in the field of biology, I'm quite sure that sometimes "what doesn't kill you makes you[r young] stronger" would apply evolution-wise in this case, and will eventually result in legit monsters being bred in training ground 44's confines.
Hell, that's not my problem anytime soon. Probably. Hopefully. Shit.
The real problem is trying to snatch enough food from the long tables with a hoard of orphans long-accustomed to this practice barring our way. They didn't do that intentionally of course, but the action is probably a subconscious one by now. The kangaroo was quite large, but the variety wasn't too much. Some small clumps of veggies and fruits here and there, other protein sources like fish and eggs, and what might've been a bakery's leftovers decorated another table.
It didn't matter that the Inuzuka matron tries to somehow always get us enough food, or that they're scattered everywhere on numerous tables for easier access, but we act a bit like cats, and therefore do not consent to herding.
The fact that the wolf-dog, Kibamaru, lies in wait under the meats table for regular pieces of scraps doesn't help matters much. It seems like the common attraction to food in all dogs is not a trait that can be curbed even with shinobi training, especially when they're somewhere considered safe. Sometimes, he even goes under the tables reserved for other foods, like when the matron stands rather imposingly over the table with a glare that practically screams at him to eat a balanced diet.
Right, the Konoha vets are pretty much all Inuzuka. Perhaps they even know how to treat snakes?
"Nii-chan," Orochi whispered with a mouthful of food. Realizing his mistake from the random splatters of stuff that flew out and his partner's unimpressed slow pat on the back, he chewed quickly and spoke again when his face wasn't stuffed with fried eggs. My little brother gives no shits that fried eggs are usually more of a breakfast food, or maybe that's just my misconception. "Nii-chan, what was the academy like?"
Shit. That was today.
I'm an absolute idiot who was supposed to go and register at the academy today, not go to a bar to perform music.
But wasn't there supposed to be someone that was going to pick me up?
Shit.
After the disastrous realization that I might've missed something really important and that no ninja came to pick me up to remind me, I went to sleep troubled. Or rather, tried to go to sleep, and remained troubled.
Random tidbit of unneeded info: back Before, I pretty much never remembered any of my dreams, and was also at least a bit of an insomniac. The second part hasn't really changed much. However, nowadays instead of just staring at the insides of my eyelids for what feels like hours at a time, listening to the soft breathing of my family in close quarters, my mind gets drawn in.
That... might be why instead of getting any restful sleep, I ended up sitting in the little copse of trees in my mindscape, humming a tune that I no longer remembered the words to.
After the Last Day, not once have I returned to my mindscape, unwilling to find what might've happened to it. With Konoha looming on the horizon, falling back into myself wasn't a viable way of coping, and after getting a little scan done by a Yamanaka, probably even less so. But now that we are all relatively safe and secure and probably in no danger of being disturbed, I sank into my mind, the steady-slow thump-thump of Dōsukēru's heartbeat anchoring my descent into the space that should belong to me, and me alone.
Or it should've, at least until Yamanaka payed an unneeded visit that much long ago.
Point is, despite the events of the past week or so, remarkably little in my mindscape changed, which somehow made me feel that much guiltier. But if one wanted to debate over details, the trees were a bit more than saplings, and the grass looked decidedly less green than before. It would've been chalked up to imagination, but it felt like there was a chillier breeze as well, despite whatever physics that may or may not govern this corner of my world.
Somehow there was still a faint hum of disordent music in the background, like a melody that followed me from the grave.
Feeling a touch too done with it all, I inched forwards on my butt until the water could almost touch my feet, and twisted around so that I was parallel with the tiny shoreline. Is it a shoreline if the body of water is only a pond? Probably not, but my mind, my rules.
I reached out hesitantly, recalling that the last, and only time that I tried touching the pond the water had seemed to blossom up into a whirlpool that could drag me under. It most definitely tried, but I had scampered out of the way and gave the water a wide berth for the next few days. If water could grow eyes, the pond probably was giving me a rather disgruntled stare for denying it prey or something.
Once again, the water reached out for my hand as well, a tendril of liquid flowing up in a convenient grove in the ground, and slowly inching towards my outstretched hand. If ponds could learn, then its actions would seem like it was trying to mimic a wave, pushing in and pulling out with a pattern that only the moon can control.
Considering how it's normally a still-water pond in my head, the pond faking movement as a tidal pattern didn't really work that well.
But… What's the most it can do? Quite sure it can't drown me, being inside a mind and all, and even if that was a possibility, any thrashing around in the waking world would prompt my family to wake me up. If nothing else, the Inuzuka matron lady and her wolf-dog would probably also hear commotion or smell panic or whatever they do to find injured kids and probably run me to a Yamanaka.
As long as drowning in my mindscape doesn't prevent me from actually breathing in the waking world, it should be fine, right?
I took a few deep breaths, and held the last. No time like the present then–
...
Huh. Apparently the water wasn't even all that wet. In fact, it felt a bit as if it was the tongue of a cat, as in it should feel wet, but because of some other aspect of its nature, it's not.
A tad braver and more confident that the pool won't try to kill me, I shimmied sideways (slowly to conserve the mindscape equivalent of oxygen) until I could plunge the rest of my arm into the pool. There was only the very basic sensation of wetness, but overall the substance just felt heavy and posed some form of resistance between that of normal water and vegetable oil (don't ask, it was for science). Like before, the water blossomed a whirlpool, but this time around my hand, and all of a sudden I was yanked forwards like some godforsaken ragdoll headfirst into the pool.
Turns out liquid doesn't have to feel wet for it to pose an obstruction to breathing, experimentally proven by allowing a miniscule amount of the liquid to flow into my nose (unfortunately stinging like acid and nearly prompting coughs), which made my previous decision of holding my breath that much smarter. The pond was also much deeper than it had appeared from land, as the bottom was obscured by the floating papery debris, and I continued to get dragged down like a brick through water until I reached the layers of drifting paper. Shit.
The next now-improvised step to this utterly stupid endeavor would be to see if the water will try to hold me under, which, hopefully it won't. Maneuvering so that I was more or less upright and not dragged down face first was a bit difficult, but doing so lessened a bit of the horror sinking in.
Once is enough, please, please don't let me die again– while praying to whatever entity that orchestrated my rebirth in the first place, I waved my metaphysical hands around a bit to test the resistance and possible currents. If I don't even get to finish childhood this time around (which admittedly is much more than what other dead people probably get), what's the point of living again in another world?
Surprisingly, there weren't any more currents at the depth that the papers dwelled, which was a small mercy. The pages of floating debris had at this point almost completely blocked all visibility at this point, but apparently the bottom was only a few feet beneath the shallowest location of the papers. Touching down, however, startled me so much that I let loose a stream of bubbles that cheerfully floated away from me.
If my life wasn't in danger of ending, I would've been tempted to catch the bubbles and inhale them. The faint ringing in my ears and the little mots of dancing black at the edges of my vision probably also curbed the intent to expend energy for a trivial task that might not succeed anyways.
(Thank fuck my lung capacity followed me from Before.)
But now that I was in contact with a bottom a lot more solid than originally assumed, it also granted me the chance to find my footing so to speak, and push upwards, or blast off like team rocket.
So I did. Shuffling myself slowly into a crouch and facing up where the bubbles were slowly pushing through the mass of papers, I brought my arms up and palms together for minimum drag, and pushed off with my legs as fast as could be dared.
Breaking through the layers of papers was easy, if randomly having no visibility and paper plastered to myself counted, but the second I hit the water above that layer, there was a drag.
Hence, panic, and bringing my arms down in a modified breaststroke and flutter kicked like my life depended on it. To be fair, it sort of did.
It got a bit hazy around there, but after what felt like eons of burning lungs and blackening vision and an audible babumpbabump beating a drumbeat in my chest, my head broke through water. Furious strokes towards the shore were the next step to hopefully counteract the currents, and as soon as I sucked in enough oxygen to be a coherent human again, there may have been a bit of taking in huge gulps of air and holding it. The moment I could feel land at my feet and air on my face at the same time, I pushed out of the water and sprang onto land like a half-drowned cat.
Sweet, beautiful oxygen~ I giggled to myself, giddy that my life was intact.
But, whelp. That was certainly unexpected.
If my mind really wanted to kill me, it could've maintained the outwards dragging currents until I got too tired, or the downwards one, where I would've just straight up drowned. Instead, once I reached what could be rock bottom, the current lessened, and the water allowed me to just… swim back?
Ugh.
Not to mention all the pieces of paper plastered to me along with the mindscape-clothing. Speaking of– holy shit, like, how many trees died to fill this backwater death trap with all this paper?
If these trees are only grown for them to die and suffocate me in a pond…I cast a suspicious glare at the little copse surrounding me, as if they would divulge me of their secrets just from a particularly annoyed look.
Trees being damned, that doesn't mean that any of the stuff plastered to me would remove themselves without my actual doing shit. Hence the task of slowly peeling off drenched paper and chucking it at random trees. As stated previously, mindscape physics is weird, and sometimes behaves uncannily like reality.
Unfortunately like the properties of wet newspaper, it ripped easily, stuck to everything, and remained a general nuisance. The process took much longer than probably required, and might've actually have been easier had I done it in the physical world. At least sticking around in this mental world would leave me exhausted enough later to actually sleep, adrenaline from nearly dying be damned.
Thankfully clouds exist in this corner of the mental world, along with blue skies and trees and musical wind and so much more that I would never have imagined having all to myself back Before.
Then the musical wind decided to tone up the dial and blew a piece of the now mostly dry paper at my face. I grimaced, peeling it off, and froze.
Sometime between being wet as a ball of cotton in water and being more or less dry, letters and pictures had appeared on the paper. "What the everloving hell?" I whispered to myself, rubbing at the faint markings that grew ever clearer. The one that landed on my face seemed to be part of a bill, except it was written in traditional Chinese? And the monetary value was insane with its six zeros?
There was a part of me that couldn't decide if it was iced over with dread or numb with disbelief, but when I scrambled for some other of the scattered pieces of paper, they were also drying into various stages of colorful hell. Another piece proclaimed that it held a monetary value of a hell lot, and a third was just the border piece of a particularly pink bill. Only the fourth was intact, and smack in the middle of it was the face of an emperor staring back at me– the Jade Emperor, the words denoting this as currency for the deceased a mocking reminder of what has been lost.
There was something blurring my vision, and an ugly lump in my throat.
Fuck this shit I'm out.
AN: First of all... Whoops? It's 2018 now?
Second of all: imma so sorry but uni was happening and here was panicking and stuff and shit and writers block and holy shit its been 6 months I'm sorry y'all
third of all: holy shit, 370 favs, 537 follows, and 168 reviews, I love you guys! thank you so much for being here with me!
(3.5: random question, how did you guys come across this fanfic anyways? just curious)
fourth of all: I have no clue when the next update will be. Hopefully sooner than this one, but uni is... interesting, and my schedule is weird. The next chap has been started tho?
Fifth: I feel like this chap is a make/break point for this fic, as honestly what the last portion suggests is... quite different. so yeah, opinions and thoughts?
oh right, i completely failed NaNoWriMo with what, 600 words? lol
Anyways, thanks for sticking with me so much, and all you people are awesome! Please leave a review of the way out if you want to!
~Cadriona Morningwing
Uploaded: May 4, 2018 (may the fourth be with you~!)