Rise and Shine

Okay, way, way later than I'd planned, and unfortunately short- I'm hoping that if I keep the updates for this shorter, I'll be able to update it more regularly & nice and speedy! Hopefully an update for Prov will also materialize soon! Also, because some people are new to this story and may not realize how long a hiatus this was on... uh, a heads-up, my writing style has changed. At least, I think so. And I put a lot more spacing in, so maybe it'll look weird compared to my other chapters. Anyway. Hope it's ok, sorry it's so late... and such a weird chapter... idk. anyway, please let me know what you think! :)

"Just remain calm, Andromeda."

"10 centimeter dilation... it's time."

"Here we go."

The pain that had been building now reached its climax. A horrible, tearing, stretching sensation. She was being ripped in half. Her spine was on fire.

"Come on, Andromeda."

"There you go, there you go."

"How's the progress?"

"The labour's just started, sir. She's doing well- incredibly agitated, though."

There was no end in sight, the agony went on and on, the needles in her back muffling it but not erasing it. Blood began to swirl in the water.

"The head... shoulders... There we go, Andromeda, there we go, keep pushing."

"Good girl. Time to go."

A sweet-smelling cotton pad covered her mouth and nose as she collapsed back against the glass wall of her tank, exhausted. She put up no resistance, slipping into blissful, grey nothing.

/

Konan opened her eyes.

She was in near-total darkness. She blinked. It hurt- her eyes were incredibly dry, and there was crusty discharge coating her lashes. She raised a hand to her face to wipe them, and found she was incredibly weak; her hand flopped pathetically by her side, then simply fell onto her face. She clumsily wiped at her eyes with her fingers, which hardly felt like part of her at all. She tried to move her other arm. It wasn't much better.

Her eyes adjusted to the darkness, and she found that she was in a bed, in a room lit by two flickering fluorescent lights under some counters at the other end. There was no window. There was no clock. She blinked slowly, looking around her stupidly. She awkwardly wiped some drool off of her chin. It was a few minutes before she even thought to wonder where she was. It was like there was a thick fog in her brain.

She turned her head slowly, reaching clumsily for Pain, to feel his warm body next to her. She felt nothing. She opened her eyes and saw he wasn't there. She felt slow and stupid, wondering emptily where he was. He always slept on her right. Had he got up to get coffee?

She looked at her left arm and noticed a load of tubes coming out of her wrist. She felt sick looking at them. She breathed deeply through her nose and sat up. Her head span and she pressed a hand to her mouth, trying not to vomit.

"Konan." Her voice was barely a croak- the oldest, crustiest toad in the world would have been ashamed of her. She cleared her throat weakly and tried again.

"My name is Konan." Better.

"I am..." she trailed off, looking down. Bizarre. Where was the bump?

She pressed a hand to the sheets, flat around her waist. She frowned. It felt...flat. Her hands got clammy, and the back of her neck felt icy cold. With a lot of effort, she pulled up the heavy sheets. Her stomach... She scratched at the paper dress she was wearing, tearing it open in her haste. She pressed her hands to her belly. It was squishy, but definitely flat. Empty.

She stared down at her waist, feeling very cold. But she couldn't understand why. She leaned back against the pillows and pressed her hands to her face. The feeling was slowly coming back to her arms. She shut her eyes and tried to remember what was going on. She had never been in this room before, she was very sure. It smelled of a disinfectant she couldn't remember buying, or noticing anywhere else. But where had she been before this? She tried to imagine what she would say to someone who couldn't remember anything.

"You must be very confused. Don't force it, you'll remember soon."

Why was she imagining her mother's voice? At least she remembered what it sounded like...

"Do you know your name?"

"Konan." She said, her voice cracking again.

"Good girl. Can you tell me where you are, Konan?"

"No." Tears were beginning to leak out of her eyes, and her throat was closing up.

Why am I so sad? Am I lost? Did someone die?

"Do you remember why you think your stomach was bigger, Konan?"

"I can't."

"Why do women's stomachs get bigger, Konan?"

"They have babies."

"Did you have a baby?"

Konan opened her eyes.

She sat bolt upright, ignoring the dizziness it brought, and slapped her hands to her stomach. Her empty stomach. She looked around. There was no baby in this room. There was not a single baby in this room. It was absolutely empty of other people, full stop. There was a beeping ringing in her ears. She slowly realized it was coming from a machine next to her. She was panting now, panicking, and the beeping got faster. She looked down at the tubes coming out of her arm again. She bit down on her lip, shut her eyes, and tore them out. The beeping stopped. She pushed back the sheets and stumbled out of the bed, collapsing against another machine. Her legs were numb, stinging horribly, fast asleep. But at least she could feel them. She staggered around the room, crashing into shelves and counters, trying to make it to the door, crying out with every step.

Where the hell am I? Where's my baby? Where's Pain? Where's Madara?

She leaned against the wall, trembling, trying to remember everything she could, shaking out her legs gently to try and restore proper feeling in them. She shut her eyes and pictured the last thing she could remember seeing before waking up; a big, white room. And people wearing white coats. And she had been in pain...

Her eyes snapped open and she turned towards the door. Someone was unlocking it. She panicked, wondering if she should get back over to the bed and pretend to be asleep... but how would she put the tubes back in? She pressed herself against the wall and prayed that whoever it was, they would tell her where she was, either willingly or by force. Whatever force Konan could possibly muster.

The door opened and a slim woman with her hair in a neat bun walked in. She was flipping papers over on her clipboard. She shut the door quietly behind her. Konan shuffled as quietly as she could towards the door. She hadn't even found anything to use as a weapon... damnit. But the woman didn't look very strong. Had Konan been her normal self, she was pretty sure she could have taken her. Possibly. The woman looked at the bed. She dropped the clipboard. Konan pressed herself against the door and felt for the handle. The woman whirled around.

"Konan! Konan, don't move, it's me!" the woman said, tugging at her black hair. It came off. Konan scrabbled at the handle. The woman shuffled towards her daintily and held her shoulders. Konan shook her head. Why the hell wouldn't the door open? The woman shook out her long, pale blonde hair.

"Konan, it's me! I'm here to help you." The woman whispered, taking Konan's hands away from the doorknob and holding them in her own. She was smiling. Konan blinked. Then squinted.

"...Ino?"

Ino beamed and nodded, walking Konan back to the bed as she began to talk quickly and softly, glancing at the door. "I know you have a lot of questions, but I can't answer them all- I just managed to get into this place a couple days ago. Before, I was working at Madara's old place, where you were held during your labor, but I got there too late- they'd already moved you. I got a job here by stealing another nurse's ID. That's why I have to wear the wig. Luckily she was a new transfer, so nobody knew what she looked like." Konan opened her mouth to speak, but Ino talked over her.

"I can't stay too long- I'm supposed to just be checking the monitors. I come here every day to check on you, and to secretly decrease the propofal dosage. I'm glad you're finally awake! I was worried another nurse might come by and realize you were getting way less than you're supposed to. Now, I can help you get out of here, but you'll have to wait until next week- that's when Madara's leaving. He was just here to ensure the first batch of your samples is delivered safely."

"What samples?" Konan asked, finally getting a word in. Ino walked over and picked up her wig, readjusting it and putting it on Konan's bed as she started to re-pin her own hair.

"He's selling your DNA. Or, I guess the Andromeda DNA. He's shipping out batches of skin samples, hair clippings, and blood across the world to be cloned. Or something like that- I only hear rumors in the staff room. I tried to get a job in the actual shipping department, but it's all men in there -very sexist- and I can't really pass for one easily."

"How long have I been here? And where is here? And where the hell's my baby?" Konan asked as Ino put her wig back on and pushed Konan back down on the bed.

"I don't know exactly how long you've been at this facility- you've been moved around a bit, at first just sedated, but you woke up and tried to get away-"

"I don't remember that."

"Well, you were knocked out pretty quickly, and pretty forcefully too, apparently. But they were trying to put you into an induced coma, which is what I've been trying to get you out of- Madara apparently doesn't give a fuck if you have brain damage, all he seems to want is your DNA, and your unconscious body."

"What?" Konan asked sharply. Ino's mouth twisted sourly as she picked up Konan's arm and started to re-attach the tubes.

"Nothing's happened yet, don't worry. And I would've taken them out, no problem. But in a month, once you'd stabilized properly, he was going to rent your body out. I guess he'd decided that even semi-conscious, you wouldn't have "behaved", as he puts it."

Konan felt sick. She lay back against the pillows.

"And.. the rest?" Ino adjusted the monitor and moved the one Konan had crashed into.

"You're at a secret facility in South Korea-"

"South Korea!? How the hell did I get halfway around the world?"

"Like I said, you were unconscious, and Madara has a private jet. He also owns this place- I've been doing some digging over the past few months, and it turns out he has similar facilities all over the world, all connected somehow with the Andromeda project. He's been planning this for years and years." Ino shook her head.

"But I don't know where your baby is. Like I said, I got here way after the birth. But I think they knocked you out immediately after you had the baby, and took you away very quickly. I have no idea what happened to it after that. I'm sorry." She brushed the hair off of Konan's forehead and tucked it behind her ear in a comforting manner.

Konan took a deep breath, feeling a hollow sensation build inside of her as she accepted this information.

"Alright." she said, in such a calm voice she surprised herself- she sure didn't feel very calm. "I have to get out of here. I have to find my baby. And I have to call Pain... somehow." She frowned. "If I've been here for... a couple weeks at least-"

"I'd estimate Madara's had you for about eight weeks total." Ino said, tucking the blankets neatly around Konan.

"Eight weeks? Then... Where's Pain? Do you know?" Konan asked. Ino shook her head.

"I'm sorry... I don't. I know the facility where you were held during your labour was blown up shortly after you were moved- the way the staff around here talk about it, it doesn't seem like it was planned. I'm sure your friends have been looking for you, so it could be that they were the ones who blew it up." Ino said, scanning the machines around Konan and adjusting the settings. Konan smiled, thinking of Deidara.

"Could be." she murmured.

But she was still worried. Eight weeks ago... if it really had been Deidara who'd blown up that place... then they'd found where she'd been held. If they got that far... could they have somehow found out she'd been taken to South Korea? How on earth could they have found that out? And her baby...

"So... my baby is eight weeks old?" she asked softly. Ino flinched for a second before smiling and saying 'yes'. Konan frowned.

"What?" she asked suspiciously. Ino sighed and straightened up, looking professional.

"Nothing. It's nothing. Yes, your baby is eight weeks old." Her tone was very calm. Konan narrowed her eyes, but shrugged.

"Are you going to make me stay here? Why won't you let me go?" Konan asked as Ino surveyed the scene, apparently to make sure it looked unchanged since Konan had woken up.

Ino pursed her lips and glanced at her watch, then at the door.

"I'm not going to make you stay here, Konan. I'm going to help you get out of here. But you have to wait until nightfall. During the day, there are people patrolling that corridor all the time, and sometimes Madara himself comes in here to check on you. It'll be easier at night. Just wait that long, okay? I'll come and get you, and we'll get out of here."

Konan nodded. Ino surveyed the scene once more, smiled, and was gone, locking the door behind her. Konan stared up at the ceiling.

It was hard to believe that it had all come to this. Here she lay, held against her will in a foreign country, weeks after having a baby while kidnapped. She tried to remember how she'd felt, not even two years previous, as she'd walked up to St Misery's. She couldn't remember at all. She barely felt like the same person. Everything she'd done at school now felt fruitless, time wasted. Had she known how short her freedom would be after that, would she have stayed? Or would she have run, run as far as she could have, praying she would never be found?

Konan's mouth twisted into a sour smile and she shut her eyes. Running would not have helped. Hadn't that been proven? Madara would have found her. He found her at school. He found her at Pain's house. He would have found her at the north pole. She would never have been free for long.

At least she had been happy, however briefly. She tried, briefly, to hope she would be happy if and when she got out of this mess. That she would reunite with Pain and her baby, that she might be happy then, have a happy life. But Madara would always come. And when he came for her, he wouldn't make the same mistake twice. He wouldn't leave her anything to run back to.

Konan blinked, feeling tears in her eyes as her throat tightened. She was just making herself even more miserable, thinking about what could be. What will be.

If she knew this- that Madara would hunt her down again, would surely kill Pain and her baby if he found them again- was there even any reason to find them, to go home? If finding them meant killing them... Konan shook her head.

The warm longing she'd felt when she thought of Pain, of seeing him again and holding him again, had vanished. The vague wonderings she'd had about her baby -who it would look like, boy or girl, what their laugh would sound like- became cold and faded. She would not see Pain again. She would never hold her baby. To do so would be to endanger them, and she would not allow harm to come to them.

Konan glared up at the ceiling. She wasn't scared, not anymore. She surprised herself, giving an impulsive, hollow laugh. She hoped fleetingly that no one had heard her, but then realized she didn't care. Who cared if Madara found out she was awake? She'd kick him in the fucking face. There was nothing he could do to her, not anymore. Not anything he hadn't already done, and there was no way he could scare her anymore. She didn't give a damn what happened to herself.

This had been her destiny the entire time, after all. Her father had planned it this way. Her mother had died for this to be so. Fighting her fate had only brought misery upon herself, her friends, and those she loved more than anything. Konan grinned as a few tears rolled down her cheeks. She'd been a mother for so short a time, and she was already crap at it- how many moms out there let their baby be fucking kidnapped immediately after birth?

The hours rolled by slowly, and Konan's thoughts became darker and darker as what little hopes she had had faded. By the time Ino crept back into her room, in the early hours of the morning, Konan didn't care enough even to greet her. She lay on her back, looking impassively up at the ceiling, so motionless that Ino had to double-check to make sure she hadn't fallen back into the coma.

"Konan, what's wrong? We have to move quickly." Ino whispered, stripping the blankets off of the bed and detaching the tubes from Konan's wrist. Konan watched her do it and felt pity for her. She'd thought she'd misjudged Ino, but she was just as stupid as Konan had originally assumed; she'd tracked Konan for months, had gone undercover to save her, had risked her life for a completely pointless rescue mission.

"Ino, leave me here." Konan said, lying back down. Ino stared at her.

"Are you crazy? What the hell are you thinking?" Ino hissed. Konan shrugged slowly.

"I'm not going back. If Madara wants me, he can have me." she said impassively.

Ino continued to stare at her as if she'd had a mental break. Then a panicked expression came over her face. "Has... Has someone been in here? A nurse? Madara? Did they talk to you, or- or did they give you something?" Konan looked at her and then looked away.

"I'm not being controlled." Konan sighed. "I can't go back, Ino. Madara will always find me, and if he finds me again, he'll make sure I'll have nothing to run back to next time he gets me. So I'm staying." she explained in a dull tone. She wished Ino would hurry up and understand and go away.

Konan had never wanted to be alone more.

Ino stared at her for a few more seconds. Then she clenched her jaw and slapped Konan around the face. Really hard. Really fucking hard.

"What the shit, Ino?" Konan hissed, rubbing her stinging cheek. Ino covered her mouth, glaring down at her.

"I don't want to hear any more of this bullshit, Konan. I don't care if you're right, I am getting you out of here." Ino said through gritted teeth, pulling Konan forcefully up off the pillows and all but kicking her out of the bed. Konan fell to her knees on the linoleum floor, her legs still stinging and weak.

"Stop it, go away!" Konan protested, trying to climb back onto the bed, but Ino held her back, untying the hospital gown and tearing it off. She crumpled it into a ball and shoved it into her bag. Konan grabbed for it, but Ino held her off.

"I am not letting you stay here, Konan." she said firmly. "Now you can do what I say, or I can tie you to a chair. Your choice."

Konan's breathing became shallow, because Ino didn't understand, she wasn't listening.

"You don't get it," Konan pleaded, starting to cry again, "He's gonna look for me! He always finds me, he's gonna... he's gonna find me," she gasped, shuddering as she cried, "He's going to kill them, Ino! He's going to kill everybody, and then I'll just be back here again. So why go? I can't go-" Ino hit her again, but she looked scared.

"Konan, I understand why you think you have to stay. But I'm telling you, that's not going to happen. We're going to get out of here, and Madara is not going to find you again. Okay? Now sit in that chair." she ordered.

Konan stumbled over to the chair and sat in it, covering her face with her hands and shaking. She was beginning to remember a little more now, had flashes of her labour, of the men in white coats, of that tank of water, blood in the water, the pain... the sweet smell and then nothing. Her shoulders shook as Ino pulled a heavy black vest over her, then a white coat, and tucked her hair up into a black wig.

"I'm going to disguise you as my alias here. Strictly speaking, I'm not supposed to be here at this time either, but at least if anyone sees you, you should be able to get away before they figure out I'm not you." Ino explained quickly, tucking her own hair into a blue wig made to look like Konan's own hair. She changed out of her own clothes into an identical black vest under a hospital gown, then pulled her coat back on over top.

"But... but if we're caught... they'll kill you for that." Konan whispered staring at Ino, who was now hanging her ID around Konan's neck. "Why... why are you doing this? Why are you doing any of this, I barely spoke to you at school!" Konan murmured, shaking her head in confusion. Ino smiled.

"Well, partly because I like you and I don't want you to die," Ino said wryly, "and also because my dad's been keeping tabs on Madara and the Andromeda project for years. He works in intelligence, and his team's been on this whole thing for decades, since your dad started developing his work, actually. He's been waiting to bring down Madara's whole ring. We're going to meet up with them when I get you out of here, actually, so you'll be safe with them for a while." Ino explained. Konan was stunned. She was about to ask a question (or rather, a dozen questions) when Ino silenced her with a look. "There'll be time to talk about this later. Right now I have to get you out of here."

Ino put on some very cool-looking night-vision goggles and opened the door, supporting Konan. She switched off the lights in the hallway, and they walked quickly through the facility. Konan was lost within minutes, partly because she couldn't see anything, partly because they turned so many times in a seemingly random manner. She imagined the building to be oblong and full of short, abrupt corridors that all linked up like a maze. The air-conditioning seemed to be turned up extremely high, making it very cold. The floor under her bare feet was shockingly cold and very smooth, like ice. At last, Ino ducked into a staircase and guided Konan carefully down the stairs.

"Okay." Ino breathed, pausing for a moment. "We've been very lucky- haven't seen anyone yet, except some guards who were going the other way. This is where it gets tricky. The alarm will go off when I get through this door. There's no way of stopping that, because my pass won't shut it off at this time. So once we get through that door, you've got to run. There's three vans waiting outside. Get in the first one, I'll be in the second. The third is a decoy. They're about twenty feet from this door, but guards are stationed just outside here. This is why we're wearing the Kevlar vests. We're going to be shot at." Ino said calmly.

Konan stared at her. It sounded completely crazy. She wished suddenly she was still in a coma.

"Uh... okay." Konan said, feeling light-headed. How the fuck was she supposed to dodge bullets when she could barely support her own weight? And the vest was really heavy, to boot.

"Okay. Here we go." Ino said, slipping her goggles back on. Besides having a baby, Konan had never felt less ready for anything in her life.

Ino swiped her pass in the black box and kicked the door open. Immediately a shrill siren spit the air. Konan slapped her hands over her ears and followed Ino as she sprinted into the darkness. Konan stumbled, scraping her clumsy feet on the concrete as she heard shouts. Floodlights suddenly covered them, painfully bright.

"Get out of the light!" she heard Ino scream as five fast cracks split the night. Konan felt something very hot whizz close to her shoulder. She ran to the right, out of the light. Her legs were screaming and heavy, but she ran and ran as more gunshots echoed though the night.

Konan's night vision was so bad she almost ran straight into the truck. She skidded, the skin scraping off her heels as she stopped, and fumbled with the door, clambering in. She had no idea if she was in the right one. The man inside said nothing to her, but he took off immediately as the back window was shattered by a bullet.

"Have you been shot?" the man asked. Konan shook her head quickly. Her hands were trembling. "Okay. It's going to be a long drive, and you're still quite weak, Ms. Yamanaka tells me." That must be Ino, Konan thought vaguely. Her whole body felt like it was buzzing. She had just been shot at. With fucking bullets. "Why don't you try and get some rest?" the man suggested.

Konan could have laughed. She felt like she would never sleep again.

She was wrong, of course- just an hour later, she drifted into a heavy, dreamless slumber.

again, sorry for the short update, also sorry this was a pretty weird chapter... idk I'm trying to get back into the flow of this story and I'm not sure if it's working. oh well.