Ayame was dreaming. Dreaming of a time that seem so, distant now.
5 year old Ayame was sitting on a large rock in her back yard, swinging her bare feet back in forth in the small pond. She was dressed in a pink dress and was grinning as a young woman in her late twenties with black hair and green eyes pulled her hair back into pigtails with pink ribbons. The lady was dressed in a purple tank top and skirt, smiling at her little girl.
“Mommy?” Ayame asked.
“What is it Ayame-chan?”
“My first day of school is tomorrow. Are you going to walk me there?”
“Only if you want to. I bet if you asked him, your dad would come too.”
“I want him to come, but doesn’t he have to work?”
“I’m sure he can come.”
Akina Hattori pulled the pink bows tight so they wouldn’t fall out.
“I’m home!”???? said.
“Daddy’s home!!” The little girl cried quickly putting her shoes on.
She ran up to the house, removed her shoes and ran to greet her father at the front door.
“Where are my two beautiful ladies?” he asked as she bounded around the corner.
Train Hattori embraced his daughter as she ran into his arms. He held her out and spun her around causing her to laugh with glee. He brought her back in safely into his arms and held her close.
Train was the one who gave Ayame her deep blue eyes, but he didn’t give her his dark brown hair that he liked to keep short. He was in his early thirties and cared about his daughter and wife more than anything else. He was dressed in purple as well.
Purple was the Hattori clan’s color and when a child graduated from both normal school and ninja school, they adopted the color purple as their own. In theSorottazousho village there were two main clans, the Hattori clan and the Kaku clan. Both of these clans were filled with ninjas who protected the village. The two clans never really got along, but they had peace because of how hard Ayame’s father as the leader of the village worked to keep the peace. These two clans have the ability to write messages that only someone from either clan could read. Ayame didn’t know how this worked, but she only knew that it happened and when she finally went to ninja school she would learn how to write and read these messages.
Ayame was happy.
That night she was tucked into bed and given goodnight kisses.
“But I can’t sleep. I’m too excited about school!” she told her parents.
“It’ll come faster if you sleep.” her mother told her.
“Yeah, besides if you don’t sleep some monster who takes sweet little girls when they aren’t sleeping will come and take you away. Then your mother and I will be very sad....” he father teased.
“Monster?!”
“Don’t scare her!” Akina said smacking her husband for his stupidity.
Akina pushed Ayame’s lose hair out of her face and started to hum an old lullaby. Ayame’s eye lids grew heavy as sleep overcame her. Before she drifted off she heard her parents say goodnight and that they love her.
When Ayame was young she was a sound sleeper, but this night something woke her up. She wasn’t sure what it was, but she had to find out.
“Mommy? Daddy?” she called out.
Not getting a reply her thoughts flew back to the monster her father mentioned . What if he forgot to tell her that the monster liked to eat mommy’s and daddy’s?! She crawled out of bed dressed in pink pj’s. She crept out into the hallway and wondered around the empty house. Where where her parents?!
She put on her shoes and left the house. Outside it was eerily quiet. She walked around for a bit before stepping in something. She looked down to see that she was standing in a pool of crimson blood. Inches away lied the candy shop keeper who gave Ayame freebies when her mother wasn’t looking. Ayame covered her mouth to prevent the scream that formed on her lips from escaping.
Now she was worried. Her parents were nowhere to be found. As she continued to search she found more and more dead bodies of people she grew up knowing. Not only adults, but some of her best friends. Tears started to well in her eyes as she realized everyone in her village was gone. But that couldn’t mean her parents where gone too......Could it? She ran to the last place she could think of. The village leader’s building. Her father worked there and she knew some of the village’s most important documents where there.
In front of the old building were two figures lying right next to one another holding hands. She couldn’t hold back the scream this time as she saw her parent’s lying there dead. She ran over to their bodies, tears pouring down her face. She fell to her knees and started to shake.
Her family, and friends! All gone! All the happiness she had, and looking forward to school seemed like a distant memory now.
A shadow towered over her. She gasped. The monster had returned and was going to either kill her or take her away. She slowly turned to see Orochimaru standing over her, leaning on a large red scroll. The scroll that caused all of Ayame’s troubles.
“It’s such a shame that I couldn’t make it in time to help. I could have saved them.”
Ayame was shaking in fear now. Could she trust him? There was something not quite right about him. She could feel it. How could she be sure he wasn’t the monster here to take her away.
“Mister.....”She said choosing her words carefully, “What should I do? Where do I go?”
“Well, my dear, you could come and stay with me.”
She hesitated.
“I’m a ninja, I’ll train you and I’ll try to track down whoever did this.” he said trying to give her a reassuring smile.
She had nowhere else to go, she was desperate.
“Ok.....”
“I’m Orochimaru.”
“I’m Ayame Hattori.”
“Well then, Ayame shall we go?” he asked reaching out his free hand shifting his weight.
“‘Kay...” she said grasping onto his white hand.
Other memories flashed in her mind. From meeting Naruto to training with Ino to meeting Rai. Rai catching her, Rai teasing her, and taking off his mask
and smiling at her.
Rai and all her friends vanished. All that was left was Orochimaru laughing.
“When the time is right Ayame Hattori will read the scroll to me and when I no longer need her....”
He picked up a kunai that was laying on the table and threw it at Ayame.
His chilling laugh surrounded her as she slipped into darkness.
She woke up screaming realizing then that the nightmare wasn’t over yet.
More later. ^.^
