InuYasha Fan Fiction / Crossover Fan Fiction / Naruto Fan Fiction ❯ Mors Mortis Miko ❯ Lady in Chains ( Chapter 1 )

A/N: First chapter is up. I own nothing but the plot, and this story was created with the help of my wonderful assistant Muffin Goodness.

Chapter 1: Lady in Chains

      She had been at it for a year. Or was it three? Eight? Twelve? Everything was starting to meld together, time nearly indiscernible. It didn't trouble her too much. Chasing her murderous friends from dimension to dimension so she could hack them to bits kept her mind pretty well occupied for the most part. The journey had developed its own rhythm:

      Chase, find, fight, escape.

      Chase, find, fight, escape.

      Even though her quest was on the forefront of her mind, she was easily distracted. Scouring a world for clues to the whereabouts of her friends, the monotony of asking, 'Have you seen any murderous, shadowed people hanging around the area lately?' became too routine and her mind would wander to other things. She'd get attracted by the sound of a fly bouncing repeatedly against a closed window, how red her hand got when she burned it with boiling water, and how easy birds made flying look. She knew firsthand that arms weren't the human equivalent of wings.

      When she did run into any of her friends, or they into her, she'd stare blankly at them for a few minutes, trying to remember if they had ever looked different than what they did now. When it hit her that she was supposed to kill them, she'd grab whatever was closest, and charge at them full-kilter. 

That was her favorite part…the fighting. It was never planned; she had no plan on what she would do next. It was all spontaneous. Which was probably why she liked it; it was incoherent. Much like her thoughts.

She had been at it enough for her sanity to slip. No more coherent thoughts for her, no more. It went from having her smiling, to laughing, to hysteria, and now to manic activeness. Plus boredom. Not a good combination. This leads to a complete disregarding of her quest, as she had come to think of it, and mingling with the people of the current dimension she had entered. So far she had been hung, shot, drowned, and beheaded.

      Sometimes she'd die before she ever met up with anyone. The locals tended to see her as a witch or a demon when she came out of dangerous stunts unscathed. It was actually fun to watch the look on people's faces when her body sat up, re-attached her head, and gave them a cheery smile and a wave. She liked to through in an occasional maniacal laugh here and there to spice things up. She had to leave after that, though, because news traveled fast and any hopes of running into any of her zombie-friends would be dashed.

      When she wasn't terrorizing villagers with pranks or damaging herself out of curiosity, she concentrated on her mission. After a few weeks (months?) of traveling, she came across a world that was fairly well forested. She spent a few days (weeks?) gleaning information off of the locals and learned that someone was killing off the beautiful women in the area. She knew right away it was Miroku. She followed his trail for a while, not really seeing anything but trees, managing to hold an intellectual conversation with the forest folk about the acorn crisis, when she came across a rather large merchant caravan that had been slaughtered. Miroku stood across the clearing, watching her. Waiting for her.

 

She smiled in greeting, and he grinned back. Same old Miroku, always the charmer.

 

      She knew it was stupid to fight him with a sword. She didn't know how to use a sword all that well, but it was close combat fighting and a bow wouldn't have been much help. So she fought him with a sword she pulled from a dead body, and ended up with it in her abdomen as Miroku made his escape.

 

      With a barely audible grunt, she wrenched to offending weapon from her gut, and watched with a small giggle as Death's curse knitted the skin back together. As the wound finished healing, a group of humans burst out of the underbrush, weapons drawn and pointed at her. They looked military to her, wearing matching blue uniforms and green flak-jackets. They all wore, what she would consider, headbands, all adorned with the same spiral symbol.

 

      "Halt where you are." One of them yelled at her, none neither coming close nor backing off.

 

      She smiled broadly in the direction the voice was coming from and shifted positions, making them all grip their weapons tighter. Some even twirling theirs in anticipation.

 

      "Are you the one doing all the killings?" the same guy asked.

 

      She stood up straighter and looked around at the massacre with a serious face, her bloodied sword, and then at herself. Smiling again she shrugged. "Maybe." She laughed.

 

      The head man, she assumed, frowned. "If you are, you will return with us for trial. Do not resist us and we will not be forced to render you immobile." The way he said it made the word immobile sound like they meant to kill her.

 

      She smiled cheekily, dropped her sword, and held up her hands to him. "I'll be good, I promise."

 

~_____~

 

      They were back. They were finally back, from that super, top-secret, no nonsense, hard to get information on, dangerous, hush hush mission that everyone was talking about.

      Someone, or something, had been out terrorizing the country-side, killing and maiming all in their path. Killing relentlessly, slaughtering the innocents, and making mish meat out of poor animals. And only the top ninja's of their village had been selected to capture this psycho. Capture him and bring him back to Konoha to be sentenced by the Hokage. They had been successful. A letter was received a week ago, informing them of their successful capture and that they would be returning today.

      So, naturally, word got out and now everyone was crowding the main road, hoping to get a glance of the criminal. Naruto was no different; in fact he had the best seat in the whole village. He was currently perched atop an electric pole, watching the steadily growing dot, which was the convoy of ANBU and their very special guest.

 

      "Hey, Naruto!" he heard someone yell.

 

      "Huh?" he asked aloud, looking towards the offending voice, only to find Sakura and Sasuke waving at him, well Sakura was waving, and standing in the front of the crowd. Even better than a lamppost.

 

      "Hey!" he yelled as he bounded over and across the crowd to join his teammates.  "Great view, I bet you could see that maniac really good from here."

 

      "Exactly why we're here. I want to see this criminal up close." Sakura told him.

 

      "Here they come." Sasuke said, his soft voice sounding loud when the crowd all seemed to hush simultaneously…the first of the ninja had appeared.

 

      The ninja…the best and youngest their village had to offer…looked as if they had been through hell and back. They walked tiredly with a timid awareness of their surroundings. None had visible wounds nor did they seem to be missing any members. Their eyes, their haunted eyes, stared straight ahead, not meeting the eyes of any of the villagers. They were uneasy, nervous, weary, and maybe even a tad bit frightened.

 

      'Of what?' Naruto thought with concern. His eyes traveled from their faces to their formation; two in the front, three in the back, one on each side, and in the middle: the prisoner. As he laid eyes upon their figure, he unintentionally stepped back as something inside of him recoiled.

 

      It was a woman. A young woman stood in the middle of the ninja squad looking around at everything with an innocent, cheerful disposition. Yet, she wore chains and shackles and ragged, blood stained clothes.

 

      Was she the one? Was she the one terrorizing the country side, killing those people, and destroying whole villages and families? She both did and didn't look the part. She was young in the face and body; he would put her into her early twenties, her hair was down and an inky, ebony black, but her eyes looked old and crazed and the way her bangs hung in her face made her seem deadly.

 

      "What's the matter, Naruto? You scared?" Sasuke teased, seeing Naruto's frightened stance.

 

      "You're telling me you don't feel that?" Naruto asked him shakily, turning to look at him for the first time since he laid eyes on the woman. Just as he asked, Sasuke went rigid and jerked his head to stare at the young woman. Naruto was used to detecting other ninjas' chakras, one would die in battle if the ability wasn't learned, and had grown accustomed to feeling the standard normality of battle-ready energy that everyone had. This woman, though, felt off.  If someone had asked him to describe it in colors, he would say blue shot through with black. Her inner energy didn't match her appearance at all. She was cute, big, brown eyes, thick tresses, and small in stature, but with the aura of insanity and darkness.

 

      She was humming to herself as she walked, but stopped as she crossed into their direct line of view. Her face was that of pure curiosity as she turned to look at them.

 

      At Naruto.

 

      Their eyes met and he froze. She seemed to take in his whole being without even losing eye connection. He took another step back and she tilted her head and smiled widely.

 

      "Ooo, what's your name kid?" she asked.

 

      "What's it to you?" Sasuke asked as both he and Sakura stepped in front of Naruto, before he could open his mouth.

 

      Her eyes widened and she smiled wider. "Well isn't that sweet?" she told them as she stepped closer, and they got into ready positions.

 

      "Keep going." The ninja behind her ordered, but a look from the girl had him changing his attitude. "Please." He added.

 

      "Of course, Aoba." She grinned at him. "See ya 'round, kid." She tossed over her shoulder as she resumed her promenade to her trial. They watched her as she was hauled off by the guards and let out the breaths they had been holding once she was out of ear shot.

 

~____~

      That was the last they had seen or heard of her. A week had gone by and there was no official news, but there was gossip. Some said she had already been executed, others said she had escaped, a few thought she was being tortured, but most figured she was locked up somewhere in the village.

 

      "She's in there." Naruto murmured as they stopped outside the Hokage's office.

 

      "What?" Sakura asked, looking from the door to Naruto's strained features. "Are you sure?"

 

      "Even Naruto's not slow enough to forget that chakra signature. She's in there."

 

      "Yeah…" Naruto agreed, but a second later Sasuke's words clicked in his head. "Wait, what did you say?"

 

      "So…you don't want to go in?" Sakura asked him slowly, only to receive an angry look in respond.

 

      "I'm not afraid of some stupid woman. The Hokage wants us and I'm not going to let her stop me." Marching in front of the two he grabbed the doorknob and entered. The group froze just inside the door.

 

The young woman was sitting in the middle of the room, shackled to a chair. She had been cleaned up since last they saw her. She was no longer covered in blood, her hair had been combed, and her torn bloody clothes had been replaced with a nondescript gray kimono that looked prison-issued.

 

      She sat in the chair comfortingly and in a relaxed position as she rocked her head and tapped her foot to unheard music. She didn't seem aware of their presence as she hummed, nor did she seem to care that she was chained to a chair.

 

      As they stared at her, they weren't aware of anyone else in the room until the Third cleared his throat and got their attention.

 

      "Lord Hokage." They greeted giving him a brief bow.

 

      "You asked to see us, sir?" Sakura asked.

 

      "Yes, I did. You s-" the Hokage.

 

      "Hey, why is she still here? Didn't she kill all those people?" Naruto interrupted loudly, jerking a thumb at the humming girl.

 

      "She neither admits nor denies and there's not really a way to find out for sure. The attacks were far between and never consistent. She was found covered in blood and carrying a sword, but none of the bodies have markings that matched her weapon. Therefore we cannot execute her, nor can we allow her to leave. This is where you three come in. She is not to wander the village alone and needs twenty-four hour surveil-"

 

      "You want us to baby-sit!" Naruto accused him with an annoyed expression on his face.

 

      "Guard her, Naruto. Make sure she doesn't endanger the villagers and keep her from escaping."

 

      "But what about when we train with Kakashi-sensei?" Sakura voiced.

 

      "Take her with you. Under no circumstances is she to be left alone."

 

      "Does Kakashi-sensei have to do this too?" Sasuke spoke up.

 

      "Of course. He's already been briefed on the situation. He's the one who volunteered your team."

 

      "Figures." Naruto muttered.

 

      "When do we start?" Sasuke asked.

  

    "Tomorrow morning, enough time for you to adjust your schedule for her?" The Hokage answered with a small smile.

 

      Team 7 were anything but happy. They had gotten crappy missions before, but this took the cake. They had to baby-sit a grown woman who was probably a mass murderer. As they began to leave they could just imagine all the fun they were going to have.

 

      "Bye Naruto…see you tomorrow." A voice, higher and softer of that of the Hokage's, sounded off behind.

 

      Stiffening, Naruto slowly turned around to face the young woman. She had stopped her humming and her foot was still now. Slowly, her head fell backwards and her hair draped downwards, giving her a comical look. Her eyes were over-bright. She smiled widely and waved her arm in the air, making the chain rattle. Naruto sped out of the room and the woman's echoing laugh following him down the stairs.