EDIT: Changed some things because I didn't like the way the timeline would have worked out. A/N: I was inspired by the first Naruto ending Wind –
I don't own Naruto.
Wind – ウインド
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They say the wind can bring change…
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When it happened, it had been sudden, unexpected, and above all – tragic. And when I say 'it' I'm referring to my death. And how could a fifteen year old dying by falling off a porch not be seen as tragic – or pitiful; it depended on how one looked at it.
Admittedly, it had been a bad idea on our half. Playing tag and not limiting where one could run to, that is. I'd ran up onto the porch, tripped on a step, and had fallen into a weak portion of railing that sent me falling headfirst to the ground that was roughly ten feet away.
Not a good height to fall from headfirst, or in general.
I distinctly remember feeling the searing, numbing pain and hearing the crack as my head hit the rocky ground. Then I was suddenly cold and drifting, then there was warmth. A cramped warmth that was oddly comforting.
The amount of time I spent in that warm place was unknown to me, but when that warmth was disturbed and I was being pushed and squeezed and suddenly so, so cold, I knew what had just happened.
I'd been born again.
Just that thought brought upon the whimpers and whines and eventually cries you'd expect from a baby.
The arms I'd been passed to cradled me, and from the feminine tone of the cooing I could only guess it was my mother.
Even as my mind was stressing and freaking and slowly fading to black I managed to catch one word repeated over and over –
Konan.
My name?
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Over the next year I found my conscience fading in and out, only remaining for a day or so every week. Perhaps it was a defense mechanism to keep my older mind from destroying the delicate child's mind and brain I now had. But now it seemed my mind was here to stay, to see and take in everything.
With how my mother was cooing at me – and from the small, recollections of words and sound gained while I was floating – and the one finger she had held up momentarily, I guessed it was my birthday.
Once again, like when I was first born, I picked up on that word – my name – Konan.
It was familiar that name, achingly familiar.
And suddenly I realized, the mirror mother sat me in front of while brushing through my short baby hair revealed all to me.
Short blue hair, wide and disbelieving amber eyes, and the name Konan.
Dear god. Why? How?
I was Konan.
Konan, the origami master.
Konan, the future war orphan.
Konan, the future friend of Nagato and Yahiko.
Konan, the future student of Jiraiya.
Konan, the future Akatsuki member and "God's Angel".
My bottom lip popped out and trembled, halting my mother's ministrations with my hair. The pressure of knowledge and destiny pressed down on me and I bawled. Because ohdeargod I didn't want this.
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My first birthday nearly a year ago had ended in disaster, as I'd been a bawling mess all day. It was something I felt bad about even now, what with the distressed and harrowed looks that had never left their faces until I cried myself to sleep that very night. The next morning I had woken up feeling numb and I had effectively pushed my realizations to the back of my mind because –
Because I couldn't handle it.
I wasn't sure I could handle it now, seeing as I was furiously and agitatedly chewing on a wet cloth. A wet cloth because it was all I had. In fact, it was the same one I'd apparently used during my teething time. Now I used it because I had developed a habit of biting and chewing on things when I got anxious.
My poor parents probably never expected to have such an odd child – hell, I'd never expected to be a child again.
Did that make us even?
"Konan, dear," Mother looked tired – her blue hair limp and face older than it should be as she picked me up, "Lunch time, come now."
"Mmkay mama," I burbled around my cloth, only setting it aside once she'd set me down in front of my food.
Food that was… rather pathetic compared to what I remembered and probably compared to what other villages had, and we weren't even in a war right now.
Even without wartime Amegakure was a rough place to live, what with being in such a spot that we'd be affected by wars even if we didn't participate in them. Not to mention the civil war that would go on during my lifetime as well.
My life was already being torn and pushed apart – first by my father being pulled and sent out on more an more dangerous missions, and another time because our income had taken a hit and we'd had to move into a house that was smaller and in the slum because my parents couldn't afford the taxes Hanzō had started pushing forward.
Hanzō was a bastard, a bastard that would end up killing Yahiko. The man that ultimately spurred Nagato's state of mind.
I didn't want that. I didn't want anything to do with the stealing of the tailed beasts or Tobito or Madara.
I wanted change – I so desperately wanted change.
But could I change anything? Could I save Yahiko? Would saving Yahiko make things worse in the end, or would things be better?
My mind roiled and my two year old body protested with a yawn, tired from the amount of thinking I'd been doing. It was with numb taste buds that I ate what I was given, though the food probably would have been bland and tasteless anyways.
The question I'd been asking was could I change things. What I needed to ask was would I be able to bring myself to do it.
I can. My small hand tightened around my bent and dented fork. I can and will. I'll try my best.
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…perhaps I can be the wind that changes something.
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I really hope to make the future chapters longer than this, but I thought this was an appropriate place to end for now.