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Chapter 1

It was wet when it all began – ironically enough, it was wet when it all ended. There is poetry in the way things worked, but I'd never been the one to ponder on that to begin with. But the pattern did cause a sensation of foreboding to rise within me.

When I awoke, my surroundings were all wrong – they were quite wet to begin with. Even my face was a wet mess. Wet clothes, wet skin, wet earth, wet grime – everything was ostensibly wet. It infuriated my numb, blurred senses. The next thing I knew, I was roughly hoisted up to meet the blinding glare of a lantern, the flames of which sputtered and crackled angrily. I met a pair of angry eyes.

I was treated to an entourage of obscenities. My vision was impaired by the steady torrent of rain, but there was fuzziness around the corners which increased whenever the hand gripping my torn collar shook pitifully in anger. I tried to breathe, and was rewarded with a throbbing sensation which swarm up and encased my weakening lungs. Rain fell on my face – maybe it was the spit of the man who was shaking me.

Maybe I could have concluded that it was all a weird dream of some sort – bizarre and quite bland and dreadful to be called one, but it definitely could've passed as one of those pseudo-nightmares. What was I being shaken for in the first place, anyway?

I don't have a clue whether it was all that shaking or insulting which brought me back to my senses, but when complete awareness came, I just clung on to the man who hurled slurs at me a mile a minute, even if I couldn't have possibly understood what they had meant at the time. There was no way I could catch a proper glimpse of his face, and he dragged me through the soil and the downpour, wriggling feet and all. Eating more mud when he dumped me, I tried to calm my breaths down to listen.

Lying there for what seemed like an eternal passage of time, I listened to the harsh rain and collected my wits. I heard my breathing and my breathing alone. Water seeped through the mud to coat my cheeks, which were steadfastly pressed to the mushy earth. The slow response to my surroundings drove me insane, because there was not a part of my body that was willing to cooperate when it came to standing up. And I wondered why everything was so wet.

Don't you hate when everything is damp? When that is the case, whatever you happen to come in contact with is slimy and sticky. I recall tossing and turning in the wet sludge to find a more comfortable and unrestricting pose, but I gave it up when something slimy brushed past my leg. I blindly thrust a leg into the air, before something hard fell on my face. I tasted leather.

Well, wasn't it a wonderful way to wake up – waking up to the taste of my own shoe.

I had a feeling that someone was hovering over me – it was a strange feeling, really. I don't know how I'd sensed it. Perhaps it was because I was eerily observant at the time. In any case, I closed my eyes tightly and attempted to play dead. It wasn't something I'd do under normal circumstances, but then I didn't realize that I was not dreaming.

The rain had ceased abruptly somewhere along the way, and I woke up to gaze at a red sky which was rapidly clearing. I couldn't see the sun, but the sky had caught my imagination. I sort of lay there in the mud, which had caked all over my face and my clothes. Belatedly realizing that one bare foot was missing its shoe, I rolled over and tried to get up.

There was a brief sensation of something light and gentle brushing against the nape of my neck.

I was in the middle of nowhere, bewildered and more than a little wet. I swung my upper body around to meet startled brown eyes, which gazed at me steadily, even if it was with uncertainty. I saw a pale, rounded face with striking features which screamed out an exotic mixture of ethnicity.

The woman stared down at me expectantly, holding out a palm. She was saying something, but I had no idea what. I caught it, a little breathless as I was pulled to my feet. Staggering a bit, I opened my mouth, puzzled when nothing came out. No sound, nothing. It was disorienting, and panic would've caught me in its tight grip if it weren't for the fact that my environment was new and so different. Had I woken up from a dream in another dream? Where was I?

The woman silently observed me from a distance as I hobbled farther and farther away from her. I noticed green grass everywhere, and the red-tinted sky had given away to a dreary shade of blue. The transition was alarming – it seemed like the sky you'd expect to see on someone's funeral, whitewashed and plaintive.

It made my heart ache, for some reason.

She was wearing a lot of weird stuff – drapes upon drapes, which were patterned with a caricature of flora and circular hues, somehow familiar in my eyes. Her hair was done up in an elaborate pattern, which was distinctly Chinese, or Taiwanese. I didn't know.

She spoke again, and I strained to grasp what she was speaking, before giving up eventually. Her lips curved in helplessness, the kind that would be subjected to a stranger in a foreign land.

I was standing on what seemed like a vast grass field, which stretched out as far as my eyes could see.

What a strange dream it was – if it was even one. My dreams usually held meanings, so what was the meaning of this dream? What was a woman I'd never met doing here, along with me? I'd learned somewhere that one always had dreams of the people they had met, consciously, or unconsciously. But that was rather silly of me to assume, wasn't it?

Rows and rows of houses, a few ones scattered around oddly – it seemed like I was on high ground. When I looked down, it sure seemed like it. A cozy enclave of houses built in an architectural pattern I was unfamiliar with. There was a huge tower that rose into the sky, spirals of stairs outlining it.

I realized that I didn't know my name.

The woman merely smiled when I failed to answer her question, and tucked her hair back. I wondered what she was doing, and why I could taste blood in my mouth.

I wish I could've said that this was the point where my vision had blurred, sending me spiralling into dark oblivion, but that wasn't the case. With every step I took, I found my legs turning to jelly. The woman clasped me by the back of my shirt firmly, even though her expression betrayed barely-concealed curiosity. I made a motion with my hands, pointing to her, before jabbing the scenery over my shoulder.

"What are you doing here?" Was what I had longed to ask, but for some curse or the other, nothing came out.

She made a sawing motion with her hands, crouching down on the grass as she ran her hand over the cool blades. I turned around to look at the patch of grass that seemed endless, terminating the edge of the cliff that overlooked the buildings. There was an uneven distribution in its length – my guess was that she had been trimming. I noticed that her hands were bruised from work, and a scythe that lay a few feet away from me.

The mysterious lady went ahead, and I followed like a dumb, confused mutt.

I am nameless. Telling you how I came to that conclusion might seem easy, but let me spare you the details. No, really. It is like I had an epiphany that this would happen from the beginning. I don't remember how old I am. As I sat in the corner of the strange room I was led into, waiting for someone to break me out of this strange dream, I pondered. And that was when memories came back – bit by bit, like dripping tap water.

I slept, thinking of the sounds Japanese doors made when they slid shut.

When I woke up, the woman from before thrust a cup that smelled faintly of cinnamon into my space, and I reared back. She looked at me apologetically, the elegant folds of her sleeves pushed back as she gestured for me to calm down. Heart racing, I had to arch backwards to get a better look.

"Where am I?" I asked, even as the warm glow of the torchlight made my squint. "Do I know you?"

She ignored me, placing a warm sheet over my head. Apparently, I was delirious with fever. I'd not known of any dream where my mouth would be dry and parched like paper. If that wasn't enough, I had to dream of a strange land. Maybe I was fulfilling my destiny?

Bullshit. The only destiny I had was to clean the week-old mold that was growing in the kitchen sink.

"Let me wake up." I told her seriously. "Let me wake up, please."

When she grinned, her luminous eyes shining in the light, she looked awfully pretty.

I played along. And that 'playing along' took me a short while to understand that without basic knowledge of Japanese, I'd be in a sandpit. It wasn't easy. Complete mastery of the language was a long way to go, but I managed just fine in three years with gradual fluency of the language, even though my Kanji writing skills drove Sasaki up the walls in cringe.

If you ever met me and asked me my name, I'd have no answer to give. That is, if you were asking about my real name. Perhaps I'd forgotten my name, maybe even renounced it. Who knows?

"Ton-chi, a little help with these boxes over here, if you don't mind me askin'."

"In a minute."

I could hear several voices coming over the partition that separated the kitchen from the main hall – in my opinion, these flimsy canvas partitions were the reason why kids came running to dinner an hour earlier than they probably should. It brought me all sorts of grievances, for one. It also made the staff clumsy.

Case in point, the daredevil who was working behind me. I heard the rough squelch of tomatoes as they were squashed.

"You are supposed to put the tomatoes over everything, at the end." I said, cracking an egg and watching it sizzle on the pan. This was the fifteenth, and twenty more were on the way for demanding mouths.

"Aw, shut up." I could hear him standing behind my back. "Watch as I try to imitate a lovey-dovey husband."

He then breathed into my ears, attempting to lick it. I ducked, and he went away, laughing obnoxiously.

"You are twenty three years too old for me, Suzuki-san." I said wryly, cracking another omelete on the skillet. You could say that making omelets were my only strong point in the kitchen.

"Why do I feel like protectin' my virtue, Ton-chi?" He asked, a toothpick in his mouth swaying from side to side as he leaned against the counter. "You got the kettle for Shio oba-san? Tha' old lady has been goin' on and on about her tea, the lazy pimp."

"Suzuki, you fucker!"

"What did you do?" I lowered my voice and turned around, only to find a plate heading for Suzuki's shiny head at break neck speed. Squeaking, I kneed his gut, pushing him onto the pile of crates. His butt crushed the tomatoes, squirting juice all over my hands as I braced it on either sides. There was the smash of glass over concrete, followed by the splintering of shards over our heads.

"Who the hell asked you to give that throwing knife to that brat?"

Sure enough, Suzuki immediately froze against my abdomen, wearing a horrified countenance. I shook my head, getting up and returning back to my omelette base, where the fire had burnt one of them to a crisp. Grimacing, I listened to the exchange that took place.

"A-aha…Mitsuni, Ten-Ten…she is a good k-kid."

Mitsuni was the resident demon. Who needed Uzumaki to have one when this man was guaranteed to throw a goddamn apocalypse? He seemed especially psyched today, wild chestnut hair all mussed up as he stalked towards his prey, who was cowering pitifully under the table nearest to him. Man, for an old guy nearing half a century, he crawled faster than a termite.

When I decided to ignore the ruckus, a plate sailed over my head. I decided to pack up with whatever ammunition I'd had – read: omelette – and leave the scene. It was routine, after all; the head caretaker beating the shit out of an insufferable colleague. We were all used to it by now.

I left the kitchen, entering the dining hall. It was nearing eight, and few of the caretakers were holding the kids at bay at the entrance of the room, even as they began squirming. They must've been pretty hungry. Some women brushed past me to enter the kitchen, and promptly came back running just in time as another plate crashed within. All in a day's work at Konoha's one and only orphanage. Squatting on the ground, I mopped my face. It sure was sweltering. No matter what the boozos at the finance section of the Hokage's council said about the annual budget, we deserved to have fans installed. The level of technology wasn't that pathetic in Konoha.

A kid jogging past me tripped on his sandals, and would've slammed his pretty nose against the floor if I hadn't grabbed his wrist.

"Watch your steps, kid."

"Uhm-" He said, distracted as I loosened my grip. "Sure, thanks."

I watched as he ran off.

Where should I begin? I suppose any sane person will tell you their name, but you know that.

Ton.

Yeah, and I definitely wasn't expecting that. Like all names, this one has a story behind it. A short one at that.

"Sasaki-san, what's tha' matter?"

"Oh, she…she can't seem to comprehend what I am saying." Sasaki had said, grasping my hands tightly as I stared dead ahead.

"Oh really?" Suzuki had chuckled, pushing her to the side. "What's your name, kid?"

"Haah."

"Say wha'? Are yah deaf or somethin'?" He'd glanced back at Sasaki, who was resigned at the time.

"Haaaahn."

"Say, you know where tha' food is?"

"Pooooo."

"Wha' the hell?" Suzuki had laughed. "She's sayin' she likes pork."

"Too-"

"Hey, we'll call her Ton, then."

Hence the name. I hadn't realized until much, much later that ton meant pork in Japanese. Part of me was convinced that the only reason why Suzuki even remembered the convo was because my hentai moans had thoroughly freaked him out.

That man is dirty, I tell you. Not that I was any better. In Konoha, you'd better believe that everyone had dirtied their little hands to an extent.

I remember most things now, and I can't tell whether that is a good thing or a bad thing in the long run. There was a jar of pickles that I'd forgotten to give to my old neighbour back home, which is probably creating one hell of a stink since I'd always left the jar open for aeration. All these random thoughts would be the death of me.

"Stop that brat! Come back here, TenTen!"

Turning around, I almost slipped on my feet as the kid whirled past me, one of her hair buns undone. At least some of us were spirited.

See, memories are painful. There are four stages of grieving that a person goes through when they lose everything, but I don't want to bore you with the details. There is beauty in forgetting, but a curse in remembering. Sometimes I wish I didn't have much to lose in my past life, but there was.

A disabled sister to take care of.

The light in the hall dimmed pretty quickly as the sun set, and the kids flocked towards the dining hall even as my feet carried me away. Sometimes, you know, I just liked to stop and think.

The shinobi world was-

Strange. Weird. Uncanny. Unbelievable.

All said and done, I could've used these adjectives. But I didn't want to, because a simple word like 'strange' would be an insult to the conflicting feelings making a mayhem in my head. It was something frightening, yet gripping; amazing, yet ludicrous – a number of adjectives, honestly. Who was I, in the face of power hungry, despotic maniacs willing to destroy entire continents with the mere flow of a questionable life force?

The answer frightened the shit out of me.