Hey, uh, so my plans to do a mass update once all the revisions were done got thrown in the trash once I decided to do one major change, and that was to the title. In the middle of editing/rewriting I've come to the realization that "Amnesiac" just didn't fit the story anymore. It's a little awkward to just suddenly change the title, since I've had it that way for three years, but it needed to be done. Of course, there'll still be amnesia themes popping up throughout the story, but it's not the main focus like I once thought it would be― Especially since the story will be taking a somewhat different direction than what I'd originally intended for it. Still, this change feels right, and I can't wait to show what I've got in store~ Apologies to all the old followers though for the confusion this will inevitably bring.

Full summary: "Papa says that when a person drowns, they dream. I dreamed and touched something not of this world. Now I live with a confusion of memories that may or may not be mine, but I can't remember clearly. I recognize people I've never met, and I also know bits and pieces of their fate. Something tells me that I've been given an opportunity to change them, so I will, even if it kills me.

Unfortunately, I think the universe has taken me up on that challenge."

Edited: 10/15/19

"No, mom I don't want to meet anyone okay! Stop trying to set me up with some guy that's your co-worker's son. No― No I really do not care if he's a nice young man with a lot of similar interests as me, you say that about every single guy. I don't want a relationship right now, it's not a priority to me. I'm only 23. I'm not going to die without getting married."

My vision is hazy.

"Mom, just drop the matter okay? Please you are literally making the task of driving more difficult than necessary. What? Yes I'm talking to you while driving. No the phone is not in my hand, I have you on speaker right now."

Is this a dream?

"I'm on my way, going through the gorge right now. Yes I'm being careful around the bends. Have a little faith in my driving abilities please."

I can't tell.

"Mom I can not understand what you're saying, the connection is starting to break up. Mom? Ok good you're still there, I'm still here, we're doing just great."

This is surreal.

"I should be over in time for dinner. Tell 'K' to not eat all the– OH MY GOD!"

There's something in the road, shrouded in a fog. I, she, we― run off the road to avoid it. The turn was too sharp though.

"Ah! No shit, shit, shit!―"

Loss of Service, loss of service, loss of service, loss of―

"Mom?

"Mom? Oh g-god I'm bleeding… so close to the edge, Mom? Mom?!"

Black. Black, black, black, black. No more haze just nothing but the color that is no color. And then there's the water. It's all around. Churning, gurgling, dragging, stealing the air. A scream. A cry for help. Choking, burning lungs, and the endless black sight spanning for what feels like eons in a second. Eons in a second... Eons in a second...

A strong arm, a tug, the blinding illumination of something that isn't black. Compression, ringing, crying. Dying. Dying, dying, dying, dying. Light, pain, more choking, more crying. A familiarly unfamiliar face, two– no three. Gasping. A hug, the feeling of water running down my skin, soggy clothes clinging to me like a leaden weight. And a single word repeating over and over again. A single word. A noun. My name. My name is―

"Ame, what is it honey? You're just staring at the water." A woman tentatively placed a hand on the little girl's shoulder. She didn't blink or move, simply remaining where she was, calmly invested in the motionless water sitting in the small bowl.

"I'm trying to remember Mama." Her voice was high pitched, childish. She didn't remember her voice always sounding like that. She could have sworn once that it was a bit deeper, somewhat rougher and more challenging in personality, mature. Was that just a dream she had had? Papa said that when people drown they dream. It must have been a dream.

But it had felt real.

"What are you trying to remember honey?" Mama sat down next to her, pulling the child into her lap. She bobbed a little as she settled down more. Her mother's thin hands that she had come to find were pale, and not a golden color like she always thought they were, started to run through her long, dark hair. Ame found her hair strange. It was long, very long, almost to her waist long. She thought that was because she didn't like the short hairstyle that all the girls in her family liked, but couldn't be certain about it if she were being truthful. It was also brown, but so dark that it almost resembled the black far shores themselves.

Mama continued to comb that hair with her fingers, maybe braiding some of it, without noticing the extent of how deep her daughter's thoughts ran.

"I'm trying to remember…," It was on the tip of her tongue. She knew what it was that she wanted to remember, but she couldn't get the words to properly come out of her mouth.

"Go on baby, what are you trying to remember?" Mama started to make the braids bigger, weaving many of them together at once. The water remained still and Ame stared intently at it, thinking. She wondered if moving it, dispelling the tranquil appearance on the glassen surface, would allow her to say what she meant. She leaned forward and touched the surface with hands tinier than she recalled, but have already become accustomed to.

Tiny ripples shimmered underneath and away from her pointer finger.

"I'm trying to remember my name."

Mama stopped braiding her hair. She looked up then, confused. "Mama?"

Her eyes, pretty doe eyes with deep chocolate colors swirling around and around, filled with tears. A frown tugged at her little lips. She didn't like to see Mama cry. Mama was too sweet for tears. If a porcelain doll cried did it ruin their face? She thought that Mama was like a porcelain doll with her looks, but had Mama always been a porcelain doll? She couldn't be sure anymore.

"Oh honey," Mama whispered sadly, cupping Ame's cheeks delicately between her hands. She pressed her forehead against her daughter's and weeped.

"Ame! Come away from the edge sweetheart." Papa's large hand wrapped around Ame's and tugged her away from the railing of the stone bridge they were crossing. Underneath it ran a stream that flows at a gentle trickle. Ame wondered if Papa was still afraid of her being around running water. She should probably have been afraid of it too, but she wasn't. The water was keeping something from her, she just knew it.

"Ame, tell me about yourself again, please?" Papa was acting strange again. Just like Mama. He often asked her to tell him about herself, and made little odd comments here and there about various things she said. She suspected he told Mama and made her worry even more. Ame couldn't stand it, but the truth was, she didn't know what she was saying wrong.

"My name is Ameida and I'm six twenty-three. I am a member of the Hiroshi clan and we can do this thing called shape shifting right Papa?" Ame looked up at Papa and cocked her head at the sight of his perplexed expression. He nodded, but she knew that those weren't the correct words she was supposed to have used. But for the life of her she couldn't seem to remember what their technique was called!

Just looking at Papa was enough to distract her from the original task, though. He had pale skin too, like Mama. And his hair was the same dark shade as her own. She could have sworn though that he had honey and sand colors in his hair. And his eyes were like Aspen bark, even warping slightly as bark did, with different hues of grey-beige colors. Not blue like the early evening. The two different images she had of her father were clashing and she squinted at him as if that would help keep them separate.

Papa cleared his throat. "Ame?"

Ame blinked, shook away the pictures of her Papa from her head, and continued with her story. "We're supposed to be spies, especially because of the war. I like reading, and I help other kids read too. I've got a bitty brother named Kalani. Mama named him after a Hawaiian word that means 'The Heaven Sky' I think. And a cousin named Rikuro. He plays with me all the time, even if he can be a little mean sometimes."

"Where did you say that Mama and I came from?"

She tilted her head back to look at the sky. The clouds were out today. All nice and puffy like little cotton balls, moving gently in the wind as if they were riding on sea swells. It was a nice day. The sun was even shining down to warm her up, even right down to her little toes.

"Mama came from the Hawaii Islands and you came from Germany. But somewhere along the lines you both decided to come live here!" She giggled and threw her hands up in the air. Papa sighed.

She didn't think he liked her answer again.

"Papa, where are we going?" She didn't really mind going somewhere that day. Going anywhere with Papa was an adventure all on its own. He carried her on his shoulders all the time and ran around. Ame quite liked feeling the wind stream through her hair. It made her feel like a spirit with the way her hair flew behind her.

"Remember where Papa said he goes to get jobs?" he asked, reminding her that she had asked him a question first. She chirped in response and he kept talking. "I have a friend there that I want you to meet. He might be able to help you with your memory."

Papa and Mama said there's something wrong with her memory. They said she told them things that they've never heard of before. Things that didn't exist here. They said that she didn't have a little brother, that there were no such places like Germany and Hawaii. It confused her, just like how Papa and Mama's colors did. But the fact that she still remembered things about herself confused them. She was a jumbled mess of herself in herself.

Papa took a shortcut through the trees. Well, she called it a shortcut, but any detour was a shortcut in her mind, even though it still took them awhile before to hit what must have been the main road. And before long she spotted a giant fortress (really it was just a rather large gate but it was fun to imagine it was something else) looming on the road ahead.

"Welcome to Konohagakure, Ame," Papa said smugly. She leaned forward in excitement. They wave to some men guarding the gates and headed deeper into the village. Some people shouted out Papa's name, which was Kouhei, and waved hello to him. Ame rested her chin on his head, soaking in the warm rays of the sun, and the sweet scent of his hair.

They rounded a bend and passed a school. Perking up a bit, Ame stretched to see if she could spot any other kids. There were a bunch of them out in the courtyard. Some looked like they were playing, others looked like they were busy training. She briefly wondered if, when we're done talking with Papa's friend, she could go play with them? She didn't get to play with many people, less so that were her age, and Rikuro was big enough that he had to go do training.

The school disappeared and Papa stopped in front of a flower shop. Vibrant colors bloomed from the inside out, filling up most of the space. Different aromas wafted around and made the area feel alive with refreshing scents. Ame breathed in deeply and settled back down into her lazy slouch against Papa. The sign above the store read: YAMANAKA.

"My friend Inoichi runs this shop, but he's also very skilled with things concerning the mind," Papa said. He lowered himself closer to the ground and Ame slid off of his shoulders. He took her hand and walked side by side with her into the shop. She happily sniffed in the scent of the flowers and grinned. They smelled like they had just been watered, creating a lovely aroma of floral in the rain.

A voice, a man, called from the back to say that he would be out in just a minute.

Her hand slipped out of Papa's and she skipped around to look at some of the flowers. While she examined the flora, the man from the back shuffled out and greeted Papa warmly. For a little bit they talked in low whispers, no doubt about her. Ame didn't really like it when the adults did that. Or kids. Well, anyone she supposed. It was kind of rude in her opinion.

After a while Papa's friend walked over to her and knelt down to make himself level with her. She, in turn, shifted to look at him, a man with long platinum gold hair and clear blue eyes. His appearance struck her as familiar, but she knew that she had never met this man until today. Maybe Papa's descriptions were just that good?

"Hello Ame. My name is Yamanaka Inoichi, it's a pleasure to meet you. Do you mind if I ask you a few questions?" His voice was soft, like he thought he would frighten her away if he talked too loudly. Normally she didn't mind when adults did this to her, but for some reason a part of her bristled at the way he spoke. It wasn't a pleasant feeling, so she tried to ignore it and nodded her head.

"Your father tells me that you have problems remembering some things. What kind of things?"

Ame bit her lip. If she told him her story then he was going to be worried like Mama and Papa. She didn't like the looks of worried people. It made it seem like she was crazy. Of course being crazy wasn't necessarily a bad thing, but some kinds of crazy weren't necessarily good either. She may not have been that old, but she could the difference between something good and bad. She knew though that if didn't tell him then Papa and Mama wouldn't ever stop worrying about her, and she hated making them worry.

"It's hard to remember my name sometimes," she shrugged, almost as if she were trying to pass it off as no big deal. "And I can't remember some things before my, um, accident. And sometimes I remember things that aren't mine."

That last little bit slipped out without her meaning for it to. Inoichi's head tilted to the left in slight concern.

"What do you mean you remember things that aren't yours?"

She started to fidget, looking down at her feet and finding the ground more interesting than Inoichi's clear gaze. It wasn't exactly that she thought they weren't her memories, since some things just seemed so vivid in her mind, but there were a lot of things that contradicted each other as well. "I remember a little brother, and lands that don't exist, and…"

Falling down much farther than from a stone into a river.

Her chest started to hurt, suddenly. It was like she was back in the water, the air being stolen from her greedy lungs. She was trapped.

Inoichi sensed that something was bothering her, so he quickly changed subjects and explained that what he was going to do next was just taking a peek into her mind just so he could see what might be going on. He wouldn't do anything else, he promised. His hands flew rapidly as he made difficult looking hand gestures before pressing his thumb against her forehead. Ame stared blankly at him, watching his expression change from blank neutrality, to confusion, to perturbed in a matter of moments. When he was finished he pulled away and moved back over to Papa.

She suddenly didn't wanna be there anymore.

"Papa, can I go over to the school and see if someone will play?" she asked, approaching her father hesitantly. She wasn't sure he heard her, but he nodded his head so she took the opportunity to skip out of the flower shop and down the road. At the school yard gate Ame stood and looked around for someone to play with.

She saw a group of three standing nearby a tree. Two boys appeared to be arguing with each other while a girl frantically mediated between them. Altogether they didn't appear to be much older than her by a couple of years, like Rikuro. One of the boys had white, spiky hair; a green scarf was wrapped snugly around his neck, although it was a little warm for that kind of clothing. The other one had soft looking black hair and a pair of orange goggles resting on his head. He pointed angrily at the white haired boy and it clicked in her mind that she had seen this boy before. It was a nostalgic feeling, like she knew much, much more about him than her own mind was letting on.

A wave of happiness crashed through her and she grin. Before Ame knew what she was doing, she had lifted up her kimono and ran towards the trio, jumping into the air to tackle the black haired boy to the ground. Her chest started to vibrate and she purred. The only thing on her mind was that he was alive and happy.

But… who was he exactly?

"Oi! G-get off of me!" The boy wiggled around and she clung to his shirt while he stood. Ame was still small enough that it meant she'd be very light, even for someone not much older than herself. The boy spun around wildly trying to find her, only to make himself dizzy in the process. Finally the white haired boy, having had enough of this, grabbed the back of her kimono and pulled hard enough that she came off, setting her back on the ground. But he kept his hand close in case he had to do it again.

"Um, are you lost little girl?" The girl, with her pretty short hair and purple striped cheeks, bent over and smiled kindly. Ame shook her head, her cute little grin still intact.

"Nope! I just wanna play!" She threw her hands up in the air and twirled around enthusiastically. Ame was certain that she had gotten them confused, but it was alright.

The white haired boy huffed. "If you're not attending the academy then you shouldn't be here."

"Oh don't be such a stiff Bakashi. She's just a little kid. If she wants to play then just let her." The boy with black hair crouched and gave Ame a lopsided grin. "My name's Obito, Uchiha Obito. The jerk over there is Hatake Kakashi."

The white haired boy muttered something about being able to introduce himself on his own before turning away to promptly ignore the conversation. Ame narrowed her eyes, instantly knowing she wasn't going to like this kid. The boy named Obito had it right when he had called this one a jerk.

"And I'm Nohara Rin," The girl, Rin, knelt down as well. "What's your name?"

She was about to answer when she felt a strange clicking sensation in the back of her mind. Their names… she knew them too. A flash, and she was seeing things she had never seen before. The three of them were a little older than they were now, about graduation age for academy students if she had to guess. They went on all kinds of missions together, become friends of sorts, and grew up together just a little. They were a unique group of individuals capable of different things. Their strengths and weaknesses were what made them work well together, and that was what made them possible to be an ultimate team. They were like a pack.

"You guys are going to be a genin team," Ame said with eyes opened wide in awe. Rin blinked in surprise and backed away slightly. Obito began to question and protest, confusion getting the best of him. And Kakashi silently judged like always. Like always? What did that even mean?

A deep sigh escaped her, and with it that dreadful feeling of water filling her chest came back. It was quick and and demanding, overtaking her entire being. Ame teetered and turned around. She didn't know what was happening, and that scared her. She needed to get back to Papa so he could fix this!

How could one drown on land with no water in sight? It simply wasn't possible was is it? Yet that was exactly what Ame felt happening inside of her. Like when she had fallen into the river behind the family estate, down that terrifying height. All that murky dark taking her sight. Eons in a second… Ame thought she heard those kids calling to her, but she couldn't tell. Hearing was like listening to half the words reach her through a wall of water. She couldn't breathe.

Her foot slipped beneath her and she fell onto the dirt. Ame curled in on herself and wished for everything to go away. She didn't like this. It was too scary! Papa! Papa!

"Ame!"

She opened her eyes in a flash and became engulfed in the blinding sunlight. Papa wavered in her vision. Large, strong hands turned Ame on her side and pounded against her back, stinging it harshly. The obstruction she felt in her lungs, the water, it rushed out and she cough it up. Someone gasped in shock. Her head hung limp as she heaved, water leaving at the same time air was coming in, causing her to choke. There just didn't seem to be enough air. There never was.

"Kouhei, I'll do whatever it is you need me to." Inoichi, he must have followed Papa, said with a hint of distress. She never caught what her Papa had said, falling into a more peaceful darkness that wrapped a blanket around her, telling her to sleep.

Ame didn't question it, and did as it commanded.