Chapter 2.8: Post-Chunin Exams
In reply to Yamada Nori (msg # 11):
The curtain had been drawn around the other hospital bed in the room since before Nori had been wheeled in by the hospital staff. Silent on the other side of the curtain, Kensuke stood with his elbows resting on the bed, curled over the body of a young girl, his eyes closed to hold back the tears and stifled sobs. Hikari was gone.
Sometimes the dark-haired boy thought his Kekkei Genkai was a blessing, but in this circumstance it was most definitely a curse. Other people were blessed that they could not see the exact moment that a person died. In Kensuke's case, he could hear her heartbeat begin to slow in that freezing cave at the same time as her speech started to slur and slow down. It was only a short while later that she began to fall from lack of coordination. Their team had dropped out in order to prevent her from dying from hypothermia, but he could already sense her heartbeat slowing to dangerous levels. After the medical team had come to the hospital room, he watched them do everything they could before calling her time of death and placing a white cloth over her face. And now, Kensuke's sight showed him the blood in her vessels in stasis and clotting--a sure sign that her body was no longer functional.
The true sign of death was not the death rattle expiration or even the moment at which the heart stopped beating. It was the moment that the blood stood still and began to harden. And he could see it all.
The last vivid memory of Hikari flashed through his mind from before the exam.
Hikari had always been a cheerful girl, if a little clumsy and naive. Still, she had the dream of being in the ANBU for the Kage of their village. When Kensuke had asked her why one day while they were training together, she simply grinned at him and asked, "Well, don't you think they just look really cool? And they protect the Tsuchikage!"
"Well, why don't you shoot for being the Tsuchikage then?" he replied with a confused quirked eyebrow.
"Let's be honest, I'm not the smartest cookie in the bakery," he said, her grin widening. "That's why you make all our team plans. Hey, why don't you be the Tsuchikage then, Kensuke-kun? That way I'll be able to protect you!" She thrust her index finger into the air at the idea and lowered it to point it at him. "Think you can handle it?" she asked with a wink.
Kensuke had simply snorted and thrown his hands up in exasperation in response.
While he had most definitely been the brains of their team, Hikari, like the Light she was named for, was certainly the heart. She kept them motivated and moving forward, pushing the emerald-eyed boy to find new solutions to problems when he got stuck with ones that wouldn't work. Or even throwing herself headlong into a problem to help the team push their way to a solution. She was always the first one to laugh and the first one to cry.
And now that heart was dead.
He had already cried. Beaten the bed with his fists. Screamed at her about the fact that she was supposed to be the ANBU to his Tsuchikage. He knew logically that it wouldn't bring her back, but it was an emotional response not a rational one. The process had long since been finished before Nori was admitted to the room, but he could not bring himself to leave Hikari's side even though she was no longer in that body.
It was the sound of a female voice talking about going back out into the Exam with a broken leg that roused him from his stupor. With his Shingan activated, he could sense the heartbeats in the room earlier, but he had ignored them in his concentration to find one shred of life from Hikari. Letting the Doujutsu go, his pupils began the process of constricting back to normal from their dilated sate, the crimson of his eyes subsiding to their usual emerald green once more. Leaning up from the bed to stand, he slid open the curtain to reveal both himself and the bed with Hikari's body behind him.
"It is easy to risk your life when you don't know the reality of the alternative," he interjected into the two girls' conversation, his voice choked with grief slicing into their words like a hot knife through butter. "Many of us came to the Chuunin Exams in peak condition and still died. Yet, you think you can keep going in the condition you are in? This isn't a sparring match. Don't expect the opponent to give you time to recover. They will target that leg until it is a bloody mess and then tear out what is left of you."
"Don't underestimate the exam," he said, gripping the curtain tightly in his hand, trying to support himself emotionally. Looking over his shoulder pointedly at Hikari's dead body behind him, he continued in a soft voice. "Don't...end up like us."
This message was last edited by the player at 23:57, Thu 26 Jan 2017.