Kurenai remembered the red glass.

She had been only ten years old then, but her memories withstood. She recalled being a bright-eyed genin following nervously after her own jounin-sensei. Her feet scuffed across the concrete as their team was led past iron door after iron door, each engraved with a number - 11, 12, 13. Lights buzzed in the overhead, flickering and cracking, so insidious that it had her reaching for Tanabe-sensei's hand.

They were deep in the belly of the Konoha Torture and Interrogation Force, emphasis on the 'Torture'.

Tanabe-sensei was nonplussed as he carried out a conversation with their tour guide, a one Dr. Yooku.

"I heard you got a new addition," said Tanabe-sensei.

"Yes, a girl. Young, pretty, but a spy of course. We think she's from the Sand, but we're not sure. We've had her here for going on two weeks now," said Dr. Yooku.

"Any progress?"

A laugh. "You know I can't tell you that. I'm already doing you a favor by showing you around - though why you think it'd be a good idea to show this to children is beyond my understanding."

"You're not a shinobi. They are. Have to show them what happens when you're dumb enough to get caught," said Tanabe-sensei.

They rounded a corner and came before a solid, metal black door with two guards in front of it. Dr. Yooku showed his badge and one guard stepped aside as the other turned the handle. The door opened without the fanfare that one would expect from something so ominous looking, but what lay beyond made up for it.

The lights were low and dim here, and the walls of the hallways were a glowing, thrumming red. As they progressed, it dawned on Kurenai that they weren't walls, but glass. Red glass. And behind that red glass were people. Some sat on their cots, others quietly read. Very docile - not what you would expect from prisoners.

"Their eyes are empty."

Kurenai turned to her teammate, Juuji, a quiet boy that she would remember as being exactly like Shino. He stared off into one of the cells, left behind by the rest of the group. Kurenai walked towards him.

"Their eyes are empty," he repeated. "Look."

Kurenai did look and saw that all the inmates perceived normality faded when she looked them in the eyes. Blank. Lifeless.

Broken.

The red glass illuminated them in all their emptiness.

"This is what happens when you get caught," Tanabe-sensei said, appearing behind them. "The enemy will break you until there's nothing left to break."

"Why not just kill them at that point?" Kurenai found herself asking.

Tanabe-sensei laughed. "Because no matter how low you think you've gotten, there's always just a little bit more to destroy."

Kurenai never forgot the look in those prisoner's eyes. She never saw it again, either, fortunately enough.

Until years later when her own genin, Hinata, rose from the ground, spluttering blood and laughter. Her white eyes wide in manic, disbelief, madness - but behind it all . . .

And Kurenai remembered the red glass.

A Hundred Evils
Chapter Three

Kurenai stared wide-eyed as the door slammed shut behind the medic-nins, though Hinata's muffled laughter could still be heard.

A terse silence fell over the arena, the kind that rang in your ears. She had her back to all in attendance – the remaining chuunin candidates, jounin sensei, and exam proctors, and she could feel their questioning stares on her.

Blood was smeared on the ground at her feet, a trail of it leading back to the puddle where Hinata had first collapsed. There was so much of it. Obviously, the loss of blood had triggered her student's strange outburst. That had to be it.

Still, the deranged laughter . . .

Kurenai, rational to a fault, just couldn't understand. Her mind buzzed with questions as she stared at the door.

She vaguely registered Asuma appearing beside her, cigarette hanging from the corner of his mouth. "What the hell was that about," Asuma said, but Kurenai had already made her decision.

"I'm not sure," she said politely. These weren't questions she wanted to answer right now. "Shino," she turned to where her final student stood on the second level with his peers. Even though he seemed impassive, Kurenai knew that his kikachu bugs were buzzing inside just as wildly as her own thoughts were. "C'mon."

And with that she began to walk away from the crowd staring at her back, trying to seem as unaffected as possible. Shino was quickly at her side and fell into step, both of them quiet as she opened the door for both of them. In the second the door was just about to close behind them, Kurenai heard the arena burst into whispers.

Neji's fist clenched at his side.

Is this what was supposed to happen, father?

He imagined the agonizing pain as Lord Hiashi activated the curse seal. That didn't bother him, though, he could take the pain. No, what bothered him was that look in Hinata's eyes when she rose from the ground. Fractured and crazed.

Had he broken the heir? It was only matter of time, he thought. But still, he never thought she'd be so weak-minded.

Shinobi who were useless in what could equate to mere spars had no value to Konoha or to the Hyuuga. If this were truly Hinata's case, Neji thought as he gritted his teeth, then he would be doing Lord Hiashi a favor. Her kind needed to be removed before she could contaminate the rest with her weakness.

Still, he could not shake how unsettled he felt, even when Naruto called out a vow with a fist covered in Hinata's blood.

Immediately, Hinata knew she was dreaming. She knew it before she felt icy wind brush her cheeks and flutter her hair, or even before she felt the snow between her toes.

This isn't real, said a voice, reinforcing Hinata's suspicious, but still, you must come.

"What if I don't to come," Hinata said back quietly, voice flat on the wind. "I don't want to be here."

Yet it was insistent, this voice, come.

Suddenly, she realized she was staring up at a pale sky. The sort of sky that was nothing but thick clouds, but the force of the sun behind said clouds was so strong, refracting its light like a match before a magnifying glass. It hurt to look at this white, winter sky. Dark spindly branches crowded the edge of her vision like exposed nerves.

Hinata breathed again in an attempt to calm herself. She didn't like dreams. Could she even call them that anymore? There hadn't been any dreams since Fuyubi died. Only nightmares. Slowly, she lowered her head and looked forward onto the path that she had been placed upon. She found that those black-barked trees bordered the snowy path like the sentries who lined the corridor whenever the emperor would return from his crusades.

The emperor.

Madara.

Red flashes of memories assaulted her but she fended them off. Barely. It was how she had learned to deal with things. To cope. She would take these terrible things and shoved them into the recesses of her mind and pretended they didn't exist. They always found their way back eventually, but for now, but for now, she wouldn't let them take control. Still, her hands trembled as she took her first hesitant step down the path.

Snow crunched beneath the soft soles of her bare feet.

Senior medic-nin Gakuto cursed whoever decided it was a good idea to set up the medical base so on the opposite side of the building from where the preliminaries were occurring. What should've been a thirty second run was now more than a minute, with every moment becoming more and more dangerous.

He and his team ran as quickly as their cargo would allow, busting through double doors and speeding around corners. His assignment was to administer whatever treatment the Senior medic-nin barked out, a difficult task considering how loudly the other junior medic was listing off the patient's vitals and basics:

"Twelve year old female. Approximate height: 149 cm. Approximate weight: Indistinguishable. Surface Diagnosis: Blunt Cardiac Injury-"

"Begin ACLS now," ordered the senior.

"Yes sir," said Gakuto as his hands charged with green chakra. The girl on the gurney was small and fragile looking with blood dripping down from her nose and the corners of her mouth. Poor thing looked like she had been put through the ringer – kid obviously wasn't cut out to be a shinobi. All color was gone from her skin and he didn't have to have his teammate to tell him her pulse rate to know that it was nearly non-existent.

Hang in there, kid, was all he could think as they finally reached the operating room.

Come, come, beckoned the voice, hardly a whisper on the wind.

Hinata stumbled after it, winding through the black-bark trees. She knew that she shouldn't be following it but her body moved on its own. One foot in front of the other for heavens know how long. Keep going. Don't stop. Even though the bitter cold stabbed through her thin white shift like knives. Each step was horrible.

But keep going.

Do you remember?

"No," she replied deliriously.

The trees began to thin out becoming sparser and sparser.

How can you not remember?

"I'm not sure."

She saw the end of the forest just before her.

You made promises, Hinata.

"Did I?"

Yes, important ones.

Everything in her was urging her to hurry past the tree line and to the clearing beyond. All the while something was nagging her brain. Both were working together to form a dire point, an urgency as she half-ran, half stumbled towards her goal. Ragged breathing reached her ears and she barely registered that it was her own.

She broke through the tree line with vigor that belied her exhausted state and unfortunately found that the snow was much deeper in this part. Spectacularly, she tumbled face first into the snow with a muted yelp.

"Ah . . . ow," she said from the bottom of the Hinata-shaped hole. Cold seeped through the inadequate white shift she wore. "What in the world," she said confused, though she couldn't shake the feeling that she knew this place. Wherever it may be.

Then she heard it. She heard it just above the whistling of wind through the bare trees, just above the light birdsong. She heard humming. A melody she hadn't heard in such a long time – a song to Fuyubi. It had been his lullaby.

Her head, just barely peeking out from the hole, snapped in the direction of the sound. Her gaze harrowed between the spaces between the sparse trees to the east. Just beyond the break in the trees was a mansion. Madara's mansion.

All the doors of the palace were slid shut but one. In the bleak and the pale of the winter, the light that spilled from the room was stark and warm. There was a shadowed figure sitting on the engawa that bordered the room, back-lit by the fire from inside. And Hinata knew it was fire that burned in that room. She knew because she knew the woman who sang.

In disbelief, she stumbled through the snow and through the trees, slowly picking her way through the garden and to the engawa. The woman who sat there didn't pay any heed. She was only a memory. A horrible memory.

Hinata barely breathed as she approached the girl on the walkway. There, in front of her, was a younger version of herself. Eighteen years old, swaddled in a luxurious, teal winter kimono that was a splash of color in the winter. Young Hinata's hands smoothed over her belly, noticeably bulging even under the layers of clothing.

Hinata knew this day well. Every moment stood out starkly in her mind – the color of the kimono, the cawing of the blackbirds in the trees, every word to the lullaby she sang.

"Take me back," said Hinata, head shaking at the vision of her younger self singing. "Take me back, please."

You've tried to forget, said the voice. You cannot forget.

"She's in surgery now," Shino said as Kiba limped into the waiting room. He was still injured from his earlier fight with Naruto, but he'd be damned if they kept him down for long. The nurses had to hold him back from hunting down Neji as soon as he heard the news.

"How long?" Kiba asked, hobbling to the seat beside Kurenai.

"Almost two hours now. No news yet," said his Sensei gently, sensing his agitation. "She'll be happy to know you're here."

"Of course," said Kiba. "If it were up to me that jackass Neji would be in here too."

"That is not true," piped in Shino. "Why? Because Neji's ability surpasses yours."

"Hey-"

At that moment a group of Hyuuga passed by the doors of the waiting room with Hiashi leading them. None of them looked happy, but then again they never did.

"You can't go in there!"

Hyuuga body guards stopped the medic from touching his presence. Hiashi looked over his shoulder and settled a steely look on the man. "I am Lord Hyuga," he said simply. "My daughter, the heir, is in there. I will pass-" his eyes flickered to the medic's badge – "Gakuto-san."

Gakuto pressed forward. "Her condition is still unstable!"

"Fine," said Hiashi, "then join us. If something occurs then you will be there to aid her." With that Hiashi turned back around and walked into the Intensive Care Unit. His Byakugan had already scanned the hospital before entering and told him that Hinata's room was the very last on the left.

The medic followed sullenly after their group, but made sure to shoulder past the bodyguards to be second to enter the room. "Don't touch her," Gakuto said immediately.

Hiashi did not deign that with an answer, but instead only looked at his daughter. The girl had always looked like her mother, he thought almost fondly. Now she looked doubly so in a hospital bed. He tore his gaze away from weak daughter, so frail that she allowed a branch house member to defeat her.

"How long will she be like this?" He asked.

". . . Unsure," said Gakuto reluctantly. "Her heart's in bad shape, so we'll have to keep an eye on her for the next 48 hours. To add that she has severe chakra depletion and minor internal hemorrhaging. If she does wake we'll have to keep her here for a month at least, not to mention a psychologist-"

"There's no need for a psychologist," said Hiashi.

Gakuto side-eyed him. "According to witnesses, your daughter suffered a severe mental breakdown before her collapse. If she wakes up then we are obligated to administer a psychological analysis to ensure that she is not a danger to herself or others."

"She is a shinobi," said Hiashi.

"She is a twelve year old girl," replied Gakuto.

Take me back, Hinata internally pleaded.

"Stop forgetting," said the voice, more corporeal, and almost as if in were right beside her. She whipped her head to the side too look for the source but found nothing but the winter behind her and the fool of a girl before her.

Hinata scrambled to the younger version of herself and grabbed her by the shoulders. "Don't do it!" she yelled, trying to shake her but young Hinata did not move. Her younger self only rubbed her belly and remained entranced as her bare feet swung over the snow drifts.

It was then that she felt it. A presence neither malevolent nor benevolent, but simply there. It permeated every sense and demanded that she look. "Don't do it," Hinata begged her younger self. "Don't look up, please!"

She knew her efforts were futile. The past was the past. But still she could not help but be horrified as the younger version of herself stopped humming and looked straight through her older self and into the horizon. Into the black-bark trees and the stark white snow. Hinata looked with her and at first saw nothing.

But then she saw it.

High in one of the trees peeked a man from behind a trunk. Half of his bright orange mask was visible.

"My daughter will not undergo such undignified measures," argued Hiashi.

Gakuto scrambled for words. "I'm trying to explain to you that something went horribly wrong in your daughter today. Several witness will attest to that. I am telling you that to ensure her health – both physical and mental – that it is pertinent that we run these tests."

"She will be fine without."

Just as Gakuto took another breath to counter, he heard a small gasp. Simultaneously all eyes turned to the girl on the bed, fragile and deathly pale, eyes still closed. She gasped again, though this time it was slightly more audible.

"Break . . . ct" she whispered.

Hiashi glanced between Hinata and Gakuto and nodded firmly. "See, she is well enough to already speak. Now-"

Hinata's muttering became louder and more frantic.

"What's she saying," Gakuto thought out loud. He ventured closer and leaned over her, checking her vitals. Then, her monitor began to go off suddenly as her heart rate increased exponentially.

He heard her clearly when she began to scream.

"Break the pact! Break the pact! Break the pact!"

TBC

Short chapter and also two years late.