Ari's POV

The situation had really gotten out of hand. And I don't mean that in a party rocker sort of way.

I'd almost pissed myself about five times since Obito came outta nowhere and decided to literally shred my world to ribbons. 

It hadn't taken more than a few seconds for the man-child bastard to subdue both my family and my pride (which took the brunt of the damage, in my oh-so-humble opinion) and now, here we were, strung together like burnt-out Christmas lights, wrists bound behind our backs, chakra-sealing cuffs biting into our raw wrists. The same cuffs were around our ankles, the attached chains stretched nearly taut, locked around trees diagonal from us, forming a creepy Satanic circle complete with kanji drawn around us in what was probably Obito's tainted blood.

Vi's shoulder was digging into my back; Scar's hair tickled the base of my throat. And I couldn't do shit.

The man of the hour (by which I mean the man I wanted to stab repeatedly while simultaneously tearing out his trippy Sharingan eyes) was lounging above us on a low tree branch, legs stretched out before him, hands linked behind his head, mask discarded somewhere in the bushes below him. He dangled a bloody kunai from his equally bloody hand, though as we (mostly me and Vi since Scar was still out of it) watched, the deep slits in his palm closed, the skin grafting together as sparkly green chakra laced over them.

I wiggled a bit, trying - and, ya know, failing - to position myself more comfortably. I wasn't even bothering to escape, cause that was a ship that was never sailing. Pretty much anchored in the harbor for all eternity and then some. Anyway, after I realized my quest for common courtesy (i.e. making your guests feel all warm and fuzzy inside) was all for nought, I scowled in the general direction of Satan himself (I couldn't force myself to meet his eyes - I didn't wanna fall under any Genjutsus anytime soon).

"Well?" I demanded, the growl vibrating thickly in the back of my throat like that feral dog Scar wouldn't let me take home. "You gonna do something bastard? Or are you just gonna sit their trying to seduce the squirrels?"

And this is when I found out that, despite being basically comatose for this entire little episode, Scar was very much awake, because she somehow managed to jab her elbow into my spine and make me so incredibly uncomfortable you just have no idea. "You. Are. An. Idiot," she hissed, voice ragged, scratchy, like she had a cold.

Or she'd, ya know, almost died less than a half hour ago.

Obito had sorta healed her when he caught us, enough that she wasn't in any immediate danger of dying. I'm guessing he did just because he couldn't have any of us kicking the bucket before his creepy little ritual.

"I know that!" I seethed, uselessly kicking my heels into the soft, mist-soaked dirt that was ruining our clothes. The rattling of my chain brought back bad memories. The first time I saw those bloody eyes, the claws that gripped my heart, hearing how we'd be the ones to kill Gaara in the end. I swallowed my growing hysteria as best I could. "I know that," I repeated, softer, an inkling of fragility sneaking into my voice.

I was an idiot. A moron. An imbecile. Gullible, naive, desperately in need of a life coach. Just plain stupid. I'd thought this would be an epic adventure of awesome Ninjaness. And for a while, it was. But I'd forgotten about the dangers that came with the new territory, all the nasty things I hadn't let myself think about. 

Bloody brawls.

Betrayal.

Death. Oh God, death. I'd been brutally reminded of that one when the Kazekage died. It hit me harder than I thought it would, made me feel crushed, broken, beaten down and worthless. I wasn't a hero; I'd known that since day one. I couldn't change things, not things that I wanted to change, anyway. Ever since we'd arrived here, in this world of our dreams, we'd done nothing but cause trouble. For the Leaf, for Suna, for Gaara and his siblings. 

What the hell were we doing here...?

I felt a sudden nudge at my shoulder and Vi's silky (even in this situation) champagne hair fell over me as she rested her head against my back. "Cheer up, Ari," she hummed. "We're all stupid, together~!"

Scar sighed, nothing regretful, no hint of blame in the broken exhale. Just a simple, weary sigh that caught my attention. "She's right, as much as I loathe being roped in with your brand of stupidity."

I blinked.

"None of this is any one person's fault, Ari," she went on, speaking quietly but no less certainly. "What's done is done; we can't alter the past any more than we can predict our futures. Or lack thereof," she added somberly.

"So don't worry about it!" Vi chirped, giggling like any other day of the year, like we weren't about to be sacrificed for the sake of bringing back a girl who probably wanted to remain in the afterlife. Like everything was going to be perfectly fine.

I smiled. Just a tiny smile, a ghost of my usual brilliance. But a smile nonetheless. I threw back my head, making damn sure it knocked against both my sisters' craniums (while ignoring Scar's heated grumbling afterwards).

"I love you guys. I really, really just love the heck outta you two."

Violet's POV

Ari was finally smiling, if the laughing-tone to her voice was anything to go by. And I couldn't have been happier! Well, maybe I woulda been happier if Obito had a kunai sticking outta his neck and Hibiki Sensei was unchaining us; but, for right now, with everything going on, I was beyond pleased with Ari's giddy shift in temperament.

Scar seemed a little lighter now, too; that might have been because she could breath again and she wasn't bleeding like a fireman's hose, but I liked to think it was more because she figured out that sisterly love trumped everything. Even homicidal man-children!

"You three have such a lovely relationship. Shame you'll all be dead soon."

Obito leaped gracefully down from his tree branch, landing soundlessly among the damp leaves and writhing fog. He stepped up to the edge of his demonic circle, hands clasped genially behind his back; he tapped at the first kanji with the toe of his sandal. "Do you know what this kanji reads as?" 

I had to crane my neck to peer over Ari's shoulder, and still I couldn't quite make out what he was talking about; Scar didn't bother looking, her hatred of everything Obito too strong for her subdued curiosity, but Ari sat directly facing the man-child, so she didn't have much of a choice.

"Rin," she grumbled, ducking her head, chin digging into her collarbone, "it reads Rin. And you've got about a bajillion of the same kanji littered around this circle of yours. Obsessive much?"

I heard her muffled grunt of pain when Scar elbowed her ribs again.

"Obsessive?" Obito ran his fingers though his spiky hair thoughtfully, his eyes narrowing, mouth quirking into a conscious frown. "That's one way to put it, I suppose. But I don't regret loving her, don't regret everything I've done in her name since. She was the light of my life, the only bright thing among the disgusting darkness of reality. I can't imagine you'd understand such deep concepts as that, but you must get why I've done all this."

"Love's a powerful thing," I murmured, inching closer to my sisters so that I could distinctly feel their warmth pressing into me, like I needed the reassurance that I wasn't alone.

A half-smile crept over over Obito's patch-work features. "Violet." The way he said my name sent icky shivers crawling up and down my spine. "A pleasure to finally meet you. You should feel honored, you know, to die for a cause as noble as my own. I'll make sure to tell Rin what generous girls you three were when we're reunited."

I twisted my neck around as far as it would go without snapping and spat, two inches from globbing up Obito's sandals.

Ari shot me an admiring look. "Your spitting skills have gotten so much better, Vi! You are so my little sister!"

"We're both older than you, Ari," Scar and I chorused, with me tacking on a bubbly giggle just to lighten the mood.

It didn't really work that well, as Obito broke apart the moment with a quiet, lingering chuckle that drifted around us like carbon monoxide: Silent and oh-so-deadly.

"Charming," he commented idly, placing both hands on his hips. "Rin would have loved you; she'd probably have taken you in like her own younger sisters. It's funny," he added, almost as an afterthought. "If Rin had survived to be at my side today, the three of you would never have been tugged into this dimension, and yet, here I am, thinking about how well the four of you would have gotten along."

There was nothing to say, no snappy comeback or disarming phrase that could work here. And he knew it.

Obito clapped his hands together, sparks of sky-blue chakra exploding outwards from the sudden impact. He then spread his hands, both enveloped in ethereal chakra gloves, undulating and writhing like an ocean in the wake of a tsunami. 

His mismatched face broke into a delighted grin. "Shall we begin?"

Scarlette's POV

My chest stilled, each tantalizing breath ripped away before I could grace my lungs with it, as Obito brought his chakra-bathed hands down upon the circle's edge. Like charmed snakes the tendrils of chakra leapt from his outstretched fingers and wriggled along the blood-lines he'd painted sometimes ago, tracing out kanji and slithering around to light up the circle with a ghostly blue that shone thought the thickening fog like a lighthouse wavering in the ocean.

Ari, Violet and I stiffened, spines straighter than the pine trees encircling us, as the kanji drawn around our feet blazed to life. As Ari had done earlier, I managed to read the luminous symbols, the words clicking in my mind with minimal effort:

Arianna

Scarlette

Violet

Sacrifices

Resurrection

And, as Ari has mentioned, Rin  was indeed sprinkled throughout the tumultuous mess, most likely more times than absolutely necessary. Her name was written with beautiful script, carefully lined and radiating a love and devotion found very rarely among Earthlings. 

He really meant to bring back a departed soul, one who had, probably, found peace in her eternal slumber and didn't quite fancy the idea of being thrown back into a world of violence and bloodshed. Or perhaps that was just my wishful thinking. Who wouldn't pounce at the offer of life, after death and all things dark and morbid? I certainly would consider it, at least. No one enjoyed the thought of passing away, either peacefully or at the hands of an enemy too skilled to outmaneuver.

Life is so precious. Which is exactly why an icy fear wrapped unrelenting fingers around my throat and squeezed mercilessly, choking me with the weight of a reality I could never escape.

Finally, after what felt like eons had passed, the coiling chakra broke free of Obito's blood-writing and slipped round the chains binding us, gliding along the links like predators privy to their prey's demise, languid, lethargic, taking as much time as they thought necessary, without thought of the prey's escape.

It was obvious no such thing was going to happen.

The moment the chakra made contact with my skin, the white-hot sensation of pain erupted from every pore, every nerve, every atom of my haggard body; an agonized shriek tore from my dry lips, but was shadowed by identical wails from my tormented sisters.

I could feel it. The chakra - unholy amounts, not meant for mortal possession - surging from the very depths of my soul, filling my body to the brim and pressing against my limits, until it burst free, searing the very air around me with its crackling ferocity.

My vision was tinted the color of a streak of lighting's afterglow - a lovely pale blue, in any other circumstances. I couldn't move, couldn't speak besides the numerous screams I could no longer hear. Without the pain coursing through me - through every vein and artery, along every muscle, taut with the strain - numbness would have seized me, veiled me from the world and made me no more than a lamenting doll. 

The world was nothing more than a screen of light, wrapped around me, too tight, suffocating me like a woolen blanket. 

Would these really be my last sensations, the very same that would carry me to whatever lay after death? Would my last imprints on the world - be it my own or this one - really be full of agony too fierce for even my worst enemy? 

Would I die filled with nothing but pain and hatred?

The scalding tears chasing one another down my blistered cheeks left no impression on me; I barely realized I was sobbing through my shrieks and wails. 

Everything was misery. Nothing more, nothing less.

And then, silence.

No tormented screams from my sisters or I, no electric crackles brushing against my weary eardrums. 

Just silence. And nothingness. No feelings of anything at all. Good or bad, calm or anguished. Nothing.

Until a voice - a voice I neither recognized nor heeded - said, "I'm sorry. I am so, so sorry...."

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Just a little FYI, these last few chapters probably aren't going to very long. You see, I know exactly what I want to happen in the final chapters and I'd rather not drag them out just to make them a little longer. Because then I think they'd suck.

Just a warning for you all so you're not disappointed!