Chapter 267 265

Alvarcus's Mindscape

"Everytime I come here I'm always surprised." Ino says as she stares out into the endless void. "Not just at what your mind is like but also because it's always in your mindscape. Only those with a strong will even get the chance to fight for control of their bodies and this is the third time in a row that we're here. It is supposed to get easier to take over the more you've been in someone's head, that's what tou-san always said. Something about knowing how the mind is set up already. But you, you're so complex. Like a puzzle that I've been working on for years yet am no closer to understanding than when I started."

"Ino why did you do this?" I'm standing next to her, also staring out into the vast darkness. "You're never going to find where I am going."

~Back again?~

Sureddo sounds oddly pleased at that.

"Yes, I am." Ino confidently responds to Sureddo. "You do not scare me enough to stop me."

~Is that a challenge? I can show you so much more, not only Alvarcus' pain but also the pain he has caused others. The pain we have caused others.~

"How about no?" I cut in. "Can't you just kick her out?"

~I do not want to kick her out even if I could. It's so very rare that I get to meet someone else besides the Host.~

"You're enjoying this, aren't you?" I accuse Sureddo.

~Yes, yes I am.~

"I want to make a deal with you." Ino calls out to the voice of Sureddo. "If you're willing."

~Depends on the deal.~

"I want you to show me where Alvarcus is going and in return I will fully experience a memory of your choice, no matter how... extreme." Ino bargains with Sureddo.

~No, the Host is right in choosing to not bring you back with us. You are too weak for it, you will break under Orochimaru's rule. You would not last a month, you'd barely last a week.~

"I am stronger than you both know." Ino raises herself up to her full height.

~Yet you are not strong enough.~

"Then I shall take what I came here for!" Ino shouts a threat into the void. "I am a Yamanaka, in the mind there is no equal! It will only be a matter of time until I find it!"

She starts to float off into the vast emptiness in search of the answers she desires.

"Ino Yamanaka." I say with an edge in my voice as I clamp a hand down onto her wrist, stopping her from exploring. "You are past the point of playing with fire. You have spilled oil all over yourself and are about to strike a match. You do not know half of the horrors I have hidden away in my mind."

~For every memory of the Host's that you view I will rip one out of your head. Then after viewing it I will make sure the next one of Alvarcus's you see will be more extreme in every sense of the word. You show us a painful experience, I show you torture. You show us a training session, I show you one of Orochimaru's training sessions. You show us a fond memory of your sensei, I show you one of Alvarcus' fond moments with his. Whatever emotion yours has, I will show you one of Alvarcus' that is more severe. Be it pain, pleasure or just simply uncaring, you will see it.~

"You can't do that." Ino scoffs out. "True this is a two way street but you lack the finesse to accomplish your threat. It takes years to master mindwalking."

"Big mistake Ino. Did you forget where we are?" I ask her.

~Yes, child, did you? For we are inside a mind that is not my own, yet I am still here. I have been 'mindwalking,' as you call it, ever since I joined Alvarcus. Ever since the Parasite and the Host unified. You think you have an advantage because you have visited his mind three times. I have been living in his mind. You have no power here.~

"We will just have to test that now won't we?" Ino boasts about her skills and I am sure they're very good. But they will not be enough to overcome the Jiongu, to best Sureddo who has lived with me for a long time. It just won't happen.

"You're both forgetting something very important." I cut in between their threat throwing. "This is my mind. Sureddo you will not interfere with what comes next."

~I will do as you ask unless she treads somewhere we don't want her to be. As you said before there are things in your mind that must never come to light.~

"Trust me, by the time I'm done she will never want to come back." I turn to Ino. "You want to go to Oto? You wish to follow me back to Orochimaru?"

"Yes." She promises me with a steely look of determination.

"Then allow me to give you a mere glimpse of what that life is like." I dramatically sweep my arm towards the endless void and it changes.

Colors spring into existence, shapes and object and even people fill the once empty void. It is not a bright and colorful field of flowers though, no that is not what I am showing her. This is a cold and dreary cave. One that has never known the grace of sunlight. It's a hole in the ground that is best left forgotten forever but it is also where Orochimaru tosses his failed experiments. It's the Pit.

I'm showing her the beginning of my descent into madness.

"But how?" Ino asks as she's staring wide eyed at the sudden change in scenery. "You shouldn't be able to do this!"

"And why not?" I rhetorically ask her. "This is my mind. I am God here. The only God, the one true God. I can do whatever I want whenever I want. The only thing limiting me is my own imagination. Calling up a memory is nothing."

"But only the most skilled Yamanaka have ever been able to call up a memory so smoothly and with such detail! I don't understand you don't have any training! It doesn't make sense!" She can't comprehend it.

"The difference is I am not invading a mind, I am simply using my own." I gesture around the cave. "Now tell me, what do you see?"

"You and Sasuke." Ino says, she's playing my game. She thinks that the longer she's in here the more time she has to find where I am going. Too bad that will be the furthest thing from her mind very soon. "You're both on high alert while in a cave. What's so special WHAT IS THAT!?"

"That, dear innocent Ino, is one of Orochimaru's failed experiments." I look at the snakeman, he's one person I will never regret killing. Well Sasuke killed him, I killed the rest of his posse. "Meet Apodora, a scumbag of the highest degree."

"WHAT IS THAT THING?" Ino shouts out in fear again.

"That is Gina." I look at my dead friend. My murdered friend. Brilliant red hair. A pair of bat like wings jutting out of her shoulders. A long leathery tail extending a ways out of the base of her spine. "And she's a she, not a thing. Nice girl, helped Sasuke and I out when we were in a bind."

"R-really?" Ino stutters out in shock. "That thing helped you?"

"Yes." I let a hint of anger seep into my voice. "Gina helped us."

With another wave the scene changes again.

"Gina is nervously offering her services to Sasuke and me. Mainly Sasuke, I didn't actually need treatment but you get the idea." I explain to Ino as we watch the conversation between Sasuke, me and Gina. "You see Gina had a rough life. She was a kunoichi before this, before Orochimaru got to her. He changed her, twisted her to become something most consider less than human. Orochimaru considers her a failure so he chucked her down here in the Pit. The Pit is a difficult place to survive in. The weak die while the strong fight for dominance. Gina was weak. So pitifully weak that she had to rely on others for protection. Down in the Pit there is only a few things that one can offer someone else. Your own skills or…"

"Your body." Ino's eyes widen in sudden realization. "She offered herself to survive didn't she?"

"No." I correct her. "I assume she offered her skills as a medic to Apodora the snake dude. He took her skills. Then he took her body. Repeatedly. Probably passed her around his little gang of scumbags too."

"She… she was raped?" Ino tears her eyes off of Gina healing Sasuke to look at me, to watch my face and see if I'm lying to her.

"She never explicitly said it and Sasuke and I had enough common sense to not ask her." I turn towards Gina. The shade of Gina. "When Sasuke and I arrived down in the Pit we demolished everyone down there. We beat them all into submission and Gina saw that as a chance to escape from her horrible fate. Ino she was broken, so very broken. She only referred to herself in the third person, she reverted back to a simple mind - almost childishly simple - to try and cope."

"Alvarcus why are you showing me this?" Ino asks me with a great deal of pity for Gina. "I get that what happened to her is terrible and I'm not disputing that. But what does this have to do with me going to Oto?"

...

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