LF14: Flashback pt 1

"Noo! Uh!" Hinata shot up in her bed. "Something wrong, Hinata?" Aelita said drowsily.
    "Oh, no, I'm fine. I guess it was just a dream."
    "Oh, okay. Well, good night, then."
    "Right."
Kiba bolted upright in his bed, looking around. "Just a nightmare, I guess," he said, wiping some sweat off of his forehead before laying back down.
"Mmm?" Shikamaru's eyes quickly opened as he took a glance around. "What a nightmare," he mumbled, soon settling back into his bed.
"Hey, guys." Shikamaru set his tray down next to Odd.
    "Hey, Shikamaru. I had the worst nightmare last night. Barely feels like I slept at all." The other two ninja stared at him.
    "What?"
    "I had a nightmare, too."
    "And so did I..."
    "That's weird. Did yours have some shadowy guy and the village up in flames?"
    "Uh! Wow, ours must have been exactly alike..."
    "That's just creepy. And on the same night, too. I wonder if it has anything to do with why we're here."
    "Huh? What do you mean? Didn't your parents enroll you or something?"
    "No. My parents don't know I'm here. It was weird, I can barely remember a thing. I was back home, looking over some books Dad was making me read, and I dozed off. Something woke me up, I turned around, and next thing I know, I was at the edge of the forest and this Delmas guy was saying he'd been looking for me and pulled me into this place."
    "Seriously?"
    "Yeah."
    "Huh. I wonder what happened?"
    "As for me, well, I just woke up in the forest... And the same thing with the principal..." Hinata twiddled her fingers.
    "Well, what happened to me was Shino and I were out looking for Hinata, she'd been gone for two days now, and then this creepy gray-haired guy popped up out of nowhere. Shino asked what he wanted, and the guy attacked him. So we were fighting, and he stuck his hand out and grabbed me. And let me tell you, that's not easy. But anyway, he grabbed me, I felt Akamaru jump up on my arm, and I blacked out. Came back in the forest, wandered closer to the campus, and, well, here I am."
    "Whoa, weird."
    "Yeah. I just thought you guys were normal students, but then there was that  thing Hinata used, the, what was it? 64 Palms, I think she said, and the Shadow Possession Shikamaru used, and now this."
    "But how could you possibly do those things, though? It seems like a logical impossibility."
    "They're just plain old jutsu."
    "Huh? Jutsu? What are you talking about?"
    "What, are you serious?"
    "Yeah, I've never heard of anything called jutsu."
    "Come to think of it, they never said anything about the chakra system at all in science."
    "What are you talking about?"
    "This place is weird. What, does anyone have jutsu around here?"
    "No, I really don't know what a jutsu is."
    "Well, it's kind of like a spell. You concentrate your chakra through hand signs, different ones for different jutsu, and then, well, you get the jutsu..."
    "Okay, but what's chakra, then?"
    "It's the elemental life energy that we all have."
    "So you guys can do energy manipulation?"
    "I guess?"
    "Still sounds a little far-fetched to me, but..." Aelita glanced at her watch. "Looks like it's about time for the bell to ring," she said, getting her tray and standing up.
    "English right off the bat. Oh, well."
    "Yeah, let's go."
"Well, I'm officially bored." Kiba walked out of the lunchroom as Odd walked up.
    "Hey, Kiba! What's up?"
    "Not much. I'm just kind of standing here, nothing to do."
    "Wanna go hang out in the factory?"
    "Sure, why not? Not like I have anything else to do. Let me get Akamaru real quick."
    "Need to let him out to go?"
    "No, he can do that himself. I just like being with him, that's all."
    "Oh, okay. I'll meet you at the factory, then!"
    "Kay, see ya!" Kiba got his beloved companion before joining Odd at the factory. "So that's Akamaru, huh?" Odd said, petting the small white dog.
    "Yup. So is this place really a factory or is that just a nickname for it?"
    "It's a real factory, or it was at some point."
    "Can we check it out?"
    "No, one time Jeremy and I-Hey! Wait!" Kiba had already headed to the stairs.
Jeremy put up his papers. "Last of the history report," he muttered, filing the pile into a folder. He turned to his computer, logging on and pulling up a program. Another window popped up with a tower standing out amongst a 3-D grid of others.
    "Oh, no." The boy instantly pulled out his cell phone, dialing Aelita and Ulrich. He started to dial Yumi's number.
    "Oh, yeah, I almost forgot." He hung up before he finished punching in the digits.
    "And Odd." Jeremy called him, hearing the phone ring a while. "Weird, he's not picking up," Jeremy said, pushing the disconnect button.
    "And I wonder where Kiba went? Oh, well, I'd better get to the factory." Jeremy closed out of the two windows onscreen before turning around and walking out of the dorm.
"Whoa! This thing is awesome!"
    "Kiba, wait!" Odd climbed down the last flight before entering the room.
    "Man, this is cool!" Kiba looked around the conveyor belts and mechanical hands scattered all around the place.
    "Kiba! We need to get out of here!"
    "What? Why?"
    "A while ago, X.A.N.A. possessed all of these robots here, and let's just say it didn't turn out very good."
    " 'Kay, if you say so." Kiba turned around and started to walk back up the stairs.
Jeremy lifted the lid of the manhole, climbing into the sewers. He boarded his scooter, zooming through the underground facility, soon climbing out. He saw Aelita on the top of the bridge.
    "Oh, hey, Jeremy, has Ulrich or Odd come yet?"
    "No, not that I know of. How about Hinata or Kiba?"
    "Hinata's just ahead of us. I don't know about Kiba."
    "Yeah, we'll probably need to get Hinata, Kiba, and Shikamaru cell phones sometime soon."
    "Probably." Aelita grabbed a rope and slid down it, Jeremy following suit. Hinata was waiting right outside the elevator. Aelita and she stepped in, Jeremy entering the control room.
    "Transfer, Aelita! Transfer, Hinata! Scanner, Aelita! Scanner, Hinata! Oh, there you are, Ulrich. Get to the scanner room."
"Huh?"
    "What?"
    "I just heard something."
    "I don't know, I didn't hear anything."
    "Quiet." Kiba and Odd stood in silence for a while on the first and second stair steps.
    "No, I don't hear anything."
    "Weird. I could've sworn I heard something move."
    "Uh, well, we should probably get out of here..."
    "Yeah, good idea." Kiba turned back around and climbed up the stairs. A couple of steps later, he stopped again. Odd bumped into him.
    "Hey!"
    "I heard it again!" Akamaru yipped.
    "Yeah, it was right behind us, just aways down!"