Author:
Date: October 24, 2010
"151 Candles"
Location: Book Restoration Clinic - Sunagakure
Date: October 23rd (RL year: 2010)
Hone Nai lived underneath a Book Restoration Clinic. Or what used to be
one, at least. The building was now just an empty structure, with stairs
leading down into a basement. Oddly, it was the basement that Nai had
chosen to expand, decorate, and dwell within. Books of all kinds lay
stacked on numerous tables, organized on shelves that themselves stood
five or six deep both north and south, and there was scarcely any room for
the one rocking chair and one old couch that were apparently the only
pieces of furniture that Nai needed.
A tapesty over the west wall concealed a tunnel leading deep into the
underbelly of Sunagakure… The Catacombs specifically. Most people feared
that dread place, with its history of strange disappearances, grisly
murders, and plagues that can wipe out entire civilizations. Nai held no
such apprehensions. Not because the threats were unfounded, but because he
could legitimately claim to be the least vulnerable person in the entire
Sand Village. And now here he was, in a vast, empty chamber, with a
vaulted ceiling some hundred feet above him, and the surface somewhere
even further beyond that. A dark, dry, cold, miserable, lonely place
the room was the perfect fit for one such as he. Situated all around the
room, however, were candles. Presently unlit, Nai held a small torch in
his hand as he looked around, counting them.
Good. They were all there. 150 candles. He lit them all, one by one or
sometimes several at once depending on whether they were standing
individually or clustered together. They were black candles, with wax that
ran red like blood as the candles melted. And then came the final one. One
last candle… The 151st candle. Nai took the torch and… Doused it in a
bucket of sand. He then approached the table in the middle of the room. He
took a seat in the chair he had brought with him. And then he used a match
to light the last candle, which was planted right in the middle of a cake.
Hone Nai, Head Recordskeeper, friend of the Kazekage, citizen of
Sunagakure, the one that ended the threat of the undead army that had been
assembled during the last day of the siege, and soon to be 151 years
old… Began to sing. "Happy birthday to me~," he began in his dry, raspy
voice. "Happy birthday, to me~… Happy birthday, dear Yane" Then his
voice broke and he lowered his hooded head, goggles still in place, along
with bandages wrapped about his face… Then he threw his head back and
laughed. The laugh would echo up into various households throughout
Sunagakure, and there would be nightmares in the heads of children this
night, oh yes, indeed there would be.
