Naruto Fan Fiction ❯ The Game ❯ The Game::Power Play ( Chapter 3 )

She stands alone.

 

She stands alone, on the vast transom of the compound, in the doorway, staring into the gathered faces of a lifetime of neglect and disappointment. They all stare back at her, eyes glowing in the wan light of the hundred lanterns that hang around the courtyard and the barest sliver of a crescent moon. Behind her, the doors hang ponderously on their hinges, great iron-fortified berms fashioned into a barrier, a mobile wall.

 

This house, this palace, is more of a bastion than any other part of the city, more so even than some places that do call themselves fortresses. It is enclosed, turtle-like, by four impenetrable stone walls that ward the family they were designed to protect.

 

She stands alone in the doorway, staring at the eyes glowing back at her like creatures of the night, all of them half-shrouded in the shadows which flicker playfully among the throng. She can sense the expectation, the anxiety, the fear. She can feel the mistrust, the distaste, the byzantine plots, the simmering hatreds. She feels their prejudice. Their prejudice against her and against each other, between everyone and everything.

 

She knows it is there because she has borne it her entire life.

 

Hyuuga Hinata steps into her house, her hooded cape draped loosely over her shoulders, her face obscured by the emblem of her village engraved in metal. Even so, they all know it is her. She wears the armour of the Anbu, as much a symbol of her service as the enameled masks she would normally wear -- but she needs a new one, and she has not had time to rectify its absence.

 

Behind her, four servants groan as quietly as they can, straining against the dead weight of the main gates, which swing heavily into place. There is a clatter as the forged iron bolts slide into position and are locked down.

 

Silence reigns. Everyone who is anyone in the family is here, now. Waiting -- for her.

 

She can see the elders, studying her with pointed interest. Some of them are bent over, hobbling on canes, leaning on younger, haler members for support. Some of them still have relatively intact bodies, and stand tall, proud, suffused and supported by the legendary pride and arrogance that fueled everyone here. Or almost everyone...Hinata disliked grouping herself and her own motivations along with them.

 

Neji is with them, and he gently guides the oldest, must crumpled looking man towards her, where she stands, unmoving, frozen in the wan moonlight. He already knows what she has to announce; he was present for the mission debrief.

 

The old man shuffles towards her, his arm hooked through Neji's elbow, his gnarled hand resting on an equally abused cane, and his expression is serene, uncomplicated, and curiously vacant, an expression that could be senile on anyone else. He isn't; he wouldn't be an elder if he were. As he approaches, Hinata drops to one knee out of deference for a man who was once the clan leader, a dreaded ninja in his own time and once a contender for the title of Hokage. His face is lined and wrinkled, slashes of scar tissue traversing the crags and valleys of his features.

 

His pale eyes have no pupils, no irises -- they are clear white orbs, bloodshot with age around the edges.

 

Everyone present, with the exception of the groundskeepers and servants, have the same, eerily inhuman eyes. They all share the same core bloodline, the same genetic predisposition which unlocks one of the oldest, most powerful ninja techniques of all time: the byakugan.

 

The sound of shuffling feet comes to a cadence, and ends, and Hinata can see he is standing three feet away from her kneeling, shrouded form. He doesn't ask anything; he doesn't need to. She already knows why they are here, all of them.

 

"It is done," she says, in her small, delicate voice, barely higher than a whisper, as she unties the sash holding up her metal blindfold.

 

The old man nods. It is done. Hyuuga Hiashi is avenged.

 

OoOoOoO

 

She stands alone, this time before a house of a different sort, a black enamel box resting lightly in her hands.

 

Overhead, the sun gleams brightly, standing on the zenith of the world and ruling absolute over the sky. Brilliance lances down over Konoha, lighting every avenue and every structure, illuminating a community whose every member is bound to each other with a sense of comradeship and purpose.

 

Hinata is at home here, outdoors, in the sun. It's less oppressive, less frightening than being enclosed by people and walls. With an open sky overhead, the weight that has always pressed on her shoulders seems to vanish. It was Kiba, she thinks, who first noticed how she stood taller, brighter in the great outdoors.

 

She allows a small smile to light the corner of her face, as she gazes up at the white facade of the two-story house before her, squeezed between its immediate neighbors like so many other dwellings in Konoha's haphazard construction. Curved clay tiles line the eaves, and she can see a handful of clouds reflected in the windows, curling in winds high far above her, carried away, free.

 

She wishes she could be like them, twisting carefree and careless, following her life wherever it would go. The slight upturning of her lips is vaguely wistful, largely because she knows it could never be that way. Not now. Not ever.

 

This is a house she knows well. It is a house she loves -- a home. It was her home for what, five years? At least. From where she stands, she can see the window to the small, congested study that was her room, her refuge during that time. The window where she would sit, sometimes, and watch the people outside her window, watch the mobs, free from the responsibilities and expectations that crowd her world. The seat where she would sit and wish she could be like them.

 

She is wearing a white kimono, in a formal style, spattered with embroidered flowers and the Hyuuga clan emblem featured prominently in the centre of the vastly complicated obi knot. Her short bangs are pulled up and clipped away from her rounded face, and she is faintly annoyed, unused to this style and her ever-present desire to be inconspicuous and unnoticed. She feels flashy, and awkward, and unnatural, and strangely deceptive.

 

Nevertheless, her shoulders are squared -- she is heir more to an image than anything else.

 

Yuuhi Kurenai's shock drives the point home when she answers the door.

 

"Hi...Hinata? Is that you?"

 

OoOoOoO

 

There is no reason for any further delay. Without fanfare, Neji and the elder turn towards the main house, towards the gathering hall that occupies most of the central building's volume, and by unspoken consensus, the rest of the elders, and then the family follow like a pack of wolves silently moving into the night.

 

Hinata stays where she is, unsure of whether or not she should follow. Her heart screams at her to leave, but her feet remain planted where they are, for some unfathomable reason.

 

The question of succession in the Hyuuga household has always been subject to ambiguity for as long as Hinata has been alive, and she knows this far too well. Her own exile was inglorious, shameful, and she had never had a good relationship with her father, the late head of the clan. Hanabi is the obvious choice, despite being her sister and five years her junior, having almost been groomed to replace her as successor.

 

They are more different than anyone could have imagined at their respective births.

 

Hinata is petite, slender, unassuming, and possessed by the bad habit of slouching, which makes her seem even smaller than she already is. When she was younger, perhaps, one might have likened her to a mouse, the natural prey of the cat -- the Hyuuga family's totem. She was never very skilled at the 'gentle fist', the proprietary fighting style of the clan, though she is competent now, nor very remarkable as a shinobi. She was unconfident and unsettled, and unable to credit herself or avoid blaming herself either, and she is unsure if much of that has changed.

 

She watches Hanabi stride into the hall on long legs, the last to enter, tall, her unfettered jet-black hair streaming in a broad fan behind her in a vision of elegance. Her eyes have lost all of their innocence, replaced by the hardened gaze of a veteran soldier who has killed and does not care, by the eyes of an assassin. Her fighting technique is impeccable, guided through every step of its development by their shared father, and later refined through her own considerable talents. Certainly, she is not as good as Neji, resident genius and now the best possible teacher of the style for the next generation, but more than good enough to level just about everyone else in the house.

 

And she is arrogant. She is steeped in the knowledge that the Hyuuga clan are now and have always been the most powerful clan in the region for centuries. She is secure in the knowledge that no one, anywhere, will best her in single combat -- even if she cannot beat Neji, she will always be able to lord over him the cursed seal that he hates, the one that will bend him to her desires or kill him. Even if he is the highest ranked member of Konoha's Anbu, and its respected chieftain. No one, anywhere, can stop her ascension.

 

But Hinata is not jealous, not of Hanabi. Hinata feels no envy for her sisters blaring confidence, for the aura of power and the demanded respect. She can't be, no matter how she might try. They are too different.

 

Above all, she does not want to enter that hall. More than anything, she wants to turn on her heel, pass through those massive gates, and never return. Nothing holds her here, not to this place where she was born and rejected. How long was it when no one here had given her any respect, ever believed in her?

 

She feels unwanted. She stands alone.

 

Hanabi stops at the threshold of the ornate doorway, her hand on one of the sliding panels that bears the clan crest. It is dark now, the crescent moon temporarily obscured overhead, and she has some difficulty making out Hanabi's expression. She suspects she knows what it will be, however. It is a sneer, and she finds that she is correct when Hanabi takes a further step into the flickering talcum light of one of the hanging paper lanterns encircling the courtyard.

 

It is a dare. The kind of dare that Hanabi knows will go unresolved, a challenge that will not be met. The look that Hanabi wears whenever she invites Hinata to spar, to remind her that she is now and always will be her inferior, in spite of their age and the correct order of ascension; is she the jealous one?

 

Before she really realizes it, Hinata is shrugging off her mist-grey Anbu-issue cloak, folding it over her forearm, and stalking after Hanabi towards the hall, towards her sister's retreating back. It's not until a servant takes the hooded cape from her that she realizes she is in motion and that she cannot stop.

 

OoOoOoO

 

Like a flawed mirror, Kurenai is somehow Hinata's opposite this morning, a sleep-rumpled, unprepared version of herself that virtually no one ever gets to see. Her eyes, initially tired, are open and alert now, stunned by the drastically changed young woman standing on her doorstep, somehow at odds with the rusted tin can full of ashes and crumpled cigarette butts sharing the space with her. She knows her hair has to be a mess, and her disheveled robe feels oddly inappropriate when contrasted with Hinata's gorgeous kimono.

 

"Teacher," Hinata says, softly, accompanying her greeting with a shallow, respectful bow from the waist. Lord, Kurenai thinks, she's being formal today. What could possibly be the matter?

 

"Um, Lady Hinata," she replies, just as formally. Hinata, after all, is from a clan that is not only highly respected as ninjas, but nobility in the outside world as well. She affects her own bow, hand clutching together the folds of her tattered old robe as she does so. "Good morning. Would you like to come in?"

 

Hinata's thanks are so quiet as to be almost unheard, and Kurenai steps back to let her past.

 

"Teacher, I apologize for disturbing you so early today," her once-student adds, slipping off her sandals while Kurenai closes the door behind them, and Kurenai puts aside her growing urge to shake the poor girl until she can get a grip.

 

She's not sure how she should interpret Hinata's face, today a curious mask of uncertainty that has the potential to dissolve into pathetic tears or unyielding determination. Her ghostly eyes are wavering, and if Kurenai could truly make out anything more than the hint of their actual pupils, she would be able to see if Hinata was just staring at the floor or looking around. Idly, she motions Hinata into her living room, silently offering her one of the cushions on the tatami-tiled floor as a seat at the low table where she was considering having breakfast not twenty minutes ago. Hinata kneels, proper, her back straight, her head erect, and her feet carefully folded under her, and Kurenai suddenly thinks she understands. She makes no move to correct the growing smile that creeps onto her face as Hinata carefully places the box on the table.

 

"Hinata," she says, drawing her pupil's attention and unnerving stare, "first things first."

 

"Teacher?"

 

"First of all, you stop calling me that. I'm not your teacher any more, and we have the same rank. Second, I'd like to think I'm a better friend of yours, so Kurenai will do. Understood?"

 

Her own smile is metamorphosing slyly with a sureness she hasn't felt in a while. Hinata's carefully composed look shatters in an instant, her eyes blinking back a short parade of emotions that Kurenai can't actually decipher with any degree of certainty.

 

"Y-yes, ma'am," she says, an ancient, embarrassed stutter stumbling from her mouth, a vocal accident that snatches her hand from where it lay by her side to cover her erring lips. She corrects herself: "Yes, Kurenai," and then nervously rearranges her legs on the violet pillow.

 

Kurenai's house is sparsely, but elegantly decorated. The wall opposite the archway into the living room displays a framed watercolour of a forest on a mountainside, an original painting by a local artist, this last certified by the red square stamped in the corner beneath his signature. The brushwork is impeccable, subtle hues fading and flowing into each other in an ethereal dance. A flock of delicate birds hovers over an army of trees in the mist, their motion forever captured in the same dilute ink that seems to give the rocks life. She'd bought it a long time ago, captivated by the near-perfect photorealism of the print, a reminder that nothing in the world she shared with Hinata was as it seemed.

 

"You don't mind if I eat while we talk, I hope," Kurenai says, going on, pushing at Hinata's limits. For all her own propriety outside, she likes to play by her rules in her own house, and hopefully, some of this will remind Hinata that this house was once her house too. Not waiting for an answer, she disappears momentarily into the kitchen to grab her breakfast. "Do you want some tea?"

 

OoOoOoO

 

It is clear that the elders have already decided who will lead the clan by the time Hinata has entered the hall. Everything in this room has the sheen of money well-spent, from the polished cherry beams holding up the room and walls to the gold-leaf screens delineating the edges of the room. The elders kneel behind a long, low table, lacquered black and red, and inlaid with twisting, filigreed gold vines. A row of banners hang behind them, and in the middle is a small shrine dedicated to the mourning of Hyuuga Hiashi's passing, and his ever unnerving stare projects, commanding, from a face that will never be seen again.

 

Hyuuga Hiashi -- the last head of the Hyuuga clan. Father of an assassin and an Anbu, uncle of the Anbu's own headmaster, and a formidable ninja in his own right, until his untimely death at the hands of his insane second cousin.

 

It is not until Hinata passes the half-way point along the unobstructed aisle the clan has left in the middle of the room that Hanabi notices she did not stay outside. She fixes her sister with an uncharitable glare, one shrouded in anger and inflamed with some deeper, primal emotion.

 

Besides the two of them, Neji is the only other member of the clan standing, the only one with sufficient rank and power in the village to have earned that right. He, of course, can never be head of the main house, but he will serve in some regards as a master of ceremonies. His face is impassive, unreadable, inscrutable as he stands just to the right of the table where the clan elders are gathered. Hinata wishes he would betray some emotion, let something slip, something to reassure her -- but he won't, she knows. Like everyone else, his head protector is absent, the cruelly inscribed seal obvious on his otherwise unruffled forehead. In moments like these, clan tradition dictates that everyone know who is of the main house, and who is not, so no one steps out of line. Hinata suspects that this will not matter to Neji, that this part of the tradition is somehow irrelevant to him, and she is most likely right.

 

Hinata slows her pace, lightens her footsteps until she is standing next to Hanabi. Together, on an unspoken cue, they bow for their elders, demonstrating the respect and fealty that these old men and women, main house and branch house, have earned. No doubt one day Neji will sit on this august panel himself, she thinks idly, and knows she is right.

 

Something, she thinks, is wrong. She is not...expected, even though it is her every right to stand here, to take part in this ceremony so critical for the house. She supposes this is partly her fault, both because she has never tried to impress anyone, but also because she has been absent from the family compound for such a long time. Not recently, perhaps, emboldened by her own, late-blooming successes, but absent nevertheless.

 

There are murmurs in the crowd, where there should be none. Rumors, suggestions, innuendo. Hanabi is looking increasingly disconcerted, as they both kneel at the head of the room. Hinata's presence has forced her sister to move two feet to the left from the exact centre of the room, and Hinata mirrors her on the right.

 

"Silence!" hisses Neji, through clenched teeth, and all extraneous noise is brought to a sudden, crashing halt.

 

There is more discussion, this time from the strangely distant members of the family council, and Hinata closes her eyes and shuts out the world, shuts out Hanabi's palpable anger and confusion, Neji's uncaring stare, and the feeling of dozens of pairs of eyes boring through the Anbu armour she is still wearing. She concentrates herself on the warm compression it imparts to her, hugging her skin, protecting her from the world. It is her shell, her refuge in this tense moment, and she rests, gathering herself. The storm is coming.

 

At last silence rules supreme, and she knows this has to be it.

 

The oldest of the elders clears his throat, a conflicted, horrible sound, a grating of phlegm and gradually failing respiratory passages, and he speaks in a brutal cacophony of rasping.

 

"Tradition dictates that the first-born is the heir of the main house," he says, a grudging acceptance of her place on the floor here next to Hanabi, "and that the clan must be led by the strongest of its members."

 

Historically, there has never been a conflict between these two precepts. Hinata nods once, curtly. Her voice, when she speaks, is a susurration, the softest breeze in a stand of maple trees.

 

"I understand," she says, and relief flickers across Hanabi's face -- but only for a moment. "Let us settle this," she finishes, and awe falls over the room as she makes her pronouncement.

 

Fury clouds Hanabi's expression, followed by confident triumph.

 

And that, thinks Hinata, is why I cannot let you have the clan, dear sister. It's time to stand up.

 

OoOoOoO

 

Hinata inhales once, slowly, drinking in the blended aroma of her tea, gently swirling the hemispherical ceramic vessel in her cupped hands and watching the tea leaves dance counter-clockwise beneath her. The tea brings back memories, hundreds of memories, some of which she has forgotten, some of which she has wanted to. She looks up to find Kurenai smiling at her over a remarkably foul bowl of rice and natto; she never did acquire the taste.

 

"So what brings you here this early in the morning?" Kurenai asks, black chopsticks stirring leftover rice into her meal idly. When she pulls them up out of the bowl, they are coated with something sticky, something decidedly reminiscent of wet cobwebs. "And don't tell me it's noon already, I know I slept in."

 

Hinata doesn't speak right away, her stalling tactic pre-empted before she could bring it to bear. Kurenai knows her too well, knows her habit of circumlocution and how to avoid it. She was always to the point, always finding the key. Her fingers move in her lap, and she wants to bring them together, reassure herself with her own touch like she always does, but she forces them to stay still.

 

When she speaks, she speaks clearly.

 

"I wanted to thank you, Kurenai. Teacher," she says, looking up and meeting her mentor's confused stare with a smile of her own. She feels oddly free, oddly liberated, and the smell of her tea mingling with Kurenai's fermented soy reminds her of the time she decided she would try it herself: 'it really wakes you up,' Kurenai had said. The last time she'd felt so sick, Hinata remembers, was the one time she'd been poisoned in combat, and she is in no hurry to repeat either the natto or the poisoning experience.

 

Kurenai is not bothered by the taste, and slowly mulls over a mouthful, swallowing before speaking. "What for?" she asks, genuinely confused.

 

Hinata also remembers Kurenai's deft hands, shaking with laughter as they held back her hair while she stared at the toilet, and she can't help but let the smallest, most fragile giggle past her lips.

 

"I never thanked you properly," Hinata continues, "for helping me. For letting me stay, for teaching me...everything. For being patient." For being the sister Hanabi could never be, Hinata wants to say, but she ends it there. Maybe Kurenai would understand anyway, she thinks, and she bows low, at the waist, giving Kurenai a glimpse of the emblem embroidered into her obi for the first time.

 

The is a sharp click as Kurenai drops her chopsticks into her bowl and catches them again just as suddenly.

 

"I...you're welcome," she blinks, a little stunned, putting down the bowl before she embarrasses herself. Hinata, for her part, plays the serene Hyuuga as she takes another sip of her tea. She looks away, up at the painting on the wall, and reminds herself that looks are always deceiving. "It was the least I could do, really."

 

Hinata allows herself a smile, indulging in the lightly spiced flavor playing on her tongue. Kurenai goes on after a pause.

 

"I guess I saw a little of myself in you," she says. "They tell you when you become a teaching jounin that you shouldn't get attached to your students, because there might be a time you can't help them, and that you shouldn't see them as kids, because they're ninjas too. But I could see you were scared in a lot of the same ways I was...and I just wanted you to feel better about yourself."

 

It's Hinata's turn to be thrown a little off balance; Kurenai's admission is not one she'd ever heard before, and she can't possibly imagine a Kurenai without her control and pride, a self-deprecating Kurenai without the confidence that made her above all a woman in Hinata's eyes.

 

"I guess we turned out all right after all, didn't we, Hinata?" she asks, and Hinata cannot help but agree.

 

OoOoOoO

 

Hyuuga Hanabi is furious. Without another word, Hinata stands, staring at her where she is still kneeling. Not to be outdone, she is on her feet in the most fluid, most gracious, and most aggressive manner she can manage, silently reminding her undeserving sister that she has a good eight inches on her. Hinata, for her part, is not locked into her usual slouch, and that eight inches feels smaller than it has ever felt before.

 

Everything is wrong, everything is unbalanced.

 

Neji is nonplussed by Hinata's quiet announcement, and announces that the decision will be settled in the gardens. Again, the elders file out, followed by the clan. Undoubtedly, they will find seating or standing room around the edges of the meticulously maintained gardens behind the main hall, or along the well-groomed stone paths at the edges. A garden, which tomorrow, Hanabi is sure, will need to be re-groomed by the gardeners. As the last of the family files out, talking animately in hushed tones among themselves, she watches Neji close the door behind them.

 

In a way, he is there in his capacity as head of the branch house, in another as the director of tonight's events. She knows he is there so that their fight does not start before it is supposed to, and as much as she wants to reach over and strangle Hinata right now, Neji won't let her. Damn him and his mocking superiority. How did they all get into this mess?

 

"What are you doing, Hinata?" she snarls, "Do you want me to kill you? Is that it?"

 

Hinata doesn't say anything, pulling back into her usual, frustratingly maddening reticence. Why can't she just admit that she can't possibly hope to be the clan head? Why can't she just give up now like she always has in the face of her family? Why doesn't she just leave, dodge the issue like she did for years?

 

Clicks echo through the vacant chamber as Hinata pulls at the straps and buckles holding her combat armor onto her limbs and torso, the treated leather thongs slithering like snakes as they come loose and abandon the molded steel to the grip of gravity. One by one, the layers of Hinata's armor clatter to the ground until she is wearing nothing but a simple grey tunic and pants, still stained and dirty from her most recent mission in the field. Her mission of vengeance, and one which Hanabi had wanted so very badly -- the one that would have proven her place in the family for once and for all.

 

"You know you can't win this! I've beaten you in every match we've ever had, not to mention you were away so long I was frankly impressed you remembered anything." And yes, she is jealous. Jealous that Hinata had convinced Neji to teach her the kaiten and the sixty-four palms during her self-imposed exile. Jealous that Hinata is even being allowed this chance to prove herself, jealous because she knows that if she were the weak one, the second-born would never get that chance. "You can't win, Hinata. Quit now, or I will kill you."

 

When Hinata finally speaks, she sounds too much like Neji, too prepossessed. "You are allowing your emotions to colour this conflict," she says, finally facing her sister, meeting her frozen eyes across an immeasurable void. "Meet me outside when you are ready...and I promise -- I cannot allow you to win."

 

With that, Hinata steps towards the door. Neji slides it open for her, not looking at either of them, and closing it in the wake of her passage.

 

And Hanabi is left in the room with the damnable knowledge that Hinata is right, and she focuses, concentrating on herself until she is an avatar of calm. The flow of chakra in her limbs is smooth, uninterrupted, her fingers steady and equipped with the deadly accuracy her jyuuken fighting style demands. Confident hands reach up to where her hands are bound in cloth, and she tightens and adjusts them, until her hands are tense, supported, and ready for battle.

 

She looks to the pile of armor and weapons on the floor, and she notices that Hinata has abandoned all of her kunai, her shuriken, her scrolls. Even her Konoha head protector lies here on the floor. For all intents and purposes, Hinata is naked. This fight will come down to the jyuuken, the only real proof of kinship in this family.

 

Hanabi grins, her expression edging on cruel.

 

No, she thinks, Hinata can't win this, no matter what she says. It's impossible.

 

OoOoOoO

 

"I...also wanted to let you know why I went back," Hinata adds, shyly. They may as well trade secrets at this point. "I didn't want you to think I was unhappy here, or that you didn't mean anything to me," she says.

 

"I wouldn't believe it even if you said so," Kurenai interrupts, relieved enough to start in on her bowl of natto again. Hinata's nose crinkles, and Kurenai suspects that she would like more tea, but is too polite to ask right now.

 

"I was here...when I became a chuunin...and when I became a jounin," and Kurenai has to settle her own accounts of jealousy towards that one remarkably talented year of graduates, all of whom had made that last, highest grade of ninja at an earlier age than she had. Hinata continues: "But I never told father that I had ever been promoted. You remember how he was training Hanabi when you told him you were going to be my teacher?"

 

Kurenai was appalled, that day, for the first time in a long while, at how poorly esteemed Hinata was in her own house. She only nods, the barest acknowledgment of how terrible the Hyuugas were at raising children for all their self-professed importance.

 

"I didn't...I didn't think that any of those promotions would matter to him. But when Shikamaru asked me if I wanted to join his team with Lee...I couldn't refuse...and I wanted to take that test. Not just for the village, but for me." Hinata smile is unguarded now, open, honest. "It occurred to me that I didn't care what father or the family thought, but that I wanted to be an Anbu so I could work with my friends for the benefit of the village.

 

"When I got in, though, I decided I was going to tell father after all. I knew he'd been a hunter-nin once, long ago, and that maybe he would be interested. I found him in his study, working on something. He never turned around, but when I told him, I thought I had given him a heart attack, because he froze."

 

Kurenai is captivated. Hinata almost never tells stories, almost never talks this much. She is so different now from the girl that had failed her first chuunin exam, who had cried in her arms and told her how she couldn't bear to face her family after so many years of putting up with their indifference.

 

"After a while, he opened a drawer at the side of his office, and took out a cloth bundle, saying that I should have it. And then he closed the door and went back to work. But when I opened it in my room, the only gift he's ever given me, I...I cried."

 

Hinata stops, reaching forward, and gently removing the lid on the box with her slender, faerie's fingers. From inside the box, resting on a pad of black velvet, is a white and red grimace, a snarling, tiger-faced mask. Crimson whiskers and gums streak perpendicular to the tabby streaks on the contorted, angry features of an angered cat.

 

"This is...this was...father's Anbu mask. I didn't know he'd kept it...when he gave it to me, I felt like I had earned my place there again. Whenever I felt like I was lost, or like I was unwanted...all I had to do was look at it.

 

"I want you to have it, Teacher, because you also made me feel like I had a place somewhere," Hinata concludes, carefully touching her fingertips to the gnarled lips, to the immaculately carved teeth, and over the twisted brow.

 

For a moment, Kurenai is speechless, and she feels so underdressed, so unprepared, and so undeserving of the honor that Hinata has so gracefully engineered. And despite all that, she stands in her ancient, threadbare robe, the same one she's had since she was a much younger version of herself, and holds Hinata like she did when the girl first showed up at her home in the middle of the night so many years ago.

 

"You're sure you don't need it any more?" Kurenai whispers, unwilling to let go of this girl, her girl.

 

"No," says Hinata, and the finality in her voice is enough to convince Kurenai that her girl has finally grown up.

 

OoOoOoO

 

It begins with the byakugan, thinks Neji to himself. It always does.

 

Hanabi starts first, impatient and yearning to end this, to bring it all to an end. Hinata stands on the opposite side of the bridge, and they face off against each other across the koi pond which meanders through the garden. Darkness and shadows fill the yard, rippling over meticulously raked sand beds and carefully nursed flower bushes. Artfully placed stones and boulders and a handful of preordained trees complete the postcard picture.

 

Nothing is out of place here, except for Hinata and her admittedly admirable temerity.

 

Hanabi moves, in an unannounced rush of motion, an abrupt, graceful dash of spontaneous momentum and force. She's quick, deft and the mistress of the kind of speed that assassins need in their everyday lives. Her assurance and confidence are unmistakable, her entire body leaning forward in this fatal lunge, her fingers pointed, charged with chakra. Hinata, for her part, is still, standing square, her palms open by her sides but otherwise unprepared, unready. Her stance is neither offensive nor defensive, nor belonging to any martial art that Neji is familiar with.

 

Hinata makes no move to defend herself, and Neji is stunned. Was Hanabi right? Is this Hinata's way of removing herself from the picture? Honorable suicide? Death by soriricide?

 

An audible gasp rises from the family as Hanabi's strikes begin to hit home. With each step, each punch, each stab, Hinata begins to stumble backwards, twisting with the blows, letting them connect. Three stabs into her ribs, and her breathing grows irregular, each breath coming in short bothered pants, as though it is painful to breathe. With her right hand she cradles herself, holding her injured side until it, too, falls limp under Hanabi's unrelenting assault.

 

Finally, her instincts win over, and she begins weakly warding off the blows, parrying softly, ineffectually. Her footwork is atrocious, she isn't even trying, and Neji wants to shout at her, bellow that she's better than this, but he is bound not to intervene. His face remains the same impassive mask it has been all night, and he catches through the corner of his eye the confused look on the house elders' faces. His teeth grind together in frustration, as he wonders what the hell she is doing.

 

She takes another step back, and he realizes, perhaps for the first time, that he might be worried. He has always been at odds with the main house, antagonized by his eternally inferior position, bothered by the equanimity with which his father accepted his role as Hiashi's body double. Even now, Hiashi's assassination at the hands of Toyama -- the murderer now stripped of his family name -- makes his father's sacrifice seem like a unforgivable waste.

 

He is ashamed, too, because he knows Toyama's secret, how he escaped the fatal curse seal long enough to finish Hinata's father while he was still shocked. Ashamed because he accepted this forbidden knowledge, even if he hopes he will never use it.

 

It is none of his business who wins this fight, who succeeds Hiashi...but he now suspects that Hanabi is perhaps the more spoiled of the two, the least mature. Hinata has proven that tonight, which makes him wonder -- what is she doing, letting herself get mauled like this?

 

Something is odd, though, he thinks, and a frown creases his face. Hinata is not falling apart like she should. She should be weaker now, her critical chakra points slammed shut by each of Hanabi's impeccable blows. She should barely be able to stand. Hanabi doesn't seem to have noticed, continuing her relentless assault, driving Hinata backwards with an inexorable steadiness.

 

Hinata stumbles once more, taking two steps back, and Neji recognizes instantaneously Hanabi's posture, the stance that can only lead into the sixty-four palms. She's playing the family's trump card now -- if she pulls this off, it truly is over, and Hinata will have lost.

 

In the dim beige light of the lanterns, Neji thinks he catches Hinata's tiny, almost invisible grin, and suddenly everything that has been bothering him about this fight comes together in his head like a jigsaw puzzle assembling itself.

 

Hanabi's assault is a blur of motion, suddenly brightening with her aura as he activates his own byakugan, watching her, and his every suspicion is confirmed. Hinata flies backwards, her back arched like a dying swan as she plummets head-first into the koi pond. A plume of water flies skyward, dotting the observers with water droplets as it then crashes back, following the girl who had fallen.

 

And then silence reigns.

 

"Somebody get her out of there before she drowns," Hanabi says, softly, something, perhaps regret, tinging her voice, as she turns to walk away.

 

"It is over," the elder says, to no one in particular.

 

Neji places his hand on the old man's shoulder. "No," he whispers, feeling two beats of his heart pass in the stillness as a servant rushes to Hinata's aid, "not yet."

 

The servant is cut off as Hinata's soaking form lurches up out of the pond. Her eyes are closed, but the veins surrounding them are suffused and swollen with blood and chakra -- she can see. Water sloughs off her ascending body like chains of pearls, glinting in the moonlight. A single lily pad is draped over her arm by its stem, trailing in her upwards flight free from the water.

 

There is no sign she was ever injured.

 

OoOoOoO

 

"I...have a place now," Hinata says, smiling softly. She'd never expected to have to stand up so quickly, to be forced into taking that place. She'd always assumed she'd be ready for it when the time came, and the cold dread that had seized her when she heard the news that her father had died still clings, still resides somewhere in her small chest. "Don't worry about me, please."

 

Still, it was too early.

 

"I'm not sure I can help it," Kurenai mutters, sitting back on her heels. "When Neji beat you in your first exam, watching you was the hardest thing I've ever had to do in my life. I wanted you to give up, to surrender, because you were killing yourself." She bites her lip, looking down at the snarling tiger resting in its varnished coffin on her table. "But you needed that fight. I'm glad you tried. I'm...I'm proud of you."

 

Hinata cannot help but blush, staring at a point three feet into the floor, in the ground. The pretense of formality has long evaporated, and Hinata knows somehow that this place will never lose its identity as home, not while Kurenai lives here.

 

"Thank you," is all she can think to say.

 

Kurenai snorts. "I think this is why they tell you not to get attached to your students," she grumbles, pretending some degree of aloofness again, knowing that neither of them are falling for it. "You end up sounding like a total sap."

 

Together they chuckle, a pealing of glass bells.

 

"I think...Kiba would appreciate the advice," Hinata offers in her usual small voice, a voice still hued with amusement. "I understand he has nominated his own students for their exams for the first time after three years."

 

"...which is perfectly normal, unlike the lot of you," Kurenai adds, raising an eyebrow. Bah, she'd always be jealous of her student's talents, not that it mattered. "Given how much he complains about them, I wouldn't worry about him being too attached."

 

"Mm. How is Shino? I haven't had time to see him recently."

 

"Ah...I was wondering when you'd ask." Kurenai grins. "He's getting hitched, but don't tell anyone yet...I think he's trying to decide when to tell..."

 

Gradually, their conversation drifts into a time long past, to a place, to a feeling that neither of them has visited in a while. They regale each other with new stories about old friends and ancient lore that only they know, and Kurenai finally finishes her long-interrupted breakfast. When Hinata finally stands to leave, she has finished her third cup of tea.

 

Oddly, she doesn't feel like she's pretending when she straightens her back and squares her shoulders. She is now, and always will be, Lady Hyuuga. Perhaps one day she will be an elder, too.

 

Outside, she looks up at the white walls of her home again, at the window where her room once was. Then, closing her eyes, she basks for a moment in the brilliance of the sun, where she belongs, drinking in its warmth with her entire being.

 

"Neji?" she asks the thin air, from whence he appears.

 

"Mm," he interjects, not saying anything and everything at once.

 

OoOoOoO

 

Hanabi's reaction time is formidable, but its not enough to stop Hinata's rush. Even as she reactivates her byakugan, Hinata is already upon her, her sharp, angular knee landing a crushing blow against her kidney.

 

This is not jyuuken; this is a blow designed to stagger her. Not that is necessarily needed. Hanabi doesn't understand, she can't. Mere seconds ago, she was the victor, the winner of a shallow victory over a pathetic opponent who hadn't bothered to even protect herself. She'd finished with a show of force, a flawless performance of the family's proudest technique.

 

Only one man had ever stood up after being struck by the sixty-four palms, and he had a demon sealed in him. How the hell did measly, incapable little Hinata survive?

 

Hanabi manages, barely, to ward off another hard strike to her torso, and she winces as she realizes that was a feint to give Hinata ready access to one of the more critical chakra points on her right, and dominant, arm. Hinata's expression is unreadable as the pain of Hinata's invading chakra surges through her veins and her elbow is suddenly sluggish and unreliable.

 

Now she staggers back, rebounding lightly away from one of the banisters guarding the edges of the bridge over the pond, and Hinata casually discards the errant lily pad clinging to her arm, letting it slide back into the water. Hinata's eyes are still closed, water streaming down her face from her hair, and Hanabi realizes she is merely avoiding letting the water in, knowing how much of a distraction it would be.

 

Hinata is more focused than she has ever seen her before, and Hanabi cannot help but wonder if her weakness was always an act, if she was merely hiding and hoarding her strengths in the manner of the most devious shinobi.

 

No, impossible. Hinata has dignity, now, and even then, and she is not that clever.

 

"How..?" Hanabi gasps, her right elbow limp at her side, her thighs marked with the telltale circular petechia that jyuuken leaves behind. "How did you get up?"

 

Hinata does not answer right away, falling into a defensive stance now. No; she'd always known Hanabi was better at this, at the jyuuken, at being the holder of killer intent...Hinata had only leveled the playing field.

 

"You said you would kill me," Hinata replies, "I could not allow that; I promised."

 

"That wasn't an answer!" Hanabi screams, rushing forward, her left hand readied. It would not end this way, it could not, and she is still good enough to put down Hinata with only one good hand and half her speed, if she focuses everything she has into this one strike.

 

Her sister's calm is infuriating, agonizing, and she fails to recognize the beginnings of the kaiten as she crosses into Hinata's personal boundary. When she does realize what has happened, it is too late. The edge of the moon-bright spherical storm catches her and flings her like a ragdoll, her entire body limp and burning with the flashfire immolation of foreign chakra. Time slows to a crawl, and she can count the stars flickering overhead as she falls, descending as though on strings, and she lands with a thud in one of the perfectly groomed sand beds. Hinata is standing over her immediately, immobilizing her with additional pinpoint strikes.

 

It is not until she attempts to move that she realizes that she is essentially paralyzed. Out of chakra, and out of energy. Her eyes slide shut into unconsciousness and she is grateful she will not have to face the unavoidable ignominy.

 

Neji finally removes his hand from the elder's shoulder.

 

"She allowed her emotions to interfere," is all he says. The elder nods, understanding. He suspects that the genius behind him knows how Hinata avoided the crippling sixty-four hands, but bears no illusions about divesting Neji of the secret. Hinata is the head of the house now, and there is no question: she is unconquerable within the clan, unopposable.

 

OoOoOoO

 

Hinata offers Neji a smile, one which she knows will go unreturned as they make their way slowly back to the Hyuuga compound. They weave their way through the village, Neji always sure to walk exactly two paces behind her at all times. Hinata stops momentarily at the market, offering to buy him an apple like the one she purchases for herself, but he declines.

 

"You didn't have to come," she says, "I think I'm safe here."

 

He grumbles to himself, dismissing her. "I didn't think you'd need help," he retorts, moving smoothly into the topic he wishes to discuss, never wasting time. "I know what you did."

 

Hinata stops, closing her eyes, formulating her response. "I know you do...and I know it will never work with you, Neji. But I want your help. You, and Hanabi both. I cannot do this alone."

 

Neji draws up short. "You should. The others all have," he snorts. Why admit her weaknesses now?

 

"No," she says, after some deliberation. "I didn't want to be the head of the clan, brother Neji. But we have to stop hating each other...and if everyone hates me, then maybe you and Hanabi can reconcile the two houses."

 

On that note she starts walking again. What she'd done to Hanabi had been ludicrously simple, but for someone as tradition bound as her sister, doing it successfully had been ludicrously easy. One, simple genjutsu to create the illusion in her sister's mind that her chakra points were all in different places from where they really were, and the 'gentle fist' style was completely disarmed.

 

Only Neji understood. Only he could. Slowly, he begins catching up to her.

 

"Yes," he says, finally and with great effort, before they reach the heavy gates blocking the gap in the Hyuuga's fortress' walls, "you...may be right."

 

Hinata smiles to herself as Neji excuses himself and departs, walking away into the core of the city; perhaps this was worth all the hassle after all, she thinks, passing through the gates into her clan.

 

OoOoOoO

 

Author's Notes:

 

So, no, I don't think Neji would ever allow himself to show any kind of weakness or fallacy, but he matured significantly after his fight with Naruto. I think by the time this story might come about, he would be ready for the kinds of responsibilities I've given him, and I think even he would accept Hinata if she proved she were ready to take them as well.

 

Hinata...I hope I did Hinata well enough here. I think, judging from Kurenai's reaction's to Hinata and Neji's fight, that Hinata is the student she watches most carefully, and with good reason. I think, under the circumstances I've described here, that they might bond more closely, so I hope I got that across; urgh, I hate writing dialogue between women.

 

I think I portrayed Hanabi correctly, in that I tried to give her all the arrogance and overconfidence of the Hyuuga, inherited, clearly, from her father. I don't think she's a bad person, however, judging by what little we've seen of her, so I tried to temper her a little. Anyway, I'm going to upload and go to bed.