Chapter Text
Hinata stretches her wings, doing the exercises that Haruka told her to practice. Though she know that her life as a Hyuuga have ended, she cannot help but worry about her former clan. After all, her life long dream was to change their practice. It won’t be easy. Even as a child she understood this. She was also certain that she would be assassinated before she could realize her dream. That is how stubborn her clan is with their archaic and cold hearted way.
How many cousins had she seen tethering on the edge of death from the Caged Bird Seal?
How many times had she been punished for trying to stop their torture by her elders?
The scent of blood is the first scent she recognize for as long as she can remember. The heavy air of despair and the stagnant feeling of helplessness are both something she’s more familiar with than the beat of her own heart.
Neji’s cold and calculated psychological torment that chips away at her self confidence, beating her down emotionally with his words because words are the only thing that he know can hurt her and he know that she is too emotionally attached to him to hurt him and punish him as designed.
Father’s unfeeling detachment and uncaring treatment of her career; her life not even worth a speck of worry on his part.
Hanabi’s slow but certain estrangement from her, despite being half of the hand that helped raised her into the young girl that she left behind.
She thought that she have more time…but as she stands there, the muscles of her wings strained from exercise, Hinata know that she have long ran out of time after she…died. The worse part? Father won’t care and Hanabi will just forget her as one of the worthless, unnamed Hyuuga that fell in an unknown battle. She would be erased from her clan.
And there is nothing that she can do about it.
Hinata sighs, sitting on the bench and sipping on refreshing sakura tea, spreading her wings out to sun the feathers while the sky is still clear of clouds. As she nibbles on a cookie, she ponders about the direction her life is taking. Hinata know that she will be seen as an outsider if her clan ever meet her again. That means that she have no voice in her clan matters.
She looks up to see Neji standing guard nearby. Naruto is still distrusting of her cousin but Hinata asked him to let her interact with him. He is her family after all. So with a small smile, she calls on him, “Neji-nii-san,”
Neji’s brow twitches in that familiar manner of whenever she does something he doesn’t agree with but will not disobey. He steps closer to her and before he could greet her with lofty, dragging manners of titles she couldn’t care less for, Hinata asks, “Hand,”
He blinks and offers his right.
Hinata gently turns it around, uncurling his fingers so that his palm is exposed to her, and places a c few cookies in his hand, “Please enjoy them…and if you don’t want to, you can always share them…it isn’t good to waste food,”
She remember when he threw away a small packet of cookies she had given him during her Academy days. They were her first successful baking attempt. It had broken her heart and she never tried giving him anything after that.
Neji awkwardly stands there, cookies in hand. He bites down on his lip before saying, “This is inappropriate, Lady Hinata,”
Hinata hums, her feathers rustling and the flashes of gold lightning through her clouds white reminding Neji exactly who she belongs to and who he answer to. But Hinata ignores the slight twitch of discomfort around his shoulders and says, “Should you ever return to the Hyuuga Clan, will you take over and change things?”
Neji blinks, “You…are still on that foolish dream?”
Hinata smiles at him, “You’re not my only family, Nii-san,”
Neji almost crush the cookies in his hand, “It is a stupid dream,”
Hinata looks at him, “There is nothing stupid about helping each other,”
Neji frowns, “They won’t thank you. They will ignore you and torment you. They will cast you down and step all over you. You are nothing to them. You have no worth in their eyes. Even if you marry His Majesty, the one with worth is him and you are nothing more than the rope that link them to him and his connections. Even now that you are ‘dead’ to them, they didn’t even send a letter to His Majesty to explain your disappearance or ‘death’. Because for as long as he favor you, you will open a thousand doors for them. So why?” He curls his fingers into fists, finally crushing the cookies into crumbs, “Why are you so foolishly stubborn? You are out of there, aren’t you? You are free, aren’t you? So why do you care? And what makes you think that I will ever go back?”
Why?
Hinata asks herself the same question day in and day out at the clan’s compound. She will wake up the morning after almost dying to her cousin’s strike, again, and wonder why she fight at all. Then the sun will shine into her eyes and she will see visions of a blond boy that keep standing back up no matter how badly he was beaten. A boy who told her that he never cry even when he have nothing and no one. A boy, with a simple remark, reminded her just how much she have. But on some days she wondered if fighting to keep all that she have is even worth it. After all, her father doesn’t even care if she dies while on duty or worse.
To the elders and other members of esteemed Main Family, she is a disgrace.
To the others of the Branch Family, she is too weak to be of any worth to back up by them.
So why?
Why did she still wake up, plaster a polite smile on her face, try to ignore the rope in her drawer and how easy it would be to tie it up to the beam above her bed. Try to ignore how much she prefers the cut of shuriken and kunai during practice than the pain her chest. That part of her hard training with her teammates were to avoid going home and facing those judging eyes. That days away from her clan were the happiest and most productive to her than standing in the clan’s dojo and facing Neji or one of the other trained clan members, being beaten down physically, emotionally, and mentally. Trying to ignore the whisper in the back of her mind or the twisted reflection of her in reflective surfaces, asking her why she still live and why she didn’t just stab herself in the artery on her neck.
Because on her lowest day, she know that no one would care if she succumb to that darkness in her and fully give up.
Less mouth to feed, the others would say.
No more shame to the clan, her elders would say.
No more embarrassment, her father would say.
No more test of strength, her sister would say.
So why?
Hinata hums, “Why did I?” She smiles at him but instead of the usual soft and practiced smile that she often give him, this time there is darkness in there that causes Neji to flinch, “I don’t know. I guess it is my pride that prevent me from giving up. After all, it is easy to give up after failing, isn’t it? You are always looking for that crybaby girl that will give up at the first painful hit during practice, that complained about being the clan’s Heiress while you became my slave. She who always give up,”
Neji frowns but says nothing.
Hinata tugs at his stone stiff fists and gently coaxes his fingers to uncurl, letting the remaining crumbs of crushed cookies to fall out. She then places more cookies in his hand.
She then adds, “I am a failure. No matter what I did or how I fight, I have no worth or weight in the clan’s decision. I am weak because I refuse to strike my younger sister whom I helped raised after mother died in childbirth. I am weak because I refuse to use the cursed seal on your temple whenever you step out of line. I am weak because I refuse to obey them. I weak because I stand firm by my belief. I am weak…because I refuse to be just another Hyuuga,”
Neji stares at her, hearing her words but unable to understand anything she said.
Hinata smiles up at him, patting his hand now once again full with cookies, “I am a coward for not speaking louder against the clan and their practices. I am a coward for not wanting to harm others with my selfishness. I am a coward for not forcing you to do things you have no desire to. I am a coward for lowering myself to meet my lesser. I am a coward for not wanting to kill my sister. I am a coward for being a scared child and being unable to defend myself before an adult. I am a coward and I have no excuse for my cowardice,”
She pushes the cookies towards him before looking up, the golden glow in her moonlight eyes announcing the approach of Naruto. Standing up, she nods at Neji, “Enjoy the cookies,”
Hinata turns away from him, eager to meet the other half of her.
Yes, it would have been so easy to give up on her clan, her family. It would have been so easy to be the monster that they wanted her to be. Like her father. Like her grandfather. Like all the other Head of Clan before them. The only reason Uncle Hizashi wasn’t outright killed was because of his usefulness as Hiashi’s body double. Something that they made use of during the Hyuuga Incident. Otherwise, they would have arranged so that they will kill each other. Something that she know she and Hanabi will be forced to do once Hanabi reach her 13th year.
Hinata never want to hurt Hanabi.
Surrendering her status as heiress is really a death sentence to her. It is why Hiashi and the elders stopped training her. She is too soft and too weak to lead.
Yes, giving up on her clan will be too easy. She have lost count on just how many times she thought about giving up. How many times have she glanced at the razor in the bathroom and the full tub? How many times she practiced knots and thought about them tightening around her neck? How many times she thought about not moving when a fatal strike aimed for her life?
So many ways to give up. So many ways to leave a final message that will just be forgotten with the tide of time. So many ways to be erased as just another failure.
“I don’t have anyone but I never cry! Not once!”
A childish brag but a sad one when one look back on it.
“Hinata,”
Hinata smiles as Naruto, taller and more handsome that when they were reunited, reaches around her and pulls her close. Her heart feels full. Connected. Hinata’s smile deepens as she breathes in the scent of storm cloud and lightning that saturates his whole being. She reaches around him, hugging him back, “Welcome back,”
She can feel his heart flutter and skip before hearing him, “I’m home,”
Not back, home
She is his home.
For an Emperor, Naruto have no real home to return to. It is too dangerous politically to settle anywhere. This ship they are on is very useful in many ways. So to hear him say that he’s home instead of back, Hinata understands that she is his home.
Naruto kisses the top of her head before pulling back to smile at her, almost blinding her like the sun peeking out from behind a cloud after a heavy rainstorm. Hinata blushes at the sight and wonders if she will ever stop blushing around him.
Naruto asks, “Do you want to walk around?”
Hinata blinks, “Walk…around?”
Naruto nods, “I finally figures out a special seal that can hide your wings. Since you are something of a hanyou, which means you can be seen by ordinary human, hiding your youkai side is important,” He smiles sheepishly at her, “I’m sorry it took me so long-!”
She doesn’t care for the rest of his words as she throws her arms around him, “Thank you, Naruto!”
Naruto is the reason that she never gives up on her clan. Because how can she when she is more blessed than him? He is the sun that wakes up her in the morning and cheers for her through the day. For him, Hinata will run the mile just to be worthy to stand by him.