Title: Lionhearted
Summary: Hinata has never been a warrior. But when the pale monsters reach toward Naruto's lifeless form, her body forgets that.
Author's Note: SP really missed the opportunity to give Hinata a nice fight scene against Momoshiki and Kinshiki. So, I filled in the gap, because I was in the mood to write an action scene. Also, it helps to write other characters than my OTP sometimes ^_^
Dedicated To: Naruto fans who aren't jerks to other fans about their favourite characters/pairings/OTPs. Antis can suck on a pinecone.
Beta Reader: None as yet, except for me and my editing software.
Cover Art: By me, based on designs by Masashi Kishimoto & Studio Pierrot
Hinata has never been a warrior.
She may be Hyūga by blood, instructed in jūken almost before she could walk, but that was a skill learned out of duty and not thirst for battle. She became a shinobi because her family expected it of her—even learned to take pride in it, eventually—but her heart never beat for the thrill of the fight.
Hanabi was the genius. It all came so naturally to her while Hinata had to bleed just to catch up.
Not that she minded.
It gave her something in common with Naruto, at a time when it was impossible to tell him how she felt. She even looks back on those years with fondness, because by watching him, she learned to be more confident and to pursue her own dreams.
Or rather, a dream.
The only vision she has ever had for herself was to be a mother. Of course, she wanted to have Naruto's love (and as she grew older, his children!) but that's always been a given.
(Ask anyone.)
But from a young age, perhaps because she lost her own mother so young, she's dreamed of the peace and warmth of a family. Of a house that was actually a home, and not a temple to the grandeur of her bloodline. A soft place to fall, instead of a daily training regimen.
And children.
There's never been a question about wanting them.
Boruto and Himawari are the ones closest to her heart, even just a little more than Naruto is. They're why she never became a jōnin. It wasn't a chore to retire from active duty when she got married and the babies came along.
It's why she has never regretted that decision.
Hinata has never been a warrior.
But when the pale monsters in the ruined stadium reach toward her husband's lifeless form, her body forgets that.
うずまき
Her retinas still burn from the explosion of light that was her husband's chakra, saving Konoha from the giant, mottled black orb of destruction. Her ears ring with the quiet whisper that his nearest shadow clone offered her— "I love you. Don't worry about me,"—before being silenced by a blast of hot wind.
She still feels the brush of Himawari's tiny hand in hers. It is grimy with sweat and dirt and tears and dredges up an accompanying sense of guilt that lodges in her throat. Nevertheless, she presses that hand into Sakura's waiting grasp, and then takes off.
Her quick eyes take in the scene as she speeds forward. Boruto is unconscious but alive; she can see his entire chakra network, blood pumping and lungs moving. He's just stunned, instead of badly hurt. An infinitesimal tongue of relief flickers within Hinata at that but doesn't ignite.
Sarada is crouched, watching over him; she's uninjured, her father and Boruto having protected her well.
Too well, Hinata worries, seeing Sasuke struggling to his feet, dazed. Even from here she can see his pupils aren't the same size.
Severe concussion.
Several yards away from the three of them, Naruto lies on his back, bruised and bleeding and immobile. Hinata can barely detect his chakra.
"I love you. Don't worry about me."
The smaller creature—Momoshiki, she recalls distantly—leans over him, hand outstretched and grasping.
That's when Hinata's energy flares protectively. Twin lions roar to life in her palms, an electric blue aura encompassing her as she darts through the smoking debris with a snarl of her own on her lips.
Momoshiki's Byakugan catches her at the last second, and he jumps back as her fist collides with the ground. Dirt and gravel spit into the air, the force radiating through her, but Hintata ignores the rattle in her bones. Her gaze fixes on the other, larger figure in the distance—Kinshiki, she remembers— as she gauges his attack-readiness.
"What's this?" he snorts as the dust clears. "Another lower being?"
His comrade doesn't answer right away, instead observing her with a haughty gaze. Then, he smirks, contempt and amusement etched upon his alien features.
"I believe it's the fox's mate," he purrs, as if he finds his words both laughable and sordid at the same time.
"Hinata," Sasuke grunts somewhere to her right, an incredulous intonation suggesting he hasn't yet regained his bearings. She can see the bruising beneath his skull even from here. It will be several minutes before he can move again, and that's several minutes Naruto doesn't have. "Don't—"
"I will protect my family," she insists, shifting into an expectant position: left palm out, right hand balanced behind her.
The Ōtsutsuki waste no time on trash-talking with her.
Kinshiki is the first to accept her unexpected challenge. He runs at her, throwing all the weight of his bulk behind his brilliant red chakra scythe, and she races forward, ducking under it and forcing him to follow her. One of his legs lashes out, aiming at her core with a force that would no doubt cave in her ribs, but Hinata jumps and twists out of his range. The air ripples within the inches between them, and she dips under to grasp his arm from behind. She misses, but the force of her jūken is enough that it knocks her enemy off-course. He careens into the dust several yards behind where he first started.
She retreats a step back, once more moving her body between Naruto and the still regal-looking Momoshiki.
"You will not touch him," she informs him.
His brow barely creases in response, but Hinata knows better than to think him inattentive. She's seen that same look before, only instead of a Byakugan it was the contempt-filled, dead-eyed Rinnegan of Pain's Tendō.
She should probably be afraid of it.
"I love you. Don't worry about me."
"Bothersome little gnat," Momoshiki eventually says, and then glides forward.
Hinata's body flows once more into the ready position—left palm outstretched, right hand prepared to whip forward. She's tempted to call upon the ancient chakra of Hamura, which has lain dormant within her for so long, but now is not the time. She's seen what these beasts can do with even synthetic chakra, she has no intention of giving them more ammunition.
Momoshiki jabs at her face with sharp fingers, and Hinata uses the heel of her left hand to force the blow astray. In an instant, he brings up the other hand to push forward in an uppercut that would be fatal if he knew jūken. As it is, the blow throws her back a few metres. Her right ankle joint creaks in protest as she lands, pivots and slides back to face him.
She jumps her balance to her left foot, regaining her stance to prepare for another attack.
I'm not done with you yet.
It appears Kinshiki is not, either, as he tries to tackle her from behind. She turns easily within her fighting range, once again pushing his punch to one side. She doesn't have the strength to catch it, but her the air between her palm and his arm is so charged that she can put him off balance. He spirals away, and she uses the forward momentum from deflecting him to dodge beneath Momoshiki's incoming attack.
She tries to knock him in the back of the head with her left palm—he's probably has the same blind spot in his Byakugan that she does. He ducks. She makes another attempt right away, lower this time and at the based of his neck, but again he senses her intent.
Hinata doesn't so much as propel him as he propels himself out her fingers' reach, and directly into the path of the recovering Kinshiki. The larger creature wavers to one side to avoid a collision, the movement more graceful than something of his size has any right to be. Then he pursues his next assault against her.
This time, she lands a strike—albeit barely—when the tip of her finger brushes the skin of the giant's nose. Hinata wills every bit of force she can into her fingertips. The chakra points and blood vessels in the surrounding area explode with the same force as if she rammed a knee into his face.
Dark blood spews across his cheeks and lips, and as he takes a moment to recover, his comrade finally appears to assess her level of threat. It's clear he didn't expect someone like her to be an issue in his plans.
"Very well," he sighs, sounding bored and bothered. The veins around his Byakugan tighten, studying her chakra more carefully.
Hinata takes his half-second respite as an opportunity, aiming for his throat. He avoids her with maddening ease, but she still follows through, bending at the knees and sweeping downward and then around. This time, she targets the cluster of chakra behind his heart. He notices and knocks her hand off course with his right hand. It's a bruising blow, but not the painful, constricted sensation of a jūken user cutting off her chakra. Instantly, Hinata course-corrects and tucks her arms back in, elbows close to her body and summoning force as he jabs upward toward his throat again.
Momoshiki deflects with his left wrist, the force of it spinning her around, but she snaps her elbow at his jaw, followed in quick succession by her knuckles. He blocks both blows, but when she flexes her fingers out in a flicking motion, he has to bend backward to avoid the same bloody injury as his comrade.
While he staggers for balance, Hinata makes another swipe at his throat with her right hand, but he recovers too fast for her. This time he is the one to use her momentum, pushing her aside roughly. She has to pivot on the ball of her feet to keep from falling, clawing at him as she twists her body from the hips.
This time, he turns his own body, bringing both his arms down on her incoming hands. Hinata rears backward like a snake, and both she and her opponent skip several paces back from one another, needing a breather.
Then it begins again.
Jab—dodge—slide-kick—pivot-bend—twist—
Hinata has no illusions of the extent of her power. Faced with these monsters, she is the weaker link, and she knows it. For a weaker fighter to succeed in battle, they have to either exhaust the stronger opponent or win using the element of surprise. Short of somehow landing a strong enough blow to her opponent's lungs and cutting off his oxygen—assuming these creatures even breathe the same way humans do—Hinata doesn't have much faith in the former option.
Which means she has to pull off something he'll never see coming.
And something that will also deal with his comrade who, having wiped away the blood from his face, is now sauntering toward Naruto once more.
"I love you. Don't worry about me."
Shino was always better with battlefield analytics than she was, but Hinata knows how to take a calculated risk. It's why she allows herself to linger a second too long as Kinshiki barrels toward her, his gleaming red chakra scythe completing its sweeping arc toward her.
Blood sprays through the air, and white-hot pain surges through her as a gash opens the length of her left arm.
Hinata skids back, falling to one knee and gritting her teeth in response to the injury. Momoshiki giggles at the sight of her wound as if it's proof of his own prowess.
I hope you keep thinking that, Hinata tells him in her mind.
These beings might know the intricacies of chakra, but they view humans as weak and beneath their notice. She can use that against them.
Beyond ensuring the wound isn't near an important vein or artery, Hinata doesn't waste time binding her wound. Instead she draws her fists in, the movements squeezing more blood down her wrists and into the dirt. The twin lions of her chakra grow, this time with the purple sheen of Hamura's chakra, and she sees Momoshiki's eyes gleam hungrily at the sight.
Bait set, Hinata races forward, swinging wildly at the smaller creature, who dodges her with ease. He weaves in and out of her range with a mocking little smile, as if her flailing is nothing but a spectacle for his sake. She doesn't let up her barrage, sometimes snapping her leg out in an actual attempt to hit him.
Even if he realises that she's leading him closer to his comrade, putting them both within her optimal attack range, he won't likely understand the reason behind it. He doesn't see that the way her blood flies from her wounded arm is purposeful, or the crude design it drizzles into the dust.
One more step, one more leap—
And then they are both within her field of divination.
Hinata slides back into her jūken stance, and then her movements become like a tornado. Even with their speed, the monsters can't escape the near centrifugal force she exerts just then.
"Hakke Sanjūni Shū!" She pivots on her ankle, then slams both her hands into Kinshiki, hitting the chakra clusters of his throat and solar plexus in near simultaneity. "Hakke ni shō!" She swivels, violet-blue chakra shoving into Momoshiki's face. "Yonshō!"She delivers a flurry of crippling blows to Kinshiki below the sacrum. "Hachi shō!" She finishes the move with her most concentrated attack to Momoshiki's heart. "Jūroku shō!"
Both her opponents crumple to the ground. They both gasp in as much surprise as pain, but neither is rendered as useless as a human shinobi would be.
"Is this…your best?" Momoshiki snarls, already staggering to his feet. His hand reaches into his robe, no doubt for another one of his chakra pills.
She has little time and doesn't waste precious seconds with a rejoinder; it's not her style anyhow.
Momoshiki might have a Byakugan, but he might as well be blind. He and Kinshiki were so occupied with her flashy attack, they didn't realise what she was doing.
Because Hinata may be Hyūga, but she is also Uzumaki.
And her husband was a good teacher.
"I love you. Don't worry about me."
The broken ground around them gleams, the until-now meaningless blood spatters forming a spiral from the outer edges of her attack range to the spot where she stands. Spindly, black symbols stretch out in spires like rays of sun, immobilising the two pale figures within. A giant double tentagram seal burns the ground black as Hinata concentrates on sealing the two within it.
She might not have inherited Naruto's clan predisposition to fuinjutsu, but when she was pregnant with Boruto, he insisted she learn it.
"Just in case," he said, and while at the time she argued—"I'm not a jinchūriki. I won't be in as much danger as your mother was!" —she is now glad that he insisted.
"Impossible," Momoshiki chokes, and Hinata experiences a small spark of smugness at shaking the arrogant creature.
She has done her family proud.
Even if that pride is short-lived.
The sealing is nowhere near complete when her Byakugan catches movement behind her. Preoccupied as she is, she has no way to defend herself.
"Hinata!" Sasuke shouts, but it's too late.
"I love you. Don't worry about me."
Pain rips through her body as if someone has spread acid through her veins. A red, glowing hot beam of chakra punches through her chest, a little to the left of her spine.
The third creature is ducking out of the strange black void dimension. She can only see his upper half, the lower bit of him obscured in the other plane that her eyes are blind to.
"Tsk, tsk. How careless of you, Momoshiki," the newcomer says, whipping back his pulls through Hinatas body, dragging blood and tissue with it. Possibly a good chunk of lung as well. "Letting such a tiny human almost defeat you?"
Blood wells in her throat as she falls to the ground, her head lolling over her shoulder.
Her husband's body is in her direct line of sight, and frustration and fear overwhelm her them.
"I love you. Don't worry about me."
"Naruto…" she almost can't get the words out. "I'm…sorry…"
Her miscalculation has cost them all.
"Might as well put it out of its misery," the third creature goes on, and from the back of her head she can see him raise his weapon once more.
Hintata waits to experience the searing heat again before death claims her—
And then there is a rush of movement as strong arms take hold of her.
She has the impression of smoke and dust, a flurry of scarlet and other colours that make no sense, and then she is lying supine on the ground. Sasuke and Sarada are on either side of her head, Boruto behind them, while Sakura crouches in front of them all. Black ribbons wind around her limbs, and her chakra crackles in a way that hurts Hinata's eyes.
"If you're going to cheat, maybe it's time I step in," Sakura tells the third member of the Ōtsutsuki.
There's something heavy and white on Hinata's chest, and as the healing energy flows through her, she realises it's not something but someone.
"Lady…Katsuyu…"
"Rest now, Lady Hinata," the slug whispers to her. One of her other bodies attaches itself to Boruto's side, and another to Sasuke's shoulder.
"I wonder how you guys will fare with hand-to-hand?" Sakura continues. "I noticed you avoid it. Why is that, I wonder?"
Her tone is colder than Hinata is used to hearing it. It would be enough for an average man to quake at, and even the alien creatures seem to take pause.
No doubt they sense the strength of Sakura's chakra; Sasuke is getting back to his feet, too.
Either they fear fighting the duo, or perhaps they believe they've wasted too much time already. In any case, Momoshiki and Kinshiki are on their feet once more, and the three Ōtsutsuki them jump out of range.
"Take care of your wounded, woman," Hinata's attacker jeers at Sakura. "The better condition they are in, the more fit for consumption they'll be."
"You'll be the first," the Momoshiki adds, more sullen than threatening.
Kinshiki says nothing, instead tramping over to Naruto and slinging him roughly over his shoulder.
"No…!" Hinata whispers, but she's still choking too much on blood to be heard.
The space around them divides into blackness, and they disappear.
"I love you. Don't worry about me."
Hinata screams silently after Naruto before the world goes dark.
うずまき
Hinata has never been a warrior.
When she wakes up and learns the fate of her husband, she wishes she was.
終わり
I know it ends on a bit of a low note, but she was barely clinging to life after the encounter in the anime/manga, so I had to have her lose in the end. which is annoying, because as I was getting to the sealing part, I really wanted her to win...
Ah, well, next time ^_^
Hope you guys enjoyed it!
クリ