Shades of Grey

A Shino-Hinata fic

It was their tenth anniversary. Because it was extra special, as Inuzuka pointed out, they brought out the big guns. Bottles of warm sake were lined up in assembly on a small round table. They were in a guest room at Hyuuga's residence. Aburame had opened up his house but was politely, if not a little too quickly declined.

"Much as I love you, Shibi, your bugs still creep me out." Inuzuka grinned sheepishly. "Hell, your entire house creeps me out. No offense."

Shibi gazed at her evenly, and his dark glasses glinted like the iridescent wings of a fly. They were not actually black lenses. They were just a very dark shade of grey; light enough to see through, but not enough to see in. It was tradition. Nobody outside the Aburame clan knew how the lenses were made.

"The sentiments are reciprocated, Tsume," he returned. "To this day, I cannot understand how you and your clan can live in such squalor." Lifting a cup of sake to his lips, he paused. "No offense."

"Why, you son of a..."

"Quit it. The both of you." Their host rubbed his temples vexedly. "I did not invite you over so you could squabble like children."

Tsume snorted. She downed a shot and slammed her cup down noisily.

"Ten years, huh," she sighed. "We've been at it for a long time, haven't we."

"Eight years, to be exact," interjected Shibi. "You left the team for two years..."

"Yeah, well, not like I could help it. I was having –"

"... On maternity leave."

A pregnant pause. Tsume sneered at him, exposing a sharp canine. "You make it sound like a crime, you frickin' misogynist."

"How're the kids?" Hiashi cut in, still massaging his forehead. A vein throbbed.

Shibi swiftly turned his attention to his host, clearly ignoring his seething comrade. "Shino is developing well, Hiashi. He celebrates his fifth birthday today."

Hiashi lowered his hand. "Is that so? Wish him many happy returns for me, from the Hyuuga clan."

"Your gesture is appreciated, and will be communicated."

"Heh, well, bet his birthday party's gonna be just as creepy as anything else."

"It is his induction ceremony today."

There was something about the way Shibi said it that shut Tsume up. The ghost of a frown disturbed his otherwise impassive expression, and he spun his sake cup errantly. Hiashi asked, "Are you worried?"

The spinning stopped, but Shibi's frown remained. "Shino is... different. The kikai bugs do not take to his chakra well. I'm starting to wonder..." He trailed off, finishing his sentence in his thoughts. Tsume was irritated.

"What? You're starting to wonder what?"

"Impossible, Shibi." Hiashi calmly poured another shot of sake for his friend. "I have seen your Shino. He is a gifted, intelligent child, and takes after his father. He is every bit an Aburame as any member of the clan."

Tsume had to stifle a gag. Shibi took no notice. Only stared into nothing, or so it seemed. Nobody could really tell what an Aburame was looking at; whether he was even looking at all, or whether he was present, awake, or absent, with his mind wandering elsewhere. The induction ceremony was an important, if not the most important moment in an Aburame's life. It was the time when a young Aburame – an uninhibited, they called it – was fused with the clan's kikai bugs; when the insects entered his system and established a pact with him, a binding treaty that trapped the bugs within his body forever. It was when an Aburame forgot silence and gave over to the insects' unending scuttle, their echoing susurrations, that would envelope and consume his body and soul. It was complicated and dangerous.

He downed his last drink, and rose.

"What, you're going so soon?"

Shibi bid them a brief, silent salute. Hiashi nodded in response as he slid open the door and stepped out. Tsume called out after him.

"We aren't finished, you hear?" She collapsed back onto the tatami. "Jackass." But it was clear that she was worried too.

-/-

It was his birthday. His mother had come into his room that morning, waking him up with an extra burst of affection. He was not used to it. He uttered a puzzled sound. When she reminded him what that day meant, he immediately shied away and became distant. His mother only looked at him. There was no way of telling how she felt about his rebellion, for she too turned from him after a moment of silence and shut the door behind her, leaving him alone.

They were at a playground. It was a sunny day, and the bright afternoon heat scorched his pale skin. He narrowed his eyes, shading his face with a tiny hand. Spotting a shady spot under a tree, he rushed over. He was not looking in front of him for he was calling out to his parents who were talking to other adults nearby. Before he knew it, he had collided into something, and toppled over into a pile of dried leaves. A girlish cry punctuated his fall. That wasn't right.

He craned his neck from his stunned, supine position and perceived another form stirring in pain. He sat up.

It was a girl. An adult would have immediately said something like, "Are you okay?" and "Can I help you up?" but Shino was a child. He sat up quietly, studying her with detached curiosity. Like the time he found a new moth on his home compound. He accidentally killed it. And was scolded for it. She reminded him a little of that moth - small, fragile-looking, and strange. Her eyes were screwed shut, and it looked like she had been hit hard on the head, for she was touching a reddened patch just above an eye. Unknowingly he touched the same spot above his own eye and felt a dull ache. But pain, he had been taught, was one of those sensations to be ignored. Clearly this creature had not been taught the same things at him.

Who was she?

Her eyes snapped open, and he gasped. Her eyes - they were white. All of it. No pools of colour. Bloodless; pure like milk. He stared at her until he realised she was staring at him too.

"Who are you?"

"Shino," he replied.

"I'm Hinata."

They stared at each other some more.

"Are you from around here?"

She nodded. "I live just around the corner of that block." She pointed. "And those are my father and mother."

He looked where she gestured and did not reply.

"You want to be friends?" She had sat up too, and they were looking eye to eye. He noticed that she was smiling, and in the gentle, dappled shade her special eyes were like two stars, two pools of light. He thought it was the most beautiful thing he had ever seen.

"How old are you?"

She held out five fingers, pushed down two.

"Okay," he said, after some deliberation. She was the same age as him, couldn't be that bad.

His thoughts were interrupted by a touch on his hand, and he looked to find his pinky intertwined in hers.

"Friends forever," she grinned. And slowly, he smiled back.

The bugs are afraid of light, his father told him two days ago. Lately in the weeks approaching his fifth birthday, the conversations he had with his parents were about nothing but his induction. It had at first meant nothing to him. His birthdays were never special occasions; they came and went. His father would give him a longer talk about his obligations to the clan, his duty to become a strong ninja when he grew up, to protect the clan, and its traditions. He could recite it in his sleep. But as the days drew closer, he began to feel a mounting fear. Or panic.

"Afraid of light? Why?"

"It's in their nature," said his father. They were sitting on the patio. It was a calm evening. Stars winked at him in the pitch blackness overhead. Somewhere in the garden, a frog was croaking. It had just showered, and the breeze smelt like fresh rain. "They were born and bred in darkness, and so will continue to live in darkness."

"But you and mother are always out, even in the afternoons."

His father shook his head. "Not for long. And that's why we wear these." He tapped the dark glasses.

"Father," he ventured hesitatingly, then stopped. He rocked his feet back and forth. His father waited. When he saw that he was not going to be interrupted, Shino plucked up his courage. "Can I not wear them? Can I be special?"

Aburame Shibi laid a gentle hand on his son's shoulder. "Does it bother you?"

He shook his head, lapsing into another bout of uncomfortable stoicism. Shibi waited again. His son's eyes darted about, staring into the shadowy garden nervously. He drew in a deep, shuddering breath, and confessed.

"It's not me, father. It's Hinata. She says you scare her. You and mother."

"Because of our glasses?"

Shino bowed his head and twiddled his thumbs, having already said too much. But Shibi only squeezed his shoulder.

"If she's really your friend, they won't bother her."

The twiddling stopped. Shibi smiled softly, the boy did remind him of himself.

"You really think so, Father?"

"I do think so," said Hinata said softly.

"Nobody's ever told me that before," he looked at his feet, suddenly very self-conscious about his eyes and where they looked. He felt her look at him, her tender gaze gentle but also slightly unnerving.

"Well," he blurted out, too eager to change the subject. "I think you have really nice eyes too."

She giggled. "Thanks."

He was very glad for the shade; if not for it, she would have seen how deep a shade of pink his cheeks had become.

"They're... cerulean." She mused. "I learnt that word today in a book Father was reading to me. It's another word for blue. I think it sounds prettier than blue."

Shino hid a mirror in the drawer in his room. Hinata had given it to him, her pocket mirror. He had no such thing at home, and the instrument fascinated him. He hurried back to his room that day, after they said their goodbyes at the playground, and shut the door and windows, leaving only a little crack for light to shine in. He held the reflective surface against the golden sliver of late afternoon sun. A translucent yellow rectangle, the shape of the mirror, cavorted on the ceiling. He created shadows, made the rectangle larger and smaller by changing the distance between it and the light source until he grew bored. Sitting back down on the floor, he held the mirror in front of him.

A young boy with chubby cheeks and incredulous expression stared back at him. He stared back.

Cerulean, he thought.

There was a noise at the door, and he quickly slid the mirror under his bed and stood up. It was his father.

"Are you ready, son?"

He kept his voice calm. "Where are we going?"

"You are going to meet the kikai bugs. For the first time."

Involuntarily, he clenched his fists. Wordlessly, in a manner that he had been trained, he bowed his head. Yes, father.

They were everywhere. This was the Dark Room, the Aburame training centre that had been off bounds to him until now. Weeks before his induction, he was to be tested. His father led him to the centre of the room. The sounds in the room were soft but unignorable - clicking, chirping, buzzing, whining. A cacophonic concerto of invisible sounds; the bugs were everywhere but nowhere. He looked around wildly, suddenly gripped by a surge of panic. He clutched his father's hand. There were no bugs, only shadows, curved, angular, moving shadows. Darkness streamed like water from the ceilings, and when he looked closely he saw tiny legs and the nearly undetectable glint of insect eyes.

His father was gently easing his fingers off his wrist. Shino was too stricken with fear to resist.

"This is the hive. The room has been imbued with a layer of chakra that the kikai bugs feed on, and has to be renewed regularly. In a few weeks, on your birthday, Shino, we will return here for your induction."

"Do they bite?"

"Why don't you find out yourself?" Suddenly Shibi's voice sounded soft and far away. Shino turned to realise, in horror, that his father had retreated to a corner of the room, leaving him in the centre - alone.

A ticklish sensation in his right palm caused him to jump, and he saw that where his father had touched him five black insects were crawling in circles. Their long mouths tapped and probed his skin. Their legs were long and sharp but light and Shino had the feeling like an icy wind was passing over him, sucking away his body's warmth.

"Stop it, stop it," he murmured, and before he knew it, he was trying to shake off the insects. But more were falling from the ceiling, having been summoned by their comrades - or was it his father? - and they were everywhere. On his neck, his arms, his legs. In his eyes.

He fell to his knees, unable to open his mouth to scream for fear of them entering his lungs. He twitched in utter horror, a silent mannequin covered and rendered formless by the swarm. But before he knew it, it was over. The coldness left him, and he was left lying motionless on the floor. It felt like he had been lying for eternity when he felt his father pick him up, like heap of weightless skin. Outside, his mother had been waiting anxiously.

"How was it?" said her voice, a whisper. But he could not hear the reply, for the darkness had returned twofold. He shut his eyes and drifted off.

He was running, running until his chest hurt and his legs were on fire. It was another serene evening, but there was something threatening about the midnight sky. It bore down on him like a suffocating wave, slowing him down, sapping his energy. But this was the last stretch. He pushed himself a little further, turned the bend at the block just metres away from the playground. And he was there.

Hyuuga residence.

It was bigger than the Aburame's, but he was not surprised. Hinata had told him a lot about it. He looked around for a way to get in, but finding no breaks in the wooden wall that fenced the estate, he darted a furtive glance about him. Then, holding his breath, he scaled the wall with all the desperate agility of a frightened child.

He was in. The inside was a simple maze, and he knew where exactly Hinata's room was. It was the one just down the main branch's second corridor, the last door on the right. He darted down the shadowy path, his way illuminated by oil lamps. His feet were light, his presence barely audible. Like a late autumn breeze, gently passing by.

-/-

"What was that? Hey, I smell..."

Tsume got up and hurried to the door.

"It's all right," said Hiashi. "Let him go."

-/-

She was sitting by the window looking absently at the moon, her back faced to the door. Bathed in silver light, she looked like an angel. He had come prepared with a proper explanation, having rehearsed his speech days ago. He stepped in, shoulders braced, inhaling deeply, readying himself. But the moment he stepped in, the words got stuffed back down his throat. She was so still.

"I can see you."

He started slightly.

She turned, and he saw that her eyes were different. They were sharper, almost fierce, and glowed not with the careless innocence of a child, but with a radiant power.

"It's called the Byakugan." She exhaled, and the sharp look went away. "Father taught it to me. But I can only hold it for a short while..."

"Hinata, I –" he had to stop. She was dressed in a simple kimono, the soft cotton sort young women wear at home. He had never seen her in anything but the slacks she wore when out at play. He looked at the floor. "I came to see you."

"You should not be here, Aburame-kun."

Aburame-kun?

"Father told me you were coming. He explained everything."

"Why, Hinata?"

"After today, you're a real Aburame." She looked back out the window wistfully. "I am supposed to call you that, because it's polite."

No, that's not what I meant, he wanted to say. I meant to ask you: Why are you afraid? Will you be afraid? Of me?

But nothing came out. He looked away, because he felt like he was going to cry. He wiped his tears away, pretending a speck of dust had gotten in. He sniffed sullenly. Hinata slid off the bed and took his hand.

"Friends forever, remember?" Hinata extended her last finger. He looked at her, and she looked at him. Blue and white, white and blue. But in the unlit room, there were only shades of grey. They hooked pinkies.

Everywhere. The elders and his parents were everywhere - in the shadows, seated in a circle. He felt their chakra rise – for he had been trained to detect his own – and the mounting excitement of tiny creatures around him. Their cries grew louder and louder, and he closed his eyes like he had been told. His palms were stretched skyward, and he lay with his back flat on the floor.

The darkness behind his lids stretched like infinity, and he imagined the sky. Bright and blue and beautiful. He saw her giggling at him; her face to the sun, the light enveloping her, like a halo.

Then a sharp flash of real light, red like the heart of a flame, sliced his reverie. Sky, Hinata, halo all vanished and were torn up, devoured by swarming insects. A deafening roar; new whispering voices that he could suddenly understand, hissing, slurring laughter. Then nothing.

-/-

Years later, at the playground. School had begun, and it had been months, years, since he last saw her. Training had kept him locked in the Aburame compound, for it took years of concrete practice to get used to his new partners. He had grown used to their voices, could tune them out when needed, but they were always there. They felt his anxiety, and asked him about it.

"It's nothing. Just this..."

There she was, dressed in new ninja clothes, waving to her father who had come down the whole way, just for the first day of school. He stood in the shade, waiting for her to notice him. Her face was the same; less plump, perhaps, but still mild in a pretty way. Her cheeks were flushed as her father whispered a few last words of advice into her ear. She nodded, and Shino recognised that look of nervous excitement. When Hiashi had left, he started up towards her, walking into the sun.

The light no longer bothered him. Not with his shades on. The insects buzzed behind his sockets, protected by the darkness behind the lens. He raised a hand to wave.

But Hinata was distracted. She was looking not at him, but at another boy who sat on a swing beside the tree. A newcomer. She looked at the boy a little longer before hurrying by into the school. She had not seen him, had not recognised him, but of course; he was wearing new clothes too. He, too, was different. Slowly, he walked into the school building, turning to cast the boy an over-the-shoulder glance.

The boy appeared around their age and had a profound expression, of melancholy perhaps. Sensing his appraisal, the boy looked up, and their eyes met.

Blue against black, black against blue.

Cerulean, Shino thought.

He turned abruptly and hurried in, out of the sweltering sun.

END

Note from the Author:

I made my debut here with a Shino/Hina fic a couple of years ago, which I could never finish. I hope this one-shot makes up for it.

Feedback, concrits, are all welcomed, with thanks. Hope you enjoyed!

- Whynter