Characters: Hanabi, Hinata
Summary: Hands down in the dirt is the only way to escape.
Pairings: None
Author's Note: Another Hanabi-centric piece. Again, I hope you all like it, and feedback is always much appreciated (Unless your feedback happens to be flames).
Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto.
Whenever the buzzing cloud arises, it is invariably so horrifying that Hanabi allows Hinata to grasp her smaller hand protectively. As much as her pride directs her and her sense of independence whispers to her, Hanabi knows danger and will welcome any shield from it, even if that shield is nothing more than her frail, wilting older sister.
She smells violence in the air, and is glad to have the scent of flower petals and soil from Hinata's ventures into the gardens rising in her nostrils instead.
Hanabi has always been over-aware, too tense, too observant, too watchful of the world around her for a child who ought not need to worry on such things. It's the only way to survive within the confines of the Hyuuga compound, to always be on her guard.
And to think they called the Uchiha the uncivilized ones. At least the Uchiha had something resembling a sense of solidarity. Here, we just tear each other apart, trying to stay alive.
Hinata, Hanabi knows, was never cut out for this sort of life. Hinata is, as all the others say but Hanabi will never know for sure, their mother's child, gentle and kind and not bloodthirsty at all.
Not a true Hyuuga, in terms of blood. Not strong enough, not ruthless enough, not brutal enough.
And Hanabi wonders when her sister will fall, consumed by the kill-or-be-killed mentality of their clan. It will have to happen eventually.
For now, Hinata stands all too still, all too exposed and fragile, like a lily against the first frost of winter, and Hanabi watches her, already seeing the way her sister's funeral will play out. She's started to make plans, herself.
Hanabi can imagine the song that will play at Hinata's funeral, can hear the haunting spectral strains echoing throughout the atmosphere, singing in the cavity of her chest and echoing off of her ribs. It suits Hinata, she decides, and will either try to discover what song it comes from or commit the melody to paper herself.
But she can't imagine what will happen to her, after Hinata's blood has cooled and her body decayed.
As much as Hanabi tries to dissociate herself from weakness and from her sister so as not to put herself at risk, on some level she still needs Hinata. Still needs the hands that have always enabled her to stand with her back straight, still needs the gentle words that encourage her after a disheartening day. Still needs the strong arms that hold her when her fear overwhelms her. Still needs the hands that bind bandages around wounds both corporeal and spiritual.
What will happen to her when Hinata is gone?
The thought troubles Hanabi greatly, and she resolves to protect her sister in future, from this moment onwards. She will always look after her, as much as she possibly can. But it doesn't extinguish the thought of the song in her chest, the song that now drills holes into her ears and worms its way into her brain.
She's with her sister in the garden, digging small hands into the dirt.
Hanabi studies Hinata without the aid of the Byakugan and sees more than she ever could with it.
Pale, delicate curve of the next and back, not a kunai's straightness like Hanabi but a flower stalk, bending against the wind. Long, fine, ink black hair like a funereal shroud doesn't sway in the wind because there is no wind, but rather hangs heavy and full against her head and her shoulders and her back. Alabaster skin seems prematurely marbled.
Hanabi bends down like a suppliant at prayer, and the smell of soil fills her as her nose almost presses against the ground. Her hands dive more deeply into the earth, the results of her sister's toil all around her.
Better the smell of dying roses and rising poppies in her nose, than that buzzing cloud that always hangs over the Hyuuga compound.
Like a pall.