Chapter 1:Weakness
"You're weak, Hinata! How do you expect to do anything with you're life when you can't even beat you're younger sister!" he bellowed. Hinata had learned from past experiences to say nothing to her father when he was in a temper. She knew what was coming and braced herself for her punishment. smack He slapped Hinata across her left cheek, harder then ever before, his rings leaving three bloody gashes across her face. Tears sprang to her eyes, but she did not flee, for leaving would cause more trouble.
After a few more blows--each a little harder than the last--and much more shouting, Hiashi dismissed Hinata. She quickly fled to her room and collapsed onto her bed, tears streaming down her face, stinging as they flowed over the gashes. For ten years of her life, she had known nothing but this pain. When he sent her to the ninja academy, she thought she had escaped, and that her life would be better.
When she first started at the ninja academy, Hinata remained quiet and withdrawn, to avoid any punishments. She had no trust in people, believing that they would beat and punish her as her father had.
Slowly, after a few years, she began trusting people. She let her teammates, Aburame Shino and Izunaka Kiba, and her teacher, Yuni Kurenia, in. She grew to trust them, and opened up to them a little.
The biggest change in her occurred during the chunin exams. She finally found her voice during the intense battle with her cousin, Hyuuga Neji. Kurenai Sensei was extremely proud of her student, and knew that Hinata would do very well if she decided to take the exam again next year. Hinata's father, however, was not impressed, and demanded that she come home. Kurenai knew it was best not to anger the head of the Hyuuga clan and grudgingly brought Hinata home.
At first, Hinata was doing fine back home. She could easily defeat her sister and her self-confidence soared; but then her father began to criticize her technique, her lack of originality, and her strength and accuracy (or lack there of), which was far inferior to Neji's. Her self-confidence level plummeted, hitting an all time low, and her fighting skills rapidly retrogressed. With her self-confidence totally destroyed, she bacame depressed.
Now, as she lay on her bed, blood and tears soaking her pillow, she wished for death. She longed for her heart to stop beating so she could escape from this wretched world. With great determination, she pulled out one of her kunai knives and, stripping of her jacket, prepared to thrust the knife through her rapidly besting heart. However, as soon as she applied pressure, she chickened out and pulled the knife away from her breast. She was terrified that she would not pierce her heart, and would survive, which would make the pain worse instead of better.
Mad at herself for failing at yet another thing, she put the knife to her arm, applied pressure, and yanked. Blood spilled from the fresh wound, and she did the same thing repeatedly, to both arms, watching the blood pool around the knife when she applied pressure. Finally, many crosses, lines, and zigzags later, she felt a little bit better. Looking over her network of cuts and scars, she knew she could not wear anything other then long-sleeves, unless she wanted people to know what she did to herself. She brought the knife down one more time to add the deepest and most painful cut yet--from the base of her middle finger to her shoulder. After she wiped the knife off, she put it away and went into her private bathroom to clean up.
After a quick shower, Hinata disinfected all of her cuts, including the ones from her father, and bandaged her arms. She put on a clean outfit and hastily threw her jacket on. Looking at the cuts across her face, Hinata sighed, knowing that they would scar. She sat down on the edge of her bed and let her mind say all of the things that she did not dare say aloud, for fear of someone overhearing her. She cursed her old teacher, who had brought her back to this hell-hole without a fight. She was mad at her sister, because her father favored her, and never did anything to bring her down. Most of all, she was mad at her father for beating her all the time and for criticizing her.
Silent tears began running down Hinata's cheeks, the salty water stinging as it passed over the gashes in her cheek. Unlike the tears she shed earlier, these weren't tears of anger, these were tears of submission. She knew that she would never measure up to what her father wanted her to be. She would never be able to defeat Neji. Hell, she couldn't even beat her younger sister.
A couple of days--and quite a few cuts and bruises--later, after an exceptionally long and violent day of training (and tears), Hinata decided that she wasn't going to take this shit anymore. She decided to run away, to leave Konoha for good. She packed her few belongings and some food in a small bag, planning on leaving that night, after her afternoon practice with Hanabi.
Knowing that either her father or Neji would come after her, she did her best to hide her trail. She used every trick and disguise she knew, fleeing quickly into the night. Not knowing where to go, she decided to try her luck at the sand village, knowing that it would be the last place anyone in her clan would look for her, seeing as how she hates the heat.
Hinata looked around and hoped that she was headed in the right direction. Since she had never left Konoha, she was sometimes distracted by the things she saw. Stop getting distracted! I scolded myself. How are you ever going to get stronger if you take a break every few minutes to look at the new sights! After that, Hinata refused to let herself stop more often than necessary, and she pushed herself to walk further and further without a break.
As the scenery changed from the leafy forest to the barren desert, Hinata started getting warm; and then she began to sweat. Damn these cuts! she cursed, thinking of the numerous cuts and scars on her arms. Because of these self-inflicted wounds, she refused to take her jacket off. The further she ventured into the desert, the more sweat poured down her face and back, but she wouldn't take her coat off. She traveled like this for nearly a day and a half.
Soon, the heat was almost unbearable, but Hinata continued on, panting heavily. However, by the time she figured that she was pushing herself too hard, it was too late. She collapsed into a heap on the desert floor, and as she fell she longed for death to take her from this miserable life. She didn't struggle, and sank into unconsciousness slowly.
The Sand Kazekage watched as the figure in the distance collapsed onto the desert floor. Normally, he would simply let the intruder perish, but he decided to take a look to see who the stranger was. When he got to the last spot he had seen the intruder, he sensed a familiar chakra, and looked to see a girl who looked to be about his own age laying face-down in the sand. Turning her over carefully, he checked her pulse, and was relived when he felt the faint pounding under his fingertips. He lifted her carefully over his shoulder and carried her back to his lodgings.
His older brother and sister met him at the door, identical stern looks on their faces. "Who is she?" his older brother asked rudely.
"None of your business," the Kazekage responded angrily, practically causing his siblings to fall as he pushed past them. "You," he said, pointing to his sister, "Come with me." She followed her younger brother to a guest bedroom at the end of the hall. He put the girl down gently on the bed and ordered his sister to change her into cooler clothes. He walked to the other end of the room and stood there looking out the window, his back toward the girl and his sister. Who is that girl? I could swear that I've seen her before. Before he could figure out who she was, he heard his sister swear and spun around.
"What the hell!!" she yelled after she had taken off the girl's jacket.
"What is it?"
"Come over here and take a look!"
He came and saw the scars all over her now exposed arms. Many of the more recent cuts had reopened and were bleeding sluggishly, and blood now stained the inside of her jacket. He looked at the girl closely, and suddenly, the memories came rushing back to him. He remembered that this girl was Hyuuga Hinata, the timorous girl from the chunin exam.
Hinata awoke to the sound of someone swearing, and, very slowly, she opened her eyes. She saw a strange boy with flaming red hair and deep turquoise eyes standing in front of her, and a girl with blond hair standing behind the boy. Suddenly, something inside of her clicked and she realized who the boy was. "Sabaku no Gaara?" she asked drowsily. "And Temari?"