'Ello, tis me, Gina. It's been a while since I posted something, and since I'm a fan of ShinoHina now, I figured, GO FOR IT!! XD

Sparked from several oddities in my daily life, the strangest of which being that my conditioner suddenly made my hair so silky soft it was scary. Like one of those shampoo commercials kinda soft. o.O

Disclaimer: Shino, Hinata, Kiba and Akamaru all belong to Masashi Kishimoto. Not me. That's why their Arc is being delayed. Though Juugo is cute, I must say. X3

Hinata never noticed those things about Shino, the ones that made him somehow stand out.

The heir of the Hyuuga clan was usually very observant, the Byakugan certainly helped out in this aspect, but it wasn't until a certain incident during training that she began to notice anything in particular about her teammate.

Like how soft his hair was.

That was the surprise of surprises for Hinata. Shino usually walked around looking like he'd made the mistake of prodding a fork into an electrical socket when he was younger, and it just choose to stay that way. But no, it was smooth as silk.

She supposed she could blame finding out about it on Kiba and Akamaru, though the blame was largely on herself and Shino for deciding to spar at the wrong time.

"Okay, Shino-kun, now move your hand upwards, and bring your left foot over a bit," Hinata said, going into her usual Taijutsu stance. Much to her surprise, the Aburame had requested that she help him in his hand-to-hand combat; despite using a shinobi method that involved long-distance, he must've figured that his close-combat needed some work, too.

He silently did as she instructed, doing remarkably well for one whose Taijutsu grades were lower than average. She moved over and lashed out with her palm, barely grazing his cheek. As she told him to do, Shino followed his instincts and quickly brought his own hand up and struck her wrist as her hand went sailing by, defending himself. She dropped down and performed a sweeping kick, catching him off guard. He started to tumble but caught himself and flipped back into a fighting stance before relaxing slightly as she did.

Hinata found herself glowing with pride for both of them as she said quietly, "Very good, Shino-kun, very, very good." He was a quick learner.

Shino didn't say anything, but she could tell he was embarrassed. It was something about the way he held himself: stock straight, with his hands in his pockets. There was no curve at all in his spine, Hinata noticed with a giggle.

Shino cleared his throat. "Shall we continue?"

Hinata smiled brightly, in an unusually good mood. "Hai!"

Unfortunately, Kiba had obviously decided he wanted to practice his Taijutsu as well. The Gatsuuga was sadly on the top of his list.

As Shino and Hinata continued to spar, Kiba was apparently very enthusiastic about training with Akamaru to make their moves perfect. As Hinata made a brilliant move and succeeded in getting behind Shino to strike what would be a fatal blow in battle, Kiba and Akamaru went barreling past, spiraling like no tomorrow, creating a gust of wind that hit Shino and Hinata with the force of a truck.

Needless to say, there was utter chaos.

"AUGH!! Ki-Kiba-kun, watch out!!" "Kiba, you moron…UGH!" "ACK!! MOVE OUT OF THE WAY!" "ARF!" "G-GAH!!" "SONOFA-" "WHOA!!" "WATCH OUT!!"

Next thing Hinata knew, she was lying on her stomach on something that was obviously not grass, and her face was buried in something brown, soft and silky. Still shaken up from the whirlwind Kiba had created with Akamaru, she tried lifting her head. When she did so, she realized something extremely embarrassing, made only worse when someone said something about it.

"Er… Hinata… D'you think you could… get off? You're kind of… heavy."

Shino's voice was oddly muffled and strained, and she realized in horror that she was lying on top of him, and that soft brown stuff that her face had been in was hishair. His hood had been pushed back from the force of the wind, leaving his –now apparent—silky brown tresses once more visible.

With a small squeal, she leaped off him and said in a high-pitched tone, "Sh-Shino-kun!! I'm sorry!! I didn't mean to— I mean, I— are you okay—"

"I'm fine," he muttered, getting up and brushing himself off as Hinata stopped stuttering and instead sank into a horrified silence. If her face had been any redder, she could have, in all seriousness, been mistaken for a tomato with a body, face, and hair.

Kiba walked over, rubbing the back of his head and grinning as he glanced at his teammates, both of whom were looking as though they'd rather be anywhere else.

Completely understandable.

"Neh heh heh, sorry 'bout that, guys," he said sheepishly. Akamaru was by his side, somehow pulling off a "you are an idiot" look, which was obviously being pointed at his partner.

Shino didn't say anything, but instead bent down, picked up his sunglasses and placed them back on the bridge of his nose. Hinata was still scarlet in the face, though, thankfully, her longer hair covered it, for the most part. She bent low over her knees on the pretense of tightening her sandal to cover her embarrassment.

Shino just cleared his throat again.

Definitely an embarrassing day.

The next thing Hinata noticed was that, despite the lack of emotion or viewable friendship or closeness, Shino actually did care about the welfare of his team.

In particular, her.

Team 8 was assigned to a mission that involved heading towards the Rain Country, but as it would take a couple of days, they would be spending the night in an old cabin that looked as though it were made during the days of the Shodaime Hokage.

Kiba, of course, complained when they got there at nightfall.

"Augh, this place is a dump!" he said, brandishing his hands at the door of the cabin. It couldn't have been anymore obvious that he had half a mind to kick it, but in its current state, that'd probably just make it collapse.

Shino made an impatient noise behind his collar, though it was obvious he agreed when a piece of the door frame fell off and cracked on the ground.

The three Chuunins looked at it apprehensively. Hinata was the first to offer words of encouragement. "Well, maybe it's not that bad," she said quietly, taking a few ginger steps and reached out to the doorknob. The moment her fingers touched the doorknob, it fell off.

Kiba let out a bark of mirthless laughter. "It is that bad."

Due to the poor conditions of the cabin, Team 8 soon found out that it had very good ventilation, which sadly was not something they'd been wishing for.

"I-it's fuckin' f-f-freezingin h-here," Kiba muttering through chattering teeth. He was lying on his side, his blanket wrapped around him in near impossible ways with his knees drawn up almost to his chin. Hinata and Shino were in similar states, though their speech was less obscene. Shino didn't even say anything. Just shivered a bit.

Hinata pulled her blanket up higher. "M-maybe if we j-j-just g-go to s-sleep…"

Kiba snorted. "Fat ch-chance."

"—then we c-can forget about the c-c-cold."

Kiba snorted again, while Shino just made a small noise that suggested he thought Kiba needed to shut the hell up or something. With Shino, it was always hard to tell.

The team lapsed into silence, as they gradually tried to work their way into sleep. The Feigning Sleep Technique was no good; it would be too late if someone attacked one of them and woke them up. They dealt with the cold as well as they could.

It was only after a few hours that Hinata woke up again. Something had stirred next to her, and, being a light sleeper, she was woken fairly quickly. She looked to her left and saw Kiba in a state not unlike being comatose, which was his way of sleeping. When she looked to her right, however, she was surprised and shocked to find that Shino was not in his sleeping bag, but instead was sitting against the wall, blanket wrapped around him in several layers. It was near the middle of the night, and their breath came out as icy fog.

"Shino-kun?" she inquired softly. He looked over and nodded his head in her direction.

"You were shivering," he said simply. Hinata raised herself up just high enough on her elbows to see that Shino's hooded jacket was spread over her, warming her in the way her flimsy three blankets did not. She felt herself blushing.

"O-oh… I… um… aren't you c-cold?" she asked. He shook his head, but she could tell he himself was shivering slightly. Shino looked up at one of the cracks in the roof, apparently very interested in it.

After a few awkward seconds, he said quietly, "You should go back to sleep, Hinata. There are a few more hours until sunrise." There was something odd about the way he was talking, and how he held his jaw.

She nodded and slipped back under the covers. It was only until she was almost asleep that she realized he was talking strange because he was trying hard not to make his teeth chatter.

When she was woken again, it was a much more louder and chaotic awakening. Shino's shouts woke her up first.

"Hinata! Wake up!"

She let out a small gasp as a large portion of wood landed not but three inches from her head. That was the second thing that woke her up. In a flash, someone's arms wrapped around her in a shielding manner. She felt and saw black cloth, and in the background, Kiba fighting off the rain of wood that was coming down on them. He was jumping up and spinning around, breaking the wood as it fell.

This meant, basically, that it was Shino that was protecting her.

And somehow, the first thought that went through her head was "Shino-kun is… warm. Eh, wait, what?" Cue panic attack. Why was she thinking that at a time like this?? Why was she thinking that at all??

Boy, she was awake then.

"Kiba, do you have it under control?" Shino shouted over the roar of the collapsing building, snapping her out of her thoughts.

"Yeah! You guys get out; I'll be there in a sec!" Kiba was already halfway towards them as he said it, Akamaru at his heels.

Hinata felt a pressure on her hand as Shino tugged on it lightly. The warm feeling from before returned full blast.

"Come on," he whispered softly; his voice was comforting. He led her outside, with Kiba and Akamaru in tow. There was a silence, and then Kiba started laughing. "Well, a nice ending for that piece of crap," he said.

Hinata and Shino agreed.

As they continued to head towards the Hidden Rain Village, with Kiba and Akamaru way up ahead, Hinata glanced over at Shino, who was starring very determinedly at the road in front of him. Hinata looked down at her feet.

"Thank you, Shino-kun, for before," she whispered. He knew she meant for caring. She could tell, because, for the first time, she saw him blush ever so slightly.

She didn't know he blushed. It was one of those things she'd never related with Shino. Shino didn't usually show any emotion, amorous or otherwise.

There were a lot of things she didn't know about Shino.

She smiled at the ground.

But she would someday.

She was certain of that.