Title: Transformation
Summary: Her elegance as she dances on the water stirs up memories from long ago, which leave him both frozen and more than a little red.
Disclaimer: I am far too lame to own Naruto, which is owned by Masashi Kishimoto, and I have no affiliation nor do I profit from this fanwork.
"You know, I don't think I've ever just sat and watched a training session before," Naruto mused, arms crossed casually behind his head. Hinata giggled.
"Think you'll be able to sit still? Though Kiba-kun and Shino-kun probably wouldn't mind you joining in if you get too restless."
Naruto shuddered. "I think they'd be more than excited about the chance to rough me up a bit. We've been dating for a month and I'm still being interrogated at random."
Hinata smiled and glanced upwards, lavender eyes temporarily mirroring the color of the rapidly darkening sky.
"It's probably going to start raining soon, so if you don't want—" Hinata was interrupted by a raindrop plunking straight onto her nose. She paused, blinking up to the sky while Naruto let out an amused chuckle.
"A little water won't kill me! Come on, we should go before Kiba blames me for you getting there late."
"Hinata! You're late! What happ—" Kiba cut himself off as soon as he noticed Naruto, opting to glare at him instead. "You! It's your fault she's late, isn't it?"
"See? I told you he'd blame me," Naruto pouted. Hinata laughed a bit nervously as Kiba marched over and stared nose-to-nose at her boyfriend.
"Kiba-kun, I had a slow start at home this morning and just happened to run into Naruto-kun on the way here, and I told him he could come watch, but that took a minute for me to explain. It's my fault."
Her hands started flailing a little when the boys' glare seemed to physically spark, but as it melted into matching brilliant grins and a fist bump, she couldn't help but smile herself.
"You just watch what I've been working on, man. I'm gonna blow you out of the water!"
Naruto laughed as Akamaru bounded toward them from the nearby wood, nipping lightly at Naruto's hand. Naruto, of course, obliged him with scratches to Kiba's amusement before the two began warming up.
"Shino-kun, are you okay with this?" Hinata asked, facing the spot Akamaru had just come from. Naruto cast a confused glance around the area, unable to locate the bug user.
"Eh? Shino? Where? I don't see him."
"If you truly want our approval in your endeavors with Hinata, Naruto," Shino began, emerging from between the darkened trees, "you should pay more attention to the people that are precious to her. Why? Because—"
"Oi! Kiba! I could do those forms even faster in my sleep!"
"Yeah? Well bring it on, then!"
"Because we go through this every time," Shino mumbled, hanging his head slightly as Hinata sympathetically patted his shoulder.
"Alright, Team Eight. Let's get started!" Kiba cried, accompanied by an enthusiastic bark from Akamaru. Hinata shrugged off her jacket, folding it neatly and holding it out to Naruto, now settled comfortably under a tree, with a questioning smile. He nodded and took it, tucking it near his side to keep it at least moderately dry. As she stretched, her muscles flexing underneath the tight mesh shirt which followed her every movement as if it were part of her skin, Naruto decided that he would have to come watch much, much more often.
The first hour of training was normal. Forms and weapon practice were the focus, as the weather gave them a chance to tighten their balance in the adverse conditions. Naruto began making running commentary about twenty minutes in—compliments on just about everything his beloved did, boasting to Kiba that he could do a better job after every technique (much to Kiba's annoyance), and occasional statements of amazement toward Shino, which would make the man smile under his collar. The second half of training, however, was when things got interesting.
"Hey, Hinata, the rain's pretty steady now. Why don't you try warping it with the Protection of the Eight Trigrams again? You've been getting pretty good at that," Kiba said, shaking some of the droplets away from his eyes. Hinata glanced at the faces around her, with Shino nodding, Kiba giving a thumbs up, and a curious grin on Naruto's face.
"Warping the water? That sounds too cool! You gotta show me that."
Hinata nodded, taking tentative steps out onto the shallow riverbed. She inhaled deeply and got into position. This should be natural by know, she figured. She's been working on this since she was a genin. After an encouraging thumbs up from Kiba, she began molding her chakra to precise lines as she waved her arms, gradually building speed.
The way the raindrops danced around her, the crystalline liquid pooling up around her feet, she looked like a nymph. A goddess, even, Naruto thought, with the way her dark locks accompanied her graceful movements, twisting and fluttering as the water followed her every command. It enveloped her, as if she were figure inside a crystal ball. It was ethereal. He was enraptured by her technique—or more a dance, he could say, and he could feel his cheeks warming from both pride and other reasons. She's really blossomed—transformed, even—into an elegant kunoichi. (Or a goddess, his mind added, but he admitted bias.) There was something so familiar, though; a gentle memory tugging on his mind. He couldn't place it.
"How long has Hinata been doing this?" he asked Shino, hoping that maybe the Aburame's insight might fill in the missing pieces of what felt like something he really should remember.
"We didn't know until she began perfecting the technique with our help later on, but Hinata began working on this not long after the chuunin exams. The first time she had really begun to get a grasp on it was when we, Team Eight, and you went on the mission to find the bikochuu in an attempt to track Sasuke."
The tugging turned into an all-out yank, and suddenly Naruto was twelve again, half-asleep and entranced by a small, lithe form twirling gracefully by the waterfall. He had decided that must have been a dream, though. Even Kiba said so! He was dreaming of a nymph, or a fairy; though honestly, he knew he hadn't been dreaming since he spent most of the night awake (and soaked, considering the tumble he took into the water when he reached out to her), dazed by what he had seen. He was nineteen again, and the heat on his face rivaled the hiding sun. With his mind joining the sun behind the curtain of rain, Naruto could do nothing but stare, jaw slackened slightly. (He had seen her naked. Her! Naked! His princess was always damn beautiful, then. But he peeped on her! But it was an accident! But he thought about it for a long time that night! His thoughts ran amok in those circles as his eyes tried to convince themselves to blink.)
Kiba poked the unresponsive Naruto, grabbing his sleeve to right him as he began to tip over. "Hinata!" he called. "I think we broke him."
Shaking the excess droplets out of her hair as best she could, Hinata approached her mildly comatose boyfriend, noting the red in his face and placing her palm on his forehead.
"Naruto-kun? Are you getting sick? I should have told you to go home earlier instead of making you sit out in the rain here, I'm so sorry."
Naruto blinked, eyes shifting upward to meet hers. The beads of rain and sweat sliding down her face (and her hair, and her curves, and her legs) combined with the moisture of her palm on his face made intelligent response impossible. What wasn't impossible was the heat on his cheeks increasing, so he quickly settled on unintelligible sounds and a slight shake of the head. She was, understandably, confused. When she pressed her lips to his forehead, he was certain that his skin matched the brilliance of his mother's hair color as the heat began to sear the tops of his ears.
"Akamaru, can you take that loser home for us? We don't need him catching a cold." Kiba shot a knowing smirk his way as Hinata and Shino lifted him onto Akamaru. Were his mental facilities all in working order, he would have had a comeback or five for the Inuzuka. With another unintelligible noise making its way out of his mouth in acknowledgement of Hinata's promise to check on him later, he mustered a pout at the dog who he swore was laughing at him.
"I'm coming in!"
A couple hours after their training had ended, Hinata entered Naruto's apartment with soup in hand. She set it on the kitchen counter and went off to find him, quickly succeeding as she spotted him lying on his couch, a pillow covering his face.
"Are you feeling okay?" she asked, removing the pillow to see his still vividly vermilion cheeks.
"Mmhmm," he mumbled.
"I brought soup just in case. No fever or anything?"
"Mmhmm."
She paused, thinking, as he kept his lips pressed into a line. Cerulean eyes darted around the room nervously, looking anywhere but at her.
"...you remembered that night during the bikochuu mission, didn't you?"
"Mmhmm."
The almost harmonizing color of their faces would have been amusing if they weren't so embarrassed.