Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto.
It was a long mission, and a hard battle to be won. Not simply against human foes, their eyes hostile and their kunai sharp, but against blinding heat and the bone dry sands. Against buzzards and jackals and scorpions and tarantulas.
It didn't help that Neji was already disoriented from his head wound, or that his canteen was half empty and that he had no earthly idea where he was and lacked the chakra to activate the Byakugan.
As he stumbled and fell across the broken wilderness, Neji's pummeling heart sang to the tune of a desert songbird whom he had once heard singing. It had been a song he couldn't put into words, a song whose words were spoken in a language he didn't comprehend.
It had had a poignant tune. Not weak in its sadness, but strong and low, almost like a funeral dirge, or a requiem for those who fell against burning sand to never rise again, their bleached white bones scattering against the dunes to never be found. The voice had been a throaty contralto, full and stalwart. The bird had stood straight and tall, sand falling from black folds.
As Neji fell, his face hitting sand, he dreamed of seeing emerald eyes. And wished only that he could have heard her singing again one last time.
Neji did not die. He instead dreamed, dreamed of his desert bird who nestled in black linen folds and commanded the wind like some heathen goddess of old. A thousand years that had never been spent came and went, a thousand words that had never been said issuing from his mouth like a wellspring in the desert.
The first thing that began to draw him back to consciousness was a far-off voice. Deep and throaty, full and low, clearly without any formal instruction, but beautiful in its own wild way as it sang what Neji was sure was his own funeral dirge.
He opened his eyes when his outstretched hand clenched upon starched sheets involuntarily. Neji's opening eyes were met with a blinding whiteness.
It could not be Heaven. Heaven did not have fluorescent lights, he was sure of it; that would have been too disappointing.
As Neji's eyes began to come back into focus, he became aware of black against the uniform white, floating in space.
It was her singing. It had to be. And as his eyes finally began to work properly again, he saw her.
She was standing over a table, rearranging orange flowers in a vase, black folds draping over her.
Her voice was high-flying and stunning, and a little sad. Sad for things she could not change and things she should have done differently, sad for every lost opportunity floating away on the wind. Neji could sympathize, and wondered if he should speak and put right what he had gotten wrong.
She heard the sound of the sheets wrinkling, and emerald eyes met his. Sad and lonely, but proud and fierce and composed. She would never bend to the force of her grief, he knew.
"You…saved me?" Neji croaked, drinking into her eyes, pining the absence of her singing.
She hesitated. Then straightened, her unbowed form still dignified. She wasn't the sort to fly into another's arms, nor to forgive wrongs done.
"Yes," she whispered.
Neji opened his mouth to speak, to tell her what burden laid on his heart since he had heard her singing, but before he could utter a single word, she swept out of the room, black folds swishing behind her.
Neji fell back onto the pillow, eyeing the falling nasturtium petals, wishing he could hear sing again.