Chapter 4: Carrier – Naruto Uzumaki
Author's Note: Sorry this update took a little while. I got most of the way writing this chapter, realized it was terrible, and went in a different direction. Enjoy! (I hope.)
When Naruto Uzumaki drifted back to wakefulness after his disturbing confrontation with the Kyuubi, he was lying in an unfamiliar bed in a room he hadn't seen before. It was far more tastefully decorated than his apartment, if rather soulless. It was almost like a nice hotel room, but clearly part of a full apartment. It screamed of having been decorated by a consultant for someone with plenty of cash.
After the room's décor, the second thing Naruto noticed was that he wasn't alone. Hinata Hyuuga sat at the room's vanity, her back to him as she brushed her long, dark hair and quietly hummed a tune he'd never heard before. Cautiously, Naruto sat up on the edge of the bed, wondering what was going on.
When Hinata saw him move in the mirror she set the brush down and stood up, turning to face him. Naruto blinked when he realized she was wearing a sheer robe of cream-colored silk that came down to mid-thigh and opened in a deep 'v' in the front, baring the inner slopes of her breasts. He'd never seen Hinata wear something so revealing, but she seemed comfortable in it, smiling warmly.
Hinata's lilac eyes were dusted with silvery motes that glittered in the room's soft light, provided by a few lamps. Even as Naruto noticed the change in her eyes, the thought that it was unusual slipped away without gaining traction.
"Ahh… where are we?" Naruto inquired, trying to figure out what was going on here, because it felt like a set-up to a scene in one of Jiraiya's books, except those perverted fantasies never happened in real life.
"This is one of the properties my clan keeps for members who want to get away from the family for a bit. You can guess why, when everyone has eyes that can see through walls." Hinata replied easily.
Naruto coughed nervously. No way was that innuendo. This is Hinata we're talking about. "How did I get here?" Naruto changed the subject.
"I brought you here after that mess in the market district."
"Why?"
Hinata moved closer to him, until she stood over him with their knees almost touching. "Because I have to tell you something," she said, "and I wanted to do it here. I love you, Naruto. I've loved you since we were in the Academy. When I was younger I was too shy and afraid to say anything. I missed you so much when you were gone; I was a fool to let you leave like that. I was so happy when you came back. I'm not afraid to say it anymore, Naruto; I want to be yours."
Naruto's jaw was hanging open by the end of her confession. He found himself remembering that Hinata had never been mean to him as a child, no matter what adults told her. He remembered all the blushing smiles, all the times he'd spotted Hinata spying on him from behind a tree, all the times that she'd stammered and faltered when they spoke, and it all made sense.
"You love me?" Naruto asked, his voice full of quiet wonder. Naruto knew that there were people who cared for him, his precious people. Iruka, the Third Hokage, Kakashi, Sakura, his friends among the Rookie Eleven, Jiraiya and Tsunade… but of all those people, none had ever said 'I love you', and realizing that Hinata had loved him even before he was a hero, when everyone thought he was a failure, was a heady feeling.
Thinking back, Naruto was startled to realize that he cared about her, too. He'd been obsessed with Sakura for a long time, but he'd always felt like Hinata was one of the nicest people he knew, though it had taken her duel with Neji during the Chuunin Exam to reinforce how important she was to him.
"Wow. Hinata, I… I don't know what to say."
"Say that you'll give me a chance," she said. "Now that I've said what I wanted to say, let me have the opportunity to become as important to you as you are to me."
"Hinata, you've been important to me for a long time," Naruto replied honestly. "I should have realized sooner that you wanted more."
"How could you?" Hinata asked with a hint of self-deprecation. "I never made it known. I didn't have the courage until you came back and I saw you again."
"Don't," Naruto said firmly, taking her hand in his. "I like who you are, even when you're shy."
Hinata smiled radiantly. "Thank you, Naruto. But I think I'm done being shy." Hinata leaned down slowly and kissed him. A dozen different things ran through Naruto's mind, but the thing that stood out was that Hinata tasted like cinnamon. Sakura's lips had a fruity flavor, like cherries, but Hinata was spice and sweetness.
Hinata climbed onto the bed, straddling Naruto's legs. In spite of himself, Naruto couldn't help but let his eyes drift south, drinking in the feast of Hinata's magnificent bosom close to his face, her breasts straining against the sheer silk that covered them. "Ahh… Hinata?"
"I want you, Naruto," she said, the promise in her voice making his stomach tighten pleasantly. "Do you…?"
"God yes," he answered before kissing her deeply, passionately. For a guilty moment he thought of Sakura, but he reminded himself that there hadn't been any promises between them, no talk of that night being anything more than it was. Sakura certainly hadn't confessed her love.
Then Hinata loosed the waist sash of her cream silk robe and let it slide off of her shoulders to pool on the floor and Naruto promptly forgot about his pink-haired teammate, because Hinata didn't have anything on under the robe.
Naruto decided he had never seen such a magnificent pair of breasts in years of peeping with Jiraiya, and certainly he had never been as closely acquainted with any of those. "I'm so happy," Hinata said. "I've dreamed of this, of you being my first."
Naruto hesitated. "Your first? Hinata, are you sure?"
Taking his hands in hers, she laid them on her breasts. "I've never been more sure of anything," she said firmly. "I want this. Please, Naruto."
Naruto grinned, cupping her breasts and luxuriating in their feel, flicking his thumbs over her nipples, making her quiver. "Of course, Hinata." He kissed her again, and her fingers got to work divesting him of his clothes.
Hideki Kobashi, twenty-four years old and a special jounin of Iwa, the Village Hidden in the Rocks, was woken from a light sleep by a knock on his door. Instantly alert with the ease of long practice despite being awakened in the dead of night, he sat up from his cot and had his hand around the kunai under his pillow in less than a second. "What is it?" he inquired.
"There's a Leaf ninja outside the cliff entrance, sir," replied the voice of Monoba Idata, one of the five chuunin under Hideki's command.
Hideki frowned, rising smoothly to his feet and crossing the small room to open the door. "Why didn't you and Kasami kill him and be done with it?" Kasami Rinne was the kunoichi who was scheduled to share lookout with Monoba.
Monoba was a short man with greasy black hair captured under the bandana of his forehead protector, and a pockmarked face with dark eyes wearing the standard brown and red chuunin uniform of Iwa's ninja. He looked at Hideki apologetically. "The Leaf ninja's not armed or trying to hide, and they brought… you should really just see it, sir."
Hideki sighed, running his fingers through his close-cropped, spiky brown hair. He was a full foot taller than Monoba, and knew that women considered him handsome even if he thought of himself as rather plain-looking. Kunoichi often chased after him when he took a new post until they figured out he wasn't interested. Hideki had no immediate plans to marry, but it wouldn't be to another ninja. Once he had enough money he'd retire from active duty, find a nice civilian girl, have kids and never pick up a kunai again.
But today he was in charge of a six-man cell of Iwa ninja manning a spying outpost deep in Konoha's territory and his lookout said there was a Konoha ninja outside the hidden entrance to their small base, so he'd worry about surviving today for now. Buried in a cliff side that overlooked two major roads, the base was perfectly situated to spy on commerce and troop movements in the northern part of the Land of Fire.
Following Monoba through the tight, dimly lit halls of their hidden post, carved from solid rock with earth ninjutsu, Hideki made his way up to the tunnel that lead to the surface, opening into a cave concealed by dense, thorny shrubs. Leaning against the wall was Kasami, a petite young woman with long black hair in a ponytail and emerald green eyes wearing the Iwa chuunin uniform with her forehead protector tied to her arm. She was flipping a shuriken between her fingers nervously and glancing at the cave entrance frequently.
Peering through the gaps in the bushes, Hideki could see their unwelcome guest waiting patiently thirty yards down the hill, and what he was surprised him enough that he changed his mind about reprimanding Monoba and Kasami for bothering him.
First, the white ceramic mask and hooded white duster concealed enough of the Leaf ninja standing calmly outside that Hideki could tell it was a woman of medium height and not much more. The uniform was of Konoha's ANBU, so if it came down to a fight it would take all three of them to kill her.
Far stranger was that the Leaf ANBU was not alone. Lying on the ground at her feet, unconscious, gagged and with wrists and ankles tightly bound with chakra rope, was another Konoha kunoichi with her forehead protector nestled in her bubblegum pink hair, wearing a red vest, a pink skirt over dark capris and knee-length sandal-boots.
"What the hell?" Hideki commented at last.
"That's what I said," Kasami murmured.
"Okay, you two watch my back; assume she's stronger than I am. If it comes to a fight we'll have to work together, but let's see what she wants first." Kasami and Monoba nodded seriously. Forming a set of hand seals, Hideki let his chakra flow into the ground, using it to shift the giant thorn bushes apart enough for them to pass through. Hideki moved forward while Kasami and Monoba shifted to the flanks of the Konoha ninja.
"You're a bit afield for a midnight stroll," Hideki commented. "Can we help you with something?"
The Leaf ANBU laughed, and Hideki was surprised by how young she sounded. "I'm here to help you, actually." He noted her accent; refined, aristocratic. Possibly even a noble's daughter turned ninja.
"What makes you think I need your help?" Hideki asked easily, even as his mind raced. If one Leaf ninja had found their base he had to assume the rest knew about it; he'd have to pull out and get his people across the border into Iwa's territory tonight. That just left the question of what this one was doing here.
"Well, as of two days ago Konoha knows about your little spider hole here. Later today a number of my colleagues will be arriving to raid it, so you'll probably want to be gone by then," the Leaf kunoichi offered. Kasami and Monoba had flanked her, but she didn't seem concerned, and that worried Hideki, because it meant she was either foolish or very skilled, and fools didn't earn ANBU masks.
"Okay. So why are you here?"
"I brought you a present," she answered. "I imagine losing this spying post and returning home empty-handed would look pretty bad for you, so here's something that will probably get you rewarded instead." The Leaf ANBU nudged her unconscious prisoner with the toe of her boot, rolling the pink-haired woman onto her back. "This is Sakura Haruno. She's the apprentice of the Fifth Hokage, Tsunade Senju. She's got a head full of classified information your village would probably be interested in, and she knows more about medical ninjutsu than anyone in the Elemental Nations excepting Tsunade herself."
One glance told Hideki that Monoba and Kasami looked as stunned as he felt, though he didn't show anything on his face. "Why give her to us? Why not just kill her if you want her out of the way?"
The Konoha ninja shrugged. "I see no reason to tell you. The why doesn't matter. Take her, slit her throat or just leave her here; I don't care. If you do decide to take her, be careful when she wakes up; she possesses her teacher's strength technique. She can fell a tree with a punch if you let her."
A birdcall came from the trees above Hideki and he resisted a confident smile. His second-in-command was in position along with the other chuunin; the odds were much better now. "So, what if I decide to take two Konoha ninja home?"
The Leaf ANBU laughed. "That would be difficult to accomplish. I'm not really here." Hideki's eyes narrowed and he threw a kunai at her with the flick of a wrist. The cloaked figure didn't even try to dodge. The kunai hit – and passed right through as she dissolved into a puff of smoke.
"Leaf ninja and their damned shadow clones," Hideki muttered.
"What's the plan, boss?" Monoba asked, while Kasami cautiously approached Sakura, making sure she was really out cold.
Hideki sighed. "We follow the nice Leaf ANBU's suggestion. This location is compromised. We have fifteen minutes to gather up what we can from the base and then we're going to collapse it and go home."
"What about pinky here?" Kasami inquired as the other three members of the cell emerged from the trees.
Hideki shrugged. "We take her with us."
"What if it's a trap? What if they want us to take her?" Monoba protested.
Hideki didn't answer right away, instead fishing out his copy of the Iwa Bingo Book, flipping to the back where the newest entries were listed. Finding the page he was looking for, he scanned it and then tossed the book to Monoba.
"She is who our guest said she was. Hokages don't throw away their apprentices to set a trap; they're too soft-hearted for that. This smells more like an internal disagreement in Konoha to me. We're just the bag men, and if that gets us a kunoichi who can be coerced to train our medical ninja I'm not complaining." Hideki tapped his left cheek, feeling the bottom end of a thin, raised vertical scar that skipped over his eye socket and rose to halfway up his forehead; he'd been lucky not to lose the eye. He'd taken the wound as a genin, and Iwa's doctors hadn't been able to prevent it from scarring. Konoha's medics were universally regarded as the best in the Elemental Nations.
"Time's wasting," Hideki continued. "Get your gear and set explosive tags at the collapse points. Go!" Hideki slung Sakura over his shoulder and followed his team inside. It took him only a minute to grab his travel backpack from his room; he never unpacked in hostile territory. Carrying Sakura down to the supply room, he passed members of his team affixing explosive tags to walls at junctions were the ceiling was weak.
In the supply room, Hideki bug through the crates and cabinets until he found what he was looking for, and took a case of syringes full of a blue liquid. Removing one before stowing the rest of them in his backpack, Hideki checked Sakura's pulse and then slid the needle into her arm, injecting her with the powerful tranquilizer. "Sorry, but if you're as strong as the Slug Princess I'm not letting you wake up until we've got you safely back to Iwa," he told the unconscious girl.
Hideki hesitated before picking Sakura up, looking at her more closely. Even sleeping she was a pretty young thing, and he could imagine her face would light up when she smiled. Not that she would have cause to be doing much smiling in the near future. Hideki felt guilty for a moment, knowing that he was likely consigning her to an unpleasant fate. For a moment he was tempted to let her go, but the damned Leaf ANBU was right. If they went home empty-handed and with a spy post lost his whole team would be in trouble, and his first job was to look out for them.
Hideki spent the next few minutes searching her, confirming she was unarmed. Then he hefted the pink-haired kunoichi over his shoulder again and headed outside. The rest of his team emerged shortly thereafter, travel packs on their backs. Once they'd moved back to a safe distance, Hideki gave the order to his chuunin. "Bring it down." He felt five spikes of chakra, and then the ground shook with a muffled 'BOOM'. They watched as the entire cliff face collapsed into the forest below. "Okay people, let's move," he commanded, and the six Iwa ninja darted off to the north, with a single prisoner in tow.
In the early morning hours Hinata Hyuuga lay awake, just listening to Naruto breathe as he slept, enjoying the warmth of his body pressed against hers. She'd known she wanted to give herself to him, but even in her fondest dreams she never imagined it could feel so good. Without a frame of reference she wasn't sure if sex was always that amazing or if it was just him, but all night she'd felt… like they were in sync. It was beyond words, and it reaffirmed her decision to do whatever it took to have Naruto, forever.
An hour before dawn, Hinata slipped out of bed, quietly dressing herself in her ninja garb. She didn't want to leave Naruto for a second, but she knew she had to deal with the fallout of the previous day. She wasn't worried about the ANBU finding her, but if she didn't go home soon her clan would start looking for her, and they would locate her in short order. Hinata paused to pen a quick note to Naruto, leaving it on his bedside table before slipping out the window and taking to the rooftops and alleys, heading for home.
Hinata was halfway home when the memories of her dissipated shadow clone hit her. She shuddered, reminded of how far she had already gone to make sure Naruto would be hers and hers alone. "I'm sorry, Sakura, but I love Naruto, and I will make him mine. No one will stand in my way," she murmured to herself half-apologetically. "He's always chased after you, and I just can't risk you interfering in the beautiful future we'll have together."
Hinata had been surprised to discover after felling the intruder in Naruto's hospital room that it had been Sakura, and angered to realize that she could smell him on Sakura's clothes. She'd been tempted to simply kill Sakura, but had come up with a more elegant plan; hand her over to the spying Iwa ninja Team Eight had located on their last mission before returning to Konoha and meeting Naruto. Sakura would simply disappear, and Hinata wouldn't have the pinkette's death on her conscience.
Hinata slipped into the Hyuuga compound without notice, and entered her father Hiashi's chambers as quietly as a ghost. He was in the midst of his morning meditations when she found him, sitting cross-legged on a thin mat in a dimly lit room filled with the scent of incense. Despite entering silently, Hiashi's head came up as soon as she stepped into the room, his pale eyes boring into her. "You've had an eventful day, daughter," her father observed evenly. "Assaulting civilians and escaping from ANBU lock-up. Give me a reason not to hand you over to the Hokage."
Hinata sank to her knees before him, bowing slightly to her father. "There's no reason you should, father," she replied easily, looking him in the eyes without a hint of uncertainty. "The ANBU had no right to hold me. I simply rectified the situation."
Hiashi was silent for a long moment. "Dare I hope my eldest daughter has finally started to think and act like a Hyuuga, rather than a simpering, scared child?" Hinata didn't react, and saw the surprise on her father's face. She supposed he expected her to look away, or turn red, or stammer a denial. "I see," Hiashi said at last. "I will admit to being pleasantly surprised to learn that you defeated four ANBU on your own. I didn't believe you had it in you."
"If it pleases you father, I will strive to continue surprising you," Hinata answered easily.
Hiashi looked amused for a moment. "Leaving aside the matter of the ANBU, daughter, assaulting civilians in broad daylight is poor form, even if they are beneath us."
"That's not what happened," Hinata said easily. "We came under some form of mental attack. Neither myself nor my teammates have ever suffered from memory loss during battle, and the civilians lost control first and attacked us; I do remember that much. The Hokage's knee-jerk reaction to the aftermath was meant to appease the civilians on the council, and I understand that she needed to do it, but I wasn't prepared to spend days in a cell while she hesitated, so I saw myself out." Hinata knew that her father disdained the civilians on the village council and the Hokage's rule by consensus, so it was an explanation that would satisfy him, and she saw the brief smile on his face before it returned to his usual impassive expression.
"I suppose then, that you're here to ask me to deal with the arrest order the Hokage's put out on you?"
"If it's not too much trouble, father, I'd be grateful. I can't keep avoiding ANBU forever," she admitted.
Hiashi rose to his feet. "I'll see what I can do. Stay here in the compound for now; you'll be safe from the Hokage's dogs." He headed for the door, but paused in the threshold. "I would be disappointed if this new confidence was just a phase, Hinata," he warned Hinata.
"I won't disappoint you, father," she said firmly.
"For the first time in my life, I suspect that may be true," Hiashi murmured before departing.
Naruto woke when the morning sun from the open window fell across his face, yawning and sitting up in the spacious bed of the Hyuuga 'getaway' apartment. A lazy, satisfied smile crossed Naruto's face as he remembered the previous night. Hinata may have been inexperienced, but she was also eager, responsive, and even playful. Naruto was beginning to understand why Jiraiya and so many other men he'd known chased kunoichi. Not only were most of them beautiful, but their stamina was at a level civilian women just couldn't compete with.
Glancing to the side Naruto noted that Hinata had departed, and couldn't help a sigh. He'd hoped he'd see her when he woke. When he got out of bed, though, he spotted a folded note on his bedside table and picked it up.
Naruto-
Thank you. Last night was amazing. I'm sorry I couldn't be here in the morning, but there's some family business I have to take care of. I hope to see you soon.
Love,
Hinata
P.S. Help yourself to the miso ramen in the kitchen. Is that still your favorite?
Naruto grinned, gloom forgotten. Tracking down his pants, he pulled them on before heading into the kitchen. There were several cups of instant ramen sitting next to a full kettle on the stove. "I could get used to this," Naruto commented with a grin as he fired up the burner to boil the water and peeled back the lids of the ramen cups, sniffing the spices. "This is the good stuff, too! I think I'm in love." Humming happily to himself, Naruto waited for the water to boil.
"You have got to be joking." Tsunade Senju, sitting behind her desk in the Hokage's office, looked at Hiashi Hyuuga in frank disbelief. She'd gotten back from lunch to find the Hyuuga patriarch waiting for her, and he barely got past 'hello' before dropping a bombshell on her desk.
"I'm quite serious," Hiashi replied smoothly. "So I expect that the arrest order on my daughter will be lifted?"
"No it will not," Tsunade replied between clenched teeth. "Hinata attacked civilians, and broke out of prison before the investigation could be concluded. I have four ANBU in the hospital. I don't know what's gotten into Hinata, but she's not above the law, even if she is your heir."
"In regards to this alleged 'attack' on civilians, members of my clan did the investigation that your people apparently did not. They found multiple eyewitnesses who were more than happy to testify before the village magistrate that – whatever may have caused it – the civilians attacked my daughter and her team, who were forced to defend themselves. Obviously it was some form mental ninjutsu we haven't previously encountered, but you had no cause to arrest my heir, certainly not without consulting me first." That said, Hiashi leaned forward and dropped a stack of papers on Tsunade's desk.
Feeling a twitch coming on in her left eye at someone putting more paperwork on her desk, Tsunade sighed and picked up the papers, leafing through them. To her disgust, every form was a sworn statement from a witness to the market riot stating that the ninja involved were defending themselves. "I recognize some of these names," Tsunade protested. "These people had no memory of the events surrounding the riot."
"I suppose their memories came back to them once they had time to reflect," Hiashi replied smoothly. "Feel free to talk to them again, I'm sure their stories will be quite clear."
I'm sure Hyuuga money and intimidation bought those stories, Tsunade thought sourly. She wasn't a fool; she recognized damage control when she saw it, but she couldn't accuse the head of the village's largest clan of fabricating evidence, and unless she handed these false witnesses over to Ibiki Morino – which she had no cause to do – she didn't doubt that they'd parrot the story Hiashi's minions had fed to them.
"Fine," Tsunade declared, tossing the papers back on her desk. "She still broke out of her cell and assaulted prison guards."
"She did indeed, and I couldn't be prouder that my daughter's finally starting to stand up for herself. If you admit you had no cause to arrest Hinata, you can hardly complain that she chose to leave. Normally I'd be demanding reparation from your office for the gross insult to my clan, but since Hinata saw fit to deal with the matter herself, I'm content to leave it be if you are, Hokage-sama."
Hiashi's words were respectful, but his tone was not. Tsunade was sorely tempted to knock his smug, aristocratic ass through the wall, but Hiashi usually provoked that desire when they talked, and she suppressed the pleasant fantasy without much effort. "All right."
"Thank you for your time, Hokage-sama. I trust the arrest order will be lifted immediately?"
"I'll send it out today, but you might want to encourage Hinata to stay on the grounds of your compound until word makes it around to the patrols currently out in the village. We wouldn't want any more misunderstandings, would we?"
"No, we certainly wouldn't," Hiashi replied. "Good day, Hokage-sama." What that he departed. When he was gone, Tsunade settled for throwing his stack of bought and paid for testimony at the closed door after him. "Arrogant prick," she muttered. "Kakashi's not going to be happy about this," she said with a sigh as she penned the order to call off the manhunt for Hinata, and release Kiba and Shino, since Hiashi's little stunt had cleared them, too.