First attempt at an action chapter. Be gentle, please.
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"… Taking into account the Elephant seals, the double-rank pulsing indicates a later incursion on the seal's matrix…"
Hinata's conscious blurred, a grey fog surrounded the words of an unknown person. A faint humming sounded from around her, an attempt to move her hand met with only unfeeling resistance.
"… and that definitely isn't his work… Seriously, father, what did you do to get sucked into helping that idiot Namikaze!?"
Straining to open her eyes, the Hyuuga princess groaned and gave it up for the moment. Her skull was screaming at her, possibly impacted, definitely a bruise judging from the swelling feeling on her forehead. She could feel a weight on every part of her body, the tension on her throat constricting her breath.
"… what made you become the lifelink, father? What made you think to leave us behind?"
The voice was young, deep and strained towards whiny. There was a rustling of grass, some way in the direction of her legs. She took stock of her position, spread-eagled against the…
… against the nothing. She couldn't feel the ground; her body was floating in midair. She tried to twist her torso, but met with still unyielding resistance and an increase in the shrillness of the buzzing.
"Ah, you're awake."
The rustling of the grass drew closer, clumping on occasion when the footsteps hit the dirt clods by the willow. She felt the presence, the tiny hairs on her arms prickling as she felt him stand before her.
"Hmmm. Mefuin: Kai."
The pressure on Hinata's eyelids fell, and her opaque pupils gazed upon the blurry world. The first thing she saw was a swirling cloud of shadows, wafting around a humanoid shape in the middle of the maelstrom. She looked over to her right, a glowing circle spreading out from her outstretched limbs and connecting to her joints by glowing threads hummed and throbbed in place.
She flexed her fingers, or at least tried to, as the threads constricted and glowed red the buzzing increased, dimming when she tried not to move. Her eyes swiveled back to the cloud of darkness.
"Like it? That was the last jutsu my father taught me before he left on conscription to Konoha. The full-binding circle jutsu, the Obakusougu. If our beloved matriarch had chosen some lesser member…"
Hinata would have rolled her eyes if her breeding and conduct were not her own. The words Spare me your rambling would have begun to line up, if she hadn't seen the body of Naruto hanging vertically in a larger, far more elaborately crafted circle-seal roughly ten metres to her left.
She had never seen so much blood.
From a strange spiral design on his stomach, concretic lines emanated outwards and flowed over his flesh, his life dripping red onto the grass beneath him. Apart from a pair of black shorts, he was naked with the carved rings in his body curving and rounding and turning into some surreal piece of art. Puddles of red liquid were pooled underneath his feet, plopping every few seconds as another drop splashed into their tiny lakes.
Her eyes widened, her face drew thin through equal parts horror and abject rage. The man noticed her look, turned to look at her target, and nodded his head.
"Yes, the fox keeps him alive. I simply put him through a few… tests." The teeth smiled again, the featureless face seemed to grow smug. "You know, I think I'd like to hear your voice, little girl."
"Koefuin: Kai."
The pressure on her throat loosened, and a gasp of air sounded through the clearing.
"W-what… did you do to him…" She stuttered, choking from a close call with air deprivation.
"I did? Oh, nothing I haven't been through myself. Nothing… unfair." The man growled, and part of the shadows drew back to show a number of scarred lines running down his arm. "Your little vessel put me through this, because father never came home…"
"Vessel?" Hinata moaned, the pain in her forehead growing intolerable.
"The Bijuu. The Jinchuriki. This boy, powered by a demon king and the death of two men, is the vessel of Kyuubi." The man spoke simply, turning away to look at Naruto, "No longer."
Hinata blinked, slowly breathing and trying to take in the information.
Kyuubi no Kitsune.
Onimou.
Vessel.
Monster container.
Uzumaki Naruto.
"N-no… Naruto isn't… he never…" Hinata mumbled to herself, "He… why? I never… n-never knew…"
"That's right. He is a good person, even we are hearing stories about this boy… killing the Red Dawn, taming the Tanuki; even beginning to master the sage arts. Quite a wonder… quite a boy… even has a bridge named after him…"
"He never hurt you… he never hurt anyone without cause… why are you doing this?" Hinata decided to play the despairing female and think of a way to cancel the seal. It responded to her physical movements… what about chakra?
"Oh, it's no grudge against him in particular, I'm just fighting destiny."
"Destiny?" Hinata gently pushed a little of her bodily energy out into the strings, watching them glow an even brighter shade of blue.
"Yeah. Oh, and don't bother with the ninja stuff, I've calibrated the seals against your muscular limits." The smug air came back to the man, who leaned forward a little.
"Those eyes… I've heard about them… the Pyuuma, yes?"
"Hyuuga." Hinata spat, trying to come up with a plan against the holding mechanism.
Limits, bodily limits, there has to be a way to turn that around… he seems confident about its capablities…
"Hmmm. The assassination contracts said there were three active nin in the family, two girls and a prodigal son… the older girl is the heir…" The man held out a shadowed limb, Hinata felt her blood race in disgust as he cupped her chin and twisted her face around.
"Oh, yes. Three ransom prices, coupled with the body return… this could be profitable…" She squirmed inside at the twisted desire on his voice, "The eye-price, the noble-price…" His voice turned husky, "The virgin price… You'll be worth a lot, I feel."
"I will kill you for what you have done." Hinata said, simply. Gone was the nervousness, the traces of fear. This man had harmed Naruto-kun who had already suffered so (And she shuddered at the new-found knowledge that even she hadn't realized the extent of his pain) and was beginning to inspect her like a second-hand horse.
She no longer felt for the shadowed man.
"Big words, but I'm sure you'll see things my way in the end. So wait right there, little miss. I'll deal with you soon."
As he walked away, Hinata raked her brain for any technique that would allow her to bypass the restraints.
Genjutsu? No, I can't force chakra out… use a tool? I can't move. There has to be some way!
Right, think. I can't force chakra out… can I force chakra in? What good would that do? It would just pass through my skin…
Chakra… in. The seal restraints are set to my body's limits…
Hinata saw him stand in front of the hanging body of the man she admired.
What if the limits were gone?
Hinata felt the memory of her training with Maito Gai flash into her forebrain. She felt the weight at her side that told her of a still-full weapons satchel.
Yes… to protect my precious people…
"You."
The shadowed man turned. "What?"
"I have three words for you."
"What, 'Please spare me'?"
Hinata shook her head, a grim little smile appearing over her face.
"Initial Gate, Open!"
--
Several kilometers away, a white blur moved over the trees and stopped in a haze of smokey-silver, gave the impression of listening, and made out at a slightly different angle.
The location was now confirmed.
--
Hinata grimaced as the strength poured into her muscles, straining until the bindings turned red and snapped in an instant. As soon as her feet touched the ground, the circle-seal around her faded into nothing.
The shadowed man slowly backed away in caution, noting the determined look in her pupil-less eyes as the Hyuuga heir rose from her now-defunct prison, hair curving around her shoulders as the wind picked up. Slowly, deliberately, she assumed the traditional fighting stance, arms low and ready to intercept and counter.
Her opponent stood still, no longer backing away. His expression was unreadable, clouded by the dark wisps that played across his face.
"I have never battled a Hyuuga."
There was something in his voice as he spoke, cold and yet somehow enthusiastic.
"Pray you do not disappoint. I have a habit of breaking toys when I am bored."
Hinata did not even dignify his boasting with a reply, but withdrew a pair of kunai from her holster, throwing them at the man's feet. He did not move, but a pair of shadows rose from the ground and swallowed the knives as they moved.
The heiress gave a triumphant little smile, and charged after them, throwing yet more kunai ahead of her. The shadows leapt out and swallowed them whole.
As I thought…
Ten feet away from the man, Hinata sprung to the left and made a seal in midair.
… His shadows are similar to the Kazekage's defense techniques… and have the same weaknesses.
Her fine chakra control allowed her to substitute the small metal weights on the ends of her kunai with the explosive tags that she grabbed from her pants pocket. The small globes that held the knifes suddenly burst into a pyroclasm of flames, knocking the man back as Hinata once again ran forward in pursuit of his body, chakra already flowing into her palms in anticipation.
"Byakugan!"
The world suddenly showed a beautiful clarity. She felt already exhausted from the continual checking of Naruto's clones, but if need be, she could… but where was he?
The man was no longer there, but traces of chakra pointed deeper into the woods. Hinata decided to try and secure Naruto and monitor his vitals until the man re-emerged, something safer than charging blindly into a location filled with obstacles.
She slowly took a step back, wary for any counterattack from the trees.
'Onichi: Rendan!'
Snaking out of the crooks and crevices of the trees came a plethora of shadowy tendrils, each arcing and earthing through the willows like shaded lightning. Hinata's extended scope of vision picked out the origin of the onslaught; the man was hiding behind a tree and working seals at a furious rate.
She took stock of her options. The strands were moving too fast to outrun, and too numerous to avoid, but it seemed they would all strike her at the same time.
She nodded to herself, waiting until the last second before the tendrils struck, pushing out chakra from every pore of her body and spinning herself on the spot, lowering her stance.
"Kaiten!"
The world around her shuddered into a blue blur as she continued the heavenly spin, feeling the slight tinglings of opened flesh as the odd tendril managed to endure the rush of grinding chakra and sliced along her body. She pushed out a little more, and the wisps burned away from the energy, leaving nothing but a hint of smoke.
Her spin stopped, and she watched the man form another circle, thrumming with unknown purpose.
"No."
Hinata pushed the chakra from her feet, pushing more chakra out from her fists to plow through the tree that the man had hidden behind. The look of frustration on his face was surprising, but the expression of agony as her right hand came around in a wide arc and launched him into the air more than made up for it.
As he reached the plateau of his mini-orbit, she jumped and prepared to bombard him with yet another technique until she saw that his circle now covered the ground below them, growing as wide as the clearing until it halted at the edge of the treeline.
The man gave her a wicked, triumphant smile as she drew up to him.
'Onichi: Tsunami!'
The shadows had left his body, and she was surprised at his similarity to an older Brother Neji in the Chunin exams, the eyes were a shade of grey, the cruel, refined features and the arrogant smirk. The hair was shorter, but still in a brown ponytail.
The shadows had left his body. And Hinata now knew where they resided.
He distracted me to set up the giant seal below!
The aforementioned seal exploded with a dark torrent upwards, a massive cascade of shadows swarmed up to meet her as the man fell back to earth, caught by another sphere of darkness as the rest volleyed up towards the Hyuuga princess.
"Only one way to survive this…" Hinata shuddered, but forced calm upon herself. Steadying herself against nothing, she somehow managed to perform the extended Kaiten that she had derived from her Trigrams of Protection.
Now… she had to draw the lines of force…
The shadows were coming closer…
Reposition the chakra overlay…
… they promised to kill her slowly, from the feet up…
Find that hidden pinnacle of strength…
… no mercy, they would offer no mercy…
Force it out…
… Already they were touching her foot…
Allow it in…
…Covering her chest, making for her mouth…
It was done.
… Choke her, choke her!
"Kyuten!"
The air around her spun like a top, transforming itself into a blue-white globe of interlacing lines that pulverized the black ichors into nothing. She felt a jolt when the sphere expanded into the man's own body and began pushing him into the dirt, crushing his form into the dust as the protective orb growing out from her body continued to turn.
Finally, she felt she could no longer continue the attack, and cancelled the technique, falling limp and slamming into the ground from the moderate height.
For a while, she simply lay in the freshly churned dust, exhausted from extended and acute chakra overuse. No birds sung, scared away by the destruction of the landscape. The only sound was the pounding of her own heart and the gravelly sound of tumbling rocks.
And there, only barely audible over the noise of her body, came the echo of a man staggering to his feet from the other side of the crater.
"Nearly got me… Hyuuga girl… nearly got me…" He breathed, slowly advancing on her prone form. "Caught me off guard with your tricks… but not this time…"
Hinata's mind screamed at her body to move, but nothing responded.
"… This time, they ain't getting' nothing back… not your eyes, not your body, not your hymen, not shit." He growled, Hinata could see his eyes, insanely widened in adrenaline and pain.
"You got nothin' left, Hyuuga girl. But I think you've still got it in you to scream… so where are those three words, huh? You got something to say?!" The man spat, saliva flecking from the corner of his mouth, standing over her with murder plain in his eyes.
Hinata saw Naruto's body, drenched in his own blood and disgraced beyond comprehension. She thought of the stares he had been given, she thought of the prisoner she now knew he carried within him.
And she knew what she had to say.
She no longer feared for her life.
"Rest Gate, open!"
--
The white blur wove through the trees at the forest's edge, and jumped to land on the path. She noted the two sets of footprints, and set off. She was close, she knew it!
--
The Hyuuga princess felt her body respond to the rush of energy that she had released, letting her legs scythe out the man's own from underneath him. Reactiviating her Byakugan in the haze of movement that brought her standing up to face him as he fell, she felt the rage overwhelm her.
"You are in my field of Hakke." She intoned as the man jumped back to his feet. She pushed out chakra from her right hand, striking his chest from below and lifting the man a metre into the air.
"Ishou!"
She opened her stance, sliding her right leg behind her and twisting underneath the airborne enemy to strike him on the chest as he fell with both hands.
"Nishou!"
He moved a little further upwards, a shockwave emanated from his back at the blows, bugging out his eyes. Hinata let another volley of blows fly.
"Yonshou!"
He was properly airborne now, but Hinata had to reset her stance, and resolved to push him higher to give him the time.
"Hachishou!"
There! He has high enough to reposition her legs and give her a full field of Hakke, bending and flexing and striking as he fell back on top of her dome of influence, burning blue as the fast strikes leaked chakra.
"Jurokushou!"
She pushed her body to supply a little more force into the palms of her hands, and it complied. She felt the strain on her muscles as they began to degrade, but she couldn't let this finish, not yet…
"Sanjunishou!"
The final hit launched the man into the air to fall head-first to the ground. Hinata felt like time had slowed down as she watched him descend in front of her, his eyes filled with a horror not uncertain.
She bent over forwards, and let the chakra spikes fly from her hands, mulching his internal organs.
"Rokujuyonshou!!"
The resultant force blew the man and the scenery around him away, carving a trench roughly twenty metres long away from her.
She staggered, feeling the exertion catching up with her, but ran over to him anyway, to check that her foe was truly dead.
He wasn't, although it was obvious that he would be soon. The left side of his chest was caved in, his right arm pointing the wrong way from two different positions, and a massive gash in his abdomen revealed the white-purple rope of his intestines.
Still, he reached out his unbroken hand to her.
"Take… take care of him…" He coughed, blood pouring from over his teeth. "My father… my father died… making that seal… and his… died… to acti… vain… don't let it… be… in…"
The hand fell, and the man's eyes glassed over. Blood no longer flowed from the many cuts on his body.
Hinata felt sick as the corpse faded into shadows, wafting and bringing the smell of carrion, but at least the threat was finished. Her fatigue, however, was now catching up. As she cancelled the limit break on her muscles and stamina, the full extent overwhelmed her mind and blew away her waking mind.
And so, for the second time that day, Hinata Hyuuga passed out.
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Maybe I should actually put this in as a standalone chapter... your thoughts?