A/N: The reader signed 't.k.' was wondering when the action happening after first chapter would appear. Irony... This is it, 't.k.' . Yes, the story opened with its 'nearly end'. What can I say? I always liked puzzle type stories, so sorry again for the crazy timeline at the beginning.

The war started. The other big four countries, plus the Grass Country, with whom they had made an alliance not long ago, and who accepted to remain on their side and not take part in the war, they had their own preparations to do for it.

They took care to strengthen their borders' defences. A war creates chaos and it was very important to not let this chaos reach their people. The Hyuugas were especially useful in this, due to their eyes. Hinata had to be the one planning shifts and distribute duties, so they could also have time for their usual missions, which was a very meticulous, tiresome work, keeping her inside her office for countless hours every day. Also, she'd be part of the squads, too, at least two times a week, because staying in for so long was maddening.

She did not have time to see either her friends, godson and surely not Naruto, who had more requests and duties than she had. Last six months have been madness. She and Naruto hadn't seen each other for the last two weeks. Oh, wait, they did, for like a couple minutes, when she handed him yet another pile of reports and the new shifts program for that week. That was last Monday. Oh, damn, she had to hand him the program for next week in... What day was it? Saturday, the calendar showed. So she had two days.

The dates, those she remembered. She was writing them daily, in her reports, after reading them in reports given to her by others, which she had to summarize...

Oh, wait, but wasn't, this next Sunday...? She checked the date again. Indeed, a year. That would make it a year since then. Wow... Had everything happened just a year ago? And so much things happened in the last two years... How had it been possible for so many things to happen, for so many things to change? If she was to count, she would never finish listing the many states and feelings she registered throughout all of that time.

Oh, but yes, she had to tell Neji, the next time he brings another report, he and his family should visit on Sunday. Her godchild would turn one, so she could as well procure the time to spend with him. Also, she needed to buy a present, yes. Was Neji even supposed to come today? Maybe she should send a letter instead.

Ah, and what was there left to finish, for today?

"A message from Hinata," Tenten came in, opening a letter. "It's been so strange, lately... All this crazy schedule and talking through letters...," she was telling her husband while taking a short look at the letter's contains. Neji was holding the boy, who had just been getting ready for his bath.

"What does she write?" he asked. Noboru was starting to get restless in his arms.

Tenten smiled while reading, and said, "She changed your shifts. To Monday. She shouldn't have... I wasn't even thinking she'd remember. How busy she's been lately...," she added with compassion.

"Hm?"

"She sends her best wishes for Noboru's birthday and inivites us over?"

"And she re-scheduled for this?" Neji smiled, rocking slowly the impatient child in his arms, "Sounds like something she'd do?"

"Shhh," she whispered to her son, taking him from Neji, "Now enough with protests, young boy. You need to look just perfectly for tomorrow. We'll go and visit your godmother."

"Can you believe they're getting married? Who thought things would turn out like this for Uchiha?" Tenten was excitedly telling, carefully cleaning Noboru's mouth with a handkerchief. The little boy was clumsily trying to eat one of Hinata's biscuits, his little baby-fatty hand barely managing to hold it properly.

Although the wedding's had been delayed due to the not very recent events, the event was still an actuality, still discussed, still awaited. And just that usual clatter was something to completely disturb Hinata's train of thoughts. How things turned out from what they had been expected to, or what had been... it was something which always tended to surprise her and raise new questions. About how things so easily changed. About how they could change continuously. And not necessarily for the better.

Tenten didn't notice and probably most of people wouldn't, but Neji was immediately aware of the change of thoughts and mood in Hinata. Excusing himself and his family, he told his cousin it was the time for Noboru's nap (indeed, the child was yawning, his eyes half-closed, sleepy).

While exiting, they and Hanabi crossed paths. It was a rather uncomfortable meeting. Neji bowed his head respectfully. Hanabi ignored them all and continued to walk.

"Should I ask Naruto to change it?" Tenten was asking.

"That would be a second change, already. We'd put him in trouble with the schedules. There are no free Jounin to take the shift," Neji replied.

They were whispering, sitting and talking next to Noboru's crib, where the boy had just fallen asleep - his afternoon nap.

The thing was, the two of them had forgotten that, just Friday, they had talked to Naruto for a change of shifts, because there was no one to take care of their son for Sunday. Neji had been supposed to go on a mission on Sunday (the one mission that Hinata had delayed) and be back by midnight. And, until Friday, Tenten had also had a mission on Sunday. Friday, Tenten talked to Naruto and got him to change it to Monday. And now they noth had to be left on Monday. With no one available to take care of the boy. And they realized that just when they had got home from their visit to Hinata.

The fact was they couldn't just let the child with anyone. A ninja family always has to deal with this kind of problems. They, same as their children, are always in danger.

Tenten rubbed the edges of her forehead, uncertain. "Well... How about we leave him at the Manor, then?" she proposed.

Neji didn't show himself too content about the idea.

"I know Hinata has a lot of other things to do, but there are a lot of people to take care of him, there. The fact is he'd be safe there, with her."

"Yes, but... I don't know..."

"It's the best choice," Tenten insisted.

Neji thought for a while before saying, "I'll... go and talk to her."

"Another Monday, another list to begin," Hinata sighed.

Her godson was asleep by now, she'd been told. Good. As much as she had wanted to play with him instead, she had work to do. It was already nine pm. A great part of that work should had been done by then. But then... Yesterday, there was Neji's and Tenten's visit. And then there came Naruto, just when the ones mentioned before were leaving. And they talked for quite a while. After all, it had been a long while since his last visit.

There was general silence. No voice of men in the hose or outside of it, no wind outside. Not even an owl or something. At least a locust?

Agh, but what was she even thinking of? There was no time for daydreaming... Or nightdreaming? But that's considered to be dreaming in your sleep, so... Well, then it's still daydreaming even if it's night, because... well, that's some kind of logic!

"AAHH!" a cry echoed through the house.

She sat up instantly, alarmed. That was...

"AAHH!" And then this scream. And this one was...

She ran there, cursing whoever invented such things as door, all the way there, jumping and storming and slamming.

That Monday night, Sasuke and Naruto were both staying out, in the woods, under the glittering stars, resting after a rough training session. It was a perfect way to release tension from work and , sure, to spend time together and away from the loneliness they'd both have found at home. Naruto's situation was perfectly clear. As for Sasuke, it happened often, lately, for Sakura to have night shifts. As much of an adept of loneliness he had used to be, Sasuke had also learnt that loneliness was precisely what made him no good.

They were staying in deep silence. Unlikely, Naruto was quiet lost in thoughts. And when he spoke, he spoke something just unexpected. Sasuke had been aware something had been happening with his best friend. But this...

"They say the way to love is working, building the way to a strong relationship, but... I think it goes much deeper. You have to want to be there, to just... want to be there. Nowhere else. Whether it's a house or on the battlefield... she's there with you and it becomes the only place you want to be at. Friend, love, family, home," he replied to the blonde's question.

Naruto nodded to himself. That was all? Come on, there's more to expect from the '#1 most unpredictable ninja'!

"Teme?"

"Ah?"

"I'm going to tell her."

Hanabi was lying down, on the ground, looking pale, the green seal on her forehead glowing. But how...?

Noboru, the only other present in the room, was still in his bed, awake, was just sobbing quietly, looking strangely down, at the pale young woman. How?

Hinata sat on her knees. Bewildered, she demanded her brain to send the right impulses, to give her hands a push to move, working meticulously with bare hands and chakra. Pressure on the chest. Pump in chakra. Pressure on the chest. Pump in chakra. Pressure on the chest. Pump in chakra...

Her eyes started to water, like any time she felt frustration like this. The chakra she sent kept her stable, but just as long as she pumped it. The pressure was not enough to start the heart work itself. The chakra went in, but dissipated as soon, finding nothing to sustain its work. And she couldn't, or at least did not want to picture the moment she'd have no more chakra to keep her even like this.

"Come on, Hanabi!" he heard herself shout. A shout that did not sound like her at all - too high, too demanding, too sharp.

Pressure on the chest. Pump in chakra. Pressure on the chest. Pump in chakra...

Her nerves were boiling in frustration. Her vision was blurring. But she couldn't afford to take her hands off of Hanabi to clean them, biting her lower lip to bleeding. Of all things, that couldn't be happening...

Pressure on the chest. Pump in chakra. Pressure on the chest. Pump in chakra... And it went like this for more than a couple minutes, but her chakra reserves faded each second, her faith was getting low, even though the strain went higher. And she moves her eyes to the whitening face of her sister, as her hands keep moving on the chest.

So meaningless... everything... and then death...

And then she winced, at the mixture of warm skin with powerful touch that came in contact when she pumped the chakra once again. And, once with the chakra she pumped, there went in another type of it. One she knew very well. She had felt it and used it. Back then. In the Fourth Shinobi War. A chakra not only extremely powerful, but that moulded perfectly with the one it was given to. His chakra.

And she induced the pressure once more, after that. And it was done. The chakra spread instantly, perfectly, as if it had been made for that body - so naturally. And that last pressure, even though no different from the others before, managed now to put the whole mechanism in move, that incredible mechanism we call human body. And she could finally breath out, relieved, at the sound of her sister inhaling that holy air once more.

Another wave of chakra followed, filling her almost empty chakra channels. With eyes glowing with tears and the just come power her body was barely assimilating, she looked up at him.

He was looking back at her. And he gripped her hands, that were still under his, tighter. The way he looked at her was... Could it be...?

"Thank you," she whispered. Another scene, much like this, appeared in her mind. The one lying down, dying, had been Sasuke. But then he had come, saved the day, then left further, for other impressive tasks. And, back then, she was somewhere in the background. Admiring him from afar. And now here they were, face to face. "If you had not come, it would have ended badly," she added, taking one hand out of his' grip turning on her Byakugan, making sure everything was alright with Hanabi. And, yes, she was, undoubtedly, stable.

"If you hadn't been so tenacious, it would have ended long before that," he told her instead, with that same look, she realized, as her Byakugan went off. And his gaze turned towards something behind her. She turned and sat up immediately, he other hand slipping, too, from his, as she headed to pick up Noboru.

The boy had been silent all along, even though any other one his age would simply cry his lungs out, after being through something so hard to understand for a baby. He was just looking at the scene in front of him, his little arms raised in the air, his eyes widened, as if he was realizing what had happened was because of him. Hinata thought, at first, that he'd been through a shock, after all that had happened, that got him in a state like that. But, in reality, he was perfectly conscious. He just continuously shot the people in the room questionable looks. An intriguing thing Hinata noticed, everytime he gave Hanabi that look, he also looked at his little hands, confused. This child...

"I'll take her to the hospital," Naruto said, picking Hanabi up. "It's Sakura's shift. She'll keep it a secret, for now. I'm sure - even though I can't understand yet the circumstances - that this situation is not favourable for a child in the Branch family," she heard him say, pointing out something she avoided to think of so far.

Hinata turned to look at him again - that look in his eyes was still there - and nodded.

"Hinata?"

"Yes?"

"You should just know that from now on I... will be always there. And never let go of you."

Hinata narrowed her eyes as she watched him leave, holding the child carefully. All these left her simply flustered. She rocked the little child slowly and saw him soon falling asleep. Whatever Naruto's words and look from earlier meant, one only thing was sure about it - whenever Naruto made a promise, he kept it, whatever it took.

But another thought struck her. Intuitively, she turned on the Byakugan and had a look through the rooms around, above and under her. In the hall under that room, another pair of Byakugan looked above.

He had seen it - or at least a part of it. And he had waited for her to notice him, too, so she gets to know he probably knew everything - the Brach family's Elder.

A/N: It did not turn out the way I had it in my head ...the first time. But there's been these things going on lately... and I've totally lost my will to write, really. I had to push myself badly to get to write this, even though the chapter had been planned already. But... I just started to think that maybe I can't write at all. I don't expect the amateur writing I do in here to be something brilliant, but I just started to believe what I do is actually bad. Well... but then, there are people still reading this... I think. So I should finish it, because abandon sounds so badly, no matter what you are linking it to...