Chapter 25: The heavy heart
Her reasons for inviting Tenten over to tea weren't entirely guiltless.
"So, He still gets that Stomach ache when he is around me or Sasuke"
"I don't know, I have taken him to Sakura and she said he is as good and as healthy as a stead, she said it is maybe something psychogenic ... in short, you spoilt him too much for my taste"
Hinata stifled a laugh
"I didn't. we, Hyuugas are never spoilt and in turn never spoil anybody"
Tenten squinted her eyes whilst looking pointedly across to Hinata "Like Neji wasn't ever spoilt, neither is Hanabi or you for what matters"
Truth was while the Hyuuga's main House affairs weren't exactly the most typical nor the coziest, they did have the perks and benefits of such Prestige and its accompanying financial bestows.
"That's why you don't want to move to the Hyuuga compound"
The task of trying to convince Tenten to move to the Hyuuga's district was delegated by Hiashi and Sasuke to Hinata, being the closest to Tenten and Tama.
"So that is what you really want to tackle"
"Look, I know my father's incessant imploration has given you whiplash, but this time, I think you should comply. Even Sasuke wants us to move out of here. Already they had the impudence and impertinence to try to attack us in our village for the Byakugan. It will be much safer. There will be much watchful eyes guarding him until this whole mess … this war is over"
Tenten appeared to be contemplating the proposed by her friend
"I can protect him, you know. Rock lee and Gai sensei can help."
'I can protect him in all the ways I would have protected Neji'
"I know and they would help but think about it. Right there, it will be all the Hyuugas in addition to Your team and Sasuke, all at his beck and call. The chances are much slimmer they could approach him, let alone reach him, god forbid with all of us there"
"I don't want him to be around this demeaning council of yours, they are domineering, harsh and cruel. They would suffocate him."
"Not with Sasuke and my father around" Hinata assured aiming to quell her lingering apprehensions "Or is there something else?"
Hinata's gaze was downcast as she searched Tenten's face for another reason of Hesitance, a reason she seemed to have deciphered, to have identified and read from those fleeting signs that swiftly swept across Tenten's face.
'Too much memories there, it is hard'
"I will think about it Hinata, I promise I will try" with this Tenten placed the empty China cup on the Zataku in front of her
'His safety first'
"Now, about you and the ice prince" Hinata looked up in disbelief "How is it going?"
"For the umpteenth time, stop calling him that"
"Quite well I see" She playfully teased "Where has gone? I haven't seen him since like a million years"
"He is out, with Naruto"
"Mmmm and you, Hanabi told me you haven't been feeling well of late"
"It is nothing, nothing serious, I just feel slightly tired that's all"
"Slightly? She said you had a syncopal attack"
"I just got dizzy and nauseated, everyone gets so once in a while"
Tenten now eyed her flustered friend suspiciously, an invoked flash of vague recognition in her eyes
"You sleep well these days?"
"Like dead, even Sasuke is complaining about it"
"Hinata, since you have become intimate with Sasuke, did something occur behind schedule or got tardy or irregular or whatsoever?"
"What are you talking about?"
Tenten extended her head in exasperation
'She could be so naïve and dense sometimes'
Hinata seemed to be adding two and two together before realisation fully hit her in tow
"You think I … I am pregnant"
"I think we should get up and see Tsunade"
Naruto's voice falls on his ears, distorted and disjoint in his vegetative haze.
"Sasuke, hang on"
'I promise you someday, I will bring you back'
Something is thrumming in his ear, turbulent, fizzy, stirring in spiral currents
'Sasuke!" Naruto's voice is panicked, his eyes helplessly darting, looking around for something, someone.
His hands work autonomously, as he lifts his ailing friend, leaning him backwards against some remnant column of the once mighty sculpted stone in the valley of the end …
'Everything commenced in the valley of the end'
The beast's voice, lumbering … and … heavy floats up to the surface of his subconscious
'All of us, tailed beasts as indomitable as we are, have a bounded vision, a limited field. When the Jinchuriki is a Byakugan weilder however, we are able to see through these eyes of his, everything … circumferential … the same visual field … the same limitless sight. The beast's Chakra with a Byakugan weilder's is a dangerous combination … omnipotent. And the Chakra transformations are unpredictable. Remember Madara and his metamorphosis into Kaguya. That's why Dojutsu weilders are rarely chosen as Jinchurikis if considered at all'
The beast's eyes were transfixed on him, studying him like an exotic specimen …
'That is enough, you are in pain' It heaved, rumbled as it smiled 'Whatever seeds you have strewn across the Hyuuga lands are dangerous ones'
His journey through Kurama's mind was a tolling venture.
Naruto douses him with water, in hopes his listless body would wake up from his demented state, snap out of this heavy trance.
And he succeeds, Sasuke's eyes open sluggishly … weakly against their obstinate will to stay shut.
"Home" he gasps
It is a small tinder of ebullience that ignites slowly within her chest, unfurls and unravels ... as Tsunade's confirms their auspicious guess
'You are Pregnant'
It explodes and flutters like a thousand fireflies, like flapping the wings of a restless hummingbird carrying it through the fickle air of joy.
But then she remembers Sasuke and that vast space filled up with joy is taken up by something else:
Worry.
And when he comes, she doesn't expect him to come limp, carried and winged by Naruto.
"Naruto-kun, please summon Tsunade-sama, bring her quickly for heaven's sake" she ushers Naruto as They set him on the bed.
"All the progress we achieved with your treatment has gone to waste" She grimly muttered "You have been stressing yourself out, of late"
"Do you honestly think I will survive?" His tone is one of bitter sarcasm
She turns her head to face him, eyes stone hard as she answers
"Well, I don't know. But you have a friend out there and a wife waiting with all those things she wants to tell you. You have to try"
She summed up all the things he feared in a single statement.
The rain, pouring for most of the afternoon has stopped, sidling into small pools on the cobblestone roads he has been roaming for hours now, unsure of where to go, of what to do.
He feels cold, so utterly cold and lonely.
The earth is spinning to fast for him.
He sat there motionless, fretless after Tsunade has left, watching his friend lying in bed for a good length of time.
'I haven't known you like me that much'
'Shut up, arrogant prick'
Naruto's smile is sad, heavy and so Phoney, so fake; the fakest Sasuke has ever seen.
'Kurama here told me that you are unwell, physically unwell'
'And how did he quantify this unwell he told you?'
Naruto drew his gaze downwards; the seconds were passing heavily.
His legs forge their way to this house he used to frequent so many times, to stalk and wait around … and his hand lands heavily on the door in steady loud knocks
"Who is it? Coming in a second" she chirrups as she runs towards the door.
He is a watery mess
His hair, unruly and sticking out, has fallen flat on his eyes, his clothes are dripping and his face … it is streaked ... with red eyes betraying so much pain threatening to spill out of him
"I didn't know where else to go"
He clings onto her, like a tree anchoring him against blusterous winds
"Come in" Sakura led him inside
"There is something unsung in your eyes" He smiles as he sits up in bed, waiting for her to speak.
She is hesitant. Her lips trembling, as words floundered with trepidation on the tip of her tongue … the worst case scenarios unravelling before her very eyes
"Hinata, are you alright?"
"I … I am pregnant"
He was stunned
He kept crying without a word all while Sakura was watching him, holding him and whispering whatever
comforting words that came across her mind
"Easy here, you will be alright" she tenderly whispered.
'It is terminal' Kurama told him
It was one of those moments his mind was whitewashed, blank. His heart was beating fast, its weight tugging at his soul, bringing his entire tangible weight down a bottomless well.
A storm rages behind his eyes, and a thousand ominous thoughts he tries to drown and suffocate.
It is a sheer moment of consternation and …
"Do you want to keep this baby?"
"Do you think I would ever consider otherwise?" she incredulously replied
"It improves your chances of moving on after I am gone" His voice coming forced cold against the warmth that stung at his eyes.
For the first time, he can't brake it until he is alone, he loses control and he cries for the first time in front of her petrified form and he can't distinguish if these are tears of bliss or wistfulness.
"I am afraid; I won't have proper time to love him"
She brought him dry clothes and hot tea … even offered to cook him ramen if he wanted.
He felt grateful
"I am sorry I have crashed like this"
She offers him the brightest of smiles he had ever seen, one he would have brilliantly returned, would have made his heart leap had the circumstances been better.
"It is no problem at all, I am glad you thought of me, I am glad you came"
"Thank you, Sakura"
"You won't tell me what bothered you so much"
"It is not mine to tell"
"I understand" she quietly nodded
He departs just as the first snow of winter falls from the sky.
"I don't want to bring a child to this world, not so dissimilar from ours" he breaks down
"It won't be as similar, trust me" she tried to appease "We will make it better for him, I swear, we will take care of him"
"Our fathers and their forefathers thought so as well…"
"We are stronger, a thousand times stronger. You are stronger than your ancestors and even if otherwise, we will protect this child, you and me against all the world if we have too"
"The child will learn all what I had done, all that I can do and he will hate me … he will be ostracised like Naruto before him, like me "
"You have saved the realm and you continue to do so despite all the hell it has gotten you through, the child will be proud of you, will be as strong and as optimistic and as powerful as you, as Naruto ... even more. He will be loved, by me, by you and by all our friends ... "She takes his hand in hers "and if he or she has quite your looks I guarantee they will adored by even more"
His face relaxed a little into a very small smile.
He wants to be happy, he wants to allow himself to revel the feeling of joy and anticipation of the new upcoming life his wife is nurturing, the manifestation of one unlikely fate and the continuum of one dying line.
His child … a part of him, with the love of his life
"Look out there, it is snowing"
He stands up on unsteady feet, their conjoint hands pulling him, guiding his strides across to the windowpane of the room.
And as they marvel together at the scene unfolding before them, of the heavenly frost, the white general falling from the vast moonlit Navy skies above, unexpectedly, she feels the tiniest of weight, the lightest of caress as his hand rests on the plane of her abdomen.
Autumn was gone, winter has just begun.