Hinari
Chapter 36
Sakura Hanamoto
Temari Sabaku Nara and Kiraxsama: Thanks for your support guys. I really really appreciate it.
Sakura woke up several weeks later to find the room spinning. She groaned and stumbled across the hall to the bathroom where she proceeded to throw up what was left of the previous night's dinner. It wasn't long before she realized what it was. Being an experienced medic and a mother, only confirmed it.
"Sakura, breakfast is ready." Sasuke said. When she didn't answer, he pushed the door open a tad. "You okay?" He asked.
"I-I think I'm pregnant." She said. Sasuke took a second to take in his wife's revelation, then, he scooped her up and spun about a couple times.
"That's great." He said as he set her back down. Sakura nodded. Sakura knelt over the toilet bowl and threw up again.
"I'll be down in a second." She said. Sasuke nodded and left. Sakura stood and waited until the room didn't spin as much. She walked through the house and came to the kitchen. Sasuke was serving Satoko while Takuro ate very slowly.
"What's wrong Takuro?" Sasuke asked. Takuro shook his head and went on eating.
XxXxXxX
Hinari sat at home, avoiding going outside as much as possible. Since snapping at Hitomi, she'd inadvertently threatened four other villagers in the past four weeks. Like that night many weeks before, she sat at the table with a blank scroll before her and a pen in her hand. But unlike that last time, she was able to write, and she wrote steadily and easily. When she was done, she rolled the scroll up and stuffed it in her pocket.
'I guess I can try and apologize to the baker. It was my own fault he yelled at me.' She thought standing and heading to the door. The weather was warming up rather quickly, the strange weather patterns never ceasing in the country. All the snow had long since melted and turned to mush and evaporated in the sun. Now, in early February, and few days from Takuro's thirteenth birthday, she headed out.
"Excuse me sir." Hinari began slowly. The baker had finished setting out some fresh rolls on the shelf when she entered. He jumped back and pressed himself against the wall as far away from her as possible.
"Please don't hurt me." He expected Hinari to lunge at him, but instead, she bowed as low as her spine would allow.
"I'm very sorry for frightening you before." She said. Hinari then straightened and looked up at the man.
"Oh, uh, apology accepted." He said. He looked down at a loaf of bread that he'd just set out and grabbed it. He put it in a bag and handed it to her. "Here you go, it's on me."
"For me?" Hinari was astonished. No one, except for Ayame, had willingly given her food before. The baker nodded. Hinari took the loaf from him.
"Thank you sir." She bowed again and ran out of the bakery. He breathed a sigh of relief and watched her through the window.
'She's not such a bad kid I guess.' He thought.
XxXxXxX
"Well, let's get this over and done with." Sakura mumbled. She held Hinari's vial of blood up to the light. Sakura pulled out a fresh slid and allowed a drop of blood to land on it. Placing a slip over the blood, she slid it onto the platform of the microscope. Sakura unconsciously had her hand on her stomach while she worked. She still wasn't sure if she really was pregnant, but so far, she had all the signs of it. Sakura leaned forward to look into the microscope when there was a knock on the door. "Who is it?"
"I have some forms for you to sign, Sakura-sama." A nurse spoke through the door.
"Leave it on my desk, I'll sign them later." Sakura said. She heard the nurse walk down the hall.
Sakura peered through the microscope, adjusting the lens so she can see Hinari's blood cells clearly. What she saw shocked her. Sakura ran out of the room and found Shizune.
"Shizune-san!"
"What is it Sakura?"
"Can you get me Tsunade-sama please, I need her help with something." Sakura requested. Shizune dropped the pen she had been holding, it had been years since Sakura had needed Tsunade's assistance with something. Whatever it was, it had to be extremely important. Shizune immediately ran off to find the woman.
XxXxXxX
Shikatarou walked down the street heading towards his team's training grounds when he sensed movement to his right. He turned his head to see, but whatever it was, it was gone already. He kept on moving, but the sound of endless giggling was starting to annoy him. He moved the band that kept his eye patch in place and scratched his forehead. He spun around, and sure enough, there they were. A legion of fangirls. He stared in awe and fear. At first he thought they were after someone else, but the screams of, "Shika-kun!" told him that he was the target. He backed up a step, but they continued to advance. Then, he turned and ran for his life.
Tsubaki paused when she felt the thundered of many feet on the ground. Looking around she spotted the source and nearly collapsed in laughter.
"Tsubaki! Tsubaki, help!" Shikatarou ran behind his sister and hid. "Help me?" He begged weakly.
"It'll cost you." She said, grinning.
"Fine, just do something!" He shrieked out, his voice cracking as it reached an unnatural pitch. Tsubaki's pulled out her fan, and with a powerful swing, she blew every single fangirl away. When they were gone, Shikatarou straightened and ran his fingers through his hair. "Thanks shorty."
"Now for my payment." Tsubaki grinned wickedly. "You have to do all my chores for the rest of the week." She said. Shikatarou groaned.
"Fine." He slumped his shoulders and stuffed his hands in his pockets and walked away. 'I hate fangirls.' He thought. Then he remembered, Valentine's Day was in about two weeks. 'Oh god I'm not looking forward to that!'
XxXxXxX
"Sakura, what did you need me for?" A tall blonde woman entered the lab, her brown eyes sweeping around the room only for a moment before focusing on the pink haired woman.
"Take a look at this." Sakura indicated the microscope and moved over for her former teacher to look into the lens. Tsunade looked at it for a couple moments before staring at Sakura in amazement.
"Whose blood is this?" Tsunade asked as she turned back to the microscope.
"It's Hinari's." Sakura replied. What Tsunade was seeing was incredible. Whatever had gotten into Hinari's system, it was running wild.
"This is incredible. Whatever this foreign substance is, it's eating away at her normal chakra." Tsunade leaned against the counter. "Has she become more snappish lately, or is she using the Kyuubi's chakra more?"
"According to what Takuro saw, her short fuse has gotten even shorter, and she scares the villagers with threats every time they insult her." Sakura said.
"This is bad; we have to get that thing out of her system before it destroys her and the whole village as well." Sakura nodded.
XxXxXxX
Hinari moved through the forest, pausing to study any interesting plant she came across. Umi was with her, and she would explain the plants properties to the girl. Hinari took in the information like a sponge and logged it away somewhere in her memory for future reference.
"Umi, are there any plants that can make a person berserk?" Hinari asked. Umi thought for a moment.
"Not that I'm aware of. If there is one, it's not native to the region, I'd know of it if it were. Why do you ask?"
"Just curious." Hinari responded. Umi nodded, still slightly suspicious. Hinari paused and looked up at the sun. The sun was beginning to set. "I better get back now before they close the gates." Hinari made her way through the forest, headed back to the village.
XxXxXxX
Orochimaru was not happy. In fact he was pissed. One couldn't tell though, he was above showing his anger openly. But everyone knew he was pissed. They could feel it. The only visible sign of his anger was the body that lay at his feet. The unfortunate boy had stupidly questioned an order he was given. Kabuto appeared to take the body away.
"Kabuto!" Kabuto snapped up to face Orochimaru. "Tell me, what have you deduced from your autopsy of Iwahiko's remains?"
"Whoever he was up against was powerful, someone with an incredible amount of chakra, and also very strong physically. On his dismembered arm, I found traces of teeth marks. This has told me that his arm was ripped off, rather brutally." Kabuto said.
"Anything else?"
"His entire kunai holster was empty; he used all of his senbon against his opponent."
"All of them you say? Does that include his poisoned one?" Kabuto nodded.
"I believe that his opponent may have been the Kyuubi's Jinchuuriki." At this Orochimaru began laughing.
"It's perfect! That poison was designed by me after all." Orochimaru kept laughing.
"If I may ask, what does that poison do?" Kabuto asked.
"That poison is made specifically to battle against a Jinchuuriki. It is undetectable by the Bijuu. The poison gets into the body's systems, circulatory, and chakra coils and breaks them down. Because the chakra coils are being broken down, the Jinchuuriki has difficulty keeping the Bijuu's chakra under control. It will make them go mad, release the Bijuu's full power until they die." Orochimaru was rather proud of himself. Creating such a poison. He had a strong feeling that not even Tsunade could create an antidote, and even if she did, it'd be far too late and the effects would be irreversible.
XxXxXxX
Sakura and Tsunade worked late into the night. They were determined to find an antidote so they could give it to Hinari.
"During the War, I was known to be able to be able to take a poison apart, find a suitable antidote, make it, and administer it quickly. But this, this is impossible. Not even Chiyo of Suna could have made something like this." Tsunade muttered. Sakura nodded. She had worked with a good deal of poisons herself, and this was difficult to work with.
"What if we-," Sakura began, but couldn't finish. She didn't want to think about what would happen if they failed to find a solution. Tsunade was scribbling some notes down on a notebook. She picked it up and read over her notes and gasped. "What is it?"
"This poison, based on what I've observed, it's like it was created specifically to be put to use against a Jinchuuriki." Tsunade said. Sakura winced, she never liked that term. Like Naruto had once said, it was an inhumane description of a human being.
"What do you mean by that?"
"Look at this. If it could be detected by the Kyuubi, it would have found the poison by now." Tsunade said.
"That's true, but we can't be sure of anything else until we bring Hinari in and examine her." Sakura said. Tsunade nodded. She looked at the clock.
"This can't wait, can you get her now?" Sakura nodded.
"I'll be back as quickly as possible." Sakura hurried out the door.
XxXxXxX
Hinari moaned and leaned against the door. 'It hurts!' Her nails dug into her stomach. It wasn't her stomach that hurt, the seal was burning, and it caused pain to shoot through her whole body. She fell to her knees, her arms wrapped tightly around her midriff. A wave of pain washed over her and she cried out. She buried her face into the hard wood floor and bit down on her lip, drawing blood. For a moment, the pain ceased and she managed to stand. Looking into the mirror in front of her, she saw that her eyes had turned blood red; her canines had gotten even longer than they already were, and her whisker marks were thicker, more prominent.
"AHH!" Hinari screamed as a fresh pulse of red hot pain ran through her, starting from her stomach and going outward. She fell to the ground again, tears streaming from her eyes.
"Hinari? Hinari, are you awake?" Hinari recognized the voice as Sakura's.
"S-Sakura-san!" Hinari called. She reached for the doorknob, but the activity made the pain even worse than before. She screamed again. Hinari heard the wood groan against a strong impact. She covered her head just as the door exploded and Sakura stepped inside. Upon seeing Hinari curled up on the ground, and thrashing her legs, Sakura was by her side in a second.
"Hinari, Hinari, where does it hurt?" Sakura asked.
"Every…" Hinari gasped, as she ground her teeth to distract herself from the pain. "…where." She finished. Sakura picked Hinari up and rushed her to the hospital. Hinari struggled the whole way there, not because she didn't want to go, but because she couldn't control her body anymore.
"Hold still Hinari, please." Sakura begged the girl. Hinari could hear her, but couldn't obey. They arrived and Sakura called for a gurney. Hinari was laid down onto it, but nearly rolled off in her thrashing. "Strap her down!" Sakura commanded. It took three nurses, plus two large doctors to keep Hinari down while they strapped her to the gurney. Hinari did her best not to struggle against the bonds that her down. She was wheeled to an empty room.
"Get some morphine into her!" One doctor ordered.
"No!" The nurses stared at Sakura in surprise. "She's been poisoned; anything else will make it worse. Get me a Hyuuga." A nurse nodded and ran to find the only Hyuuga medic in the whole building.
"You called for me Sakura-sama?" A young medic, only in her late teens arrived.
"Ah, Futami, please, tell me what her chakra coils looks like." Futami nodded.
'Byakugan!' After a moment, Futami reeled back in shock.
"What did you see?"
"Her-her chakra coils, they've nearly collapsed completely." Futami responded. Sakura turned to Hinari who was still crying out, attempting to free herself from the bonds that held her down.
"Get me Tsunade, now!" Sakura bellowed. Futami rushed out of the room, only to run into Tsunade as she turned from the door. Tsunade watched the Hyuuga run off, not realizing who she had bumped into.
"Sakura, what's wrong with her?"
"Her chakra coils are about to collapse entirely." Sakura attempted to mend the damage, but it was too much. "What do we do?" Sakura asked. As if on cue, Umi appeared at the door.
"Uchiha-san, I think I can help." Umi said, jumping up onto the bedside table.
"How?"
"Earlier, Hinari asked me if there was a plant that could make one go berserk. I told her that I wasn't certain, but I hadn't though enough on the question. There is one herb that can in a concentrated enough quantity." Umi explained.
"What is it?"
"It's called Snake's Fang. You can only find it on the border between Fire and Rice Country." Umi said. "If my siblings and I work quickly enough, we may be able to find it. You can develop an antidote with it."
"Do it, and as quickly as you can." Tsunade said. Umi nodded, jumped off the table and ran away at full speed.
"Hinari, listen to me, Hinari." Hinari turned to Sakura; she still held the features of a fox.
"Sakura-san, it hurts so much." She murmured. Sakura nodded.
"I know, I know, we'll find a cure, we promise. No matter what, we won't let you die." Sakura pressed a wet cloth to Hinari's forehead, cooling her hot skin. Hinari managed to somehow fall asleep, despite the pain, and she continued to cry. "What should we do if we can't find a remedy?" Sakura asked.
"Don't think like that Sakura." Tsunade responded. "We can't give up hope, if she's anything like her father; she wouldn't want that until the very last second." Sakura nodded.
"Hinari's been full of miracles; perhaps, she can pull another one out of thin air." Sakura muttered as she watched the moon travel across the sky.
XxXxXxX
"Umi! Umi! Is this it?" Tetsujin jumped up and down excitedly. Umi ran to her brother's side and studied the plant carefully.
"Yes, this is it!" Umi grabbed a mouthful and took off back to the village. The others not too far behind.
"Faster, we can't let Hinari die!" Akagane ordered. The six took off as fast as they could. 'We're comin' Hinari, just hold on for as long as you can.' He thought worriedly.
XxXxXxX
Sakura and Tsunade sat in Sakura's office, reviewing the notes they'd taken on the poison's properties. Hopefully, Umi would return quickly enough for them to have an adequate amount of time to prepare the antidote. They looked up when a nurse opened the door and Umi entered. She jumped onto the desk and dropped the herbs on the table.
"This is it." She said. Sakura and Tsunade looked at the plant. It had a thick stem, and long narrow leaves that really did look like a snake's fang. Sakura picked it up and headed to the lab where Hinari's blood sample still sat under a microscope. She began rummaging through cabinets, pulling out supplies as she went along.
"We have to be quick; each second we waste mean's Hinari's closer and closer to dying. Tsunade-sama, could you please extract the poison from Hinari so that we can figure out exactly what we need to make. Umi, I'm going to assume you know enough about this plant to help me sufficiently." Tsunade and Umi nodded. Tsunade left and collected a few nurses as she went. She had them prepare what was necessary to extract the poison.
She came to Hinari's room to find the girl awake again, and breathing heavily.
"Hinari, Hinari, I need to tell me where the poison entered your body." Tsunade said. Hinari winced and was able to lift her hand enough. She pointed just above her stomach. Tsunade nodded and carefully removed the straps that held Hinari down. Hinari was no longer thrashing, she didn't have the energy to. Tsunade carefully removed Hinari's shirt. "Hold her down." Tsunade ordered. Two nurses gripped each of Hinari's thin shoulders and held her down to the bed. Tsunade pressed her hands to the basin filled with water beside her, and carefully extracted what poison she could from where the opening had once been.
XxXxXxX
Umi and Sakura worked together on the antidote, not knowing what to look for. Sakura sighed as they scroll exploded with a puff of smoke. "Another failure. We're running out of ideas." Just as she said this, Tsunade came through the door, carrying a small vial filled with the poison she'd managed to extract from Hinari.
"I got what I could, but its spread throughout her body far too thoroughly for me to get it all." She said.
"It's good enough. Hand it to me." Sakura took the vial and opened it. She studied it carefully. Umi gave it a sniff.
"Yuck, this thing is highly concentrated. It's pure Snake's Fang. There's nothing added to it, except a large amount of very evil chakra. Whoever made it must be like the embodiment of evil."
"Orochimaru," Sakura whispered.
"What?" Tsunade looked at her former student incredulously.
"Sasuke's been investigating a rumor of him somehow being alive. It was confirmed when Satoko and Hitomi were kidnapped. He's alive, and I have very little doubt that he targeted Hinari for this." Sakura explained as she crushed the plants in a mortar. "Umi, tell me if I've got too much."
"That's enough there, do you have any Foxglove?" Umi asked. Sakura thought for a moment, and then hurried to a cabinet on the other side of the room. Yanking it open, she pulled out a small container filled with the plant. "Crush two leaves and add it to the mixture, and then, boil it. Strain the leaves. It'll be faster if you just inject Hinari with it." Umi said. Sakura did as she was told.
Once she strained the remainder of the leaves from the mixture, she filled a small eyedropper and squeezed a drop onto a fresh scroll. It hissed and sizzled in reaction.
"It worked?" Sakura stared. "It worked! We did it! Thank you Umi!" Sakura picked the fox up and hugged her.
"We're not done yet. We still have to give it to her." Tsunade interrupted. Sakura nodded. She filled a syringe and headed for the door. She pulled it open and heard a crash and scream. They followed the noise to Hinari's room. A nurse leaned near the door.
"What happened?" Sakura demanded.
"I was putting a fresh shirt on her when she woke up and jumped through the window!" The nurse cried, pointing to the broken glass. Umi jumped to the window ledge.
"Come on! Hinari must have realized what was happening to her so she decided to leave before any innocent bystanders got hurt!" Neither of the experienced medic-nin could argue with the logic. Sakura found Shizune.
"Shizune-san, wake the Hokage and tell him what's going on. We're going to need support." Sakura said as she and Tsunade ran out of the hospital, following Umi. Shizune nodded and ran to get the Hokage. 'Hinari, don't worry, we're coming now Hinari, we can save you for sure.' Sakura thought.
Hurray, chapter done! This one gave me some grief; I started over a couple times to get it right. Anyway, hope you enjoyed. Oh and by the way, I will be having a time skip and this story is about half done, storyline wise. There might be another two chapters after this, maybe only one, I don't know yet. Review, and tell me what you thought. Hinari's condition will be explained fully next chapter, I swear.
"Mom! Dad!" Tsubaki came running to the group. "We've got trouble."
"What is it?" Temari asked.
"The whole freaking village is up at the Hokage Tower, they're demanding for Hinari's immediate execution!" Tsubaki declared. The adults tensed up. Takuro's hold on Hinari tightened defensively.
"What should we do?" Sai asked.
"We head over there, now; we have to find out what the hell they want." Tsunade said. "Don't let Hinari go boy, protect her with your life if they choose to attack her." Takuro nodded. He looked down at Hinari; she was staring at the ground.
"Don't worry Hinari; I won't let them hurt you." He whispered in her ear.
"Yeah, no one gets near our best friend without having to go through us." Tsubaki added.