A/N: We are here! In the last stretch! It's the day before Tenten's birthday (we're only an hour or so off) - 8 March 2020. And I am so glad to be here. If you haven't read Syn recently, I'd recommend a quick re-read because I have made some edits, and I'm not going to run through the exposition and the OCs again, because flow. See you at the end of the chapter!

Syndicate

By Tanya Lilac

Chapter Twenty Four – Divide and Conquer

11:34 January 17. Hitomi's apartment, Sendai.

Tenten woke, not to the sound of her alarm, but a knock on her door. She blinked, instantly alert, and reached for the gun she kept in her bedside drawer before she realised where she was. It wasn't her room, but rather, Neji's. She started, feeling disoriented, realising that she had been dreaming of her apartment in Tokyo.

"Neji?" It was Hitomi. She was wearing a black button up shirt with a tuxedo collar, tucked into high waisted pants. Layers of fine necklaces poured down her neck, stones shining against the silver of her unbound hair.

Tenten sat up in the bed, gathering the blankets around her chest.

"You're fully clothed," Hitomi said flatly.

Tenten said nothing, looking away. Neji's jacket wasn't on the back of his chair. Where had he gone?

"Where's my cousin?"

"… Not here. I thought you could tell who was on the other side of the door without seeing my face."

Hitomi gave her a wry smile. "You're as helpful as I thought you'd be. Want to get breakfast?"

Tenten checked her phone to find it was dead. She sighed and plugged it into the charger on the bedside table and glanced up at the clock. "I'd say we're closer to lunch than anything."

"That's not a no," Hitomi said. "Let's go. Wear what you like. I'm leaving in twenty minutes."

"Perfect."

Twenty minutes later, Tenten followed Hitomi into the lift, which they rode down to the car park. Hitomi turned, presumably to give her outfit another scrutinising look, and Tenten straightened as she walked.

"I didn't know my cousin liked lavender. What's with this white contrast collar?"

Tenten sighed. She had decided against using any of the pieces in her stash of disguises and other work clothes she had left in Neji's wardrobe, eschewing them for the business shirt she was now wearing, tucked into a pair of navy linen shorts, complete with obligatory black stockings; a standard Miyako outfit.

"I don't know, I just found it. I didn't have any clean shirts because I wasn't expecting to stay the night." She stretched and yawned, flexing her knuckles. "Is Okuchi not joining us today?"

Hitomi gave her a surprised look.

"His shoes were in the entrance when I came over," Tenten said, shrugging. A car engine started and she turned to find a middle aged man in a crisp suit, white gloves and all, waiting for them. "You can't drive?" she asked, arching an eyebrow.

"No, and I don't intend to learn. Are you coming?"

They got into the car and the conversation resumed after Hitomi told her chauffeur where to go.

"So you have no idea where Neji is today?"

"I'm his partner, not a shadow," Tenten replied. Neji had asked her to drop by last night to run some ideas by her, and it had turned into a long discussion about suspects and motives. It was all speculative, however, and he had successfully retrieved another sample of Lucia, in its powdered form, from Kazuma. If it matched up with the pills they had found in Tokyo, it was going to be very strong evidence in their favour, which could be confirmed if they found anything on their mission tomorrow night. He was probably organising for a courier to run it back to Konoha.

"It troubles you that you don't know where he is," Hitomi said. Tenten turned to find Hitomi sitting comfortably back into the seat, staring out the window. Hitomi sighed and met her gaze. "Am I right? You two seem … very close, even though you say you're just partners."

"We were team mates, ever since a long time ago," Tenten said quietly, knowing what she was asking. "He is one of a small group of people who know me best, and vice versa. It's not a secret … how we feel – felt, about each other."

"What changed?"

"We both did," Tenten said, turning away and not sure why she was telling Hitomi about her feelings. Perhaps she'd just been waiting to talk to someone about it, someone who wasn't Neji. She definitely couldn't talk to Daichi about it, obviously, nor Suzune.

"And now?"

Silence fell, and Hitomi seemed to think about prodding some more, before leaving the her alone. There would be plenty of time to talk over lunch. The car pulled up in front of a house-turned-café in a residential area, on the corner of two quiet streets. The small two-storey house was whitewashed, lace curtains in the windows and a chalkboard sign in the shape of a cat detailing its specials. Tenten arched an eyebrow. "You got that dressed up to come here?"

"I'm usually overdressed to everything I go to," Hitomi smiled. "I've stopped caring. Now, are you coming? Their cheese scones are fantastic."

Tenten followed the Hyuuga into the café, and the bell above the door chimed brightly to announce their entrance. A middle aged man directed them to a booth in a quiet corner, past mothers gossiping over babies and black coffee, and an older couple on a date – a frail looking recent divorcee with long, thin hair, brilliantly red lips, wearing powder at least three shades too pale for her skin, and an overweight man with slicked back hair, a thick gold chain around his neck, and a large signet ring – who was probably into petty crime. After a quick glance at the very small menu, Tenten ordered sandwiches with lemon tea and Hitomi got the cheese scone set with fig jam and black tea.

The waiter left them and Hitomi sat patiently, as Tenten stared at her expressionlessly. What were they even doing here?

"Did you bring me here to talk about Neji?" Tenten asked, as comprehension dawned. "Or why I came to Sendai?"

"Mmm," Hitomi thought about it. "Probably both. Really, I just wanted the food. Come on, lighten up, Inoue." She paused, testing about the surname. "I guess that works. So we can dance about and play the icebreaking games but I imagine we're a bit past that. And we do have some people in common. We can talk about them, if you don't want to talk about yourself…"

"It's nice weather we're having today," Tenten said, blinking once.

"Yes, it's always nice this time of year," Hitomi said without missing a beat. She poured cups of tea from the tea pot a waitress had deposited on the table as soon as she saw them head over to the booth. "But really, how long have you known my cousin? I'm guessing seven years now, since I know he would have been sent off to that summer program like a majority of the Hyuuga progeny."

Tenten didn't bother to correct her assumption – it was closer to ten years. "We've known each other a long time, I'll leave it at that."

"And there haven't been any other girls in his life, I'd imagine, not with his personality and … career choice. So you were the one, then. The reason why our engagement was dissolved," Hitomi mused. "You might not have known it at the time, but we were engaged, up until about six or seven years ago."

"Something he conveniently forgot to mention at the time," Tenten muttered under her breath. But the news was surprising. The Hyuuga family, relenting in the face of … youthful romance, as Lee would have put it?

"There was a plot," Hitomi continued, ignoring her, "to dethrone my cousins Hinata and Hanabi, after Neji and I were to be wed. The official story is that my mother was doing it for the money. The company is worth a few billion American dollars. However, the heart of the matter is something far more … complex. My mother wanted to overthrow the power structures that continue to pervade the family."

"The Head and the Branch," Tenten murmured.

"He's told you then. That was why Hizashi-jii agreed – he, too fought against his fate. My mother saw that unifying the two halves would be the first step towards eventually having more power to make more decisions about the Hyuuga family; decisions she believed Hiashi wasn't strong enough to make, like forbidding outside marriages and encouraging more political activity, not just being involved with the shadows in Konoha and a multi-billion dollar private conglomerate. She wanted the Hyuuga name to be one of political strength and power, and not just commercially, as it had once been in Japan, centuries ago. I doubt Neji even knows this much." Hitomi sighed. "But of course, my mother was at the heart of her schemes and we had to dance along. Our marriage, if it had gotten that far, would have been a front. Neji doesn't know, of course, but I was a marionette, slowly but surely cutting my strings ... with his father's help."

"You knew Hizashi?" Tenten asked, her eyebrows lifting.

"Yes, Hizashi-jii was my mentor, along with Yuuhi Kurenai, at first," Hitomi said, her gaze turning to the window. There wasn't much to be seen beyond the lace curtains that offered them scant privacy. "Even though we would have been quite a considerable force of power – literally – in the clan, my mother believed I would always answer to her."

"She didn't know you very well, it seems," Tenten said quietly.

"Oh, no, she did," Hitomi said ruefully. "Even now, I am still my mother's daughter. I am what she made me. A political machine. I keep people of power very close to me, I gather secrets, I watch my back… and help others when it suits me."

They fell silent as the waiter returned with their orders. Tenten waited until he was out of earshot.

"So why are you helping us? Why did you want to rejoin Konoha?"

"Like I said, I want to prove that my friends are innocent," Hitomi said, as she cut her scone open. It was freshly baked, and the steam rose temptingly from within. "In proving them innocent, I maintain my life here, with my … with Shinji and Hiro, Michiru, Fumiko…"

Tenten realised that they were probably the first and only friends Hitomi had ever had. She gathered from Neji's retellings that Hitomi had been severely lonely as a child, and had only been introduced to her peers after her mother had witnessed Hitomi coming fully into her psychic powers, to use her as a spy, reading people's emotions. It was likely that everyone would have shunned her, even with 'permission' to interact with them.

"And that is my story," Hitomi said quietly. "Now, what's yours?"

Tenten sighed, and took a bite of one of her sandwiches to stall for time. They were an assortment of dainty little finger sandwiches; this one had sliced cucumber in it. She regretted not taking Hitomi's recommendation, and finished the rest of it. "What do you want to know?" Not that she had asked Hitomi to tell her story in the first place.

"Well, what the story is with you and my cousin, I guess. I'm intrigued by your story. My mother deemed him 'unsuitable' because he fell for you, so naturally, I'm curious. How did it happen?"

"The way all love stories happen," Tenten said. "By chance. We were assigned to the same team, and that was that. Our other team mate became something more like a brother, and Neji … was just Neji. We were … together from the first year we started working together properly, after high school finished."

"Together?" Hitomi pressed, spreading jam onto the second half of the scone and cutting it into neat quarters.

"Like you and Okuchi, we didn't label anything," Tenten said dryly. "I didn't realise the implications at the time, especially when ..."

"He was officially recognised as an heir and fast tracked through the company," Hitomi finished for her. "That was three years ago now," she said with a frown. "You were together for a good five years then, and nothing?"

"Nope," Tenten said. "And don't ask me if I had seen it coming, or what kind of future I'd had in mind, because I have no clue."

Hitomi smiled. "Of course you did," she said. "Let me guess, if you'd had the choice, you would have wanted the white picket fence in some foreign country and for Neji to mow the lawn."

The brunette almost dropped her sandwich and her jaw, but settled with looking away, discomfited. "Something like that," she mumbled. "But I don't regret those years."

"Or are you just saying that? What did he say when he left, three years ago?"

Tenten swallowed with difficulty and stirred her lemon tea, stalling for time once more. She hadn't talked to anyone about this, not Lee, Sasuke or even Ino. The memory came, unbidden, as many of her recollections did. The lock on her box of memories was broken and Lucia had smashed right through them. For the past two and a half weeks, words and triggers, mentioned casually, had brought so many things crashing back into her present. She was grateful for Neji's help in their training, but not so grateful for this.

"I've been recognised legally as one of the heirs to the Hyuuga conglomerate, in honour of my father's … contribution and sacrifice to the family," Tenten quoted in a flat voice. She could remember it now; they were standing on a rooftop in the rain. She had been assigned to be the sniper and Neji her spotter, as they watched over the Foreign Affairs Minister on his overseas tour to America.


Spring, three years ago. New York, USA.

"I'm … leaving Konoha."

Her thoughts shifted away from herself. "Lee? Gai-sensei?"

"… Everyone knows."

Tenten exhaled shakily. She had been the last to find out. Hot, angry tears welled up in her eyes, and Neji's gaze softened with guilt.

"I wanted to tell you in person, because …"

Because she was the one who knew everything else – the one he had turned to in moments of darkness, when he had completely opened up to her in bitterness and frustration at his own powerlessness, against fate and against his family. Neji cleared his throat and reached for her hand but she snatched her hand away, crossing her arms so he couldn't try again. There was no comfort in any of this.

"Hiashi … told me everything about my father, about how it had been his idea to be the decoy, that it had all been arranged in secret so no one would know the difference," Neji said, his hand falling back to his side. He did not reach for her again. "I … I believed my father had been forced into it this whole time, as his duty had demanded … but now … now, they want me back in. I'm going to learn how to lead the company, and work with Hinata-sama and Hanabi… they want me to leave Konoha so I can work full time."

"Do you have a choice?"

Neij's silence was enough of an answer. "Divide and conquer," Tenten whispered, still looking at him. It felt like she was having an out of body experience. Was Neji really telling her that he was leaving Konoha, or that he was leaving her? Why was her heart pounding in her ears? Why did she feel nauseated? "When are you leaving?"

"This is my last mission," he confessed. "I specifically requested to be your spotter so I could tell you." They paused awkwardly. "Tenten, I'm so-"

"Congratulations," Tenten said. "Now you don't have to worry about killing your cousins one by one in demonstration matches for interns. It must be nice, having a family; I guess they can forgive a lot of things like that."

Neji's jaw tightened. "That was a long time ago."

"Yeah, I guess they've moved past it. I'm happy for you," Tenten said a little too quickly, finally picking up the aluminium case which held her rifle. Why couldn't things be as simple as they had been half an hour ago? She hadn't needed to reduce any targets, but they had been in complete sync. Now, there was only a feeling of dissonance that left her feeling hollow. He had made his decision a long time ago, she knew. That's why he was so … unaffected. He knew she was saying all of these things to provoke him and make him upset, but he was taking it all, wordlessly, without complaint or retaliation. "Let's go. The van's waiting downstairs."

She strode past him and opened the rooftop access door without looking to see if he was following. It was suddenly so clear. She expected nothing less of the Neji she had come to know, the one she had worked beside all these years. In their public lives, they were partners. He watched her back and she watched his. Behind closed doors … she had always been a distraction, someone to confide his problems in. Once those problems went away, he hadn't needed her anymore. He always left without waking her up, never stayed the night. Never could, or never wanted to. And now, finally, he had a ticket out. A get out of jail free card – he could leave Konoha, and have something waiting for him on the other side. Family and a normal life. Perhaps not even that – it was probably better than normal. He wouldn't have to worry about half the things she'd worry about if she quit her job.

"Tenten … I want you to come with me," he said hesitantly. "Please … just…" The rain had eased up and now his words were punctuated by the sounds of stray drops of water running off the lip of the small shelter above the door, falling into puddles at their feet. He'd never asked her for anything before, not like this.

"And be what? Your girlfriend? Your bodyguard?" Tenten demanded, dropping her case and whirling around to face him with eyes that blazed with resentment and anger. He flinched. "No, Neji, I won't spend the rest of my life watching your back for you as you face the spotlight. It's not me your family wants, it's you. I decided my path long ago, and this is apparently where we split."

"I didn't want to make this difficult."

"You are having a difficult time telling me that you're leaving?" Tenten spat. "Did you agonise over your decision when you first heard about this, months ago? No? I wouldn't ask you to choose me over your family, Neji. That's not what I'm asking."

"You know I would have wanted you. I would have picked both of you!" Neji said, raising his voice above the rain drops. "What are you asking me then?"

"Did you ever even…" she couldn't bring herself to ask, or even say the word. She couldn't bring herself to believe that the years they had spent together, but not together, had been a lie. Spies weren't allowed love, but this was probably as close as it got. If he had truly loved her, perhaps he wouldn't be leaving her now. Selfishness blossomed within her before she could squash it, wrestle it into a box and forget.

Suddenly, Tenten felt exhausted. No, this was his family. He had found a place that was not at her side, and all this was, was her having trouble accepting it. People moved on in life – and it was time for their paths to diverge. There was no point in trying to argue against it, because she had told the truth – she wouldn't make him choose, because he'd already decided. Resignation sapped her anger, and her emotions drained out of her. "Forget it," she whispered, finally opening the door.


Hitomi watched her carefully as she lapsed into silence. The moment stretched and Hitomi daintily ate another quarter of her scone and sipped her Darjeeling tea.

"And that was it?" she prodded, finally, setting her cup down. "He just told you that he was leaving?"

Tenten gave her a hard look, her mouth set in a firm line. A bold move. "More or less."

"So what's happening between you two now?"

"It's … complicated." Another sigh. She hadn't talked to anyone about this.

"Because there's someone else in the picture?" Hitomi guessed. "Or because of your history? Knowing my cousin, and our family, I'd imagine … he did his best to cut you off completely in the years you were apart, and maybe vice versa. Your type tends to keep things neat, in boxes – it's either in or it's out."

Tenten knew the surprise was showing on her face, affirming the Hyuuga's well educated guess. "Did you hear about him … getting shot last year?"

"Yes, as a matter of fact, I did. Robbery gone wrong or something," Hitomi said. "It caused quite a stir. People don't normally have possession of guns, do they?"

"No, they don't," Tenten replied. "It could have been anything from a robbery to an assassination attempt. It was sloppy. No one knows why but the guy who had entered his apartment had been carrying a sub-automatic with a silencer. A sub-automatic machine gun," she repeated. "What do these people think? This isn't some mafia story set in the eighties."

"Did Neji tell you about it? Or did they get to the bottom of the story, at least?"

"The investigation was closed a week later; turns out someone had actually ordered a hit on him, some … internationally wanted crime boss. Neji had insulted him in front of his wife the week prior in some shady business meeting… not that the Hyuuga are delving into international crime, he'd just wanted to check out the situation overseas and had contacted a few people." Tenten sighed. "Not that I heard any of this from him, of course."

"You have informants?"

"No, just a friend who is very well informed," Tenten said tightly.

"A friend who … is related to this situation between you and Neji, it seems," Hitomi observed. "A female friend? So there's another man involved as well, then, otherwise Neji wouldn't be so upset. Someone other than Sugimura, because anyone in their right mind can see how little he actually meant to you."

Tenten couldn't refute the statement. "I shouldn't have expected any less of one of Kurenai-sensei's students. How long did you know her?"

"I met her when I was a child, long before she ever met Hinata," Hitomi smiled, allowing her to deflect for a few moments. "Although reading emotions and profiling was something I learned, painstakingly, throughout childhood. Some people are easier to read than others. Your body language is quite loose for a spy," she said. "I would have never picked you for an agent."

"That was the point," Tenten said dryly, before taking another bite of her sandwich.

"What happened on New Year's Eve?"

Tenten sighed yet again.


01:15 January 1. Hitomi's apartment, Sendai.

Michiru left Tenten shortly after as she spotted Hiroki and Shinji returning from the balcony. The couple headed up to the loft to say goodbye to Hitomi and left to go back to Hiroki's place, which was nearby, leaving Tenten alone with her soon-to-be boss. He sat down next to her and she tried to shift over. He smelt like cigarettes, and had not tried to mask their scent with cologne.

He looked up at the pair of Hyuugas, still talking up in the loft.

"Do you love her?" Tenten asked suddenly.

"Not even a, 'how did you two meet'? I like your style," Shinji said lazily.

"I'm thinking about things," Tenten said. Her mind wouldn't stop working, things reminding her of other things, her train of thought looping in and out of memories and ideas seemingly at the speed of a rollercoaster.

"Ah, Lucia does that to you," Shinji said sagely. "I remember the first time I met her," he began, lifting his chin in reference to Hitomi. "We were at a bar. She was with Isaka-san, back then. He was the one who introduced us, and she also became good friends with Isaka Fumiko, I mean, because she met her through Isaka Kengo, her brother. Sorry for rambling, but you get the point. Fumiko's brother introduced us." He sighed. "It was like I'd been struck by lightning. Like, sure, physical attraction was one thing, but our eyes met and I knew … like I really knew that she was something like no one else I'd ever met before."

Tenten laughed. "The eyes of a Hyuuga."

"No, I mean it," Shinji said earnestly. "Like … it just got better and better. We started talking and she was just so … with it. She was smart, smarter than I was, and so quick," he said, clicking his fingers. "I almost couldn't keep up, she was that good. Hitomi really put me through my paces. And it was like … it was like the first time I'd met someone who didn't know who I was, and wasn't afraid to push me." He was looking right into her eyes as he spoke, and Tenten swallowed. He couldn't possibly remember, could he? But now, sitting so close to him again, she could almost feel his lips against hers, the taste of that whiskey, the smell of his cologne.

"But fuck … yeah … if I had to say, she's probably the only woman I've ever loved. More than my own mother," he said bitterly. "God sometimes I wish … things could be different."

"But then we wouldn't be here, sitting on this couch, feeling this high ..." Tenten leaned back and stared straight up at the ceiling and closed her eyes. "What are you thinking about, like right now?"

"The past, same as you," Shinji said casually. "Like I get nostalgic. Your experience with Lucia really depends on your mood. If you're in a deep, dark place, then your bad memories just pull you down, further and further. It's like … alcohol. Your mood is amplified. But right now, I feel like I'm on top of the fucking world. I had a shit year this year, and but every day with Hitomi is like … I've done something right in another life because I sure as hell don't deserve a woman like her, not after all the shit I've done."

"I've noticed your … prolific appearances with other women in public," Tenten said, recalling times she flipped through magazine covers – and indeed, the photos of lovers on his phone. Tenten felt her memories pulling her in, willing her to simply drift away from reality to just bathe in images and sounds and scents.

"She knows … you know. Like Neji. We're in the public eye; people read too much into who you've been seen with, who shows up with you to where … and that's why she gets it; Hitomi doesn't want to be seen as that woman who's dating that hotel guy."

Tenten opened her eyes and smirked at him. "Or maybe you don't want to be that guy who's dating that famous designer."

"Well said." He nodded slightly, his lips quirked.

"So what's the deal with you and Isaka then?" Tenten asked, completely ignoring Michiru's advice. Her argument with Shinji felt like it had happened years ago. "Were you in love with her or something?"

Shinji scoffed. "Women. You read too much into shit like this."

"Don't be a condescending bastard," Tenten said, shoving him.

"It's nothing, she's just a good friend. We've all known each other since we were old enough to walk and steal each other's toys – Hiro, Isaka, Kazu and me. Besides, back when we were kids, Isaka … there was someone else in our circle, someone we lost in that fucking debacle …" Silence descended and Tenten supposed he was taking a moment to remember Kyousuke and Shintarou, who had not survived the hostage situation. "Watanabe we've known since middle school but I didn't really get to know her until she and Hiro started dating, just before we graduated."

"And Dai?"

He gave her a weird look. "We all went to the same school, but we ran in totally different circles. He's only around now because he's with Fumiko."

"You don't like him?"

"Well … the girls like him, and so does Kazu. I'm not going to rock the boat," he said gruffly.

Tenten scoffed. "You don't like him. Because you liked Isaka," she said, jabbing his shoulder. "I would bet on that."

"Betting against the house never ends well," he scowled, shrugging her off. "Would you quit it? You're getting on my nerves right now. Holy fuck, I have no idea what he sees in you."

"Neji?"

"No," Shinji said venomously. "Yori."

Tenten felt her heart pound as her eyes narrowed. "You want to try me?"

Shinji flinched. "Jesus, calm the fuck down."

"What's happening here?" Neji's voice broke into the space between them, and Tenten looked up to find him frowning at how closely they were sitting.

"Neji, I have a secret," Tenten said, waving him close to her. "Come closer," she said, grinning, "I don't want Shinji to hear."

Neji leaned down over the back of the couch hesitantly, wary of her clearly unusual mood, and started in surprise as she kissed him, cupping his face in her hands as her tongue slipped between his lips. He wasn't sure if he was imagining things but she still tasted like the spices of the tea.

"Easy there," Shinji muttered under his breath as he stood up. "Don't you have a room for that?"

Tenten let go of Neji, lips still locked as she silently expressed her sentiments towards the businessman with a raised finger. Shinji only chuckled in response. "Enjoy this now, because I'll be your boss in four days."

Shinji's words fell on deaf ears as Tenten broke away and stared into Neji's eyes, years falling away in a heartbeat. She smiled at him, certain he knew exactly what she was feeling. "I'm sorry, I've been wanting to do that for ages." Neji stared at her as she clambered over the back of the couch, and took the hand he offered her, jumping down onto the floor. Neji pulled her close and breathed in the scent of her hair.

"I thought I'd lost you," he whispered, but Tenten realised he hadn't spoken – memories of him were echoing in her mind.

"Hey Neji," she said softly against his chest. "Dance with me."

The world fell away as he laced their fingers together, and suddenly, she was laughing and they were spinning, back in a ballroom in Vienna as they waited to make contact with another spy, retrieving some secret or another with a perfectly timed brush pass. They passed into the shadows of the candlelit corridors, and they kissed passionately in the alcoves. They were supposed to be avoiding detection but as always, they got caught up in the moment.

Tenten opened her eyes and she was in Shanghai, white dress long forgotten as Sasuke kissed and licked and left bite marks on her skin. She was aflame, incoherent as she burned and he was intent on feeling all of her just as much as she wanted him, all of their desires unfolding before them. Words tumbled from her lips, swollen from his kisses, his skin red beneath her fingertips as he gasped. It all just felt so right in that single instant, she realised how much she had wanted this, wanted him and –

"Tenten."

Sendai called. No, not Sendai, Neji. Tenten's back was cold, her dress was pushed up around her thighs and Neji's shirt was on the floor, buttons scattered around them. She blinked. Neji was above her, his hands next to her head. His hair spilled over his shoulder, trickling onto hers, casting shadows across his eyes in the dim room. How had they ended up here?

"You … and him."

"What?" Tenten said dumbly. The heat was receding but memories were still flooding in swift as the tide.

"Yamanaka tried to tell me about Shanghai and I didn't believe her," Neji said, sitting back. He looked at the buttons on the floor, sighed softly and stood, leaving her lying on the floor. To say she was completely stunned would be an understatement.

"What did I say?"

"You know very well what you just said."

"No, Neji, I don't," Tenten said seriously, sitting up and readjusting herself. "I can't remember anything since kissing you on the couch. What did I just say?"

"You said his name."

"Who?" She asked, although she had a strong idea.

"Uchiha," Neji said curtly, pulling on a navy tshirt. He took out a plastic container from a secret compartment in his suitcase and opened it to reveal a number of syringes and glass tubes.

"What are you doing?" Tenten asked, scooting backward so her back was against the bed.

"Our job," Neji said softly. "Clearly you're not in the right state of mind right now." He took a deep breath and pulled on some disposable latex gloves. "Give me your arm," he said, and frowned as she flinched and crossed her arms over her body.

"What for?" She asked, blinking up at him.

"I want to take a blood sample so we can get some tests done back at the lab," he said slowly. "Do you know who I am?" he asked, registering the tension in her body. "Do you know where you are?"

By the time morning came, Neji couldn't look at her – from the guilt of knocking her out to subdue her, or from the anger that she'd slept with Sasuke, she couldn't tell. Her entire world was slightly off on its axis, like a transparent image overlaid on top of a photo, nothing quite matched up perfectly and she saw echoes of the past at the edge of everything. She had never felt so utterly alone.


"Neji found out I had slept with someone … he wasn't particularly fond of," Tenten said grudgingly. Hitomi nodded.

"Sounds like double standards to me," she mused. "Neji sleeps around with half of Tokyo's idol population and you … or your character falls right in line. You sleep with a … colleague, I'm assuming? And Neji gets to put you in the Arctic circle? What does your other friend think about this?"

"I admit, I was hell bent on making him miserable for a while. I … I feel like we can work through it. Clean slate." Tenten said, avoiding the topic of Ino and Sasuke.

"Because you're even?" Hitomi scoffed. "No, he would have been upset. You found out the whole thing was a sham, but he found out you had slept with someone else because you wanted to. And there's a huge difference there. He might say he's past it –"

"He'll mean it and I'll believe him," Tenten said firmly. "Because I'm past thinking about those women. What about you and Okuchi? Is this how you feel about him, showing up to places with other women? Are you happy to be with him just behind the scenes?" She paused as realisation sank in.

Hitomi smirked. "That took a lot longer than it should have."

"Are you saying you're not completely happy with your situation?" Tenten asked, curious. "Shinji, to me, seems to be getting the best of both worlds."

"He struggles," Hitomi admitted. "With being second best. Work always comes first. He has – had – Miho," she corrected herself. "I don't know, I've always known he needs different things from different people – and I can't be his everything, all the time … and vice versa," she admitted. "I don't know, it's unconventional and it works for us, but not everyone we get involved with."

"Are you sure you're not just trying to become dependent on him?" Tenten asked.

"We're not talking about me," Hitomi said, sipping at her tea, and waited patiently for her to arrange her thoughts.

"When we worked together, it wasn't an issue. When he left, I was determined to part ways … and I stopped caring about connecting with other people like that, stopped caring about relationships, like Neji had taken that part of me with him. That is, until I met his replacement, who …"

"Was interested in you?" Hitomi finished for her. "And you were attracted to him."

"You could say that," Tenten said. "It crept up on me, after a year of working with him. I knew it was mutual, this attraction, but … I didn't want things to go the way they had last time. I was very happy to leave things as they had been, eight or so months ago ... after we slept together. Things were really normal between us. He went back to being his same old, protocol following self. Most of the time. But when I left Tokyo, he told me he had feelings for me."

"Way to impose on someone," Hitomi muttered. "If you know it's unrequited …"

"Well, he didn't say anything about waiting or making me wait. If anything, all he had wanted to do was tell me. And that was it, and I left it at that." But still, she wanted to give him an answer to his face. A proper one, out of respect for him, after what she'd said to him about changing and being the person he wanted to be.

"If you want my advice –"

"I don't, not really."

"Neji's your first love, the one you fight with and fight next to. This other guy seems to have your best interests at heart; and if he's still working with you, his priorities are the same as yours. I think you're an idiot," Hitomi said breezily. "If you pick my cousin. You look like you're really fond of this guy. I can hear it in your voice, and you've been fiddling with that apple necklace for the past ten minutes, and you've worn it almost every single time I've seen you – it sings to me, of his feelings for you, or at least some nostalgia on your part. Neji has only ever been miserable; he was probably born miserable."

"It's not your decision to make," Tenten said softly. Silence fell. "Can I ask you something?"

"Shoot." The Hyuuga took a sip of her tea.

"Why do you need to take Lucia? What does it do to you?"

The other woman paused thoughtfully. "I used to tell Kengo it helped me with my abilities. Suppressed them to a degree, because it helped me turn completely in on myself."

Tenten blinked. "That seems a little simplistic."

"We had no idea what we were dealing with. He helped me test the limits of my abilities for years – but when we stopped seeing each other for those reasons, I began to really understand what was happening. When I take Lucia, I have complete control over every mental impulse. How much I hear, see, feel in my physical body becomes completely irrelevant because my mind … is completely free. For most people, there is nowhere for their imagination to go – they go back into their memories, their past. But I can see everything. Intimately. I can see who is tethered to their present, and those who are also wandering in the past. With exquisite control. It took me a long time to understand all of that. Even in my dreams, I can still tie myself to the waking world – but no one else is usually there to listen."

"Can ordinary people do the same thing?"

Hitomi gave her a secretive smile. "Under certain circumstances, maybe."

Tenten tried to hide her annoyance with the Hyuuga's cryptic comments, and finished the last of her sandwiches.

Hitomi cleared her throat. "How was your mission yesterday? I figured you and my cousin would be crashing at your place last night."

"No, that's tomorrow night," she frowned. Wait, what?

The Hyuuga froze and stared her right in the eyes. "What day do you think it is, and where is my cousin?"

Tenten blinked. "It's the seventeenth of January … and I don't know where Neji is, he told me last night he was running some samples to a courier in the morning, who could deliver something he'd taken off Saito to Konoha."

"Give me your phone," Hitomi commanded, holding out her hand.

"I left it at home," Tenten said. "I must have forgotten to charge it last night."

"Where's your other phone? The agency one." Hitomi asked. Tenten patted her pockets and frowned as she came up empty.

"I could have sworn …"

"Neji's in trouble," Hitomi swore softly. "And your memory has been tampered with."

"What?" Tenten felt her heart sink. No, this couldn't be happening.

"It's the nineteenth of January – you went on your mission to the docks last night," Hitomi said, taking out her own phone. "Neji sent me a photo of something you found yesterday to ask me if I'd recognised it. Check the date and time." She stood up and went to go get the newspaper, and Tenten looked at the photo. It was the snowflake symbol that was stamped onto the Lucia tablets they'd found in Tokyo. Eighteenth of January, 23:17. Hitomi returned and slapped the newspaper down on the table. Tenten stared at the date. It was the nineteenth of January. Tuesday. Not Sunday.

"How –"

"Come on, we have to go," Hitomi said, pulling a note out of her wallet, leaving it on the table and putting her jacket back on. "Come on, Tenten, we have to move!"

Instincts kicked in. Tenten pulled on her jacket and followed Hitomi to the door. "Why did you wait this long to ask me?" she asked.

"Why are you being so unhelpful today?" Hitomi asked dryly. She stopped and closed her eyes. Tenten watched as she took off her jewellery and shoved it into her bag. "Fuck."

"What?"

"The driver's gone. They switched him out with someone, someone who's blocking me." Tenten whirled around and bumped into another customer.

"Sorry," she said hastily, and looked up. "Dai!"

He beamed at her. "Hey, Miya-chan." He paused, seeing how flustered she was. "Everything okay?"

Tenten smiled, torn between frustration and desperation to escape whatever was happening. She felt like a mark, completely taken in by a con she couldn't grasp. Was she dreaming? "Um, yeah, Hitomi and I just have to –"

"Tomi-chan is with you?" Daichi asked, frowning. Tenten turned to find Hitomi gone and the parked car beyond the window had also vanished. She frowned as she felt something prick her, like a … like a needle. She looked down at her shoulder, speechless as Daichi removed the syringe from her arm and she took a few steps backwards, poison surging through her as her heart pounded frantically. Shadows edged in around her vision as Daichi grabbed her arm to stop her from backing away or falling over. "Sorry about this," he said, still smiling. "Like I said, it's all business. You know I wouldn't be doing this unless I had to."


Notes: For some reason, these later chapters are longer than the first two thirds of this fic, so there's a lot to look forward to in the next ... eight or so chapters, plus an epilogue. Because I'm a sucker for that. Thank you for being with me on this ten year journey that really could have been published as a trilogy, but there's not much we can do about that now. See you in two weeks - but in the meantime, I'd love to hear from you (even though I definitely hear crickets chirping in this corner of fandom) - what have you been doing in the last five years? What's changed? Who's your OTP?