Hinata looks at Tatsuya's face with sharp eyes. Her twin has tried his best to school his face to one of determination but the look in his oh so young dark eyes, the movement of his throat, the restless twitching of his right hand—they all practically scream 'petrified'.
"It will only be a simple escort mission for a merchant to the Land of Rivers and he won't be alone. He'll be joined by three more. He's now eight. It's time for him to start. Do not forget that your older brothers started a year younger," their father calmly explains, the expression on his face a clear indicator he's not going to change his mind.
Hinata remembers very well the day her older brothers were sent out on their first mission. Remembers how they returned with tired, haunted eyes after. Young and helpless inside a small body, she was not able to protect them. Like she was not able to protect their two little brothers. Like she was not able to protect so many others she loved in the past.
She's still young but she's considerably stronger now than she was before, especially with her mangekyou sharingan's capability. And for her twin, she wants to do whatever she can, protect him for however long she can.
What good is power if you cannot protect the ones you love?i
She meets their father's dark eye and speaks using a gentle, persuading tone, "Let me go with him. I, too, am eight now. With my byakugan, an escort mission will be perfect for me, Father."
Tajima's jaw clenches and his eyes harden, his signs of irritation. "Stop coddling your brother. It's time for him to learn, Hinata."
"I am not coddling him. Coddling him would be me asking you not to send him out. He's still going to take the mission Father, I'll only be there to accompany him and gain experience myself," she reasons out gently.
"And the healing wards?" he asks with a raised brow.
"Have sufficient manpower even without me here. Natsuki and Emika are now capable of basic healing,"
He exhales before nodding his head, "Very well. Prepare yourselves then. You leave tomorrow."
…..
There are five of them. She and her twin, a thirteen year old boy named Setsuna who she's come to learn is a third cousin through their father and two distant relatives named Hiro and Akio, also teens.
With her byakugan now able to cover a decent twelve kilometers, the mission had been relatively easy and they were able to safely escort the merchant to his town in the Land of Rivers without any issue.
It is when they re-enter the borders of Fire that a complication arises—three Senju complication.
When the three men enter the range of her byakugan, she immediately notices the Senju crest stamped on the neckline of their armors and decides to keep them within her sight. A few minutes after, she realizes there must be a sensory ninja among them. The three males are clearly tracking them, their pace picking up the closer they get.
"Pick up your paces and be on guard. Three Senju males. Adults. Ten kilometers East," she tells her brother and cousins.
The atmosphere is instantly tense. Tatsuya looks at her with a mix of fear and determination, Hiro and Akio look uneasy while Setsuna looks angry and excited at the same time.
"Let's deal with them. Five to three doesn't look a bad match," the teen proposes.
"Absolutely not," Hinata answers right away, "Have you not heard me cousin? I said adults. That means they're strong enough to have survived this far. Don't underestimate them and don't forget this is the first time for my twin and I."
"As the leader of this mission—"
"You should know better than to risk the lives of your teammates and cousins with your foolish desire to engage in a battle you don't know you'll win," Hinata shuts the foolish teen down.
The teen glowers darkly but thankfully shuts up and picks up speed while Hiro and Akio shoot her looks of gratitude.
"They're fast. Eight kilometers now. Hurry up or they'll reach us," she tells them tersely.
They increase their speed even more but when the Senju men close the distance to just six kilometers, she knows then they'll get caught in a fight if she didn't act.
"All of you stop and come to me," she orders them.
"What? Why? Wasn't it you who told us earlier to pick up pace?" Setsuna asks with a scowl.
"Do it," she says with a harsh voice she copies from Madara. The Senju are all within five kilometers now and if their speed was any indication, it will only be a matter of time before they're engaged in a fight some of them might not survive.
She doesn't know the three men, doesn't know their powers and skills. But with her byakugan, she can see that all of them have easily large reserves, one in particular can even easily outmatch her father's.
She also knows that Senju Butsuma is famous for being a harsh and demanding Clan Head like her father. As such, the three are bound to be stronger than the usual run-of-the-mill shinobi. She's neither foolish nor arrogant enough to think her teleportation capability will be enough to win a head-on fight with unknown people.
Her twin immediately complies, followed by Hiro and Akio. Setsuna looks about to argue further so she decides to activate her three-tomoe sharingan and glares at him with all her might, "I'll leave you behind if you don't stop being stupid."
He shuts up immediately and approaches her warily. "What are you going to do?" he asks.
She wraps one of her arms to her anxious twin and opens the other to her distant cousins, "You'll know soon enough. Come and hold on to me. Be quick."
They do as she asked and when they're all in the circle of her arms, she activates her mangekyou and with her byakugan on the other eye still active, teleports all of them twelve kilometers away from the approaching Senju men. She does it five times, bringing it to a total of sixty.
By the time she's done with teleporting, she only has about three-quarters of her chakra reserves and she's surrounded by dizzy and vomiting boys.
"Fuck it! What the hell did you do you little brat?" Setsuna angrily asks before groaning and clutching his stomach.
"I teleported and saved all our lives, cousin. We're now at least sixty kilometers away from them. But don't get complacent, all of you. We're still far from home," she answers before going to her twin and gently patting his back while he throws up his last meal, all the while keeping her byakugan active.
…..
Madara scowled and cursed under his breath when his pebble sunk for the sixth time.
Another fail. How annoying! Stone-skipping was supposed to be easy! Why couldn't he get his stones to reach the other side?
Determined to succeed, he bent down and made sure to pick up a smoother, better-shaped pebble. He was about to get up when he noticed another pebble. It had an imperfect heart shape, but what really caught his attention was its color. It strangely reminded him of the color of his sister's eyes—purple, just a bit darker. He decided to pick it up and give it to her later. Perhaps, she'd find it cute. Perhaps it would distract her, even if just a little bit. She did find beauty and took pleasure in the simplest things.
He sighed at the thought of his little sister. And subsequently, his little brother, Tatsuya.
The twins have gone to an escort mission in the Land of Rivers and their absence was adding to his stress.
With Tatsuya already eight, Madara knew it was only a matter of time before his younger brother got initiated to the shinobi business. He just didn't expect their sister join so soon and could not help but feel anger at their father for allowing it. She should have been given more time.
Their little brothers' deaths have really affected and changed Hinata in ways he wished had never happened. Oh she still went on about her life like she did before—spending her days on training and learning, healing and teaching. She still looked out for Tatsuya with much love and patience and care. She was still very close with Izuna, still spent time with their second eldest just talking quietly. She was still the same with him. She was still the one with the eyes that saw much and understood him better than anyone else.
They all still trained and sparred together. She's even more challenging now. Though she still has lesser chakra reserves compared to him, she's a lot stronger, a whole lot faster. It's as if in a blink of an eye, while he wasn't looking, she has closed the gap between them. There were even times felt that she could be stronger than him—if she stopped holding back.
She's still the same strong, intelligent, perceptive and kind little sister they all knew and loved. She's still the same in all the ways that really mattered. But sometimes…she was not.
Sometimes, she would have such terrible night terrors she'd wake up crying, tears and sometimes blood streaming down her little face. They'd tried to ask her many times so they could help but she would just smile sadly and tiredly and say she'd handle it. Sometimes, her face would have this awful look of as if she's gone back to that time when Kiyoshi and Kenji died and she's drowning in an ocean of pain and sorrow. And other times, there's this look in her eyes that made it feel as if she were miles and miles away—in a place somewhere they couldn't reach.
There's something new to her presence too—sometimes heavy, sometimes suffocating, sometimes empty.
Their father said that it must be grief. That she must still be grieving for their two little brothers. That the pain must be just amplified by the fact that she felt the danger and was on her way to the lake but failed to get there on time and save their brothers. That her new eye abilities must be a painful reminder of what she perceived as her failure.
He understood everything his father said. He did. But it was frustrating! For years Hinata has helped them a lot after their mother's death and now that she needed theirs, nothing seemed to be working. And now she's starting to go on missions!
Getting worked up, he drew his arm back once more and threw the pebble, watched it skip a few times then…
Another fail. This act of skipping stones was supposed to be relaxing. Now it's just pissing him off.
With a small sigh, he bent down to pick up another pebble, not willing to give up. He is Uchiha Madara, he's not going to lose in a stupid activity.
"This time, I'll reach the other side for sure," he muttered while bouncing the pebble in his hand.
He was about to throw the pebble when something whizzed over his shoulder. He stared and saw…a pebble, skipping the water and reaching the other side.
Scowling, he turned his head to look at whoever threw the pebble and saw a grinning boy. He had dark eyes and an ugly bowl-cut dark hair. He looked to be around Madara's age.
"Just aim it a little higher than you'd expect. That's the trick," the boy said.
With a glower, he turned around to fully face the intruder who dared to provide him uninvited advice. "I don't need you to tell me that. It will reach the other side if I put my all into it! Who the hell are you anyway?" he asked rudely in retaliation.
"Hmm. Right now, I'm just your rival at stone skipping," the boy declared. Then, with a smug look, he added, "Though mine has already reached the other side."
Annoyed at the boast and the lack of answer to his question, Madara demanded, "I asked you who you are!"
"It's Hashirama," the boy answered, "I can't tell you my last name due to reasons."
"Hashirama eh?" Madara turned to face the river once more, fierce determination on his face, "Well, just watch. I'm gonna make it this time." He absolutely refused to lose to stupid bowl-cut boy. He's got his own pride to protect.
Thinking it more effective, he decided to use the stance for throwing a shuriken and threw the pebble and watched as it skipped a few times over the water…then sunk once more. Unable to take the humiliation, he deflected by turning around and confronting his newly-acquired stone-skipping rival, "Hey! You stood behind me on purpose to distract me! I'm the type that can't even pee when someone's behind me!"
To his surprise, Hashirama suddenly went down on the ground. "S-sorry," he apologized, an aura of gloom blanketing him.
The look somehow reminded him of his little sister and immediately made him feel guilty. "Hey…Don't take it so seriously. Sorry, I was just making excuses," he admitted while pressing a hand to his face, all the while feeling awkward.
"I…I didn't know…That you had such an obnoxious self-diagnosed neurosis," Hashirama responded.
The insulting words contrasted with the look the other boy presented that Madara didn't know how to interpret it, making him feel annoyed. "I can't tell if you're a nice guy or a nasty guy!"
Catching him by surprise once more, the other boy instantly lost his aura of gloom and laughed, "One thing for sure! I'm better than you at stone skipping."
"Want me to skip you instead?" he asked while pointing a finger, mighty pissed at the other boy once more for the comment.
And the aura of gloom returned and down the boy went to the ground once more saying, "S-sorry, I didn't mean to upset you. To make amends, I'll let you throw me into the river. Go ahead, throw me."
By Sage! What an immature moody weirdo!
"Do you even notice your own obnoxious neurosis?" Madara asked in wonder.
"I just…hope I reach the opposite side," the boy Hashirama muttered in a cheeky tone.
Immediately, Madara was reminded of his failure and burst a vein in anger, "You're a real eyesore! Get lost!"
As if nothing happened, Hashirama simply got up and with a careless smile and goodbye wave said, "Well then…"
Disliking the casual attitude, he grabbed the other boy's shoulder. "Wait a second!"
"Which is it? Why don't you be clearer?" Hashirama asked while looking back with a frown.
"T-that's…" Madara trailed off, also not knowing why exactly he was so annoyed and angry and why he even stopped Hashirama from leaving. For a moment, he worried that the other boy's weirdness was contagious and rubbed on him.
Suddenly the expression on Hashirama's face changed and Madara noticed him looking at the river. He turned around to see what caught the other boy's attention and saw a corpse floating face down, moving with the slowly flowing water.
"That's!" Madara uttered in slight shock and stopped when Hashirama suddenly moved and approached the corpse. Madara immediately took note of how the other boy walked atop the water. "Are you…a shinobi?" he asked warily, though deep inside he already knew it must be so.
"This location will become a battlefield soon. Go home," the other boy said, not answering his question. "Sorry, but I've got to go," he next said before neatly leaping to the other side of the river. "So long." Then as though remembering something, he turned to Madara.
He realized then he hasn't given Hashirama his name and introduced himself, "It's Madara."
"Madara?"
"Not proffering one's family name to a stranger…is shinobi law," he reminded the other boy, a knowing look in his eyes.
"I knew it," Hashirama said, dark eyes serious, "You're a shinobi too."
Soon after that, the moody weirdo with the ugly bowl-cut hairstyle said his farewell and disappeared between the trees. It was a very quick, almost meaningless interaction and yet, Madara felt that it was somehow important. He didn't dwell on it for long though. With the memory of the floating corpse and the knowledge that the area would no doubt become a battlefield soon, he hurriedly returned home.
i Cersei Lannister – Game of ThronesA/N: Yes, the Madara-Hashirama dialogue is not mine. It's taken directly from the anime. I just added some to describe the setting.