As always, Naruto belongs to Kishimoto.
That anyone was capable of defeating Gamabunta seemed impossible but to hear the village was destroyed . . . their village . . . this wasn't a great ninja war. How could they even believe it? Neji ran at the front of the team, something deep inside pressing him lengths ahead of even Gai and Lee.
Gai sprinted forward to get within a step of Neji's pace. "What do you see?"
Neji's lips thinned and he took a moment to brace himself. He hadn't looked to the village yet. He hadn't wanted to see his home in ruins, not before he had to, but they needed to know what they were about to run into. Enemies could still be nearby; they had to be prepared. Taking a deep breath, he fed the chakra veins to his eyes.
Neji stopped, falling to one knee as he took in the destruction. There was no village left to find. The only proof that . . . crater . . . was once Konoha was the cliffside behind it. Shodai, Nidaime, Sandaime, Yondaime, Godaime: the five hokage now stared down to emptiness.
"Neji." Gai doubled back as the others caught up.
"It's gone."
"What's gone?"
Neji swallowed. "The village. All of it. There's nothing but rubble left."
"Nothing . . ." Gai's voice seemed to trail off into the shocked gasps of his teammates. "Is the enemy still there?"
Neji forced his sight further, through the rumble to find the chakra of those remaining. Given the state of the village, if the enemy was still nearby, then their chakra would be the strongest source. How could it be anything weak when they caused such devastation? There was so little chakra in the village. Were so many dead? No, he couldn't think about that yet. The enemy . . . the enemy was . . . "It can't be. Naruto has released the Kyuubi. It's not completely formed, but I've never witnessed so much chakra before, and it's growing."
For a moment, hesitation tainted Gai's voice. "Can you tell if Naruto was the one who destroyed the village?"
"I don't think so. The destruction doesn't look like something done in a rampage, and it looks like he's chasing an Akatsuki member away from the—" Neji's heart froze, his mouth turning so dry it hurt to breathe. "No . . . no, no, no, no, no. It can't be . . ."
Chakra burst from his feet, propelling him forward at such speed that whatever call his team had to stop him went unheard. Neji ran faster than he'd ever run in his life. Faster than any race with Lee and Gai. Faster than on the mission that made him jounin. Faster than when they raced to save the kazekage. All of that was merely training to bring him to this moment, this race against time to reach the body left alone on a forgotten battlefield, attended only by a couple hounds who held tight through the torrent of chakra breaking around them. He had to get there. He had to hurry, because his eyes were wrong. His eyes weren't showing him the truth.
Hinata wasn't dead. She couldn't be. He must have been too far away to see that last glow of chakra. His eyes too weak to find the rise of her chest with each fighting breath. Because Hinata would fight. Hinata would survive. He was her sword and her shield; Hinata couldn't die before him!
The battle happening in the not-too-far distance was a danger Neji couldn't comprehend as he ran through what should have been the village's edge down into the crater below, his team only just keeping pace with him a few yards back. He might have heard Gai's voice calling for an explanation, but it was muted beneath the thrum of Neji's blood pulsing through his veins to push him faster, harder, giving him everything his body could to reach the wilted figure he refused to believe was real. He was missing something that proved Hinata was still alive. Hinata couldn't be dead. She couldn't.
He hadn't dared to look with byakugan again, not when it was lying to him, so the image of Hinata's body, twisted beneath itself and unmoving, caused the panic to seize him anew as he approached. Several dogs lay near her, some hurt but breathing, others as still as Hinata herself. Two remained mobile, one slowly dragging the last of their injured brethren to rest out of the path of danger, while the other carefully did the same for two small toads, only one of whom appeared alive still.
The pug, who'd cared for the toads, sat beside a bloody black rod near Hinata as Neji came close enough to roll her over. He trailed his fingers feather-light over a person he barely recognized. So much of her body was broken; half-formed bruises and bloody wounds were the only color left in her ashen skin. Not at all the young woman he remembered. And her eyes . . . her white eyes were open—blank and empty. Above them was a gaping hole in her head, smooth and round and begging to be made whole again. There was no pulse, no faint breath passing over her lips.
Hinata was . . . dead.
"We took out the rod. It didn't seem right to leave it in her," the pug said, though it may have been to the rest of his team, who'd arrived without Neji noticing.
Neji pulled her abused form close, feeling the weight and awkwardness that came with a body no longer moving on its own, and stared into those cold, lost eyes as if holding her would bring life back to them . . . as if he'd see the quiet joy that used to light up her face when he'd hug her as a child. Her emotions were so obvious in those eyes; even now that she'd grown and learned to hide herself, Neji could still read her with ease in those gentle eyes. He shook her, his hands fisting into her tattered jacket.
"Wake up," he whispered. "You need to wake up . . . "
A strong hand landed on Neji's shoulder to hold him in place as two smaller ones, more delicate despite the calluses, cradled his face, urging it to turn away and look at the woman kneeling beside him. Tenten's eyes were wet with unshed tears.
"I'm so sorry, Neji," she said, rising up onto her knees to pull him deep into her embrace. "Let her go. She's not going to wake up."
"She has to," Neji repeated, over and over. It was easier to hold tight to his denial now that his face was buried in the curve of Tenten's neck. "A med-nin . . . she just needs a med-nin . . ."
"Neji," Gai's voice boomed, not with the loudness that normally amplified his every word, but with an authority that grabbed hold of Neji's heart and ripped his denial back. "It's too late. Let her rest."
Neji made no reply, because then he'd have to admit she was dead, but his hands clung to her body still. It was all that was left of her . . . his little sister. He couldn't let her go yet.
He couldn't tell how long he and Tenten stayed like that, her supporting him while he clutched the remnants of his little sister, but the sound of footsteps beating fast against the ground finally broke through the grief threatening to overwhelm him.
An emptiness had grown inside him, an emptiness that wanted to be filled. As his eyes lifted enough to see the figures running with desperate speed towards them, his denial filled that emptiness with a force both terrible and all-consuming, a feeling the part of Neji that had seen death in Hinata's blank eyes knew he should never feel in this moment: hope.
"Sakura!" he screamed, body moving eager to escape Tenten's grasp and the reality in Gai's harsh voice. Sakura could save Hinata. Sakura was the hokage's student—the hokage who was known as the greatest med-nin in the world. Yes! Sakura would bring Hinata back.
He barely registered the second figure, running from a different direction but with haste just as great. In fact, he might have ignored her all together if not for the seal bright and raw blazing on her forehead. It was his mother, he realized as his grief-muddled mind focused on the woman. Her face was wet with sorrow and her body moved in long, heavy strides he was not accustomed to seeing in his mother's gait. She wasn't as young as him, but she was still quick and nimble, as a Hyuuga tended to be. Now she ran as if the world weighed on her shoulders, dragging her down with each step unless she pushed forward with all her strength.
Sakura arrived first, her youthful face seeming many years older than last he saw her. Blood splashed her clothing, though no wounds appeared on her, and her hair was tied back as he'd seen her do to work her medical knowledge. In all this chaos, she must have been busy. Neji grabbed her wrist even as Gai and Lee moved to keep her away.
"You have to save her." There was an edge to his voice that made everyone flinch, a cold, hollow sound grasping the tail of his un-achievable hope. It was a voice that he'd heard before, but never from himself. It was his uncle's voice as Hizashi writhed on the floor in agony. It was his grandfather's voice ordering the family to leave to main house so Hinata could learn the seal. It was absolute authority demanding obedience. Hope had been dangerous to him, but if that voice was not obeyed, it would destroy the hope he shouldn't have felt and bring out something far darker. Neji wasn't sure what would happen then, sitting on the edge of that darkness.
"Neji," Sakura said, looking down at the body in his lap with a mournful revulsion. She reached a hand down and closed Hinata's empty eyes. "I'm sorry, Neji. I can't save her, but I might be able to save the others."
Sakura slowly turned to face the arrangement of animals nearby but Neji's hand tightened around her wrist, causing her to wince and twist in his grip.
"Let her go," Gai's voice demanded, and when Neji did nothing, two hands he couldn't see pried Sakura from his grasp.
Neji stared ahead, unable to look down, unable to see and believe again. Gai was speaking to him, but he didn't hear. He didn't hear any of them until someone dropped to her knees before him, tired sobs coming so deep from her soul Neji felt them as if they were his own. He clawed his conciousness back to the world to find his mother cradling Hinata's body to her chest, face buried in her daughter's hair. All he could see of her was the seal, a murderous scar normally kept hidden.
"Your forehead . . ." he whispered, his voice trapped in his throat as he struggled not to see how limp Hinata was in their mother's embrace.
No one spoke for several minutes as Naomi's grief swept over them. Then, tears still falling, Naomi let Hinata's body ebb away enough to look at her son. "I tried to stop her, and she used the seal on me," Naomi said, her voice bitter and dark. Not at Hinata for doing it, but at the seal. Hatred for this thing carved into her flesh that stopped her from protecting her child.
As she worked to help one of the injured dogs, Sakura's eyes lingered on Naomi curiously, but she made no mention of it when she spoke. "Naruto was fighting Pain, the one who did this to the village, but he got pinned down. Naruto was the only one who had a chance against Pain, but Hinata went down anyway. When she was . . . when she fell, Naruto released the Kyuubi." She looked up from her work to the fading trails of dust still roiling in the distance. "He's driven Pain back."
"More than that," a new voice said, sharp and quiet. A slug slid over Sakura's shoulder to be seen by the rest standing there. "He's just defeated that incarnation of Pain. There is another, the real Pain controlling all the enemies we've seen so far. Naruto plans to face him next."
"He's going after the one who killed Hinata?" Neji asked, his voice distant as his eyes fell once more to his little sister, death bathing her body in a cold, unfeeling pallor.
"Yes, he requests everyone stay here in the village until it's over."
Hinata would never wake, Neji knew, the denial broken. Her body was just a body now: broken, beaten, dead. Her spirit, which he'd witnessed grow and stumble and rise again so many times over their short lives, was now stagnant. He had nothing to offer her. All his life he'd sworn to protect her against any dangers, within the clan and without, yet she was dead and he no longer had a purpose.
"I hope he kills that monster slowly," Naomi said, once more lowering her head to Hinata's body tangled in her arms.
Neji's hands fisted over his knees as the wellspring of emotion his denial had held in check overflowed inside him. He did have a purpose still, and it was one he had to fulfill. He couldn't sit here frozen in his grief while the one who'd killed her was still alive. Neji was the sword of the Hyuuga clan, and he would avenge his sister. He would kill this Pain. Nothing would deny him vengeance, especially not the foolish order of the boy who let Hinata die.
The raised veins of byakugan formed without a breath of notice by those around him, and while his eyes stared on the lifeless form of the girl he'd loved so dearly, his sight searched beyond to the area the battle had been. His search was thorough and quick, coming to rest on Naruto. There was such pain in his face, altered with chakra ancient and strong. It wasn't physical pain, for his body, though weary, stood with the confidence of the uninjured. The agony in his eyes spoke to Neji's own suffering, which tempered the miasma of fury and hatred kept silent behind a mask of composure. Naruto knew where Pain was, and despite his need to destroy his enemy, Neji would allow Naruto to help.
With all the skill and grace he'd gained sparring with the speed necessary to fight Gai and Lee, Neji vaulted from him place on the ground and ran for Naruto. Together, Hinata would be avenged. Together, Pain would die.
Gai failed to reach him, hard as he tried. No one was going to stop him. If there was only one enemy left—this real Pain, the one orchestrating the attack that killed Hinata—Neji was going to be there with Naruto to kill him. Neji failed to be her shield when she needed it, but he wouldn't fail to be a sword of vengeance for Hinata and the village.
A figure waited in the trees, red coat fluttering around his legs. Neji leapt to the branch across from him; it was the only person he was willing to pause for. "You know where he is?"
Naruto nodded. The agony Neji had seen before with byakugan was carefully hidden beneath a mask of confidence. If he'd been in his mind to look closer, Neji would have seen the way Naruto's eyes didn't quite meet his, or how his fingers hung stiff at his sides. But it was hard to see clearly with so much rage blinding him.
"Please, Neji, leave this to me."
Neji hands shook. "I'm going to help you kill Pain! Nothing you say is going to stop me."
"Neji, calm down," Gai said, finally catching up and landing beside him on the branch.
"Shut up!" Neji screamed, needing to be louder, to make them understand he would not be denied no matter if Tsunade herself ordered him to stop. "I'm going to help Naruto kill Pain! I want to watch him die with my own eyes!"
"I need you to let me do this, Neji. I'm . . ." Hesitation and uncertainty lowered Naruto's gaze for a moment, his chest rising and falling in a controlled breath before finally finding Neji's eyes again. "I'm going to talk to him first."
"Talk?" Neji jumped forward, grabbing Naruto by the collar of his fluttering coat. "You're going to talk to the person who destroyed our home? I won't let you go play nice with Hinata's killer! He deserves to die for what he did!"
One of Katsuya's slugs slunk back further on Naruto's shoulder, but he didn't move other than to look into Neji's eyes. The same strange empathy Neji'd witnessed when Naruto faced Gaara now stared back at him, as if Naruto understood his suffering, that Naruto felt it, too. But he couldn't know it. Not the way Neji did. If Naruto truly felt the same, he'd never consider talking with Pain. If Naruto felt what Neji did—that deep emptiness that made it impossible to breathe unless he filled it with anger and hate—if Naruto felt that, he'd understand why Neji had to avenge her.
"It's not your fault you weren't there to save her," Naruto said softly, careful to watch his reaction. "Hinata wanted you to know that. She said you couldn't be her shield forever."
The emptiness inside him seemed to grow, bigger than all his anger and hate could even fill. Tears blurred his vision, hearing her voice in Naruto's words. "I was supposed to protect her! What's the point of all this genius if I couldn't protect my little sister?! I should have been the one to die!"
"She knew. That's why she wanted me to tell you not to blame yourself. It was her decision, because . . ." Naruto's voice shook as he forced himself to continue, "because the head of the clan was the one who had to fight the worst battles."
"But the branch family is meant to protect her." Neji felt the tears finally falling in wet streaks down his face. Whether the grip on Naruto's coat was out of anger or desperation to stay standing, Neji didn't know anymore. "I'm not allowed to call her my sister in the clan. I won't get to stand as family when we burn her body, because I'm branch and the branch family has no rights to the main family. All I have is the chance to avenge her death. She deserves that much. Didn't you care about her at all?!"
Naruto pushed back for the first time, yanking Neji's arms away. More than grief and anger showed in his face, though. There was conflict Neji couldn't place, but it kept Naruto from looking at him. "Of course I did! She was the first friend I ever had. That might not mean much to you, but to me it was everything. To finally hear someone say they wanted to be near me, to not look at me like I was a monster . . . I never thought anyone would ever care about me before Hinata."
"Then why would you talk to him? Pain needs to die!"
"Don't you think I want to kill him, too!" Naruto's fist struck the tree they stood on, cracking the thick trunk and sending bark flying. "I want to believe in peace like I promised Pervy Sage, but then I see her lying there and all I want is revenge. I don't want Pain to be right—I want to believe there's another way—but I can't forgive him."
Neji blinked away his tears away enough to see Naruto, scarlet sleeve hiding the anguish falling down his face.
"She congratulated me . . . cause she wouldn't be there when I become hokage. She was the only person who always believed in me, right from the start. I want to be—" Naruto dropped his arm, his flushed face stained with tears. "I need to become a hokage worthy of her life. Sandaime . . . Yondaime . . . they believed peace was possible. If I go planning on killing him without even trying, is that really the person she wanted to save? Is it, Neji?"
Neji stepped back, a still-shaking hand searching for the cracked tree trunk to steady himself. That wasn't a rhetorical question; Naruto was asking. The conflict from before burned deep in his wet eyes, like fire ever burning. Did he follow his convictions, passed down from mentor to student, or did he satisfy his need for vengeance with blood and life? For all his bluster, Naruto didn't know the answer.
How desperately Neji wanted to tell him too kill Pain, that Hinata would want him to finish what he started. Would Naruto go through with it if he did? Neji thought so. That would be the end of Pain. Hinata would be avenged . . . that was all he wanted . . . all he wanted.
Neji closed his eyes, fists clenched. "When we were kids, not long after the Uchiha massacre, our grandfather made us fight. He said it was to assess her skills, but it was just a way to show everyone how far she was from what he expected her to be and how much better I was than her. My father was furious. It was the first time I saw him actually yell at my grandfather; being branch, that shouldn't have occurred. Everyone was terrified of what would happen, and no one knew how to stop it. Then Hinata, after being completely humiliated by our grandfather, runs up to him and gives him a huge hug. When they asked her why, she said he looked upset and she thought he could use a hug so he'd stop saying things that made people mad."
A salty tang leaked into the corners of his smile as he cried the happiness of the memory away. "No one could believe what she'd said, and my father was laughing so hard he couldn't breathe. It was one of the most frightening moments between him and my grandfather, and Hinata resolved it all with a hug.
"I want you to kill Pain. I want to avenge Hinata's death." Neji opened his eyes again, locking onto Naruto's face, calm and attentive. "Hinata was better than me. She believed in people, cared for them, even when they didn't deserve it. Hinata would trust you to make the right choice, and she'd never tell you killing was the first option."
Naruto wiped the tears away, his blue eyes steadying as the conflict within him resolved into determination. "Thank you, Neji. I'll be the man she believed in. I promise." He nodded one last time before leaping away and leaving Neji to his grief.
Neji's foot slid forward, ready to follow—needing to follow—but strong arms grabbed him and turned him around. If Neji had ever wondered—and he wasn't sure he ever did—how Gai would react to the death of someone close, he'd have expected hysterics and tears, given his instructor's penchant for obscenely emotional displays. Yet his eyes were quiet as they held Neji in their gaze, quiet and sorrowful and understanding. Gai's arms came round Neji's shoulders and held him, not in a hug, but with all the considerable strength he had in his body, because he understood that Neji needed to follow and that he couldn't allow him to, because he understood that Neji needed to fight someone, needed to hurt someone, and Gai could take it.
So Neji did. He screamed to the world words that had no meaning or thought—words of agony and grief and rage without end. There would never be an end, because the place they came from was a void needing to be filled. Naruto said he would be the man Hinata believed in; Neji couldn't. Too much of him was still the child who held her hand and promised not to leave her side. Too much was the brother desperate to protect his sister. Too much was the brancher bound to his clan head. How could he be the man he'd planned to be—the one she would be proud to call her brother—having failed Hinata?
Time passed in a strange limbo as they stood in the woods silent of all but him. Neji struggled and fought and beat against Gai's back to be released, but the arms around him never loosened and the man holding him never made a move to defend. A wall against the rage until Neji's body felt as heavy as his heart and Gai's arms supported him rather than restrained him. Neji trusted Gai and his team like no one else outside of the clan, but he was reserved, and not even Tenten had ever seen him weep as he did there, clinging to Gai like a lifeline.
"There are people still alive," Gai finally said as Neji sagged against his instructor's shoulder.
The rage had been screamed out. It would return, Neji knew, many, many times before he was able to face it, but for now all that remained was the emptiness and the pain. It was exhausting. The anger and hate gave him strength and adrenaline to fight—that was where he wanted to be, in battle where that need for action would let him escape the truth—but the hollowness of grief left him drained. It was wrong. He shouldn't have done what she wanted. He shouldn't have let Naruto go alone.
"I should be killing Pain," he said, compelled by Gai's voice to respond, but unable to leave his own thoughts enough to recognize what had been said.
A darkness was growing inside Neji that he'd never felt before, slithering on the edge of the hole once consumed by his rage. It was colder than the rage, calmer, but it made him sick to feel it so near to the place in his heart where Hinata was supposed to be. Part of him wanted to grab it, cling to it, embrace it if only to fill the gaping wound inside him, but the rest recoiled. That darkness held something Neji wouldn't be able to come back from, something that frightened the man he was supposed to be.
"There are people still alive," Gai repeated louder, as if he knew what was happening inside his student's heart and was desperate for Neji to hear. "Your mother, your father . . ."
Yet the darkness was tempting, teasing into his soul like a friendly hand. The coldness felt like strength and power. Strength and power he didn't have to do what he needed to. Strength and power to break free of Gai and kill Pain.
"Shou!" Gai practically screamed in Neji's ear now.
The darkness shrank away as Neji took a breath. It was fouled by sweat soaked into Gai's clothes, a rank musk that at any other time could have choked him. Instead, it acted like a wake-up call, clearing his mind. "Shou . . . they'll make Shou heir. He's unsealed. They'll treat him just like they treated Hinata."
"Then he'll need you, like she did. There are people still alive who need you to be strong, who need you to go back to them."
Neji was strong. He didn't need the cold power of the darkness retreating from his heart. He could have protected Hinata . . . he just hadn't been there when she needed him. He couldn't do that to Shou. He couldn't be late again.
Neji fisted his hands in the stretchy fabric of Gai's sleeve. "I need to go back to the clan."
"Good." Gai sighed. "We can go back now. Your family needs you."
"No," he said, pushing his instructor away to see the intent of his words written on his face. "I need to go back to the clan. Permanently. I wasn't here when Hinata needed me. I will be here for Shou."
Gai's eyes widened. "You're hurting, Neji. Don't make decisions like that right now. Deal with your pain, and think when your mind is clear."
It was almost ridiculous how competent Gai was acting at the moment. Perhaps it was simply because that was what Neji needed at the moment, but it also felt strange on his normally obnoxious instructor. Neji cared for Gai, respected him, but if he was capable of acting with a clear focus and thoughtful attitude all the time, Neji would have enjoyed his company far more. To have him be the instructor he'd always wanted at the moment Neji knew he would no longer be a part of his team . . . was that irony or a twist of fate?
"We should go back to . . . we should go back." Neji couldn't say her body. That made it all too much, too real. It implied a future without his little sister, and deprived of his anger and revenge, he did not want to face that future. But to have a direction now, a purpose in protecting Shou—from his enemies and from the clan—that cleared his mind enough to make the seemingly endless grief manageable. At least until he knew the rest of his family was safe.
Gai held Neji's arm in a grip that felt more like a warning than a comfort. "Don't add to your mother's burden now."
"I won't," Neji said after a moment. "I'll wait to decide."
It was a lie, but not one Gai could see though. He seemed satisfied, releasing Neji's arm and letting the ever watchful caution he'd treated Neji with fade away. Neji wasn't adverse to lying to his instructor, but usually only small lies to keep from being dragged into his and Lee's emotional displays or ludicrous challenges. He did not normally lie when it mattered, and a part of him would have felt guilty if only there was any part of him left that did not ache already.
Neji would not leave Shou alone to face a future he was not meant to have. He would not fail again. Even if that meant trading the life he loved for the one Hinata tried so hard to escape. He would not live for the clan, though; he would live for Shou. Maybe one day that will be enough to take the guilt away.
Neji didn't have the heart to hasten to Hinata's lifeless body, so they walked, steady and slow. Each step felt heavy to Neji's weary heart. The strength in his body seemed useless to lift his leg, one after another across the patchwork sunlight filtering through the crown canopy. So lost in his grief, Neji didn't notice the first change in the light, not until Gai paused and leapt to top branches, his eyes widening in wonder more fitting to his usual disposition.
"Neji, come see this!"
Neji followed his instructor's command. The air tingled strangely warm with the sun bathing across his face as he broke through the treetop. Shadows streamed across the skies like meteors burning blue and bright against the end of the world. Down they came in a shower of fireworks throughout the rim of Konoha.
"Is it another attack?" Gai asked, looking to Neji's sight for the power within.
Neji wasted no time activating byakugan, the fear gripping his heart anew. The shadows illuminated unlike any chakra he knew, though a small shard of chakra remained inside them. Neji followed one arching high only to fall to the ground—no, not the ground, the dead. The light flashed and merged with the body of a man, bloody gash opening the muscle of his chest to the dusty air. A moment passed—a moment that felt like a lifetime as he waited, breath caught in his throat. Why would an attack target the dead? That made no sense. So what was this? What did Naruto do?
Breath passed his lips.
"Hinata . . ."