Summary: All of the world's unproven things could be explained in concepts: fate, freedom, fear, love...and a girl obsessed with birds made Hizashi question everything he believed in and made him believe. He didn't question it, he just let it be. After all, change is just a concept too.

Word Count: 6108

They all made chunin that year, and Hizashi found himself struggling to keep his emotional distance from Asuka.

It seemed that every time he looked at her, she grew even more beautiful. Her once flat and unshapely body had now developed soft curves and toned muscle. She was even faster than before, her legs long and lean to help carry her at incredible speeds. Her hair was now usually braided into a ponytail to keep it out of her face and it trailed behind her when she leapt from tree to tree, becoming even closer to flying.

She was now able to use the wind-riding jutsu much more proficiently and it was now more common for her to spar in the air rather than on the ground. They all had their fair share of scars now. Some on their arms from rather tough enemies, some from surgeries after they were exposed to toxic chemicals, and some from each other. Yet their team's bond was unbreakable and stronger than before.

However, he was furiously failing to keep the distance he promised the heir of his clan.

It was hard to avoid her. Sometimes he noticed that he would be cold to her but she wouldn't care, because she knew just as well as he did that he would always find her again. Once he had a new training idea, she was the first one he went to. And when she'd sneak into his bedroom in the middle of the night and talk about her mission or birds with such passion in her eyes...how was he to continue to be cold to her when she made him feel so at home?

She took his sudden changes in attitude to be moodiness and still treated him the same. It was usually later in the day where everything would be normal again.

They each were promoted to jonin one by one in the course of four years after several missions led by Kazane-sensei. On one of the S-ranked missions, the four of them stumbled upon a map in one of the scrolls of their assassinated targets. It appeared to be a map in a language that he didn't understand. However, when Kenji examined the scroll once more, he understood it immediately.

According to their teammate, it was the signs and symptoms of strange diseases understood by a skilled medics. However, the procedure and symptoms apparently made practically no sense and were organized into several chunks. Kenji spent a week trying to figure out what it meant, even consulting Tsunade, who was also very confused.

One day, when Kazane-sensei and Hizashi were meditating, Asuka bird-watching, and he was reading, he jumped up and shouted. "I know what it means!"

The three immediately looked up and he spread pages of lined paper onto the ground, pinning them with kunai.

"So most of them provide strange snippets like right here, it says the nerve was damaged severely and the word nerve was underlined. So to try and remember this, I put the abbreviation for "nerve", which is "N" on this paper, then went to the next one, which says "sutures in the nose" so I shortened that to "intranasal" and abbreviated that to "IN". Those ones were super obvious but some of them like the missing symptom for a disease were harder to find."

"You lost me, Kenji." their sensei admitted.

"Nevermind. If you take the chart abbreviation for each section it spells out into complicated instructions to a ninja falcon cliff! It's a map to find the ninja summons of falcons written down by a med-nin who probably wanted to keep it a secret!"

And with that statement, Asuka nearly fainted. He caught her as she fell back but she clearly needed to hear more, and she couldn't do that if she was unconscious. She recently also acquired a contract with ninja owls, and it was clear she was hungry for more. With a writ from the Hokage, she was granted permission to leave the village in search of the ninja falcon.

Sixteen-year-old Hizashi and the other two bid their teammate goodbye at the gates of Konoha, supplying her with emergency contact gear, extra weapons, summoning scrolls within summoning scrolls, and items that were supposed to bring luck. She assured them she would be fine even as Kazane-sensei reminded her to do things in the way she used to back when they were genin. They were reluctant to let her go, knowing that it could be half a year before seeing her again. Yet this was her passion and if she succeeded, she would be a stronger ninja, something they all wanted to be.

After hugging the other Kenji and Kazane-sensei, she quickly threw her arms around Hizashi, taking him by surprise.

"I know you don't like hugs," she softly as his frozen hands shook, then slowly wrapped around her waist. "But I'm really gonna miss you, Hizashi."

He blinked, burying his face in the crook of her neck into the soft fabric of her dark grey cloak. It was true that he disliked hugs, but having her in his arms was a completely different story. "I'll miss you too, Asuka. Please be safe."

"I will,"

They seemed to linger for a few moments, even as the other two watched their interaction carefully. She then pulled away and ran off, speeding towards the distance. She leaped and turned around mid-air, giving them a final wave before disappearing.

He felt disappointment flood his body and admiration as her flowing cloak and hair escaped his immediate sight.

Kenji put a hand on his shoulder and shook his head, a grin plastered on his tanned face. "Oh man, you really got it bad, don't you."

"I—I'm not supposed to—"

"Have you told her how you feel yet?" his friend asked.

"I don't have—"

"I have my own Byakugan that see through the lies you tell yourself, Hizashi."

The young jonin sputtered, his face reddening. Kazane-sensei rolled her eyes and shoved her hands in her pockets. "Come on, Kenji. Let the poor guy try to actually sort his feelings out himself. He'll tell her when it's ready."

"Is it really that obvious?" he said a little bit too loudly.

They both gave him an identical look and he groaned, burying his face in his hands.

Four months later, he was nearly asleep when a bird was tapping at his window. It was Suisen, the tiny swift that destroyed his twin brother in the Chunin exams. At first, he thought it was a dream. But when he opened his window and let her in, she quickly flew onto his lamp. "Asuka is back."

His heart pounded in excitement. "Did she summon you to get me?"

"Nah, I thought you'd like to know. She's back home, finishing up cleaning. I think if you get there fast enough, you'll still get there."

He didn't need to be told twice. "Thank you, Suisen."

Hizashi cranked open his window as she disappeared with a poof and silently leaped over the rooves until he reached the window of her apartment. She lived on the highest floor, close to the sky and the roof. Her light was still on when he crouched on the sill of her window, knocking on it three times. When she didn't answer, he slowly pushed it open with a little bit of chakra and crept in. No one was in her bedroom and he was slightly worried.

Suddenly, the door opened and she was standing in a towel, dark hair dripping, and completely oblivious to the fact that he was in her bedroom.

"Asuka," She screamed, throwing her hands out to make hand seals, nearly losing the grip on her towel. He quickly looked away and raised his palms up. "Wait! Wait, it's just me."

His best friend relaxed and put her hand over her chest. "Lord Kami, you scared me, Hizashi — wait — Hizashi!"

Her face lit up and she hugged him once again, damp skin pressing against his clothes. He had to push her away, knowing that nothing was under her towel. She seemed to suddenly realize this fact too and blushed hard, stammering.

"Let me put something on."

Asuka took a few clothes out of her drawers and headed back the way she came, coming out once more with a loose shirt and shorts. "How did you know I was home?"

"Suisen," he replied, still trying to grasp his mind around the fact that he was home.

He wasn't supposed to miss her so much.

Every day he thought about her, wondered if she was ok, or if she missed him too. His nights were restless even though in the day he prayed he could go back to sleep just to see her in his dreams again. Then he wondered if she would even come back. What would he do without her? And even then, he thought about her hair and her birds, her cloak and her smile, he was pretty much a wreck while she was gone.

"I—I thought Suisen went back. She didn't tell me that she would find you—"

"I'm glad she did."

"Oh?"

"Yea. I really missed you, Asuka."

She smiled, brown eyes beaming warmly at him. "I missed you too."

"How did it go? Did you make a contract with any falcons?"

Her face lit up and she started on the tales of her journey, nearly falling off a cliff several times, being soaked to the bone, getting lost, and finally making it to their habitat, only to be tested if she was worthy. She talked for an hour, the light in her eyes shining as she talked about something she was passionate about. Usually, she didn't say much and they could understand each other through glances alone, but she could go on forever about birds. Sometimes he would zone out, the sound of her voice morphing into music and the way her lips moved entrancing him. Though she looked exhausted, she had enough energy to finish her story.

"The falcons can see even farther than you can," she whispered.

"Don't tell me I'm being replaced." he joked.

Asuka laughed, shaking her head. "Unfortunately, they don't see tenketsu points. Otherwise, you would have been screwed."

"Do they have crazy families?"

"Oh, yea. That falcon family would be crazier than yours besides the fact that they don't inflict terrible pain to those who disobey them."

It was a weirdly morbid joke that made the two silent for a moment, but Hizashi started laughing and she was on her way to apologizing until she burst too. They laughed, clutching their stomachs and rolling around, trying not to wake up her neighbours. Then he realized how pretty she was when she was laughing like that and stopped admire her.

When she noticed that he was no longer laughing, she stopped too. Her eyes fluttered to his lips, then back to his eyes. He prayed she would do whatever her eyes were saying she wanted to do. He prayed for her to have less self-control than he did because right now, he knew he didn't want her enough to kiss her but wouldn't stop her if she did.

Yet Asuka was never one to be bold in situations like these. Even in the rare seduction missions, she wouldn't even have to play the innocent girl because it came so easily. In a mission where she would have to show a lot of skin and crawl her fingers up an old man's arm, they would be screwed. When she looked away embarrassed, he wasn't surprised. It didn't stop Hizashi from feeling disappointment though.

He coughed awkwardly, reluctant to go but unsure of what else he could do. She smiled weakly at him when he crouched at her windowsill.

"Goodbye," her soft voice echoed through his ears.

"I'll see you tomorrow, ok?"

She nodded and he waved a final greeting before jumping out her window, feeling light and airy, almost as if he could fly as she did.

Months later, he found himself winded up in one of the most intimate moments he ever had. The two lay side by side, staring up at the sky, which was littered with flecks, shimmering above them. Nothing touched his skin but blades of grass on their open training field, and the soft breeze of the summer night. He was fully clothed but he never felt so exposed in his life.

Hizashi didn't know much about stars and neither did Asuka, but she explained to him how birds sometimes knew where to go by looking at them. It was one of the few things about the feathered creatures she couldn't figure out: how they found their way home no matter what.

She reached out her hand as if she could touch the brightest stars and he briefly wondered how soft her fingers would feel if he wrapped his around them. Yet instead, a small owl flew past and fluttered silently around them, landing near her, looking around for prey before flying off again.

"Back in the academy, I thought your obsession with birds would be a phase. I've been proven very wrong. You have a way with them and you don't even seem to try."

She shrugged and sat to look back in the direction where the owl left. He now only saw her face, rather than stars in his vision.

"I'm not sure why. Maybe it's because I respect them. I always have seen them as equals." she paused for a moment. "For the longest time, I've wanted to be like them. They're free. They have no bounds. I wished so badly that I could fly as easily as they did."

"You said all of that in past tense. Do you not wish to fly anymore?"

Asuka chuckled. "No, I do. But I can almost fly, and for me, that's enough. I wanted to fly because of the freedom, but even birds have their limits. They have more limits than humans do. I didn't want to be caged but the truth is, all of us are in one. For them, they cannot swim or go past our earth into space. For me, my limits are the same as birds and the laws of the shinobi. For you, it is your clan. I am happy with my cage. It satisfies all my needs, there is enough space, and enough unknowns to last me a lifetime."

"You always talk about freedom, but if you are caged, then how can you be free?" he asked.

"Freedom is a concept," she explained. "We all are restricted by one thing or the other. It is only freedom when you don't feel like you are restricted. I feel free even within my restrictions, therefore I am free. Yet if I were to be put into your place, in your clan, I don't think I would be. Do you feel free?"

"Sometimes," he said. "When I'm not at the compound, I feel it completely. I'm free until I take off my forehead protector and see my cursed mark. Or until I see my brother without one. When my parents don't look at me anymore."

"I'm sorry."

"It's ok," he smiled weakly. "Around the team, on missions, and with you, I usually just forget about it."

"Do you hate them?" she asked.

"I try not to. It's hard, that's for sure, but there is little I can do about it." Hizashi then hesitated.

"What is it."

"I—I hate my brother."

"I can hate him with you,"

He laughed softly. "It's ok, my hate is powerful enough for one person. It's just that I see him and try to find things I'm better at than him. And I am better than him. I learned all the techniques faster, became jonin quicker, and I know that we're identical, but I feel more attractive than he is."

Asuka rolled her eyes. "You have no idea how odd that sounds coming from a person like you."

"Anyways, I think about all the ways I'm better than him, but then I remember he doesn't have a curse mark and it outweighs everything."

She thought for a moment, staring down at him with sad eyes as he watched the stars.

"What about our team?"

"Hmm?"

"You have our team. Does that outweigh your seal?"

"Asuka I—"

"Does being on a team with me outweigh your seal?"

He felt himself at a loss for words. When he thought about it, she was right. Having such a close bond with his team outweighed the seal. Being close to someone as wonderful as her by itself outweighed the seal.

She blushed, looked away and sighed, threading her fingers around the long grass.

"Hiashi…he likes you. I—I can't."

"Since the academy, right?" she murmured. "It's just an infatuation. And it's not like he even knows me. How could he have real feelings for me when he knows practically nothing about me?"

"How do you know he doesn't have real feelings for you?"

"Are you defending him?"

She didn't seem angry, just surprised. He nodded, thinking selfishly that if she were to like him back, it would be easier for him to avoid her.

"May I ask why?"

"I'd rather not say."

Asuka crossed her legs and he propped himself up on his elbows. The moonlight hit her face at a perfect angle, highlighting her soft cheekbones and illuminating her eyes, making them appear almost silver. Her lips seemed incredibly welcoming at the moment and he wondered if they felt as soft as the looked. Would he be more satisfied by a quiet gasp if he kissed her jaw and sucked her neck or if she pressed her thin frame onto his, winding her fingers into his hair?

"H—He doesn't look at me like you do." she breathed. "You look at me li—like you—"

"Like I what?"

When words didn't arrive, he felt his stomach drop. Yet he suddenly tensed up much more when her hand reached up to his jaw and her thumb brushed lightly against his cheek, turning his face to her. His heart pounded in his chest so loudly that he couldn't hear his own thinking. Did she think about doing that? Was it easy for her to just touch him like that or did she contemplate on it, like he did every time he was around her?

"You care," she whispered. It wasn't a comparison anymore. She didn't say "like he cared". She knew. And the way she said it, he knew that she didn't mean it platonically.

She knew that he was in love with her.

It was something he had denied to himself until the very moment. He knew this as his skin heated before her hand even touched his face and as he found himself dizzy around her. When the thought of losing her made his chest hurt so much that he felt like he had to hold it and cry. How just being around her was probably the best thing to ever happen to him and how he wanted her to be around for the rest of his life.

Her whisper may have been quieter than his raging thoughts, still deafened by his pulse, yet the two words rang in his head over and over again.

Hizashi swallowed, slowly raising his hand to grab hers, locking their fingers, and painfully choosing to lower them from his face and back to her side. He let go of her hand and a new set of voices rang in his head again.

"Stay away from Asuka,"

"Hi—Hizashi?"

"I can. I can make you do whatever I want,"

"I should go—"

"Am I wrong?" she said, sounding hurt and so innocent, looking at him with big sad eyes that made him feel disgusting.

"No," he choked. "You're not wrong."

"Then why?"

And they both knew that deep inside, he knew she returned his feelings. Two people who loved each other should hardly be a problem, but it was. He lay back down from his elbows and rubbed his face with his hand.

"I don't want to hurt you—"

"You know I can handle pain, even emotional,"

"I—You—What if you realize that I'm not worth being around—"

"We've been teammates for five years."

"I have orders!" Hizashi choked, trying to keep the tears at bay. He wasn't going to cry in front of her. "I can't make any advances on you."

She was silent because even she knew that orders from the main family weren't to be taken lightly. "For how long?"

"Since you beat Hiashi during the chunin exams."

"That's when you started trying to avoid me."

"I know."

"I'm not an object."

"I told him that,"

"Yet it's an order nonetheless." she sighed.

"I'm sorry, Asuka."

He sat up, deciding that it could be a good time to leave.

"If—If you didn't have these orders, wo—would you have kissed me by now?"

One last sentence rang in his head.

"You better keep your word, brother."

"Yes, I would have," he said honestly. He wasn't going to lie to her, especially when it was a truth, not an advance. When he wasn't going to let himself go any further, she deserved it.

"Then if you don't make advances, is there anything about rejecting one?"

He blinked a couple of times, running her question in his mind over and over again. "No,"

She leaned in closer, darting her eyes between his and his lips. He prayed she would break the distance. Once again, he wouldn't lean in until she kissed him. Asuka hovered over his lips, so close he could feel her breath, so close that they shared the same air, and so close that he was scared she would hear his heart beating out of his chest.

It seemed to be forever when she finally closed her eyes and kissed him, wrapping an arm around his neck and slowly joining their breaths together. He sighed in relief and wrapped his arm around her waist, lightly pushing her to the grass and savouring her lips. They were just as soft as he imagined them to be but the fireworks exploding in his chest and the dopamine rushing through his system were completely unexpected.

When it was time to pull away, they lingered around each other, eyes still half-lidded, faces still pulling towards each other like two positive ends of a magnet, almost touching, but never there. They didn't want it to end.

"Asuka…"

"Hizashi…"

"May I walk you home?"

"You don't have to ask."

It was silence on the way to her house, unlike the other times he walked her home. Yet it was a comfortable silence, one that was warm and welcome.

She pecked him on the cheek just before walking inside, beaming radiantly.

"Goodbye,"

"I'll see you tomorrow, ok?"

She nodded and smiled, then closed the door.

On his way home in his daze, he didn't realize that her small summoning owl was trailing him. His strength was his sight, not his hearing, and the owl also knew how to keep in the blind spot of his, even when his Byakugan wasn't activated.

What he did notice, however, was his brother standing at the entrance of the compound with his arms crossed. Hizashi was not one to be scared of another. He was scared of concepts. He was scared of dying without purpose, others controlling his fate, and unimaginable pain that was enough to strip him of his humanity. Yet as he stared in the identical yet much too different eyes, it was clear that he was scared of his brother because he could be all the concepts that Hizashi was ever afraid of.

"You broke your word."

Funny how the same vocal cords can sound so cold when they come out of another's mouth. Or how someone you are more powerful than can still hold more control over you.

"I did not,' he replied steadily.

"Then what was your session in the woods today?"

"You watched me?" he growled.

Hiashi didn't move. "I have watched you uncountable other times. It appears that you never came to your senses after all."

"I did not put forth advances. It is she who has chosen to kiss me. Do not blame me for the fact that she knows I'm a better shinobi and a better person than you are."

"Don't lie, you kissed her back."

"I did."

"That counts as an advance."

"You did not specify."

"Must I spell it out for someone of your calibre?"

Hizashi ground his teeth together. "If you truly had feelings for her, you would consider the fact that she can make her own decisions."

"Oh, I know she can. I'm not stopping her from falling for you. I'm stopping you from letting her. I can't control her, but I sure as hell can make sure you don't lay another finger—"

"You make her sound like she's your property! You probably don't even remember the type of bird she summoned to defeat you in the chunin exams. You don't care for her at all."

"Her name was Suisen. She's a swift, a White-throated Needletail to be exact. I know more than you think."

He blinked a couple of times, surprised. "You can't have actual feelings for her, can you?"

"I can."

"Wow, I'm surprised that you even had any emotion left inside of you, Hiashi-sama. Looks like you've changed. Next time work on treating women as equals and brothers as humans. Or maybe try to give people a choice and to stop lying about caring for someone you don't know—"

Hizashi suddenly felt a fist hit his face, faster than he could react.

"You don't know what you're talking about, branch filth." his brother spat.

In his years of knowing him, even though Hiashi never defended him or did anything good for him, he had never sunk so low to call him by his status in the clan. Furious, he went to punch, but Hiashi's Byakugan was already activated.

Everything turned downhill from there. Two brothers, similar in skill, equal in rage, threw gentle fists, weapons, and chakra towards each other. It was a battle to kill.

Yet Hizashi was just a little stronger than he was, so Hiashi slowly started to lose. It was until the branch member was about to close a tenketsu point until a searing pain erupted through his head.

It was indescribable.

The pain could not be explained and he wasn't aware of anything anymore. He suddenly could not use any of his senses. He didn't know if he was screaming or not. He couldn't tell if anything was happening because he couldn't hear himself, nor could he feel his vocal cords growing sore as the pain in his forehead masked it. The agony started to subside in what felt like an eternity.

When his sight started growing clearer, he saw elders looking down at him with disgust. His brother's mouth was open in shock and he was staring at his hands. His own father stood over him and looked at his state without any sympathy, then at the bruise on the heir's cheek.

"Do it again," he demanded.

"Father," Hiashi's voice shook. It was the first time Hizashi had ever heard him falter. "I—I ca—is it really necessary?"

"Do it!" he bellowed. "If you are ever to rule the clan you must be able to inflict the curse mark like I taught you to!"

"Please Hiashi," he whimpered, "Please don't,"

"Address him with the proper suffix, branch scum,"

"I—I'm sorry, Hiashi-sama,"

"Son, do it now! Don't show branch members any mercy. You let them beg, but you do not ever grant their requests. They must know their place within the clan."

But Hiashi didn't move. He shook. For a moment, Hizashi was relieved, glad that his brother really did have some compassion, even after inflicting the seal on him himself. Yet his father quickly brought his hands together and the pain was present once again, this time even worse than it was before. Those hands were experienced. They had struck pain into countless branch members, rather than just one.

He wished he could pass out but he didn't. He wondered if this was the end for him. Would they even find his body? His hands gripped at his hair, his scalp so numb that he didn't know how much he could have ripped out. It could have been days when the pain finally started to ease. Yet it was still night, the footprints still fresh on the dirt.

Hizashi couldn't hear it but he felt a warm presence drift near. A huge bird landed by his side and a girl jumped off, gathering his forehead protector and pressing an ice pack to his head. It didn't completely ease the pain but it helped and he blindly reached out to whoever had provided him with the relief. She took his hand and let him squeeze it as hard as he could, even when he may as well have crushed her bones.

The girl carried him onto the back of the bird, he decided it could only be an owl from the silence, and they flew off.

"Asuka?" he breathed. "Is it you? Am—Am I alive?"

It was only then when he heard her sobs as she wiped his tears away with her finger. It stung when she touched his cheeks from the tears he didn't even know he had shed. The rush of wind blowing past them as she held him on top of her owl soothed the pain on his skin but did nothing for the agony in his temples.

"You're alive, Hizashi. I'm so sorry. I'm so so so sorry." she cried. "You're going to be ok, we'll be at Kenji's house in seconds."

"It hurts," he whimpered. "It hurts."

"I know, I know. I'm sorry,"

She apologized over and over again, though he didn't know or ask why. The owl fluttered by a window and rapped its claws along the glass until their teammate saw. Kenji was didn't have his prosthetics on so he stumbled out of bed and used his hands to propel himself towards the window at an alarming speed, cranking it open so she tumbled in, dragging Hizashi with him. She still pressed the ice pack to his head and tears were still streaming down his face.

"What the hell happened?" Kenji asked as he strapped on a pair of legs and removed the ice pack from Hizashi's forehead and replacing it with the back of his palm. His eyes widened when he realized that it heated up seconds after removing it. "How did he get this fever?"

Asuka cried even harder. "It's not a fever. It's the curse mark."

And the seal was still glowing.

His groans filled Kenji's apartment and his parents rushed in the room, shocked to see their child's teammate clutching at his head, another teammate crying over him, and the pain he seemed to be in. The medical ninja quickly explained the situation and took out his summoning scroll. He bit his finger and with a poof, a small needle and a vial labelled "morphine" appeared. After measuring a small amount of the drug, he took out a tourniquet to find a vein in Hizashi's arm. However, his skin was so pale and the veins already protruded from the tension and all he had to do was look to inject the morphine into his system.

Hizashi's screams and moans were finally reduced to small whimpers.

"I've been working in the hospital for almost 5 years," Kenji broke the chain of unspoken words. "I admit, I may not ever be as talented as Tsunade, but that also means I have dealt with more traumas, cases that don't require 12-hour surgeries, far more patients than she had at my age because I treat everyone, not just the serious ones. In these five years, I have heard screams louder than his and eyes swollen shut from crying but I don't think I have ever and will never see someone in so much pain, physical and mental. I would even go so far and say that the curse mark functions by combining the user and the receiver's emotions, throwing it into the mind, and turning it into pain. Usually, someone would have passed out from how much of it he was experiencing, and I think he endured it without falling unconscious because that was just a part of the torture."

The medical-ninja switched the melted ice pack for a fresh one. "Hizashi, please tell us what happened."

The deathly pale sixteen-year-old looked at Asuka for permission and she nodded. "It's your story to tell, not mine."

"Wait, what do you have to do with this—" Kenji interrupted, then saw the way they were gazing at each other. "Oh...oh...oh shit."

"Hiashi has liked Asuka since the Academy, as I'm sure you know. After he realized that she would never see him the same, he, uh, he ordered me not to make any advances on her."

"But you did," their teammate sighed.

"No, I did," she said. "I—I did. It's my fault. If—If I hadn't then none of this would have happened. You wouldn't be—"

"It's not your fault," Hizashi said soothingly, slowly sitting up. "You can't blame yourself."

"But."

"He's right," Kenji replied. "Is it ok for you to tell us what happened next?"

He took a deep breath. "I don't know why, but Hiashi was watching us. We argued and I told him that he was emotionless and called him out on the way he was treating us. He punched me and we started attacking each other. I was about to knock him out before he—he activated the cursed seal."

Even his forehead hurt by thinking of it, and Hizashi winced in pain. They set him down and lay his head back on the pillow. He continued to tell them what happened, how Hiashi refused to activate the seal again so his father did, and how he begged for them to stop.

"What about you two? What's gonna happen now?" Kenji asked. "Will you still be together?"

"No," said Asuka.

"Yes," Hizashi replied at the same time.

The two looked at each other uncomfortably, then at the medical ninja.

"Don't look at me! I'm worried for you too and you probably need to figure out what you'll be from now on. Dating? Secret lovers? Friends with benefits?"

The kunoichi nearly passed out of a nosebleed at his last comment. "N—No. I won't let us go on. You can't suffer more because of me."

"Are you breaking up with me?" he asked, failing miserably to bring light into the situation. "Wow, I'm glad you thought of me as your boyfriend in the first place."

"I—"

"What if you do keep whatever you have going on?" Kenji asked. "I'm rooting for your safety, but if you guys can be safe and dating or whatever, I want that for you two. If you keep—er…this, will Hiashi continue to activate the curse?"

"I don't think he will choose to. I can only hope that he has enough humanity left to let us be."

"Do you really think so?"

"He's my brother. Hopefully, he will put aside his anger and remember that."

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