ANOTHER WORLD
CHAPTER 13
By Blackmamuth
Under the moonlight and the protective gaze of the faces of the previous hokages carved in the mountain, the event was going to take place. A gentle breeze and a lot of fresh flowers were also present. It was an image that you could have found in a romance novel. Under the only light provided with the stars and several candles scattered into the green field, all of Konoha was reunited to see the joining of two of the greatest nins that Konoha had ever seen. Two of the sannins, Jiraya the Toad Sannin, and Tsunade, the legendary medical nin and fifth Hokage of Konoha.
Hinata could see the park under the Hokage monument full of life, the flowers in full bloom. Everyone stood several feet away from the monument where all the names of the shinobis who fell in combat were carved on.
The monument in front where they were going to proclaim their love for each other in front of all of Konoha, the spirits of their fallen comrades, and the petrified hokages in the mountain.
Hinata looked at the public while walking. Familiar faces stood there, obviously. Clad in her ceremonial Hokage robes, the hat in place, and with a regal attitude, she walked slowly between the two groups, in the right, there was the Konoha shinobi, and personal friends of the happy couple, and in the left, the foreign and diplomatic guests.
Hinata placed herself in front of the KIA shinobi monument, and adopted a calm and collected stance, a stance she learned in her youth when she was enduring those diplomatic and protocol sessions in front of her father and the clan guests.
Hinata searched for Naruto in the public, and found him instantly in the first row of people, in the right side, With little Iruka climbed in his shoulders, who was playing with Naruto's blonde mane. He was talking very loud (as usual everyone else was ignoring his antics) and moving his hands wildly, his attention focused with the neighbours he had in his right side. No one else than Uchiha Sasuke, who strangely enough, no only wasn't ignoring him, he was also smirking. (a truly feat of expressiveness coming from the youngest of the Uchiha brothers) Sakura was smiling there listening to him, holding hands with said Uchiha.
Near them, was also Shizune, with a jounin flak jacket, and with a smile in her lips. Oddly enough, she was alone. Hinata raised her eyebrow. Was the perverted jounin late at the wedding? Didn't Shizune cure him from that annoying habit in this timeline?
Hinata scanned the faces in the crowd, finding more familiar faces. her former sensei Yuuhi Kurenai, with his family, his husband Asuma was smoking a big cigar. Konohamaru and Hanabi, were under a shade of a big tree holding hands, Unsurprisingly, they weren't paying much attention at the event. Chouji and Ayame were near the end of the field, and Chouji was eating (duh!) At least he was being discreet about it. Lee and Gai were seated together, and she could hear them rambling something about youthfulness from her position, several meters away. Weird. (Hinata wondered if in this timeline there were also rumours saying that their relationship was more deeper than student/sensei, after all, these two had no known girlfriend in all their lives)...
Hinata continued to scan the crowd when she found him. She froze. Was the byakugan lying to her? He was not supposed to be there. She checked again, hoping that her eyes weren't lying to her. Nope, they weren't lying. It was real. He was real.
In the other timeline. She had to dispose of the corpse herself. That was one of her worse memories. Seeing her friend and team captain soaked with blood, slowly dying, giving his life so his team could escape alive.
because her clumsy attempts had gotten the team detected, And her team leader had taken the responsibility to deal with the group of fifty enemy shinobi who were surrounding them. And he did it. He used some complicated forbidden technique, one technique powerful enough that allowed him to massacre the enemy shinobi. A kinjutsu (forbidden technique) that claimed his life in exchange. It was not in vain. The mission was a success under the temporary leadership of Lee, and they managed to steal the enemy battle plans. With them, Konoha managed to mount a strategy that gave them the war, and saved hundreds of lives. But that what mattered. What really mattered was that her incompetence cost Shikamaru his life.
But here, Clad in a black uniform, Shikamaru was seated lazily in a rock, watching the stars. Oddly enough, it wasn't his jounin uniform. It was something different, something she never saw Shikamaru with. A green and black mix between a flack jacket and an ANBU uniform. It looked like an armoured flak jacket. It was somewhat familiar, where she had seen it before?
-XXX-
Hinata found herself seated behind the desk in the Hokage office, and there were four shinobi's assembled in front of her. They all wore the black and green camouflage pants, and a black jounin flak jacket with green armour plates. The symbol of Konoha was proudly displayed near the location of their heart. in their back, they were allowed to display their family symbol.
And there were family symbols indeed. The oldest of them, wore a red and white fan, The Uchiha clan symbol. It was Uchiha Itachi, who wore proudly his outfit.
Next to him, there was his younger brother, Uchiha Sasuke, who was mirroring his brother expression.
The third component of the group, was wearing the Hyuuga clan symbol, he was grinning a foxy grin at everyone, and he could barely contain his happiness to everyone else involved.
and the last one was sporting a lazy expression, and was looking positively embarrassed. He was Nara Shikamaru, The shadow user.
And then, Tsunade talked from hinata's back. She was wearing her usual green jacket. She was smiling at those four, especially to Naruto.
"you know why we called you here. Hinata and I discussed it with the village council, and reached an agreement. " A brief pause followed her statement. Hinata continued. "we were able to do it. There is now a new rank in the leaf, a rank higher than Jounin and special jounin. We created a rank were only the top village shinobis will be able to reach, a rank where the ones that are at Kage level are allowed to hold ,We called it "Legendary", a bit arrogant really(a short laugh followed that statement), but they are calling you that already. As you know, we decided to promote you, the four yonnin's to that rank. I'm already the Hokage, so getting this rank would be a demotion. We promoted also Jiraya and Tsunade-sama to that..."
Naruto couldn't hold himself, he had to interrupt.
"Ne, Ne Hinata-chan! How is that Baa-chan hasn't to wear this ridiculous outfit? "
Hinata grimaced. Really, she liked those outfits, and it wasn't her fault that Konoha's ninja law said that their shinobi weren't forced to wear their uniforms when on duty. (it was something related to freedom of movements, and wearing clothing that most suited every shinobi style of fighting. The only thing a shinobi was forced to wear was the forehead protector, where his village symbol was engraved (and name, rank and blood group in the inside part of it ) )
"Naruto, you don't have to wear it if you don't want. it isn't like an ANBU outfit where you are forced to wear it. It's only voluntary"
Sasuke looked at Itachi and they nodded for each other. Let's say that no Uchiha wore the ridiculous new outfit in public. Naruto wasn't going to wear it too. In Naruto's opinion the outfit was creepy (too much black), it gave him itches, and it was hard to look cool with it . That's something Naruto valued.
-XXX-
Hinata Cursed herself for not finding about Shikamaru earlier. What more differences were there? Finding a pair of alive, breathing, and loyal Uchiha brothers, should have tipped her that there would be more differences in that department. Who else was there what was supposed to be dead? That should have been one of her first priorities. Instead she was overwhelmed in the wonderful feeling of Having Naruto-kun for herself. Hinata reactivated her Byakugan without hand seals (Oddly enough, In the first timeline, she was unable to do that.) Instantly, the 360ยบ vision appeared, and she used the telescopic vision to scan the names into the monument in her back. She recognized some of the names, and she found also a few that were not supposed to be there.(there also a lot missing)
And there they were. Those names were not supposed to be there:
Hatake Kakashi.
Died in action defending a medic team during an assault from the sound. and saving his team-mates from certain death. His dead wasn't in vain, he managed to bring Yakushi Kabuto with him to the afterlife.
Yamanaka Ino
Found dead in the middle of the Jounin exam with a kunai pierced directly into her heart. Shikamaru took care of the cloud Jounin wannabe who did it.
Umino Iruka.
Died from an exploding trap that the cloud put in the Icharaku Ramen stand. Thanks to him trying to delay the exploding of the complicated trap, The old man, his daughter Ayame, and Naruto. Even today, Naruto still blamed himself, and he still had nightmares about Iruka shouting. "PICK THEM AND RUN!"
But not all were bad news. .
The Inuzuka elder sister wasn't there. Genma name was nowhere to be found also. And there wasn't Tenten too. Ebisu, Anko, Akamaru... The list of shinobi KIA WAS shorter than the one in the old timeline.
Hinata couldn't think about it anymore, he could see Jiraya approaching her. The wedding was going to start.
END CHAPTER
Note about Shinobi's not being forced to wear they uniforms. Tenten and Sakura? is a chuunin in the new arc, and they aren't wearing a flak jacket. Neji and Kurenai are Jounins... Well you get the point
Sorry about the delay, I lost my pen drive with a lot of chapters already written, and rewriting everything again made me lose my enthusiasm temporarily.
