The Chaos Theory

Interlude 7

By the time Hanabi was fifteen, her sister had married. Sasuke didn't move in per se. She found him one morning in the kitchen blearily searching for coffee. Besides that, he worked like a dog and moved like a ghost. Hinata had moved into a the master bedroom on the other side of the house, and on the occasions she passed it, Hanabi could sometimes hear her and Sasuke talking. They seemed content with their lives despite their conflicting positions.

And although they were newlyweds, they treated their personal affections with a level of discretion that Hanabi appreciated.

The entourage, however, Hanabi did not favor—Sakura dropping by with a cake that everyone suspected radioactive; Naruto pounding on the door in the middle of the night, distraught that Gama-chan had fallen down a well. She hadn't realized it before, but the Uchiha had siblings—annoying ones at that.

"So, what do you think?"

Hanabi heard Sakura's voice late that night. She had been on the way to the kitchen for some water.

"About?" Sasuke responded.

The two older nin were standing near the threshold of the living room. They must have just gotten off mission together.

"Hanabi."

There was a pause as Sasuke deliberated. "She's a normal teenager."

Hanabi flushed at the analysis—her identity simplified into four words by an ANBU special ops member. She stepped back into the corridor and returned to her bedroom.

Why was the Haruno-bitch so obsessed with her? Hanabi wished she could just be rid of her.

"I know you heard."

Hanabi stiffened and turned to face her open bedroom door. She was abashed that she had let Sasuke sneak up on her.

"Are her suspicions warranted?" he asked.

Hanabi was beginning to realize why all the old sannin were dead. "I've been taken off missions," she said flatly.

"That's unfortunate. You have a lot of potential." She was surprised by the compliment. His remarks were almost awkward in their casualness. "Coincidentally enough, I've been placed in the ANBU Interrogation Squad. Maybe I'll use you for practice."

It took her a moment to register it as jest. She had never heard him make a joke before. In fact, she'd never heard him have a casual conversation with anyone except her sister. Hanabi began to register what was going on. He was trying to bond with her, or something weird like that. Hinata had probably put him up to it and it was all uncomfortably domestic.

"Don't you have other things to be doing?" she offered a joke of her own. "Like entertaining my sister? Making an heir?"

There was a pause that might have been uncomfortable for anyone else, but Hanabi was pleased with herself.

"It's early yet," said Sasuke, sounding gruff compared to before.

She just smirked.

"I'm busy," said Sasuke. She didn't know if it was a parting or an excuse until he elaborated, "I have no intention—"

Hanabi raised her eyebrows. "That's ridiculous. You knew the rules before you married Hinata. The clan needs an heir."

"But what if we didn't have a child—or couldn't? What if our bloodlines were too distinct?"

That was pointlessly speculative, bordering on ludicrous. Hanabi shook her head. "But then by default the clan would go to..." she trailed off.

"You," said Sasuke.

Hanabi frowned. "I don't have the byakugan." With the loss of her eyes, she had been stripped of her identity. She wasn't a Hyuuga anymore.

"That doesn't matter," Sasuke snapped. As he began to leave, she trailed towards the doorframe.

"Hinata would never go along with that," she called after him.

"She respects my wishes," Sasuke responded. "Parenting doesn't really fit with my patience or my agenda." And then he was gone.

Bemused, Hanabi closed her bedroom door. She walked to her bed and dropped to her back. The Uchiha had made a bizarre proposition and she didn't know whether to cringe or smile.

And it was a pity. Sasuke might have possibly been a vaguely...half-decent...father. On his days off, he was charged with packing her lunch, and always cut the crusts off her sandwiches.

Not that she wasn't a teenager, and fully capable of doing it herself!

It was just that she was practically languishing from the mundanity of documentation at the Hokage tower.

She spent most of the days there taking verbal mission reports from shinobi freshly home from thrilling adventures. Occasionally there were strange gaps in time or suspicious casualties of civilians. The inconsistencies amused her, but made her better understand her own.

She walked to the Hokage tower with Sasuke on the days he was also stationed in the building. He'd mutter a "ja" when they parted, or grasp her shoulder the way her sister did. Even as the weeks wore on, Hanabi was reluctant to admit how they had become her impromptu guardians.

"Will you give this to Sasuke?" said Kakashi one evening, at the end of her shift. Hanabi felt a scroll being pressed into her palm.

With a nod, she left and descended the tower's many levels, stopping on the first floor. Belatedly, she remembered that Sasuke didn't usually get off until much later than she did. Hanabi found the door to the basements where the Interrogation Force was, and descended two more flights of stairs, emerging into the unit, and feeling the thickness of the stale air. For some reason it made gooseflesh spring up on her arms.

She moved down a hallway enclosed in thick walls of cement or stone, her footsteps echoing in the silence until some voices sounded from a door left ajar.

"She's like the second-coming of Anko," a man chuckled.

Another snorted. "I wouldn't mind if she hurt me."

Hanabi entered a lobby and could feel Ino's chakra there. The medic leaned back behind a desk, her boots thumping down against the surface.

"What are you doing here, midge?"

"I'm looking for Uchiha."

Ino snorted. "You mean your brother-in-law? You know we're all family now." Her deadpan words weren't very convincing. "He's in the corridor on your left. Fourth door. Knock first."

Grasping the wall, Hanabi followed it to the new corridor and counted the doors with her progression even though it was superfluous when she could sense the hollowing in the stone with each room she passed. They were thickly spaced, and by the time she reached the fourth one, she could no longer hear any noise from the lobby. She pushed her way inside.

The first thing Hanabi noticed was the odor. It stunk with blood, some of it fresh, and some stagnant, turning sour.

There was a wet panting noise: a man choking on his own saliva. Then hacking sounds that turned to sobbing, "No..." he pleaded.

Hanabi's senses launched into overdrive. Where there had been vacancies became familiarities.

She recognized the sensation of being under the earth—she could feel the humidity in the air, only this wasn't just moisture, it was fear, rot, and body fluids, filling her lungs until she could taste it in the back of her throat.

There was the scrape of metal, as though right against her eardrums, then the distinct sound of flesh tearing—and alas, a screaming, and it was suddenly her room, and her shrill screaming, her body being hacked away, little by little. She didn't notice the choked sound that escaped her throat until someone turned to face her.

"Hanabi?"

This person grabbed her arm and dragged her out of the room, slamming the door shut behind them. She recognized Sasuke's calloused fingers on her arm.

"What are you doing here?" he demanded. "You shouldn't have seen that."

But she hadn't seen anything. She had experienced it.

"You're a torturer?" she managed.

He didn't even hesitate. "This is Anko's task force. We all are."

Sasuke, Ino, even the men who had been gossiping near the lobby. Though her limbs felt weak, she still managed to back away.

"Hana—"

She ran down the corridor and through the lobby, oblivious of how she ever made it to the stairs. She heard Ino call out, but ignored her, and when she reached the ground floor of the tower and exited into the night, she took desperate gulps of the cool night air. Too disoriented to find direction, she began to walk meaninglessly.

"Hanabi?"

She jerked at the sound of her sister's voice. Hinata placed a hand on her shoulder and guided her around.

"What's wrong?"

"Did Sasuke tell you to come?" Hanabi asked, suddenly defensive.

"What are you talking about?"

Hanabi swallowed. She knew she was being irrational. She had only been out of the tower basements for a few minutes. Or hours. She couldn't be sure.

"What are you doing here?" Hanabi asked.

"I was worried about you."

Hanabi drew a deep breath. "You're not my mother."

A pause. "Of course."

Despite that, Hinata wrapped her arm around her shoulders, and Hanabi allowed it because she was still rather shaken. The trip to the house was silent, her skin cool and clammy, her heart, still pounding in her temples. Hinata took her as far as her bedroom and even then Hanabi did not want her to pull away. If Hinata had any queries, she didn't voice them. The connection broke. Hanabi leaned heavily on the doorframe.

"Will you be coming down for dinner?" asked Hinata.

"No."

"Oh..."

They fell into silence again, and Hanabi wondered why Hinata was lingering. Just as she prepared to turn away, Hinata embraced her. Hanabi remained stationary in her hold, arms hanging at her sides and face stuffed in Hinata's shoulder.

"What is it?" she mumbled.

Hinata pulled back. "Don't tell Sasuke," she said, and Hanabi could tell the woman was smiling even without being able to see her. "But he's going to be a father."

Father-to-be, and professional torturer. How delightful.

But Sasuke ended up leaving the ANBU Interrogation Force. Hanabi didn't know whether it was because of her, or because of her sister's pregnancy, but he returned to reconnaissance missions with the ANBU ground squadron for the next several months.

They never returned to the level of familiarity they had achieved previously. More than anything, Hanabi withdrew.

She was finishing up work at the Hokage's office one afternoon when Sasuke returned from a mission, looking more haggard than usual. Girls used to fawn over him. Now they just offered him food and shelter.

"Hey Sasuke, welcome back! I'm assuming your mission went well?" said Naruto, who was standing in front of the Hokage desk. He lowered a couple of mission reports he had been signing off on for Kakashi.

"Get out of my way," said the Uchiha.

"You seem preoccupied," complained Naruto as he was shoved aside. "Oh, that's right, you're going to be a dad soon."

Ignoring him, Sasuke took a clipboard and began scrawling down his mission report in untidy, indecipherable, somewhat passive-aggressive, scribblings.

"Oh, right. I knew there was something I was supposed to tell you. Hinata's having the baby."

Hanabi heard the clipboard drop. "I am going to kill you," Sasuke assured Naruto before storming off.

Hanabi raised her eyebrows but didn't remark.

When she entered the house, having left the tower shortly after Sasuke, she could hear the couple confronting each other in the living room. Sasuke was probably confused.

"Why are you staring at me? Can I help you with something?" said Hinata.

A pause. "No."

Hinata was probably holding her belly in a protective manner as though Sasuke was some deranged lunatic. Her lips lifting at the prospect, Hanabi walked in the kitchen and began to search the kitchen cupboards for cereal. No one cooked around there anymore.

In the living room the awkward silence was broken. "I missed you," said Hinata, sniffing. "Didn't you miss me?"

Another pause. "Immensely," said Sasuke.

He didn't sound very convincing, and Hanabi secretly hoped Hinata would burst into tears.

Shutting out what she could of the conversation, the younger Hyuuga found a box and poured herself a bowl, hoping it was cereal. She was still absorbed in what Kakashi had told her before she'd left the tower.

"Naruto really said that?" Hinata randomly laughed in the next room. It sounded like they were on the couch, their bodies connected in some way. Maybe her head was on his shoulder. Hadn't she just been on the verge of crying or something? How irritating.

"I'm going to kill him..." said Sasuke, his words trailing as though he was dozing off.

"I'm not due for another three weeks."

"Which is why he's going to die." Sasuke's voice was muffled in clothing or hair.

"You poor thing," said Hinata, potentially petting his head as though he was an animal.

"Are you mocking me?"

Hanabi munched on her cold meal, somewhat uncomfortable by the growing intimacy. She longed for the day the relationship reached its peak annoyingness. Then they could silently resent each other like a proper married couple.

"How are you feeling?" Sasuke asked Hinata, as he usually did upon his return from a mission. There was the sound of his lips making contact, not with lips, but maybe a cheek or ear.

Hinata sighed. "Excited," she said, but her voice wavered. "Scared. Tired."

He kissed her again, as though it would do any good.

Hanabi rested her face on her knuckles, again musing about her exchange with Kakashi that afternoon.

I'm going to give you one more chance with missions.

The corner of her mouth lifted.

She would take it.

She was matched with the most challenging teammate Kakashi could think of—Ino. They were tasked with escorting a missing nin from Kusa to Konoha for trial.

The mission was going well. They had collected their charge easily enough, and had encountered no dissidents throughout the journey. Konoha was only a few days away, and everything was on track so far.

Then came the night that Hanabi was supposed to be keeping watch.

She was roused from her sleep by shuffling noises about the camp, but assumed it was Ino getting up, so she drifted off again.

Her senses, however, remained wide-awake. There was none of the twittering of birds she was accustomed to in the mornings. It was early—before dawn, and Ino wouldn't be up yet.

Hanabi forced herself to rise, and the moment she did so, she realized that their prisoner had absconded.

Grabbing her weapons pouch, she hurried off into the forest, trying to track her captive while not alerting her teammate.

He moved quietly while suppressing his chakra, but not well enough. She was smaller and faster, navigating through the foliage with quick, fluid movements. She descended on him after only a few minutes. The man pelted shuriken at her as he retreated, but Hanabi dodged them, and caught his neck with her knees. She twisted, and there was that satisfying crunch.

She flipped off his shoulders, landing gracefully as he collapsed in a heap.

"What did you do?" Another's voice pierced the dawn.

Hanabi turned. "Ino—" she began.

"You idiot!" Ino knelt down beside their charge and tried to heal him, but both knew it was too late. Straightening again, she rounded on Hanabi. "Who's next?"

"What—?" started Hanabi, but Ino was upon her, oozing hostility. Hanabi tried to remain impassive as she was shoved against a tree.

"Other people are expendable, so who's next, Hanabi? Me? Are you going to try to kill me again?"

"He was going to be killed anyway," grumbled Hanabi, as Ino placed her hand on her forehead. Hanabi tried to swat it away, but the woman's fingers sunk into her hair. "What are you doing?"

"I'm taking a look into that fucked up head of yours."

Hanabi tensed. "No—don't—"

Ino unleashed the technique, and suddenly Hanabi could see again, if only in her mind's eye. She saw her life, compacted to one searing, excruciating instant, out in the open for Ino's appraisal. Hanabi nearly collapsed when it was done.

Ino released her head and stepped back. "Empty..." she breathed, seeming dazzled.

When Hanabi stabbed her with a swift, hard, jerk of her arm, Ino gave a startled grunt, her eyes opening wide, then closing.

The kunai was thick, crude, and damaging, fully impaling Ino's heart so that when the medical chakra surged, it simply faded, and so did Ino.

It took Hanabi three days to get back to Konoha, never stopping for food, water, or rest. She skipped reporting to the Hokage tower, instead going straight to the Hyuuga compound.

When she got inside, she was briefly puzzled by the plethora of chakras. "Hinata had the baby," an elder informed her.

Processing this, Hanabi inquired, "Whose eyes?"

"The mother's."

Nodding, Hanabi continued toward her room, but detected a familiar chakra along one of the walls. She approached it. "What are you doing here?"

"Congratulating Sasuke and Hinata. Checking up on you, of course."

"Of course." Hanabi joined Kiba against the wall, allowing her posture to sag, and the weight of her actions to truly register. Kiba placed his hand on her shoulder as though he could sense something was wrong.

"I know it's hard," he said candidly.

She distractedly nodded. She wasn't fazed by what she had done, which in itself was the problem. She didn't care about anything.

Her voice was weak when she spoke again. "I respect you." She felt defeated. Hollow. "But I can't feel anything else."