family affair
thirteen:
the long game
"I got him," Hinata said sternly, her voice a flat-line, her form unwavering as she led Shikamaru to a seat. "Ino, just sit down. I got him."
They were in a theatre. It was 5:15 am. Half an hour ago, Hanabi had stormed into her room and thrown the blankets off her still-drunk body. Hinata had fallen asleep in her tank top and underwear, smelling like whiskey. She dreamt of Sasuke and the pink-haired girl in the black dress for the single hour she had slept, the pinkette dancing around their bodies, her eyes a pair of magnifying glasses. Who are you? She'd asked.
Hanabi slapped her hard in the face to sober her up, a move she'd likely seen her father do to their uncle one time or another. Hinata winced, her head going dizzy as she clambered out of bed, moaning an uncharacteristic "What the fuuuucc--"
"There was a raid," Hanabi explained, face hot. "I heard Shikamaru come in-alone. He's in bad shape with-"
"Alone?" Here Hinata sprang up, recalling that there had been three of them, not just one. She scurried from bed, grabbing the jeans she'd worn that night and pulling them up her legs. "Is Shikamaru okay?"
Hanabi shrugged, her face was pinked and scared. "I don't know. They went right to the theatre and I'm not allowed down there, but they called Inoichi and Ino came too, and she just said to go get you."
She was mostly rambling. Hinata tried to calm her down, leading her to a seat and handing her the cup of water Hinata had set out before she went to sleep-it was supposed to be for her inevitable hangover, but at present, she felt nothing except the slap on her cheek. Hanabi had done her a good one.
Hanabi was likely, and reasonably, traumatized. This had happened years ago when Hizashi was arrested for the murder of Gaara's uncle. The Estate stood still and quiet, ready for anything.
When Hinata had assured Hanabi to a reasonable degree ("once I'm done I'll come back up and tell you everything,") she bolted down the stairs to the theatre, where she found her father, Inoichi, Ino, and Tsume crowded around Shikamaru who was bleeding out his arm.
Hinata went to his side and inspected it, moving a worried Ino out of the way. She reeked of vodka, still wearing the purple dress with the feathers or whatever, as she worried over her boyfriend. She was sniffing, saying "some way to start the new year."
She was also trying to get to Shikamaru, who looked frantic and vaguely nauseous. Hinata quietly said, "I got him, Ino. W-will you please let me take care of him?"
"I don't think it's bad," Shikamaru said once he sat. Hinata began unfolding the torn shirt he'd wrapped around the wound. "I wanted a paramedic to look at it when I dropped off Shenji, but it started to become a hassle and I needed to tell you all what happened."
The sleep was more than gone from Hinata's eyes as she inspected his wound, trying not to let his words bristle her more than she already was. Her father was in the room, and so he controlled the conversation. From the closet behind the bar, Hinata pulled an elevated version of a first-aid kit out and sanitized her hands.
"And Shenji's condition?" Hiashi asked.
Shikamaru winced, "I'm––I'm not sure, Hyuga-sama. He was shot in the abdomen. It was a raid: cops everywhere. They were arresting Kiba who had gone out––guns blazing––and I managed to load Shenji into the car and take off. I wasn't followed.
I took him straight to the hospital and he was admitted. They tried to look me over but I didn't let them. I needed to report to you. I figured it was just a graze," Nara looked at Hinata expectedly, and she nodded, confirming his suspicion.
"Just a graze," she said as she began to soak cotton towels in disinfectant, and dot them against his bleeding arm. He hissed and Hinata ignored him. "You'll need stitches, though."
He nodded. The room folded into silence, Hiashi smoking a gracious amount of cigar, taking it into his mouth, and then releasing it all in one great exhale. Ino had acquired coffee from the small bar, a brash attempt at sobering up. Her face was pink with panic. Tsume stood beside her for lack of a better place to stand. Her eyebrows had risen into her hairline in her alarm. Kiba was not accounted for.
"What do we do about my son?" She ventured to ask, her tone making it seem like her heart lived in her throat, and it pumped uncertainty into her words. Her red eyeshadow began to blend in with the color of her face, and her triangle tattoos that Hizashi had done years ago faded into her discomforted complexion.
Inoichi cleared his throat, casting a sideways glance at Hiashi, whom he was sitting next to. "Tsume, this is an extreme situation, you understand..."
"Our people get arrested all the time!" She cried. "What's so extreme about this?"
It was an inane question, considering the circumstances. Hinata dutifully worked the wound, letting her head clear as she threaded the needle. Even she understood that this situation was not like the others. Shikamaru and Kiba were among the highest-ranked members, just under their parents, the Uncles. Nothing about their mission, this raid, was casual.
"And do we make it our business to get all of them out, Tsume?" Inoichi rebutted. He looked tired, his forehead creasing the same way Ino's had. "Look, I want to get your boy out too. But God knows he's trained for this. He won't crack. I've already contacted our guys down at the department to see what they can do, but this wasn't any old street bust. This was a raid. The feds knew we were coming."
"The issue is far bigger than Kiba," Hiashi said, his voice stern and flat. He did not sound remorseful. "The entire Syndicate is in danger. Between Hinata being attacked yesterday and now this...we have been compromised."
The air felt heavy. Hinata felt Shikamaru's body stiffen as she worked to close the wound. She could not allow her hands to get sweaty. She could not think of how tired she was. She could not even take a single moment to remember her dream. She watched the skin change around her touch.
"Let's adjourn," Hiashi said finally, into the almost-silence. Tsume's heavy breathing filled the room, not quite a cry, not quite a whimper. "It's late. We will discuss everything in the afternoon. Hinata, when you wake up first thing this morning you will go to see Shenji. Take Ino and Hanabi with you. Shikamaru––you will stay at the Estate tonight to rest. Call your father and tell him we need him to come from Osaka. He needs to be here by morning. Inoichi, please arrange the jet. Tsume––" with a sigh, he looked at the distressed woman, a frown pulling his lips into a far corner of his face. His eyes were hard, "you better pray your child doesn't say a thing. Go home and look out for phone calls. I have a feeling he won't be getting out any time soon."
Hinata swallowed and looked away. Shikamaru, too, was looking into a far corner of the room though he could be attempting to distract himself from the pain. They both hoped that Kiba would be alright, but it wasn't looking good, especially from her father's tone. Kiba was not in the sort of position that would allow Hiashi to vouch for him––no, not where there'd been a raid.
She patched Shikamaru up with a bandage and patted his shoulder. Ino rushed over, quick to leave Tsume's side, to wrap her arms around him. Hinata smiled at the picture of the two, though it was a sad smile, marked with a fear she had not yet fully comprehended. "I'll t-take you two to a g-guest room. Goodnight, father."
He said nothing as he watched the three of them leave the room. Hinata walked them back up the stairs of the theatre, locking the door behind her. She showed them to their room, trying to look away when Ino kissed Shikamaru with her mouth open, her relief so apparent on her body that she looked like she was going to fall down and cry. Hinata closed the door to give them their privacy.
After that, she called Sasuke to tell him what happened.
He answered, but he never came.
-:-
"What the fuck happened last night?"
Sasuke was fuming. Ox was unemotional, and Sakura looked like she was seconds away from falling over––he could see the wary look in her eye practically through her mask. He suddenly remembered that she had been out all night last night too. At least she had gotten more sleep than him. Sasuke had popped an adderall and made the 2-hour drive to headquarters led by drugs and fury alone.
"What do you mean, Crow?" Ox said, her voice thick and uncaring, a monotone that bounded off the walls. She stood in front of the Sakura's big windows, the sun inching its way towards the middle of the sky.
"The raid," Sasuke said through his teeth. "Why the fuck did you let that happen? And don't even pretend like you didn't know about it. You've compromised the whole mission!"
"Federal agents act without us all the time," Ox said, her masked face looking flatly at him, the horns curling. Sasuke had never seen her without it. Unlike operations with Dog, he never got to see who he took orders from. "You would be good to remember that."
"Be fair Ox," Sakura broke in, her mask tilted in Sasuke's direction. She likely felt guilty for 'jeopardizing' this mission herself. Good, Sasuke thought conspiringly. He needed her on his side. "If the feds knew ANBU was involved, they would send us a warning before a raid. They might even hold off on it altogether. I've seen it happen before."
Sasuke was furious. He could feel the heat rising from his stomach and had to stop it from spewing from his mouth. He was grateful for his mask because, without it, his expression would have given far too much away. His fingers twitched at his sides. It was ridiculous that Naruto had been caught in a crossfire. It was ridiculous that Ox had not shown any remorse for his injuries. It was fucking ridiculous.
Ox sighed and moved from where she was staring out of the window. She wrapped her long, blonde hair around her neck as she went, shaking her head until she was standing directly in front of Sakura and Sasuke. "I do not have to explain anything to either of you," she said in a terse, strained voice. "You are agents for ANBU. The feds are agents of the State. If they want to raid, we do not have the authority to say no. We can make suggestions, we can pull our agents, but we do not, under any circumstances, tell them what to do."
But that seemed wrong to Sasuke. Confusion began to eclipse his anger, but he stopped it. He needed to feel this rage. He recalled all the times he had worked with a federal agent, especially during the Orochimaru bust, and had taken liberties to give orders, organize movement, and stop actions. Dog had been integral to this, with years of experience and connections to guide their unit to success.
"But––that's not true!" Sakura suddenly said, her chest rising and falling. Sasuke was surprised; she rarely challenged authority, often choosing instead to find loopholes where her needs were met with walls. She was sneaky that way. What was more––Ox had become a mentor to her, so she must have really felt strongly. "I've seen it happen. Even if that's the case, you could've removed Naruto if you knew a raid was going to happen."
Ox sighed heavily, shaking her head. The crown of her mask shone porcelain and bright against the light of the rising sun. She sat heavily in Sakura's seat. Then, she began to laugh. "You young folks think you know everything, don't you? It does not always work like that. You do understand that we are contract workers, don't you?"
"Of––of course, I do!" Now, Sakura stumbled, caught off guard. She had gone stiff beside Sasuke.
"Good..." Ox sighed. "I'll be candid, then. Japan has formally rescinded some of our access––some of our power to make decisions on a few of our missions, like this one. If they decide to raid, I can do nothing to stop them."
"Why?" Sasuke barked, blood running cold like he had just stepped into a cold shower.
"We don't know yet," Ox said quietly. "But they have made Hiashi's takedown a top priority––that's why they raided. They're taking matters into their own hands. It doesn't matter that they're paying us, too––I imagine they want all the help they can get. I don't know what all the fucking lollygagging is about, Crow, but you need to finish this mission. Whether you have Fox's help or not."
With that, Ox stood, unwrapped her hair, and stepped out of Sakura's office. Sakura quickly replaced her in the chair and grabbed the bottle of sake Ox had left behind. "That was weird."
"Incredibly," Sasuke echoed, frowning. This was yet another strange occurrence, a weird turn of events, he would have to add to his list. A raid in the middle of a mission was not unheard of, but they definitely tried to avoid them. Resistance to ANBU by the state? Had ANBU done something wrong? Had they ruffled too many feathers?
The Hyuga crackdown was the only thing that made sense. But even so...a raid? That meant they had eyes on the Hyuga outside of their ANBU hires. Why go through the trouble of doing both?
His head hurt and he was grinding his teeth, a side effect from the adderall and lack of sleep. His stomach was attempting to carve a hole out of his abdomen-he had not eaten in an entire day. One thing was for certain: he needed to finish this mission, or Naruto might not be the only agent to end up in the hospital.
His mind flashed with details and pictures, but trying to review the last 24 hours was quickly deemed impossible. He thought about asking Sakura about Orochimaru's prison but thought better of it, as distrust began to make a home out of his mind. He'd have to wait until he had more information. He needed to talk to his brother.
"-Crow?" Sakura's voice rang out as Sasuke cleared his mind.
"What?"
"I said, 'Do you want to get some food?' You're...you're shaking."
"No," Sasuke said. He made his body go still. He thought of his apartment, of the notes he had taken, and the map he began to draw across his walls. The goal of this mission seemed so far away-retrieve the file, erase the Hyuga database, learn the internal workings of their operations-that they almost seemed like lies. Hearsay. What the fuck was he doing there? He was making no progress, just digging himself deeper with his questions.
He couldn't deny that he had his own goals: he wanted the Hyuga punished for their crimes against his clan. He wanted to end their reign. He wanted to find his brother. But somehow...all that seemed misplaced. Hinata swirled around his memory, her eyes a pressing, urgent, lavender.
"I'm going to go home," Sasuke said.
-:-
There was a quiet roar in her ear. Like drumming. It spoke to her in rhythms; all of her different functions-heart rate, regulatory breathing, swallows, scratches, blinking-coalescing into one sound. She had to remind herself of homeostasis just to make sure she was still human.
Hinata stood outside of her father's office, her figure a picture of quiet in the shadows. He spoke with his back facking her, and his guest was an outline in black. There was music playing, drinks exchanged, incense wafting into the open air. The door to the interior garden was shut and the hallways, beside her, were empty.
She was there to update him on Shenji's condition. She, Ino, and Hanabi had driven there together that morning. Ino was exhausted and fearful, and Hanabi was just happy to be there. But Hanabi quickly realized that her "syndicate business endeavor" was perfunctory at best. And it was not only uninteresting, it was depressing.
They were admitted to Shenji's hospital room, where he was bedbound in ICU. He had tubes coming from his nose, wires connected to his chest, and IVs running down the length of his arm. Hanabi turned white when she saw him. Hinata was not allowed to look away. She took in every detail, every bruise. She remembered that morning before this fateful mission, when she had given him a bowl of rice, and he had smiled at her so brightly she thought that he couldn't be possible. That his presence here could not be possible.
She sat tiredly in a chair at his bedside, waiting for a nurse to enter so that she could be specific about his injuries when she spoke to her father. It took a long time for a nurse to come. Hinata lulled beside him and he didn't stir.
The night had been long. For a while, she had waited for Sasuke to show up so that she might explain everything, but he never did, and she didn't know why she had expected him to. They were only acquaintances...did she think that his presence, his rage for his friend, would comfort her?
So she had attempted to sleep after an hour of nothing. It was not a fruitful sleep. She dreamt long arcs, sagas full of different things: her mother's red fingernails, the strip mall where she'd been taken, the steam of the sauna, Sasuke's hands on her torso...
So no, it was not fruitful sleep. She got up and dressed quickly, woke up Hanabi, met with Ino, drove them all through the Starbucks drive-thru, picked up five-dozen roses from Yamanaka Flowers, and signed in to the hospital to watch Shenji sleep.
She held her head in her hands after all that finished. Hanabi and Ino arranged the roses beside him on the bedside table that held a phone and a button used to call a nurse. Ino left the room quietly to fill up his water pitcher. Ino could not look at his face because it reminded her that it could have just as easily been Shikamaru instead.
She was fairly selfish that way.
A nurse came in after twenty minutes passed in relative silence. Hinata's iced coffee dripped wet with condensation between her hands. The nurse wore bright green eyeshadow that Hinata focused on while she spoke: Shenji is in a coma. A gunshot pierced his chest, causing pneumothorax: a collapsed lung. He has also been shot in the left arm. The bullet shattered his humerus and broke into tiny pieces inside of his arm. He will be going in for reconstructive surgery, um, at 3 pm, then we will need to see if we can extract the bullet fragments. He will require months of physical therapy. Can I put you down as his emergency contact? They said he didn't have identification papers on him when he arrived.
Hinata said yes. She filled out a clipboard for him as she watched his chest rise and fall in stuttering, halting movements. The nurse suggested that he would be moved from ICU after his surgery and that his breathing was getting better. She did not know how long his coma would last.
Now Hinata had come back to report this to her father. The shape of the Estate had changed since morning, with black cars stretched across their circle driveway, parked and gleaming against the afternoon light. There were guards at the front who nodded to her as she entered, and more spread throughout the manor. As she walked through her home, she imagined that most of the men had retreated into the theatre, where surely meetings were underway.
This was different from an Affair. Though she guessed that there would be one soon.
She continued to the West Wing where tatami mats greeted her and made her steps feel softer and less intentioned. She stopped abruptly at her father's office when she heard voices waft through the soft walls. All familiar, but only one made the hair on the back of her arms stand up. They were here because he was not allowed in the theatre, he probably did not even know that such a thing existed.
"You need an ally," Gaara was saying, his voice gruff like sandpaper being rubbed together in her ears. "That much is clear."
"That could be true," another voice said, one she had not heard in a while. It was low and thoughtful and sounded like gravel under a tire. Nara Shikaku. He had made the trip fast. "But last I heard, Hinata was attacked under your supervision."
The room went quiet. Someone stood up. Hinata shrunk back into the shadows. A lighter flickered. Quietly, she heard her father offer Shikaku a cigar.
It was good that Shikaku was there, but it also meant that it was dangerous. Something heavy lodged in her throat. Shikaku only came to assist her father in Konoha when real shit was going down. His brilliance, wisdom, and experience outranked everyone except Hiashi himself. Even Hizashi, when he was living, was red-faced and stuttering when Shikaku came to town. It was a point of contention.
Hanabi and Hinata had loved Uncle Shikaku more than Hizashi, running into his arms when he would come from Osaka and sometimes overseas, bearing gifts. He delighted in them, too. When Hinata was kidnapped, the tiger had been his idea. He was fiercely protective of them all. When Shikamaru was small and still lived with his father in Osaka, he would come back to Konoha with him on trips, and Hinata would sit with him and Neji as he thrilled them with stories about Syndicate life on that side of the country. To them, Shikaku was a hero, just like Hiashi.
Shikaku declined the cigar and must have pulled out a cigarette, which Hinata smelled as the thick scent blew out the door. "I mean no hard feelings," he drawled out. "But I care deeply about that girl. How can you propose such a thing if you have already failed to protect her? Am I correct in assuming that it was the Uchiha bastard who brought that scum to his knees?"
"You're incorrect," Gaara cut in, though his voice sounded less confident than before. "It was Hinata who extrapolated herself."
"So, as it stands," Shikaku continued without a beat, though his voice swelled with pride. "Neither man truly prevented harm."
"You're suggesting that image is enough. That image is a fear tactic. How do you figure? Is Suna so powerful that we need you?" Hiashi's voice cut through then, changing the subject to one of less feeling. Hinata was grateful, she didn't like being discussed, but the feeling didn't last. Panic still welled.
"That's not what I'm saying, Hiashi-sama," Gaara's voice came out respectfully, mild. He had switched gears, accessed the situation, and changed his angle. Hinata knew this routine so well it made goosebumps appear on her flesh. What was the playing at? "I'm saying that if we show them-Akatsuki, Orochimaru, whomever-that we are united somehow, it will change everything. We are both powerful enough to stand alone, that much the decades have proven. But together? I don't think anyone has seen anything like that before. It could change everything."
The room fell silent again. Nobody moved.
Gaara went on, "Respectfully, you both are my elders. Your years in the business have been exceptional and Suna is grateful to be your ally and not your enemy. But you called me here for a reason. I know we have had years of instability-"
Hinata could practically feel the tension rise in the room, like Hizashi's ghost hovered above their heads.
"-but we have passed that uncertainty. It was before my time." Now Hinata felt the vomit she had been holding in climbing her esophagus. Before his time? What bullshit. It was not before his time when he was throwing her around, screaming, red in the face about the loss of his Uncle Baki. Even in the steam room his confidence and anger had been appalling. Now he was acting as if all that was beyond him?
But Hinata could not forget. He was the head of his own syndicate, and that made him one of the most powerful men in the city. Gaara went on, "I would be remiss to not mention my own insecurities. If you are being attacked, we all are. We're partners, are we not? I'm sorry I put Hinata in harm's way and it won't happen again under my careful watch, but...this is our chosen line of work."
What the fuck was happening? Hinata shrank further back as their shadows converged. She was shaking all over. She could not grasp at all what the three of them were talking about. And what did it have to do with her? And why was Gaara pretending to care about her?
"You will move the weapons from the desert patch overnight," Hiashi said heavily, after another beat of stillness. The silence of the room felt as if it hurt. Hinata was having trouble breathing, too. Hiashi's voice was hard: "We will receive them in bulk, and I will arrange a Tiger tomorrow night like you wanted. I will continue to hold the Byakugan File-that is non-negotiable. As far as my daughter goes..."
Her breath caught. How had she become a negotiating piece? Would it always come to this?
"Perhaps you are right, image is a powerful thing, and I can see this obvious alliance shaking the city. It will disrupt everything we know. Hinata is my pearl but she is also the dragon who protects it, so I cannot in good conscience release her to you. Hinata," he called to her so suddenly, that she jumped. He had known she was there the whole time. "Make yourself known and tell us what you think."
She walked into the room with halting steps, flushing a deep red at being caught in the shadows. Shikaku and Gaara looked startled to see her, Shikaku's facial expression of mixed emotion: pride, alarm, irritation, while Gaara's was erased clean after he'd filtered the initial shock away.
Hiashi had always been in tune with Hinata's movements. It happened after the kidnapping, and he taught her how to turn her meekness into a strength. He was the one who taught her stealth, and he would never let her, or himself, forget it.
"Could you c-clarify , Father?" She asked. She stood now in the center of the room, giving Shikaku a small smile, and avoiding Gaara altogether, whose body was radiating with agitation. He was too proud to think she'd be given a say. He was too confident.
Shikaku smiled kindly at her, stepping forward to give her a familiar hug. "Things are bad, Hinata," he said, his voice the softest it had been. "We need help. We called Gaara here to see if Suna could be of assistance. He suggested some sort of overt alliance. It was me who suggested a romantic guise between himself and...well, it wasn't supposed to be you, specifically." Now he looked sheepish. "I was going to say Hana or...or Ino."
She tried not to let scorn flash across her face. It would never be Ino, who was all but engaged to his son. It would always be her. It didn't matter that she and Gaara had already been together for real. It didn't matter that he had harmed her. And it didn't matter that she told no one about it. This was Syndicate business, and it took precedence over all of that.
She took a breath. "And...w-what will that require of me?"
Hiashi took a glass from his desk and filled it with brandy. "Much of what you already do well," he said as he swished the beverage around. "Playing the part. Gaara has a big meeting, a boys club of sorts, that requires a date. We thought you would fit in well, and surprise a few people while we're at it. It is not without additional benefits for the Syndicate."
"And...and Suna," Hinata. She thought of the Tiger.
Gaara said nothing.
"Exactly," Hiashi said, his voice its own confident room in the small square of an office. "I can't promise that this will be the only outing, but I can say that it will change the trajectory of the long game. We're going to shake some things up."
He handed Hinata the cup of brandy. When she closed her fingers around the glass, Hiashi's hands caressed hers. Since her father rarely touched her, she looked down in surprise. That was when she noticed the four-finger gesture of quiet. Be still. Be still. Be careful with this one.
This would be her new mission. Her focus shifted from Shenji to Gaara. Her father did not trust this man. He did not like this ask that used his daughter as a ploy. But he was going to use her back. And she would come back to him with information. Hyuga's played the long game, after all.
"Of course, father," Hinata said, her nerves bundled inside her body like a beehive. If only he knew what she already did of the type of person Suna Gaara was. "Understood."
AN: Don't worry, we'll get to our regular scheduled SasuHina next week :-)
