Goodbye

After they had revived Tenten with smelling salts, checked her for a concussion and explained in more detail how Tsunade had advised them to find a keeper for the weapons as she was the one who had kept the gunpowder with her so it wouldn't spontaneously combust in the safe. So then they had tried to fill the vacancy but it was very difficult to vet someone to be in charge of weapons of mass destruction. So, choosing someone who had literally already proven they were willing to sacrifice themselves seemed like a genius plan. Even better, to have a guard that technically didn't even exist to guard weapons that shouldn't exist seemed too poetic to not be the right choice.

As much sense as it made, it didn't make things easier for Tenten.

"Do you think you'll be ok?" Hinata asked.

"I guess. I made peace with him being out of reach before. I'll do it again." But it was getting a little tedious.

"Oh, that's actually not what we meant."

Tenten's head couldn't take very much more explanations no matter how well-intentioned they were but she gestured for Hinata to continue.

"Neji sort of requested we tell you if you came back from the past. In fact, he was sort of involved in planning this mission. Together with Tsunade, they were really valuable sources on determining what you really did or really didn't know. We all felt like you were holding back from us back then."

"So, is Tsunade another person who knew of Neji's revival before me?"

"Oh. yeah. Sorry."

"Great. The more the merrier."

Sakura packed up the smelling salts and Naruto didn't really know what to say. Since those two seemed rather uninclined to tell Tenten the last bit of truth, Hinata went on:

"He wants you to visit him."

ttt

Tenten needed a break. After hearing of Neji's request last night, she'd just shut down. She'd walked out of that meeting, gone home, crawled into bed and slept through the night and part of the day. Then she'd started packing.

Sakura was reluctant to let Tenten go off without medical supervision and hadn't released her until she'd answered a myriad of different questions all with varying degrees of embarrassment. Sakura was using her as a case study to perfect time travelling endeavors in the future. Tenten couldn't say that she enjoyed being a guinea pig.

She had about a year's worth of vacation days saved up and nobody but Sakura was surprised upon hearing that she was thinking of using them. Since Tenten had been absent in the past, her second-in-command had already been successfully running her division. Tenten was not worried about her job or physical health. She was a little worried about her mental health.

She journeyed North, where the terrain was rough, the mountains high, and the caves deep. It took her two days to travel so far and she remembered many a lonesome travel route from her life chasing down dangerous weapons. She was definitely no stranger to roaming the countryside to other parts of the world.

The farther North she travelled the more she realized that Konoha's mountains were mere picnic hills. Thundering waterfalls, skyhigh vertical caverns as though someone had thrust a sword into the world and sliced it in half, hidden little temples to gods she wasn't familiar with. It all led her into a world of twilight as she ventured farther into the mountain. Sometimes she wasn't even sure she was on the correct path anymore. Or on any path. The farther she ventured, the more she was convinced she had read the maps Naruto had given her incorrectly. But finally, she entered a clearing in the middle of the mountain. She just stepped out of a tiny stone opening and the light from the small valley blinded her.

As her eyes adjusted, she had to admit Neji's hideaway was … impressive.

First of all, it was a dream to defend. Even if someone had an army, this secluded little bastille of rock was almost impossible to take by storm. There were very few access points. The sides of the rock were too vertical to allow for easy climbing and the ridges on the top looked dangerous. Even if someone might make it up there and managed to rope themselves into the valley, there would be problems. Tenten could see that there was a ring-ditch along the lines where someone might land and it was equipped with wooden spikes that put an end to any kind of infiltration from above.

After Tenten's inner warrior had marvelled at the defenses, she was free to admire the sheer beauty of nature and its synthesis with architecture. The only place that wasn't included in the ring-ditch was where she had emerged and a home was built into the face of the mountain. Long terraces ran inside another vertical chasm, leading further into the mountain. Tenten couldn't help but grin from ear to ear as she beheld the impossibility of this place. It was a fitting home for a man who was supposed to be dead.

She made her way down from where her little hole had emerged onto a ledge into the shrubbery surrounding the house with difficulty. The ground was very rough and slippery at the same time. She got scratched up pretty badly just moving the half a mile to the house. She grabbed a hold of the engawa and had to hoist herself up because of how it was fused with the mountain. Once she made it, Tenten collapsed onto the wood. She'd made it and she was exhausted.

"Hey, there," she heard Neji's voice. "I wasn't sure you'd come."

Electricity shot all through her body at the sound of it but she didn't quite dare to lift herself up and actually see the man yet.

Tenten couldn't lay on the floor, exhausted, forever. So finally she'd had to relent and get to her feet. Neji looked… older. Still infuriatingly good and familiar. But also scarily distant and different. For one thing, he was sort of smiling. Perhaps smirking would be a better word. That was unusual, but since Tenten knew all sides of him now, she was aware that there was more behind the stoic facade than anybody anticipated. Still, the smile just unsettled her.

She opted to not meet his gaze directly, but she knew she needed to say something. So, she started with what she thought he ought to know first:

"I just came to say goodbye."

"Pretty far to travel for goodbye."

The way he stood on his porch, all majestic and calm, she wanted to strangle him.

"Well, I figured after literally defeating death you deserved a third goodbye."

"Does this mean I get to tell you I lo-"

"Don't you dare. I will end you and no one will find your body and revive you then."

"Got it."

He didn't look as though he'd gotten it. He looked like he wasn't going to comply with her plan.

"I see cockiness is not cured by death."

"No. Sadly it's not."

"So, it's really you."

"Yes. Cockiness and all."

"They really revived you."

He opened his arms as though to present himself better and did a 360° turn for her as though to prove the point.

"Yes. They revived me to guard a bunch of weapons that should never be revived again."

"Oh yeah. How does it feel having the means to destroy entire worlds?"

"I feel that being a Hyūga has prepared me for the level of self-importance needed for this task."

"It seems death gave you a sense of humor."

"No, just the freedom to actually use it."

Tenten didn't know what to reply to such a statement. She hadn't thought beyond this point. She was going to come here and tell him 'goodbye' at last. A proper goodbye, one that wouldn't leave her feeling as though she lived half a life.

But there were still lots of feelings to work through at the sight of him.

"I don't know whether to be angry or happy. I mean, I just saw you… back there, in the past," she exclaimed.

It was strange referring to the past like a place that one could visit. But that was literally what she'd done. Neji didn't reply, so Tenten was left to continue.

"And now you're here, where you're not supposed to be. And I've accepted that. I think."

She moved closer to him. Somewhere in the distance she could hear wind chimes but all she could think about was that Neji wasn't retreating. If she took one more step, she'd be able to touch him.

"I was really ok with you not being here anymore. But you … you just come back to haunt me. Twice already!"

"Sorry. Technically, you came back to haunt me the previous time. But I am sorry you feel haunted."

"You're not supposed to be sorry. You're-… Wait, is your body real?"

Without much dignity, she put her hands right in his face, touching his nose and eyebrows.

"Yes, it's real," he assured tersely. "Would you stop touching me please?"

He was frowning disapprovingly. Which is when she knew he was really him. Nothing said 'Neji' like a disapproving frown.

ttt

Last night after verifying he actually existed and stammering unfinished sentences, Tenten still had had lots left to say but she just didn't have the energy to say it all. So she'd just quietly followed Neji into his home. The inside was pretty traditional. Shojis separated the different rooms. Tenten couldn't tell what was in all these rooms - there were many - but she couldn't imagine that this elegant building was where he kept all the most dangerous weapons.

She'd gotten her own room and found a futon and bedding in the wall closet. She really needed a good night's sleep. It was strange knowing Neji was in the same timeline, the same house even. She didn't know which was his room, so she couldn't even get up in the middle of the night and go to him. Not that she wanted. Except, she did.

Her head had hurt when she thought about what she wanted. She wasn't made to have this much decision thrust on her. Dead people were supposed to stay dead. Tenten hated to think of 'What if…'. Those thoughts killed the 'now' and Tenten tended to live in the 'now'. One mission after the other. One step at a time. She didn't have big career aspirations like Naruto always did or grand dreams for her love life like Sakura. She was just little, old Tenten and the mere possibility of a second chance at 'what if…' was driving her insane. She just couldn't handle it.

Thinking about all this, Tenten hadn't fallen asleep until the crack of dawn had dipped the world in lilac.

Only over breakfast did Tenten find her voice again. Neji probably wasn't expecting her to speak since for the last thirty minutes she'd just been staring at him. Staring at him as though he'd slip through her hands again. It felt like yesterday that they'd gotten drunk together, that they'd made peace with their fates, that they'd sat in Tsunade's home together.

"I just… left you," Tenten admitted, referring of course to her sudden disappearance from his time.

"Yeah, I know. I remember."

"But you don't understand. I didn't just leave you. I said goodbye to you for the second time. I put you behind me. I just - You just... I left you to die."

"Yeah, but I lived for years to come. Then, admittedly, I died. But now I'm alive and have waited a year for yesterday. That one day."

Neji put down his chopsticks. He could see how Tenten's fingers traced the leather of her kunai sheath. Still, he said:

"Do you have any idea how tough it is to wait for something you're not sure is going to happen? I didn't know whether you'd come back, make it back, whether time worked that way."

He swallowed hard. "Or whether it was all real, whether you really felt that way about me. I had to hold it all back for all those years, whereas you were ...clueless."

He chuckled bitterly at remembering her younger self. Tenten got to be blissfully unaware of the future and he had to live with the burden of knowing, never letting go, always being perfectly controlled. "So, don't sit there and tell me about what's hard in this life," he gritted out. "Because I know."

"You arrogant-"

"Just give me some time," he said a lot softer.

"Time?"

"Yeah, isn't this what this whole story has been about? How to make time for another person."

"What do you mean?"

"I mean I want to make time for you. Please. I've waited ages to make time for you. Just… stay here. Have your vacation like you planned-"

"How can you possibly know I want a vacation?"

He didn't offer her an explanation for his uncanny knowledge of her. Instead he countered with a question. It was lighthearted as if they were just old friends finally getting together again.

"Now is it all too much or can you forgive me and let me do what I should've done a long time ago?"

"What?"

"Ask you out on a date."

"What did you think I'd come here and have sex with a ghost?"

"I said 'date'. I don't know how quick you usually move but I figure we should get in 3 to 7 dates before we think about sex."

"Do you hear yourself? This is all a huge joke to you."

"No, I'm just not afraid of doing stupid things anymore."

The answer jarred Tenten into switching the topic. Neji seemed disappointed but not surprised she didn't want to answer his request.

"Is Tsunade somehow involved in this?"

He knew immediately that 'this' referred to the valley rather than his very personal proposal.

"Not really. She's never been here. As far as I know she has her own project. She guards knowledge of dangerous jutsus no one should necessarily have access to. So, she's sitting on a mountain of scrolls somewhere."

Tenten pretended like their conversation had come to a natural conclusion when it had done anything but.

The rest of the day, Neji showed her the property. Though they didn't go in to see them, Neji told her that the weapons were kept in a labyrinth inside the mountain chasm. Furthermore, the valley had fresh water supply. There was even game and fish to hunt. The valley's very own eco-system provided relatively well for someone to live here. In their own little world.

Mostly they were quiet, but Neji was curious about her getting back. He asked her what it had been like, waking up at the hospital. Tenten didn't really feel like telling him about those memories. To be honest, Tenten was also curious about how he had fared after her departure. But she wasn't sure she was ready to hear everything she was curious about.

They chatted about safe topics for a while. How Neji had gone on that mission for his uncle and finally found out what was in the scroll. It had been the building instructions for the fire weapon they'd found. So Neji and Tsunade had put on quite a production. Neji laughed as he told Tenten what a surreal experience it had been to let himself be beaten up on purpose. All so he could tell his uncle, the scroll got destroyed in the process.

Neji also confided in Tenten how he had fully anticipated that his failure would cement his dismissal from the Hyūga family. On the contrary, his uncle had seen Neji's state as a testament to how much of a fight his nephew had put up. Hiashi had even commended Neji for letting the scroll be destroyed rather than have the wrong knowledge fall in the hands of others, who might want to harm the Hyūgas.

Tenten couldn't help but feel queasy as she envisioned just how close to death Neji must have taken the production to make his uncle believe their little scam. It reminded her of what she had said about Neji and duty. He'd do anything to get the job done.

When they arrived back at the house, Neji finally had a question of his own.

"Are your memories back in order?"

"Nope. Or maybe they are and I just don't realize this is how they are supposed to be. My head still feels like a chaotic place."

"I bet they can't stop asking you questions."

"You're right, they can't. They want to know everything there is to know about time travel, down to my pooping schedule. You'll be happy to know that time travel does not cause constipation."

"Glad to hear it. Great to know Konoha's researchers are aware of what's important in their research focus."

"Me too."

"Would you like a beer?"

It took Tenten a moment but then she answered "Absolutely."

She watched him walk off and return with their refreshments. He handed her a bottle and they both sat with their feet hanging off the engawa.

There was a viscerality to his body that was attracting her relentlessly. There was something so alive about him, the way his voice rumbled deep in his chest that harbored a functioning lung and a body that moved because blood and chakra flowed through it. A body that worked - it sweat, it drank - brimming with life. It made Tenten want to … consume it, soak it up, dig her teeth into skin, grasp every body part of his just to make sure he didn't slip through her fingers. She was ravenous for him and it was getting really difficult not to act on it when they were sitting so companionably next to one another. So damn close. Their shoulders almost touched.