Hinata looked at the village of solemn faces that stared at her from their homes as she headed to the orphanage. She intended to inform them that she would have to lower her visits with her new responsibilities. She didn't want to send a message and make them feel pushed aside so she had gone to do so in person. That might have been a mistake.
Before long she was surrounded by worried faces.
She slowed to a stop as she was slowly, silently surrounded. She put her hand up signaling her guard to back off as they started to move closer. These were their citizens she would not have her guard involved.
"Is he dead?" Someone finally asked.
"I have reason to believe that the Kazekage has died." She voiced her hand came to the jar around her neck subconsciously. "However we have no way to confirm and until then we should keep hope that he will return to us alive."
"Why are you not looking for him?" Someone she couldn't see cried at her in frustration. "She was hurt!" Someone else barked at them.
She put her hands to quite the raising voices. "I am more helpful here. I would be happy to aid the search in for my husband, but I would be no more use to them as any other Hyuga would be. I am here to serve Suna while my husband can not." She explained feeling her heart ached for herself and the lost people.
"Why are you Kage! You weren't even born here!" Someone else snapped.
She pierced her lips together and nodded her head. "It was his wish I take his place until the Kage he had chosen is ready for the position. I am temporary. I apologize if this upsets you, it was a decision made in case of emergency. We hoped we would never have to use this plan."
More questions came. She answered them the best she could before Kankuro stepped in between her and the group seemingly from nowhere. She frowned at him. She asked him to step away as she had no problem speaking to the people but he shook his head and handed her a note.
"This just came for you." He explained.
"Who from?" She asked, accepting and breaking the seal.
"A clone." He explained looking eager to hear the news. "Konoha, I believe. They seemed low on chakra, maybe in a hurry." She looked more clearly at him. It looked like he ran here.
She opened it and stared at its contents. She looked up at his questioning face but her mouth opened without the ability to make words. She flinched to looking at the gates and then back and then at the gate with her mouth a gapp she squeaked.
She shoved the scroll in his hands and took off running for the gate with all her force.
"Get me a full medical team at the front gate!" She called behind her as she knew Kankuro juggled the scroll to read it.
Naruto looked up at the gates as it opened. He could see just barely someone squeeze between the doors as soon as it was open far enough to fit through sideways.
"Put me down." Gaara told him from his shoulder. He looked back at him, his eyes were locking on the person bolting for them. There was no mistaking that hair in this dessert.
He started to kneel when he was roughly pulled back up. "Kazekage-sama you're too weak to walk." Sakura protested. She was not in a good mood. Gaara had refused any more medical treatment until he got home. He was weak and sickly still adjusting to not being, well, dead.
"Put me down." He repeated.
Naruto wasn't going to argue with him. He lowered himself and helped Gaara stand. He held him up by his arms as he found footing. Hinata finally reached them, stumbling to a full stop in front of him, panting holding her hands shy of him, like she expected him to collapse. Though it looked more like she would.
Neither of them said anything, they just stared. Eyes locked breathing and wind filling the silences. Hinata's face was streaked with tears which made sand that blew around in the wind stick to her face. They both looked a mess.
Gaara opened his mouth and closed it and simply reached for her weakly. She took it, fully burying her face in his chest wrapping her arms around his chest. She cried, whimpering loudly in a way Naruto had never heard from her before, harsh balling. Gaara let go of him to fully engulf her. Naruto grinned as Gaara buried his face in her scarf.
"Woah!" Naruto rushed forward as Gaara's legs gave out, Hinata took his weight and between the two of them, they guided him to the ground.
Gaara's name and title were called in the distance as more realized he was home. Gaara looked up as two new sets of arms wrapped around the two of them.
"Wipe that grin off your face," Sakura mumbled, shoving his arm.
"Told you." He knew his rush home was for her. He threw his arm around Sakura's shoulder and pulled her in as she frowned at him. He loved seeing a little love in the world.
Hinata sighed as the last reporting nin finally left. She felt her robe tugged on, and she turned around to Gaara's medical bed. "You're awake." She smiled sitting down next to him.
"I have been." He mumbled, rolling his head toward her.
"We didn't keep you up, did we? I could go to another room." She didn't want to leave him but if her work was bothering his rest she could keep an eye on him through the wall instead.
He shook his head. "I did not want to interrupt."
"I think the Kage is allowed." She hummed leaning over in her chair on to his mattress.
"You're Kage." He corrected her.
"Not any more, you can have it back." She smiled though it felt weak, she was tired. She was emotionally and physically exhausted. She would be sore tomorrow after straining her wounds.
"I have failed." He glanced at her flatly. "I failed to protect the village and I failed to protect you."
"Both the village and I are alive because of you." She argued frowning.
"You are alive because Shukaku protected you." She could see the anger in his tired eyes. Anger at himself. "I was not the one who removed you. I did not act quickly enough. If he hadn't removed you when he did you would have been crushed." He growled weakly.
She frowned at his broken face and she felt even more tears, at least she could freely cry now. "I don't care. I am alive and the village is safe. You cannot blame yourself when nothing is wrong."
He rested his head back annoyed.
"I will miss him." She whispered. He heard her nails click against the glass and he glanced up. She fiddled with a small bottle of sand held to her by a string, turning it, watching the grains fall.
"What's that?" He wondered, lifting his hand to it. She let go, he turned it feeling that it was his sand.
"It's what's left of my ring." She whimpered. "When it fell apart, I knew." He stared at her red-rimmed eyes and his chest felt an odd sharp pain. She had known the second he had died and had lived with that until he returned. He felt an emotional jerk back as he thought about the opposite. He violently shoved the thought away. He didn't want to think of her death.
He rolled the glass between his fingers. He wondered if it would still obey him so freely. He shifted his thumb over it and the sand popped the cork open and the sand flowed out and fell into his hand back in the form he had wanted. It was more difficult but he assumed it was because he was weak.
He held the ring flat in his hand up to her. She took it with shaking fingertips and slid it back into place and then wiped her cheeks of tears.
He pulled her hand to himself and pressed his lips to her finger breathing in her scent again. He couldn't get enough of it, he may have never experienced any of her again. He found that he disliked that more than the idea of his death.
She leaned over on his bed folding herself over to kiss him before laying her head down. She was tired. The darkness to her eyes gave him a good idea of much she had been sleeping. "Lay with me."
"Spouses aren't meant to stay in the bed..." She mumbled, he knew she didn't believe that, she had him lay with her when she was in the hospital. "But don't worry I'm staying right here." She closed her eyes. Though the position she was in didn't look comfortable he wasn't going to argue with her.
He watched her fall asleep and raised his hand summoning his sand. If there was any gift Shukaku had given him in their parting it was that he kept this ability, if for nothing more then to make sure she made it to bed.
With her soundly tucked under the blanket with him he dismissed the sand, then frowned. He moved his hand and formed a small solid sleeping tanuki replica ruled up by her side and stared at it for a moment before closing his eyes.
It would fill the silence in his head tonight.