Disclaimer: Naruto belongs to Kyuubi, and anyone who says different will probably have their head bitten off, and that's only if he's feeling merciful, which is highly unlikely, by the way. But Kyuubi belongs to Kishimoto Masashi, so that's who you really need to fear…

Notes: I'm really veering away from canon with one (well, actually both) of Hanabi's teammates. But, hopefully that'll make them more interesting.

Summary: Neji reflects on Hanabi's accomplishments so far.

Hyuuga Secret Arts

(Companion to "White Dog Night")

Part 4: The Art of Destiny

A Naruto Ficlet by

Nate Grey (XMAN0123-at-aol-dot-com)

How far she had come in such a short time.

His little Hanabi.

Neji thought of her that way only because he could see himself in her now: her rage, her arrogance, and her complete confidence in her own abilities. Those were gifts he had no real intention of passing on, because there was always a risk of corrupting her. Yet pass them on he had, and eagerly she had accepted, though she still somehow managed to remain true to herself, and to him.

Hanabi's ceaseless drive to better herself had won her powerful allies. Within her cell were represented three of Konoha's more well-known clans, and Neji couldn't have selected more fitting teammates for her himself.

Konohamaru, grandson of the Sandaime Hokage, had been completely smitten the first time he laid eyes on Hanabi. Though already placed in another cell, he had used his status (and a substantial amount of complaining) to get himself onto Hanabi's team. Neji's first impression was that the boy was a spoiled brat, and even worse, a loud and annoying one. Aside from the status, he'd reminded Neji a great deal of Uzumaki Naruto… and as it turned out, there was good reason for that. Claiming to be Naruto's number one apprentice, Konohamaru had proceeded to do what his "boss" did best: overturn the prevailing attitudes against him with undeniable talent and a lucky streak a mile long. He was among the best "shape-stealers" in Konoha, so long as the target was a very attractive female (his Tsunade had won rave reviews). Though a natural prankster, Konohamaru could only be reigned in by a sharp look from Hanabi, and obeyed any order from her without question.

At the opposite end of the scale was the mysterious Nara Kouji. Like the rest of his clan, he could manipulate shadows. Unlike the rest of his clan, he practically was a shadow. The rumor floating around was that he had been badly burned at a very young age. There were always heavy bandages covering his face and forearms, save for his prominent, yellow, almost feline eyes. He wore black at all times, more than likely to reduce enemy visibility when in his element. Kouji had mastered the ability to transport himself through shadows, virtually teleporting, even before he'd graduated from the Academy. A curious addition to his attire was the colored vials worn around his waist on a thick belt. He could commonly be seen splashing the contents of one vial or another on his bandages, and it was thought that they were medicine for his burns. Neji suspected some of them were more in line with soldier pills, considering the Nara Clan's ties with the Akimichi Clan. While he never spoke much, Kouji seemed content with his teammates. Several times Neji had seen him accompanying (but never participating with) Konohamaru on his latest prank, or allowing Hanabi to use him as a practice dummy (one vial had to be a painkiller, since he never flinched from her blows). Like Konohamaru, he had no problems taking orders from Hanabi, and had even become something of a bodyguard whenever Neji was unable to escort her around the village.

For her part, Hanabi tolerated Konohamaru's foolishness, though she was not above a jab to his head if she thought he deserved it. She got along much better with Kouji, possibly because he had no romantic interest in her and knew how to keep his mouth shut. At any rate, she was the obvious leader. It didn't matter that Konohamaru had brought his own tutor, Ebisu, in to be the team's elite jounin instructor. While Hanabi was usually willing to listen to his advice, she had become known for turning around and doing something entirely different, yet twice as effective, all while still in plain sight of Ebisu himself. Any time that Ebisu got red in the face, Konohamaru was quick to remind him that Hanabi was the Hyuuga heir, and, more importantly, the future wife of the next Hokage (him, or so he boasted). Hanabi did not care at all for such claims, but since they allowed her to maintain uncontested control of the team, she did not refute them.

Together, they had achieved fame that was nearly unheard for such a young genin group. And while some of this could be credited solely to Konohamaru being on the team, it was so much more than that. Hanabi had only allowed her team to track down one lost pet before she outright refused to accept another D-ranked mission. Her "punishment" was a series of B-rank missions, all of which her team came out of relatively untouched (except for Konohamaru, and no one could prove that Hanabi hadn't roughed him up herself). Impressed with their unmatched stealth, Hatake Kakashi had dubbed them "The Three Little Shadows of Konoha" (with a promise to remove the "Little" once they were chuunin). The name stuck, and even the Godaime Hokage had recognized them as her "little Hokages in training."

But Neji knew that as far as Hanabi was concerned, becoming Hokage was an unnecessary burden that she didn't care to deal with. She would have enough baggage once she took over the Hyuuga Clan.

He remembered how worried he'd been, the night Hanabi told him her dream of joining ANBU. She'd insisted that only in ANBU could she learn the skills she would need later on in life, though she would not say for what. She'd asked for his approval, and reluctantly, he'd given it to her. Why? He still wasn't certain. It was not a matter of doubt, because Hanabi never spoke of goals unless she meant to achieve them. For her, ANBU was merely a means to an end.

It had bothered Neji a great deal, when Morino Ibiki first approached him to inquire about Hanabi. She hadn't been a genin for more than an hour, and Ibiki had wanted to know if Neji thought she was ANBU material. Neji had only agreed to talk to the man because since first meeting him in the chuunin exam, he had thought of Ibiki as something of a kindred spirit. Here was a man that knew it meant to bear scars that weren't so easy to hide. Since then they had spoken on more than few occasions, though never about Hanabi until then.

To this day, Neji wondered what ANBU looked for, what they saw in her even then (and especially how they'd known to come to him in the first place). Was it the same thing that had drawn Uchiha Itachi to them? That was his greatest concern, that she would become Konoha's fourth great plague, after the Kyuubi, Itachi, and Orochimaru.

Thankfully, ANBU waited until Hanabi became a chuunin at 13 before snatching her up. She had probably been qualified as a genin, and Neji hoped that their choosing to wait even that long was a sign that they had learned somewhat from their mistakes with Itachi.

Joining ANBU had required that Hanabi limit attachments to the outside world during her term of service (not that she'd had more than a handful to start with). When she told Neji that, he was afraid he'd already lost her. She'd said that it was not mandatory that they stop speaking, but that she thought it was for the best. He would distract her, she claimed. He had agreed only because he knew this was important to her, and that she would never forgive him if he blocked her "predestined" path in life. Hanabi firmly believed that she was working towards being able to face Hinata again, and somewhere along the line, Neji had started to share that belief.

It was as if Hanabi simply ceased to exist. It was true that the specific activities of ANBU were rarely ever made public, but it was still not unusual to see them around the village occasionally, and especially in the company of the Hokage. But Neji never spotted Hanabi among them, and soon realized that she almost had to be purposely avoiding public appearances. Often the only way he could get any news of her was by hanging around outside of the Godaime's office, until she got sick of him and assured him that she'd seen Hanabi recently. And if he had to take Tonton for a walk or assist Shizune in surgery with his Byakugan before she would say anything, it was a small price to pay.

Neji would've thought that time would pass slowly without Hanabi, but it seemed to do just the opposite. There was plenty to do in the meantime concerning his own life.

First, he decided to pursue jounin certification. In a rather odd yet fitting twist of fate, what he had come to think of as "the Uzumaki Curse" came back to haunt him yet again. Neji's jounin examination was proctored by none other than Temari, the Sand kunoichi who had defeated Tenten at the chuunin exam. Even worse, apparently Naruto had at some point bonded with Gaara's family, and Temari wasn't shy about stating up front that she'd put Neji through hell before he became a jounin.

She hadn't lied. It was one of the longest months of his life, but in the end, Temari passed him (wearing one of the most sadistic smiles he'd ever seen). Neji still couldn't look her in the eye without shuddering slightly, and he strongly suspected she liked it that way.

His teammates also took up quite a bit of his time with constant sparring, but by then Neji had reached a point where he didn't mind this at all. Tenten had helped him perfect several of his own techniques in the past, and Lee, for all his failings, was always an eager opponent. He came to think of them as extra fingers: not necessary to his success, but helpful all the same.

Neji had always known Lee to be incredibly dedicated when it came to improving his taijutsu skills, but it was Tenten who eventually emerged as the true fanatic in bettering herself. Her determination had puzzled Neji for quite some time, and he could only guess that she either had never really gotten over her loss to Temari, or she was still trying to prove herself worthy of Neji's attention. The latter he could understand; after that first kiss during the chuunin exam, any romantic inclinations between them had simply come to a halt.

It was not so much that Neji had no desire to pursue a relationship with her, as he did not feel he was capable of giving Tenten his full attention yet. Even if she did not demand it, Neji knew she deserved it, and there were still many goals for him to achieve before he could seriously consider being with her. He had tried to explain this to her, but he wasn't sure she understood it the way he did. Despite her willingness to wait, in the meantime Tenten seemed entirely devoted to the idea that Neji could not and would not be allowed to forget about her. At times, Neji actually felt like they were already a couple; they didn't necessarily act like one, but Tenten was so frequent a presence in his life that it was nearly impossible to distance himself from her… not that he tried all that hard after a while.

Hanabi was never too far from his thoughts, however. In his mind, Neji knew why he treated most aspects of his life with a certain sense of detachment. He needed to be ready to leave Konoha at a moment's notice.

One day, Hanabi would return to him. She would be stronger, wiser, and certainly more deadly than he had ever known her to be.

And something told him she would not be willing to wait long.

End of Part 4.

Endnotes:

Don't look too hard for a reference on Kouji, I made him up. Why wouldn't he end up in an InoShikaCho trio? Partially because I doubt three clans can constantly produce the exact same number of kids (or only ONE kid) for very long, but mostly because Kouji would be Shikamaru's cousin to avoid all that hassle. It's pretty likely there are more clan members we never see (clan implies several related families living together, but a widespread decrease in clan size might explain the shortage of ninja in Konoha that makes it necessary for genin to take on higher-ranked missions).

I notice the Rookie Nine cells follow a general pattern of combining a loudmouth, a quiet one, and a deep thinker (I guess Chouji would be quiet in the sense that his mouth is usually full). I didn't feel quite so obligated to do that with Hanabi's team… but in drawing influences from Rookie Nine members (namely Hinata, Naruto, and Shikamaru), it seemed to work out that way despite my best efforts.

I don't think it's ever specified how jounin certification is achieved. It's probably more fun for fans to imagine for themselves, anyway. I do think it makes sense that Temari would become a jounin before Neji, though. Neji's team trained for an extra year before attempting the chuunin exam, which implies that Gaara's team was even more well-trained. It may be that Sand nin are just better equipped to deal with heavy taijutsu users, but I doubt it. Gaara and Temari practically bulldozed Lee and Tenten, and the idea that Kankurou was actually holding back (and that Temari could probably perform her summon even then) just makes me think their abilities were already chuunin-level (where Neji's may have been just slightly above genin). I can't really be sure, since Neji's luck pitted him against Naruto.