Tough Break

10

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Hinata didn't even want to think about her father's reaction when he found out about the incident with Gaara. All three of them, Neji, Hinata, and Naruto, were in the hospital, two unconscious, and one a conscious wreck. Hinata occupied a room of her own while Neji and Naruto shared the room adjacent to hers. Hinata's ribs had been patched up and her scrapes and cuts dressed. She had needed only a day and a half to recover the chakra lost, but Neji and Naruto would need at least another day or two before fully recovering themselves.

The chunin exams were very close and there were absolutely no excuses for backing out, even an almost successful murder attempt. Neji and Hinata would be required to enroll even if they were half-dying, but Naruto could probably get out of it if he wanted to. However, Hinata knew for a fact that he would never do such a thing. If Naruto was conscious to protest his prolonged hospitalization that's exactly what he would do.

It was in Hinata's nature to worry, so when the nurses reassured her that the two would be okay, she only half-listened. Neji had a serious wound just below his ribs while Naruto's body was bruised from head to toe. Hinata had gotten away fresh as a daisy compared to the two of them, but it only raised her suspicion more about Gaara's motives for killing her.

His words echoed in her ears like a high-pitched ring, making Hinata squint at the memory. Exactly how…would he break her love for Naruto? That's what he had meant, wasn't it? Hinata couldn't imagine how he would do it, but wasn't the most obvious solution to…break Naruto himself? Well, Gaara had pretty much done that, but he didn't kill him. Truly if he had it would have destroyed Hinata…but…then again, that wouldn't have broken her love.

Gaara must have known that. Death doesn't break love…it merely blooms hatred in addition to love. If anything death multiplied love, and Gaara did not want that to happen. If he was going to break the love Hinata held for Naruto, he would have to do it some other way, but what other way could there possibly be?

Hinata feared the answer.

As for Gaara himself, Hinata did not know what had befallen him since yesterday's encounter. Surely the Hokage had heard about the incident as well as the Kazekage, so the question of Gaara's punishment was still a matter to be decided. That is…if they hadn't decided it already.

*-*-*-*-*-*-*

His siblings stayed as far away from him as possible, located on the other side of the room under a more luminous area and as close to the door as possible…just in case. Gaara stood upright, gazing out the window while completely ignoring them both. The cowering fools. They may have felt more comfortable with their sensei there, as he always was, but unfortunately Baki was off doing damage control. That little uncalled for stunt Gaara pulled yesterday had gotten all of them in trouble, putting everything they were doing completely and recklessly at risk, and yet he couldn't care less.

It was definitely a relief to the rest of them that Gaara had not killed anybody this time, but the possibility of him being banned from the chunin exams was still very real. Baki would do all in his power to make sure that didn't happen, but it was a long shot. Gaara was certain it both irritated and enraged Baki that he couldn't even yell at Gaara for what he'd done, since he, like the rest of his Godforsaken village, was scared shitless of him. One glare and Baki would retreat back into a corner, trembling and mumbling excuses along with his useless siblings.

However, the fact still remained true that a lot would have to be made up for this. It would without a doubt be a problem if Gaara was banned from the chunin exams, but the red headed sand nin figured Baki would handle it to the best of his ability. Like all other matters of which his father staked high efforts on, Gaara didn't give a damn, but…there were things he wanted to do in the chunin exams.

Though that girl…that little mouse…had claimed a generous portion of his time and attention, the desire to extract the blood of many a strong opponents still lingered in the center of his heart. The ones Sasuke and Neji….though Neji had been easy enough to defeat this time around, it was anyone's guess as to how much he would improve in the future, and the Uchiha…Yes. He would make a very fine opponent.

"What were you thinking, Gaara?" Kankuro demanded, breaking through Gaara's concentration. His older brother rather bravely approached Gaara with a somewhat nervous look and a sweat bead hovering on his forehead. He came to a purposely distant stop in front of his little brother and Gaara stared at him with an expectant look which leaked blatant irritation.

"You attacked two Konoha ninjas with absolutely no supportive reasons and put them in the hospital! Not to mention they'll be competing in the upcoming chunin exams, so that means the higher ups will automatically assume you were trying to cheat by eliminating the competition early! How do you explain something like this? You put everything we're doing in jeop--"

"Shut up," Gaara seethed with venom. "I already know all of this. Do you think I'm stupid?"

Kankuro grit his teeth and coiled his hands. He took a step back, making an unsuccessfully concealed gulping noise in his throat, and said, "Exactly what was your reason for--"

"My reasons were my own and none of your business," Gaara responded in a low and raspy voice. "Or…perhaps you would like to take action behind your demands and fight me?"

"Now hold on," Temari interjected. She came to stand beside Kankuro who'd widened his eyes in a response to obvious fear at his brother's threat, and confronted Gaara seeming more than obviously reluctant. "Fighting will only make things worse and you know it. It's no use arguing over what's already happened. It's best if we just wait for Baki to come back with more information about what's going on."

As if on cue the door cracked open and out emerged a very exhausted and exasperated Baki. Temari and Kankuro turned to him abruptly, Kankuro looking a little more relieved than his sister. "Baki-sensei!" Temari exclaimed. "What did they say?"

Baki scanned right over her and placed his eyes upon Gaara who was staring at him expectantly as well. There were words swimming behind Baki's eyes, angry and scolding words, but what he said was, "It seems Gaara has not been banned from the exams after all."

Temari and Kankuro reacted with genuinely relieved expressions, but Gaara turned away from them to stare out the window. Once he heard what he wanted to hear there was no reason to keep lending his so very limited patience. The reasons behind the conclusions were of absolutely no concern to him, including the repercussions, and as long as he was able to compete in the chunin exams nothing else mattered.

"At first they were going in that direction," Baki continued, leaning comfortably against the wall, "but since the exams haven't actually begun yet, it wasn't exactly necessary to exclude him from them. It's only illegal to attack participants after the exams have already been set in motion. However, the head of the Hyuga clan was--or is--extremely angered over this, not to mention the Hokage himself wasn't too pleased. Gaara almost got us kicked out of the village, but fortunately Lords and Nobles from all over the countries are heavily anticipating Gaara's participation in the exams and are riding high on outrageous bets with one another. Talk of the Uchiha's enrollment in the exams has spread like wild fire and many are hoping that he and Gaara will both be progressing though the test. Were Gaara to be dropped now it would ignite too much heat."

"Well I guess we lucked out," Kankuro commented. "You hear that Gaara? You were lucky."

"We were lucky," Temari responded quickly. "This effected all of us. Don't forget that." She leaned in closer to Kankuro's ear and whispered seriously, "We were supposed to be keeping an eye on him. Don't forget that that's the main reason we were assigned to take the exams and not some other nins."

Kankuro dropped his eyes toward the floor and let out a quiet, "Hmph!"

"What about the hospitalized participants?" Temari asked Baki.

Gaara turned from the window and directed his attention at his sensei, looking at him from the side of his eyes.

"It remains to be seen as to whether or not they'll be able to continue as planned in taking the exams. If they don't recover in time they won't be able to make it."

Gaara turned his whole form toward Baki, clearly offering all of his attention now.

"But there are only three days left," Temari noted. "Are their injuries really so serious?"

"Yes," Baki said. "Two of them need an exponential amount of recovery time and right now it looks as if they won't be able to participate."

"And the other one?" Gaara demanded unexpectedly.

All three looked at him in surprise, wondering why in the hell he would even bother asking of the condition of someone he intended to kill.

Baki, taking a moment to collect himself, said, "I…I'm pretty sure the damage they sustained isn't nearly as severe as the other two, but…I think he'll still be able to compete."

"You mean 'she'," Gaara corrected. This earned him more bewildered looks. Baki hadn't really bothered to take note of the gender of the victims since it was irrelevant, but if he remembered correctly a Hyuga girl had been hospitalized as well. The Hyuga heir, in fact.

"Gaara…did you purposely target those children?"

Baki hadn't thoroughly considered that. Gaara was well known for killing miscellaneous people on a whim, especially those with exceptional skill, but never had Baki thought Gaara would intentionally seek someone out for the purpose of ending their lives. Normally he just killed them as they came.

Gaara glared at him, making Baki and the other cringe back, then turned to stare out into the sky once more.

"No."

*-*-*-*-*-*-*

No one came to visit. Not her father, not her sister, and certainly not her cousin who lay unconscious in the next room. Only the Hokage and a few of his guards came, but only to question Hinata about what had happened. Hinata was very surprised at what she felt when being asked such things. For some reason there was massive confliction in her chest; unsettling and disturbing emotions whirring confusedly together as well as that of guilt. Though she had remembered very clearly what had happened and the time limit Gaara had given her days before, all she could tell them was…"I can't remember."

Of course they pressed for more details, urging her to remember something of value, but all she could say was, "I'm sorry, but…I just don't remember."

Eventually they had to give up and leave it at that. Before the Hokage departed he gave Hinata two gentle pats on the shoulder saying that Gaara would not harm her again since they would be keeping a closer watch on him than ever.

What he had not said, Hinata noticed, was that Gaara wasn't exactly in trouble, meaning he was still going to participate in the chunin exams.

Tough Break.

Hinata relaxed into her pillow, staring out the wide open window which revealed the shining sun peeking over the trees. The day was well into the afternoon and yet the sun was still high in the sky. A good sign.

Hinata didn't know what would become of Gaara because of his actions, but…whatever the outcome, she was certain it wasn't extreme. At least not for him. To think that something or someone would be able to hurt Gaara…a very hard thing to imagine.

A shuffling of feet sounded outside in the hallway and for a moment Hinata's heart swelled with the hope that maybe her father had come to see her after all, but a slender figure followed by a thick trail of pink hair smashed those hopes as quickly as they'd come. Ah…it was only Naruto's teammates coming to visit him.

Hinata heard the sliding door to Naruto and Neji's room open, along with a separate set of footsteps advancing casually past her door. It was Sasuke. He too had come to visit Naruto, and before passing Hinata's room completely, caught a side glance of her and stopped. Hinata raised her head in surprise as he came in, very unexpectedly if she were to add, and closed the sliding door behind him which the Hokage had left open.

"Hey," he greeted blandly.

"U-Um…H-Hello, Uchiha-san," Hinata greeted in response. This was certainly a surprise. Never had Sasuke and Hinata exchanged even a word together, and yet here he was waltzing right into her room completely without warning. The only interaction they ever had together was being in the same room, and if Hinata was being perfectly honest, she wasn't even sure if he knew her name.

Sasuke pulled a chair from beside the window and set it beside Hinata's bedside. He took his seat casually, crossing his arms over his chest, and said, "So I heard you were attacked too. By that weird Sand Ninja."

Hinata, too shocked to form words, only nodded in response.

"What do you know about it?"

Ah, another interrogation was it? Hinata, surprisingly enough, was much more comfortable with this than an ordinary get-well visit which she embarrassingly assumed this was at first.

"I…I don't really know a whole lot," Hinata answered.

"Is that right?" Sasuke replied, leaning back in his chair. He looked away from her and scanned the open window where a cool breeze played with the curtains. "Naruto and that other Ninja, Neji I think his name is--he looks just like you--are hurt pretty bad. Yet you're the first one awake, seemingly void of such extreme injuries. Why is that?" He looked at her again, boring into her eyes, and Hinata drew back into her pillow, pressing against her headboard.

"I…well, that is…I am not as fierce as an opponent as they, s-so…there was no need to inflict so much damage on me."

Sasuke stared at her for a moment, then nodded his head quietly to himself, instantly believing her. "I see…" he said. "And Sabaku Gaara…did you talk to him?"

"Wh-Why do you want to know that?" Hinata asked.

"I met him once. My team and I," he said.

Hinata blinked in surprise. So she had been right.

"His stupid teammate was picking on some kid Naruto knows and we had to interject. That spook came in afterwards, threatening to kill the guy, which is surprising since he's part of his own team, and introduced himself as Gaara of the Sand. He's very dangerous."

Sasuke stopped, looking into Hinata's eyes for conformation, and she nodded right away. "Yes…he is."

"Just as I thought. Of course there was no real way for me to tell if he was someone to be taken seriously, but…it's just the aura he gives off." It seemed now as if Sasuke was talking more to himself than to Hinata, staring hard at his hands which now lay folded across his lap. "It's the look in his eyes…" Sasuke continued, clenching them together. "I want to know…" He glanced up at Hinata with those dark and chilling eyes…"exactly how dangerous he really is."

Hinata widened her eyes at Sasuke's words; so subtle and yet so demanding. Hinata faltered for a second, completely at a loss as to how to explain the magnitude of power possessed by the opponent in question, and all she could come up with was, "Very."

No term explained it better.

Sasuke narrowed his eyes into focus, hanging on her words tightly, and said with a dark smile, "Good."

He stood from his seat, pushing it back to it's original location, and made his way to the door. Hinata watched him slide it open and shove his hands into his pockets on the way out.

"Get better quickly," he told her in farewell. "I expect to see you at the exams."

//***********************************//A/N//************************************//

Normally I would use a word other than "spook" to describe Gaara, especially when spoken through Sasuke's mouth…but…that's really what he calls him in volume 4 of the actual Naruto manga. I claim no responsibility for the term's corniness.

And if anyone wants to see some fanart for my fics, check out my profile page! The links are posted right on it! They're all freakin awesome!