7: He Wants with All His Heart and Soul to Cry
"Tenten, Neji, there you are; you're late!" Tamari said yelling to her friends.
"We got here as fast as we could," Tenten said yawning.
"We got held up a few places by a few guards and such but we took them down with ease, don't worry." Neji said.
"They know you have the child?" Tamari asked.
"No, they made a checkpoint but we got through with help from Neji." Tenten added.
"She needs to sleep; do you have a place she can rest?" Neji asked.
"We have a cottage up here on this mountain, there is a room for you two. You can rest there." Gaara said pointing to the house that sat a bit up the mountain. Tenten said sighing and collapsing on the ground. "Pathetic." He said. Neji just smirked as she fell on her back.
"Gaara, they're tired stupid." Tamari said sighing. "Sorry come on."
"I don't think I can move, too tired." Tenten said.
"Ha, I don't think you want to when it starts snowing later tonight." Tenten fussed and just laid on her back. "I'll take care of the child." Tenten held up the child that was sleeping on her lap.
"Well I'm going to bed," Gaara said walking back to the house.
"Whatever," Tenten closed her eyes and surprisingly Tenten fell asleep right there on the ground.
"She's one weird girl." Kankuro said coming down after his siblings had returned to the house.
"She does this a lot when I overwork her at practice, we both end up sleeping on a tree, against a tree, or in a tree. We're use to it."
"But it doesn't snow there does it?"
"No, the trees hold a field so it's warmer on the ground then in the trees. Of course I don't her sleep there if I wake up like that, I carry her home." Neji explained.
"And her parents don't mind?" Kankuro asked.
Neji looked at Tenten, "No, they don't. That's one thing we have in common, we both have no parents. That's why we wake up early and leave late. We wouldn't be as good as we are if we didn't."
"Oh, well bye." Neji nodded. After a few seconds of quiet he decided that she had probably settled into her sleeping state, she would after about 6 minutes of sleeping. After that she was solid asleep and carrying her wouldn't wake her up.
He scooped up her in his arms and carried her to the room that Tamari, Kankuro and Gaara had set out for them. Some how they had found out about their engagement or they wouldn't have set the rooms up like this but they were fine, on most night for a good portion of the night they would be sleeping next to each other in a tree or under a tree or something.
He laid her down in the bed, and went to the bathroom to wash up and change his clothes then returned. She was still sleeping as peacefully as when he had left her. He smiled at how gently and peacefully she was sleeping. He crawled into the bed and joined her in a peaceful night's sleep.
At promptly 5 a.m. Tenten crawled out of the bed and went out to practice. Neji too was awake. "Morning," She said happily.
"Morning Tenten," He said sitting up and kissing her cheek, she giggled. "You ready for practice." She nodded, she went to the bathroom to take wash up while Neji just changed since he had washed up the night before. (Wash up meaning showering.)
She met him on the field in a opening in the snow, and they went all out, Tenten was the one at a disadvantage now, she was on even ground with Neji meaning that she couldn't lay traps, or hide to attack. She had to go head to head which had become easier knowing how the chakra flared out of his hands, and how to dodge them. They did this for about 2 hours until 7 when a screaming Tamari came out.
"There you two are, I thought they took you or something. Don't scare me like that?" Neji rolled his eyes while Tenten laughed.
"What are you are mom Tamari?" Tenten added, most who didn't have parents would cry at this phrase but both didn't remember their mom so they wouldn't know to be upset, they couldn't miss her or be sad.
"I might as well be, you worried me to death. Why are you practicing at this time of day?"
"Because we now can't get practice done because you're bothering us," Neji said, deactivating his Byakugan and walking over to Tenten and pulling her behind him into the house, he had expected this but he didn't care. When they got home they could practice all they wanted to.
"Hey guys, where were you two, Tamari was having a fit." Kankuro asked them.
"They were up the mountain fighting each other." Tamari yelled.
"Training," Neji corrected, causing Tenten to giggle.
"Whatever, I still think it's strange for you to be fighting her Neji, you could kill her."
"Could I? most likely not; would I? most likely not; and Would I try? I have."
"What!" she yelled.
"Yeah, when we train we go all out, our powers at full energy and using all our chakra power until we can't any more." Neji explained.
"That's insane, you could kill each other."
"No, we stop when either of us is badly damaged to the point they can't get up. I also wouldn't use any techniques that would cause her to drop dead. I'm not heartless you know. We train ourselves to the next level." Neji added.
"Yeah, Neji and I work as hard as we can at full force so we can move up in power. If we went easy we wouldn't get anywhere, we agreed on training like this years ago. It's always been like this." Tenten said.
"Insane," Tamari said.
"You just don't seek to become stronger, you think that where you are is your strongest, and you got stronger when you battle so if they do it everyday, think about how above them you are."
"So, I don't need to be any stronger." Neji rolled her eyes. "What are you saying?"
"Just fight already!" Gaara yelled annoyed with the same conversation.
"Fine, come on Neji, let's fight before we take care of everything." Tenten was confused but they probably meant doing something for the child.
Tamari, Kankura, Neji and Tenten with Gaara following behind went to the spot where Tenten and Neji had previously been practicing. Tenten sensed that Neji's chakra was particularly low from their training. They had made the most of their morning practice and seeing and neither of them had warmed up he had used a lot of chakra.
"Can I fight her?" Tenten asked.
"Huh?" Neji asked looking at Tenten.
"I want to fight Tamari, I mean I can sense your chakra supply low and seeing as she uses indirect attacks that it's going to be even harder and you'll probably lose a lot of chakra for no reason by fighting in direct, so let me." Neji shrugged and looked at Tamari.
"Whatever but I'm not going easy on you Tenten."
"I wouldn't have it any other way, I see this as a well needed rematch and training." Tamari said.
"I wouldn't underestimate Tenten, Tamari." Gaara advised.
"Whatever, she uses the same techniques as she did before, what could change?" Tamari asked.
"A lot," Neji answered.
"Ready?" Kankuro asked, both girls nodded and they were off. Tenten had used a jutsu to manipulate the snow into 6 columns of snow. Neji smiled, he had seen this move except using trees that were already existent.
Tenten disappeared up to the top of the column and Tamari looked around, and spun around, she couldn't see Tenten. Suddenly a kunai and shuriken hit her square in the back. Tamari fell to the ground, in pain. But quickly stood up after pulling them out.
Then before Tamari knew it she was trapped in a net and hanging above a mysteriously appearing pit of kunai and shuriken, the fan had fallen through the net, and Tenten was standing on it.
"Fine, I give up but how?" Neji smirked.
"Easy, when you winced in pain and lightened your body for a few micro seconds your body was not touching the ground at all, so I threw a invisible net under you, and had it tied to the kunai in my hand, so then I pulled up trapping you, then the fan fell through the net and it was all over.
"And the kunai pit,"
"All deception, that you were too confused to even see through, that's why I didn't use it during my match with Neji, he could see through it. I'm smarter than I appear. I did train with the Hyuuga Prodigy." Tenten said smiling at Neji.
"So what now, sis?" Kankuro asked.
"Prepare the coffin, Gaara, you know what to do?"
"A coffin for what?" Tenten asked.
"The child," Tamari answered bluntly.
"You're going to kill her?" Tenten asked concerned.
"Not her, me." Gaara said.
"But why?" Tenten asked.
"I'm sure someone had told you this before but the guy who took the place of my father doesn't belong there, Kankuro, Tamari and I do. We can't allow the child to take over and bring more suffering to the people. It's for the best." Gaara answered. Tenten had never saw Gaara as a nice guy after what he had done to Lee, her almost friend and teammate but she saw that when it came to the country he was.
"Why are you being so nice to Sunakakure all a sudden, I thought you swore to avenge it."
"I will but not in the way I had planned, the people have suffered enough, I have avenged those who did it to my mom already, I am going to fix the country not destroy it." Gaara answered.
"I still can't let you hurt an innocent child just to save the country." Tenten answered.
"Tenten, you have to understand that we have to. Your mission is over, you don't have to agree, or like it, or watch it. You and Neji can return home but it has to be done. Your mission was to bring the child to us alive."
"Why alive, why not tell us to kill her; why?" Tenten said crying falling to the ground.
"Because she was born impurely, of my aunt and my uncle my uncle a horrible man now, and my aunt someone who was just used. They were the last people I had to avenge, that is it Tenten, good-bye." Gaara waved his hand off.
"We really are sorry Tenten, but it's like that for a reason." Tenten was crying, and Neji picked the girl off the ground and hugged her. He hated this, more than anything. The child was being killed for no reason and Tenten had bonded with this child.
"Neji can't you do anything?" Tenten begged. He shook his head and brought her closer to his body. She was crying, and his shirt was extremely wet, but he didn't care.
"She may be strong but when it comes to the Shinobi rules she has a problem I see; it's a shame, that could cause her some problems as a kunoichi." Tenten was ingnoring Kankuro's insults directed at her.
"I see she has never seen someone die in battle." Gaara added.
"I don't think so." Neji replied, she nodded agreeing with their statements. "She agrees as such."
"Then she must understand many die in battle for no reasons or many reasons." Gaara answered. Gaara took the child from Tamari and set it in a box of sand that was laid out, "sand coffin." Within seconds the child was gone and a lot of blood was scattered about, but it wasn't the child's. It was hers.
"Tenten!" Neji yelled running to the girl's side. It was clear that if she wasn't dead she defiantly wasn't alive, she was either dead or comatose. He collected her limp body and transported to Konoha hospital and alerted Tsunade.
"Tsunade, it's an emergency, now. It's Tenten." Tsunade ran in and saw the bleeding girl, her arms and legs seemed to be fine as in whatever had smashed her only grabbed her middle where she was sitting.
"Neji what happened."
"I'm not exactly sure, Gaara was about to kill the child with sand coffin, her preformed it and she was in the child's place.
"This is not good." Tsunade said. "We'll do everything we can Neji, but there is no guarantee, it took years with Lee, she might not be back and if she does she'll never be the same. He nodded understand, her being alive would be better than her dying, even if she couldn't be a ninja.
At this particular moment, he wanted to cry. He couldn't. He wanted to cry to show his fear, worry, sadness, anger and pain that he was now feeling. He returned to the waiting room as Tenten was in surgery. A very familiar shy girl showed up and hugged her cousin/brother person.
"Neji-nii-san, I am so very sorry for you. If there is anything I can do, please tell me." She answered.
"If you, Ino and Sakura could help in there, it might go easier and faster. I just want her alright." Hinata nodded gather her other doctor-in-training friends as they got ready and went in to help, he was worried and scared.
After a day the hospital was closed to guest to prevent germs spreading during a special surgery for Tenten. Neji had not been able to sleep at all, he stared aimlessly out his window and didn't move or practice, sleep or eat.
A girl burst in his room, and slapped him so hard there was a welt mark on his face where she had slapped him. He opened his eyes and they revealed something she thought she never see, they were no longer pale lilac but black.
"You can't see can you?" He nodded. "You did this to yourself you know?" He once again nodded. "Don't you see, if she makes it through she's going to cry because she'll blame yourself. You have to pull yourself together."
"Why should I, I can do that when the surgery is about to be over."
"What is wrong, hasn't a day ever gone by where you weren't with her?"
"No, we train 7 days a week, 20 hours a day, we sleep the other 4 and eat together. There hasn't been a day in a long time where I haven't seen her." Neji replied.
"Then you two are pathetic."
"So be it, you do know I know you are Tamari only through your voice." She nodded but he couldn't see it.
"I know, your eyes don't have any of the tiny bit of chakra needed to hold your Byakugan lilac eyes, so they're all pupil. There is no balance either all or nothing. You have nothing."
"How do you know?"
"Tenten of course, if you fell apart she could piece you back together exactly how you were when you fell apart. But do want her to have to when she gets out of the hospital?" He shook his head.
"I just need her back."
"I know you do, everyone sees and knows that but you don't get it Neji, she won't be able to when she wakes up. Let me also tell you, she won't be intransed like anyone else in a coma, her body is going to suffer lower body tension, she could talk, see, smell, and taste but feeling is something she can't and move. They say there was no brain damage because it was just her center area, and because of so much chakra to her heart he hard could take the chakra enfused with sand but the sand is choking her, they're having to take out all the sand, it's a lot and Gaara is even having problems since she has soaked it in."
"They're all helping but will she be better, the answer is clearly no." Neji answered.
"Get a hold of yourself, what is wrong with you?"
"I can't cry."
"What does that have to do with anything?" Tamari asked.
"Crying is a physical manifestation of feeling, it's a opening and ventilation for feelings that are inside, Hyuugas are supposed to avoid feelings because our eyes can't vent them out through crying, that's why I'm like this. What can I do?"
"Oh, so you didn't do this on purpose."
"All my feelings are stuck inside with no way out, that is why I thanked Tenten when she cried, through her I knew I had to hold strong for her because she couldn't hold emotions while I always held them."
Two weeks past, and Neji laid in bed, at night Hinaba through Hinata's direction would use small water crystals into him so he wouldn't die of thirst and small food particals so he wouldn't starve though he planned to.
"How can she cry?" He asked.
Tamari sat next to Hinabi by Neji's side to check on him. "Who?"
"Hinata, she has the Byakugan but she can cry. I need to cry?"
"Neji, a lot of female members of our clan can cry."
"Why not I?" Tamari rolled her eyes but him being blind couldn't see it.
"Hyuugas had to be good a deception of males so crying played a huge role in deception so we can while males have to be strong so they can't. That is why, sorry." Hinabi apologized.
"Why won't you let me die?" Neji asked.
"Because stupid Neji, if you die then when Tenten awakes she'll be worst off than you because you are dead, you have no more chances to live, to be happy, to get married, to love her, to help her though her troubles, she would have been better off dying. Are you that insensitive?" Tamari yelled.
"I guess I am."
"Come on Tamari, let's let him think about this, he's confused and wants to cry."
"He can't," Tamari added
"Doesn't mean he won't try." She added.
Neji desperately wanted to cry so he could move on and be there for Tenten but he couldn't move, just be miserable. He needed Tenten to cry, to care again so he could feel complete. No one in the world she be deprived of crying. Crying is a symbol of humanism, and hurtful thing if you can't.
For Tenten, From Neji: If you get this good, I'm glad you're okay and alive enough to read this, unfortunately I'm searching for my human side, I'll be back. I love you.
I yearn to cry like you do
I yearn to feel like you can
I yearn to know what it means to feel
I want to be let free
I want to see you again
I want you to help me
I need you alright
I need you safe
I need you here in my arms
I have a want
I have a need
I have a yearning
All because of you
This isn't your fault for you opened my eyes
Now I'm blind.
They Reasons Why… He wants with all his soul and mind to cry.
1. She wasn't dead.
2. She wasn't alive.
3. She was comatose
4. She was bleeding.
5. She might not be back.
6. She'd never be the same.
7. He wanted and needed her alive.
8. Show Fear, worry, pain, sadness and anger
9. Tenten could cry, he couldn't.
10. symbol of Humanism.
11. Hurtful thing to be deprived of.
12. Helped him to feel, to know, be let free
13. Open his eyes
14. Blind him
15. He loved her, she hurts.
