Hey everyone
Here's the next chapter, and finally the last arc of the Bikochu.
There's also a bit of Naruhina closeness in this story, so I hope for those who have been on wit's end for some you'll like.
Chapter 10
Naruto tried to get up and break free from the wax, but he couldn't; it was too hardened.
"Leave this to me" Hinata said. She sounded different from the Hinata he was use to; she sounded confident and fearless. Surprised, Naruto set his focus on her.
"Hinata!" Shino said in a voice she knew too well.
She nodded, and began to observe her opponents. 'I haven't used that in actual combat yet, but, I must use it now!'
"Hachi bakudan no justu!" The blond haired bee user cried out, sending his wasps.
"Hachi senbon no jutsu!" The bulky bee user cried out, sending the bees with stingers.
"Hachi mitsu no jutsu!" The female bee user cried out, sending the ones filled with honey.
All three types of bees had begun to surround Hinata. They were flying all around leaving her with nowhere to escape. She slowly began to bring her two fingers to her front. 'Naruto-kun. Naruto-kun. Watch me.' Getting into her new Huyga stance, she unleashed her newest technique, "Shugo hake rokujuu yon shou!" Her hands began attacking the bees at an alarmingly fast rate.
"Nani?" The three yelled out in surprise. Not a single one of their bees were able to get near and touch her.
Naruto felt surprised at what he was seeing; this was different from the Hinata he had met back at the chunin exams, "You're kidding me…That Hinata….can use such an amazing technique."
"The Hinata that you remember…is from when?" Shino suddenly asked.
Turning his head, he looked at Shino questioningly, "what do you mean?"
"After the Chunin exams, you learned a new technique, right? Hinata had also been working on one as well; she is steadily developing" Shino explained.
Understanding, Naruto turned his head back to where Hinata was now killing all of the bees that were coming at her.
"She's been hesitating for a long time", Shino continued, "Through her strict training, she made her own style and developed her own technique. That is the result of her training. Due to her training, her chakra control has improved considerably. What helped her to achieve it is that technique. Shugo hakke rokujuu yon shou. By combining the flexible body that she already has, with the precise control of her chakra, she completely protects herself from attacks in all directions. It's an absolute protection technique. It's different from Neji's Hakke shou kaiten. This is Hinata's technique alone. She was finally able to acquire that technique on her own. It was most likely created so that she would be acknowledged by her father, so that everyone would acknowledge her, and to be acknowledged by you."
He was so immersed in Hinatas movements that he felt as if he had seen that sort of movement before, like dancing. 'Why does her technique seem so familiar, even though it's the first time seeing it?' As Naruto was thinking about it, a breaking sound broke him out of his thoughts. Turning his head back towards the sound, he was surprised to see Shino standing and out of the honey hardened wax.
"How?!" Naruto couldn't keep the bewilderment out of his voice.
"Because you trusted me, my plan worked; angering the queen bee and getting encased by the wax, were both according to my plan. That was the only way for us to be saved from the larva absorbing our chakra to the point where we couldn't move. Besides, I was ordering the bugs; it turns out that the wax that trapped us is hollow."
Naruto tested his own wax, and it turned out that Shino was right; because of his bugs, the wax was fairly easy to break through. Getting up, he saw Shino help Kiba get out of his bindings. Kiba slowly regained his consciousness.
After getting up, Naruto kept his eyes on Hinata the whole time; he couldn't stop watching her. Her movements were so precise, so fluid, and so rhythmical. He couldn't help but feel awed despite the situation they were in. 'Hinata, your amazing' was the only thing he could think of while he watched her.
"None of our attacks are working on her, just what is that technique?" The blond one yelled out.
"Man, what a girl…Wait! When did those guys break free?" The bulky one screamed in shock.
Getting frustrated; the female of the group bit her finger, and smeared it on her gloved palm. She slammed her gloved hand onto the ground, "Kuchiyose no justu!" she yelled out, summoning her queen bee onto to the field.
Startled, Hinata turned to see the queen bee staring her down.
"Blow her away" the queen's master commanded. Flying towards Hinata, the queen unleashed the honey wax at her. Hinata, however, kept up her technique, causing the wax to circle around her like a dome. The queen just flew directly at it, sending Hinata flying.
"Aaaah!" She screamed as she rolled onto the ground.
"Hinata" Naruto was about to run to her, but felt someone grab his arm. Looking behind him, it was Shino preventing him from going, "Shino?"
"Trust…Her." Shino said as he let go of Naruto.
Turning his head back, he saw Hinata getting up as she wiped the blood of her lips off with the back of her hand; her face looked determined.
The queen was starting to head back at Hinata's location in order to finish the job.
'Chakra…Sharper…Stronger…Larger….More flexible!' It was flying closer now, 'More…More…More…More…More…..More!' Her justu was getting bigger; bigger than before. The queen just couldn't break through and land back at her master, who was with her group, sending them into the lake.
Hinata had done it; she saved everyone this time.
Exhausted, she was barley standing up, "Hinata!" Naruto called out as he caught her from collapsing onto the ground, slowly lowering her down in his arms.
"Hinata" Naruto called out, hoping she was still conscious.
"Naruto-kun…?" Hinata lifted her head to meet his eyes.
"Hinata, that technique was amazing. You're really amazing" Naruto said. The grin on his face was so wide that it looked like it would split in half.
Hinata had a light blush sporting her face; she couldn't help but smile, feeling warmth from the praise he gave her, "Naruto-kun" she brought her head to the side of his left beicep, resting it there, the smile never leaving her face.
"Let's hurry. It's almost dawn" Shino said now that the battle had finished.
"Hai!" All three of them said at once.
They quickly made haste back to the location where the Bikochu was being hidden; once they got there, they saw that the egg had changed.
"It became a pupa" Naruto said.
"All we have to do is go back and get it to smell Sasuke's belongings, then its mission complete" Kiba said, sounding excited.
They were all eager for it to hatch.
"Impossible" a voice said. Turning their heads, they saw that it was the female bee user, looking ragged, "Inside a tree? The bees should've been able to find it right away."
"You're still able to move?" Kiba asked, looking startled.
"I put the Aburame clan's secret bug repellant on this bug cage. Due to the bug repellant, the bees wouldn't come near here. As long as you guys used the bees to find this, there was no way you could've found it" Shino explained.
She began to quietly laugh at that, "impressive as usual. As long as your clan is around, it was our fate to be destroyed. But…" she suddenly jumped up and landed on her bee that had come from the sky, "I will not let your mission succeed!" she said. She started flying towards them.
"Kage bunshin no jutsu" Naruto said, making his favourite hand sign. A shadow clone popped right next to him.
"This thing here is our hope", Naruto began rotating the chakra in his hand, while his clone helped it turn to shape, "in order to get our comrade back!" It had become the fouth's hokage strongest technique; the Rasengan, "we won't let you have it" Naruto slammed the Rasengan onto the queens face, sending both the queen and the women flying far off.
"Hey look" Shino said, quickly grabbing everyone's attention. The pupa was starting to hatch out of its shell.
"Alright" Naruto said as he brought Sasuke's headband up in front of it.
Once hatched, it immediately smelled the headband. All four of them waited anxiously on its next movement, standing afar. The bug began to fly up into the air, landing on Naruto.
"Huh?" Naruto said.
"What?" Kiba said.
"Naruto-kun?" Hinata sounded worried.
"Could it be…?" Shino appeared to be thinking.
All four of them looked at the headband, then back at the Bikochu; they started to slowly put the pieces together, causing them to go pale.
"Nani? Why does it have my scent instead of Sasuke's?" Naruto couldn't believe what was happening.
"The most plausible reason could be that you've been holding onto Sasuke's headband for so long that your scent got mixed with it. Naruto, was it raining on the day that Sasuke left?" Shino asked.
Naruto nodded, remembering that day as if it were yesterday.
"If that's the case, then most of his scent was washed off, replacing it with your own" Shino concluded.
"So…" Hinata began.
"You mean…" Kiba continued.
"That this mission is a failure!" Naruto finished.
All of them looked at the Bikochu one more time that was sitting on Naruto's shoulder, and they all sighed.
"Gomen, it looks like it's my fault" Naruto sounded gloomy.
"Naruto-kun…" Hinata looked worried.
"Ah, it's okay. There's still three years until the snake-bastard tends to take over Sasukes body, just got to find him before that happens" Naruto stated, showing that this failure wasn't going to bring him down.
"Let us proceed back to Konoha. It just turned morning so we will be able to cover a lot of ground" Shino said.
They all nodded, packed their things, and left towards their home.
All of them were taking their time walking back, completely exhausted. None of them had the energy to speak. It wasn't an uncomfortable silence. Just because none of them were talking, though, didn't mean that they weren't thinking of miles ahead. Shino was thinking of what to write in the report of the mission, being the leader. Kiba was wondering what he was going to work on for his new technique. Naruto's thoughts were a bit more complicated as he was thinking about a certain someone. Staring at Hinata's back from behind, he couldn't shake the thoughts of her movements seeming so familiar to him. Another thing was how much stronger and determined she had gotten; she was still timid, shy, and tended to stutter, but, on the battle field, she showed how powerful she could be. 'It was the first time seeing her without her jacket as well' who would have thought that innocent, sweet Hinata was the most developed out of the rookie 12 kunoichi's. 'Wait…Bad Naruto; it's not right to think of Hinata like that! Damn you ero-senin', Naruto felt his face turning red from shame, and cursing the pervert from somehow influencing him on thinking those perverted thoughts in the first place.
Oblivious to his turmoil, Hinata felt both happy and pleased with the mission despite its failure; she was able to complete her own original justu and rescue her comrades; Naruto even said that she was amazing! The reason why she decided to stick with walking in front of everyone was so none of them could see the smile plastered on her face. It didn't even bother her that her father would be disappointed that the mission was a failure.
She took a quick peek behind her to see how her teammates were holding up. All three of them looked tired for the most part, but something caught her eye; Naruto was staring at her and looked a little red. Worried that maybe he had gotten a cold or something, she decided to ask, "Naruto-kun, did you by any chance catch a cold? Your face is a little red." All this did was make Naruto turn even redder.
"No! I'm perfectly fine, but that justsu, man I can't stop thinking of how you handled those three so easily." Naruto hesitated for a second, but continued his train of thought, and came closer so he could ask her without the two hearing them, "say Hinata…..when we reach Konoha…..could we meet up when you're not busy? There's an issue I've been having recently, and I think you could help me with it" Naruto whispered to her.
Hinata had started to turn red when he got closer to her, and it went a darker shade when she realized that he wanted to meet up with her alone for whatever issue it was that required him to whisper it in her ear. 'N-n-aruto-k-kun and I-I, alone' Hinata nodded before losing conscious.
"Ah, Hinata!" Naruto cried out, startled that she had collapsed on the ground.
"Seems like she fainted; well, it will be sunset soon, we shall rest here for the night. Naruto, please carry Hinata and place her near the rock by the lake. Kiba and I will set up camp" Shino said, taking his backpack off his back.
Nodding, Naruto removed his own bag, and went to pick up Hinata, bridle style, and approached the rock. As he tried to place Hinata on the ground, she suddenly wrapped her arms around his neck, and nuzzled her head into his neck. Naruto was starting to turn red again as he worked hard to ignore the perverted thoughts, cursing the perverted senin once again. Not being able to get her off of him, he just sat on the ground, leaning his back on the rock, with Hinata in his arms.
Hesitantly, he looked at her face, where she now had her head resting on his shoulder; she seemed to be at ease. He just couldn't figure it out; he's the so called unpredictable ninja, but Hinata surprises him every time they meet. First with her willingness to help him back at the Chunin exams despite not being on the same team, then her determination to go against her cousin even though he was more skilled, and now she had beat three full grown ninjas with an original move of her own making despite being a ninja less than a year. 'She's rapidly growing; innocent Hinata is gaining more confidence in her. I wonder what's causing her to push forward' he decided to ask her when she woke up, and maybe see what kind of training she's been doing when they would meet later. Looking down at her serene face again, he couldn't help but feel a tug of a smile spreading to his face. The other two were looking, and just shook their heads of how dense Naruto was.
Naruto was so dense, that he himself didn't realise that he was slowly beginning to get interested in Hinata Huyga.
There we go, I'll probably be adding more characters back to the story now that this arc is completed
Also for the justus, I couldn't figure out their names in English, but if anyone finds it, please let me know
Cheers