Dreamcatcher

By Airyo

This Lonely Fortress - 5

Hinata fidgeted uncomfortably under the weight of three pairs of eyes. Itachi's students, the (in)famous Team 7, faced her with grim expressions. The slanted lighting didn't help and casted strange shadows across their faces.

"Hanabi-san said you had business with me?" she asked. The three exchanged a look, before Sasuke leaned forward, lacing his fingers together in front of his mouth.

"Hinata-san, what are you thoughts on my brother?"

She paused.

She turned bright red and suddenly found her hands very interesting.

"Excellent…" Sasuke murmured with a wide smirk. "We would like your cooperation in getting you and Itachi together." Hinata began to protest, but the younger kept speaking, leaving her no chance to make a sound. "I have a gift for you, a little proof that we're serious. It was incredibly difficult to secure, but now you have it, you must guard this with your life. No one must discover our exchange. Do you understand?"

Hinata's thoughts skittered astray, clinging onto to anything that wasn't the reason for her tomato complexion.

"So...that's why we're gathered at a ramen stand?" she asked skeptically after a beat, surprising herself with how snarky it sounded. The group glanced at Ayame, who waved at them at them from behind the counter. The little silver-haired boy strapped to her back cooed and copied his mother.

"Oy, Hinata-chan, don't diss the Ramen," Naruto grumbled. He turned to pout at Sasuke. "Bastard...you were being too dramatic." His attention jumped back to Hinata, giving her an uncomfortable sense of whiplash. "Basically what this jerk is saying is that if you tell Itachi-sensei we came to you with this, we'll be in big trouble."

Hinata couldn't help but be curious.

"What are you giving me?"

Naruto grinned with far too many teeth. "His diary." He removed a scroll from his vest pocket and snapped it open with aplomb. He cleared his throat. "Dear Diary," he read in a deep, serious voice, "I have fallen madly in love with Hinata. She is the star of my eyes, the apple of my sky. I like her hair and her face and definitely her large, round -"

"Don't mind him," Sakura said sweetly as she plucked the scroll from Naruto's twitching fingers and flicked it open to reveal childish doodles on a what appeared to be a mission report form for a D-rank mission. "This isn't the actual scroll."

Hinata blinked her large, round eyes.

"I see. Is...the Rokudaime going to be alright?" Naruto would have a lovely footprint-shaped bruise on his face tomorrow morning, courtesy of the medic Haruno Sakura.

Sasuke shrugged. "Hazards of the job," he said, as if that explained everything. Oddly enough, Hinata felt it did. She wondered if it was a warning sign of her own burgeoning insanity.

He pulled another scroll from his vest pocket and placed it on the counter. "Itachi meticulously logs his notes for his projects. He sealed it so only those he trusts can open it, even if he doesn't specifically key them in - sort of a failsafe if something happens to him. But after we tried to use it to avoid bathhouse duty," - he shook his head, don't ask - "he's keyed it so we can't open until he hasn't written in it for three months."

Sasuke attempted to untie the ribbon around the scroll, only to have chakra zap his fingers. He turned his palm to Hinata, showing the blistering skin as proof before extending it to Sakura who healed it.

"But he wouldn't key it against you."

Hinata looked between the scroll and Sasuke's hand, wondering if she should run for it. But she'd missed Itachi, and his students wanted to help, and…

Hesitantly, Hinata used her thumb and index to tug at one end. The ribbon slid loose without any chakra zaps, the scroll unfurled easily. Bolstered by the honor of Itachi's trust, she turned to Team 7, blushing under their eager gazes.

"So what's the plan?" she whispered.