Chapter 13: Love

"Hinata, I…I—"

"You don't have to say anything, Naruto. And you don't have to share the same feelings as I do, but just know that I will always be holding on to you. You will forever have a home here" Hinata's hand stops above her chest where her heart lay.

Naruto could see the clear commitment in her lavender eyes. She had offered him a place he could call home, a lifetime of devotion with her. Everything he could possibly want. He wanted to run over to where she stood and swoop her up in his arms. He wanted to kiss her, to feel her presence, to lay with her, to love her. It was all within his grasp at this very moment.

But, I can't.

Naruto turns and takes off downward into the thick forest, running as fast as he could. He needed to leave her before he did something he was going to regret. He could feel her presence fade little by little as he increased the distance between them.

I'm sorry, Hinata.

He recalled her being in his arms, unconscious after putting her life on the line to save his. At that moment, he knew her existence was crucial to him and that he would protect her at all costs, even from himself.

Naruto is a wanted criminal that is despised and feared by most of the world, a fact that plagues him on sleepless nights. Dozens of bounty hunters have attempted to kill and torture him in his lifetime, and sometimes he would only escape by the skin of his teeth. He knew nothing, but destruction and misery and that is the way he would stay. He could never expose Hinata to such deprivation and if he were to fail to protect her…. Naruto winced at the thought. He couldn't even imagine it.

Beads of sweat were gliding over his foreheads surface and he realized that he was going way too fast. He slowed down and stuck to a steadier pace while he mentally composed himself.

If he were to get involved with Hinata, he would inevitably drag her to hell with him. It was a sad certainty that couldn't be avoided. Naruto felt his chest tighten with anxiety. How he wished he could be with her now.

By morning he had made it to the coordinates Sasuke had given him. Sakura was there waiting for him, one kilometer outside the towns border. She looked at him, her emerald green eyes scrutinizing his emotionally worn state.

"What happened?" she asks with her hands on her hips and one eyebrow raised.

"Nothing." He says faintly.

"Well, Hinata is safe now, isn't she? You should be happy."

"I am."

Sakura comes closer and puts a hand on her chin as if thinking long and hard about something. "Mmm, did something happen between you and Hinata?" she says finally, her eyes showing a mischievous gleam.

Naruto was unprepared for her question and was silent for a short second. "Nothing happened, Sakura," he says.

She shakes her head and laughs, "Naruto, you were always one to wear your emotions on your sleeve. It's too obvious."

He was getting irritated now. "What's obvious?" He demanded.

"That you love her."

Naruto's eyes widened and the tension in his chest returned. "Even if I did…" he says, "She's better off without me."

Sakura gives a deep sigh, "Maybe she is better off without you," she says plainly. "But maybe, she isn't. Don't act like we women don't know what we're better off without. We will decide for ourselves, and ultimately it will be a decision that we will never regret."

Naruto couldn't say anything back. Could she be right? He thought to himself. He didn't know if leaving Hinata back there was right or wrong. He didn't know anything anymore.

"You finally made it, Naruto."

Naruto looked back to see Sasuke walking toward them with what looked like a bundle of clothing in his right hand. He threw the piece of clothing at Naruto and Sakura. "We will be entering the town soon, wear these to hide your faces," he says.

"Where did you manage to find this drab piece of junk?" Sakura says holding the half poncho, half cloak in disgust.

"I stole them from a vender in town. Now, put them on, we're leaving." Sasuke says as he lifts the hood of his cloak, casting a shadow over his face. Naruto and Sakura do the same and soon set off for the town.

The three of them walk through the towns entrance undetected and precede to move forward until they are at its center.

"This place is creepy." Sakura whispers as they stand in front of a shabby, unkempt building.

"We'll start here." Sasuke says, pushing the buildings doors open.

They were in an Inn, an appropriate place to start since many shinobi stop here to rest for the night, Naruto thinks. An old woman in her seventies was at the counter smiling at them.

"Welcome." She says. "What can I do for you?"

Sasuke stepped forward "We need information regarding the shinobi that came through here not too many days ago."

The woman scratched her head and looked deep in thought. "Ah yes, I remember. There were two hundred or so, I think. Why?"

"Ma'am, did you happen to hear anything they said or what their mission was? Or perhaps, who their captain was?" Sakura says.

"Mmm, no I don't think so. They were a quiet bunch, just came to get a quick bite from beside here." Her hand lifted as her thumb pointed to the tavern that sat adjacent to her building.

"Thank you, ma'am." Sakura turned to Naruto and Sasuke.

"Oh! That reminds me, not too long after the shinobi left, another one came here. A girl with opaque eyes, they say. She made quite a ruckus next door!"

"What happened?" Naruto says anxiously, looking at the old woman with serious eyes.

"I guess, she was asking about the same things you are now. A couple people from the tavern came running in here shortly after she went inside and told me. Soon after that, the girl walked out of the tavern and headed south."

"I see." And with that, Naruto turned and swiftly exited the Inn. His feet carried him to the taverns large doors where he could hear loud music flowing from its chips and crevices from the wood. He casually opened its doors and adjusted his eyes to the dim, musty room. It was a bit crowded with drunken men and women, all trying to talk over one another.

Naruto took a seat at one of the tables in the far corner and waited for Sasuke and Sakura. They entered and paused taking in the sight before them, Sasuke taking a slight step backwards in disgust while Sakura's hand was pushing him inside. They see Naruto and guide themselves over to his table.

"What was that all about, Naruto!" Sakura hissed.

"Hinata was h-."

Before he had a chance to say anything else, an arm was slung across his shoulder as something warm fell in his lap.

"Hey there, sweetie."

She sat there on his lap, staring down at him with her glazed over brown eyes. She was barely clothed and she was drunk. Two things that would make any man go crazy. But Naruto couldn't help but fight the urge to let her fall from his lap.

He looks over and sees Sakura shaking in her seat nearly in tears and Sasuke shaking his head in a disapproving manner. Fuck you too.

The woman in his lap was pretty with shoulder length red hair and legs that could go on for days. She gives Naruto a seductive smile and wriggles herself on top of him, trying to generate a response. When nothing happens, she turns to him and pouts.

"You're not gay are you?"

"No-."

"Then just relax." She says huskily. Her eyes skim over the darkness of his face. "Is it because you're ugly and you don't want me to see you without your hood?"

Her hand was already grabbing the fabric of his hood before he had a chance to reply and in one swift motion pulled it away from his face. Sasuke immediately stood with his fingers gripped on his swords handle while Sakura stared wide-eyed. Naruto instantly grabbed the hood and pulled it back over his face, hoping no one saw or recognized him.

The woman's eyes were wide as she gaped at him. She didn't seem to notice Sasuke's threatening stance in front of her or Sakura's gasp. The woman finally looked down, a blush slipping into her round cheeks. "You're not ugly. You're actually quite good looking."

Everyone's breaths of relief seemed to go unnoticed by her as she wrapped her arms around his neck. "Come home with me," she whispers to him.

"You will forever have a home here."

"Home." He thinks. He wanted to go there, but just not with her. "I can't," he says.

The woman looks down again with her glossy eyes. "She must be special." Her voice shook as she spoke softly.

"She is." Naruto's voice was firm and unwavering. His home lay within Hinata, and no one else.

The woman was teary eyed as she lifted herself from Naruto's lap. "I'm sorry." She began to turn away, but Naruto wasn't quite done with her yet.

"Wait," he says. "A group of cloud shinobi came through here a couple days ago, you didn't happen to see or hear anything about their mission did you?"

Her eyes became wide again as if she was remembering something unsettling, "That's what the last shinobi asked before she started attacking everybody!" Her voice was loud, causing a couple heads to turn in their direction.

"Calm down, I am not going to attack anybody." So Hinata started a fight, huh. He pulled out a chair and gestured for her to sit. She sat down slowly, finally becoming aware of Sakura and Sasuke's presence.

"What can you remember about the shinobi that came through here?" Sakura asks in a soothing voice.

The woman fidgets nervously before responding. "Well, there was a lot of them, but I didn't hear anything about their mission."

"What about their captain, he wore a hood." Sasuke says.

She gives a slow nod and points to a man sitting at the bar with his back to them. "I don't know much, but what I do know is that the hooded man was not someone I'd ever want to cross paths with again." She gulped. "The man sitting there talked to him."

"Thank you, you have been a huge help." Naruto says as he gets up from his chair and makes his way over to the mystery man at the bar. He takes a seat beside the man and looks at him in the corner of his eye. He notices the man is looking at him too.

"Are ya from around here?" He asks eyeing Naruto's hood.

"No, just returning home from a mission. Thought I would stop here to grab a bite to eat" Naruto says casually.

The man rolled his eyes, "You and every other ninja it seems like these days," he says.

"Oh yeah? I heard a couple hundred cloud shinobi came though here."

"Yeah! They talked about intercepting the Three Yaban and some shit like that. Didn't say much after that…Now that I think about it, I haven't heard anything about what happened. Maybe they're taking their sweet ass time." The man said swinging his drink around.

Naruto laughed, "I bet they are. You didn't talk to their captain did you? He had a hood on."

The glass of alcohol the man was holding was instantly spilt. The man fumbled to pick up the glass with shaky hands. "Err, yeah….I did." The man's voice was low now.

"Can you tell me about him?" Naruto asks cautiously.

Naruto observed the man look back and forth from his seat before whispering, "He didn't have much to say. But there was not much that needed to be said, you know what I'm saying?"

Naruto was having trouble deciphering this man's drunken ramblings, "No-"

"His eyes said it all…"

"His eyes?" Naruto was confused now. "So, did you get a look at this cloud shinobi's face?"

"...Those grey eyes." The man leaned in closer, "And I don't think he was a cloud shinobi either. I happened to see a little bit of his uniform under his cloak. It was different than what those cloud fellas wear."

Not a cloud shinobi? "What did you see?" Naruto asks.

"Err, I didn't see very much of it, but from what I could tell he had a green flak jacket on."

"I see." A green flak jacket... Naruto racked his brain for an answer.

The man interrupted his thoughts by scowling. "That cunt that was in here a few days ago was asking about shit too! Starting giving an attitude and shit, but don't worry," he says smirking. "She was on her knees by the time we got through with her."

"What did you just say?"

The man started laughing, "Yeah! She was a fine piece of ass too. Didn't have an attitude anym-."

"Liar."

In that instant, the man saw a pair of eyes similar to that of the hooded man that came in a few days ago. But these eyes were red. A blood red that glared so ominously with hatred and passion. He felt his body go numb with with a fear he's never experienced before.

"The woman you're talking about would not yield to you or even an army of a thousand men. Next time you say otherwise, I will kill you."

Naruto felt a hand on his shoulder. Breaking his eye contact with the pale man, he turns to see Sasuke behind him. "Lets go." Sasuke says, hand still gripped to Naruto's shoulder. He stood and left the bar, while the man sat frozen and speechless in his seat.

Sakura and Sasuke follow him outside where the air is suddenly not so heavy. They exit the town and run three kilometers before stopping and tearing off their cloaks.

"What happened, Naruto?" Sakura asks with a concerned look.

Naruto shakes his head trying to avoid the last words he said to the bastard, and instead tells Sakura and Sasuke the new information he learned about the strange hooded man.

Sasuke crosses his arms and looks down deep in thought. "Not a cloud shinobi, huh? So, which village uses a green flak jacket?"

"Konoha." Naruto says wide eyed as images of various leaf shinobi came to mind from his days living as an orphan in the village.

"Why is a leaf ninja captaining a massive squad of cloud ninja's?" Sakura asks, incredulously.

Unfortunately, none of them had an answer. The sun slowly sank as the three of them stood there wondering about the identity of the hooded man and why he was hunting them down.

"Im going." Naruto says after much contemplation.

"Huh? Going where?" Sakura demanded.

"Back to Konoha. Sakura, Sasuke- Go back to the mountain and look for something that we might've missed. Try to find survivors."

Sasuke smirked, "Even if there were survivors, the hooded man would have covered his tracks and killed them, but I will play along. Let's go, Sakura."

Sakura shot Naruto a troubled look, "Don't do anything stupid, Naruto."

He gives a slight smile, nods and bolts back in the direction he came. He knew finding the hooded man's identity was reckoned to be top priority, but it wasn't for him. Another force was impelling him back to Konoha. A force so strong and dire.

He was sick and tired of running. He had been running his whole life, and now, it's time he realized. He finally knew what he was after.

Eventually, Naruto came to his journey's end. It didn't take him long at all to reach the place he desired to be. He stood at the door for a long while before knocking. For the first time in his life, he was scared. Scared that he would be cast aside. Scared that his heart was too stained to lie in conjunction with hers. Scared that his love was not enough. But when she opened the door, his fears were merely a past recollection as his eyes connected with hers. Because in this moment his heart, mind, and soul was finally at peace. A peace that could only be achieved by love and a love that will live forever within his tarnished being.

"Hinata, I love you."