Part two of the sasuhina mission with violence and non-graphic death

Chapter 10: (No more) Calling like a crow for a boy

Hinata set a steady pace, Sasuke following closely as they passed acres of well-maintained crop fields. The neatly sectioned fields slowly turned into a more forested area. Hinata slowed here, walking them into its depths to a cluster of trees, their roots twisted together. The trunk of the largest tree in the center was at least a meter wide. They stepped carefully around the roots until they reached the center tree at which point Hinata bent down and brushed away some foliage to reveal a small opening.

"Ladies first," Sasuke deadpanned.

Hinata shot him an amused look, but entered the hole feet first with no complaint.

Sasuke squeezed through uncomfortably after her and landed in a crouch.

The leaves they'd brushed away settled back over the cave opening, leaving them with only a patchy glimmer of moonlight. Sasuke's dual dōjutsus could make the most of what little light there was, but they didn't give him night vision.

Hinata gasped softly, pale eyes gleaming in the dark.

Sasuke moved closer, his elbow brushing against the thermal fabric of her shirt. "What?"

"I…don't know. It's a huge mass of chakra." Hinata paused. Sasuke wished he could see her face clearly. "It doesn't look human."

"I'm not sure that white zetsu qualifies as human," Sasuke said shortly. "Is it moving?"

"…No."

Hinata fished out a flashlight from her pack, more for his benefit than hers Sasuke was sure. As she lit the way, Sasuke took the lead. Hinata was right, there was a massive amount of chakra nearby and Sasuke could sense it well enough without the need for byakugan.

The cave system was irregularly formed, curving, narrowing and widening unexpectedly. Several times Sasuke had to stop abruptly at a dead end, resulting in Hinata bumping into him. Nonetheless, she made sure to keep the light over his shoulder so he could see where he was going. It would have been more efficient for Sasuke to hold the flashlight, but he only had one hand to spare.

They moved as stealthily as they could. Steps light and breathing subdued, the distant sound of running water covered any noise they made.

"There," Hinata whispered against his back. Sasuke could feel the mass of chakra just around the corner. He didn't need to tell her to stick close, he could feel her fingers curl into his cloak. Moving slowly so as not to disturb her hold, he turned and stepped into a large cavern.

Hinata didn't make a sound, but her grip tightened. Sasuke could feel the responding tug on his cloak, but his attention was on the sight in front of him.

Thick tree roots protruded from the ceiling, shifting from brown to an unnatural white the further down they grew. Dozens upon dozens of white zetsu seemed to be growing out of the tree, many half-formed and undeveloped. Their gnarled and twisted bodies were repulsive.

"They're in stasis," Sasuke noted, voice low.

"What should we do?"

"Burn the whole thing down," Sasuke said decisively. "Kill whatever's there and stop anymore from growing."

Sasuke was preparing to use amaterasu when he saw a movement in the corner of his eyes. Hinata's gasp came a beat too late, he was already pushing her back and throwing a handful of kunai.

The huge, malformed white zetsu let out an angry cry as it batted away the kunai like toys.

Sasuke sneered up at its towering figure. "Didn't think it could get any uglier." Almost as if in response, it split unevenly, a smaller, gangly white zetsu warping out of the bigger one. They both charged forward at the same time.

Sasuke quickly unwound a scroll. "Shuriken jutsu." He summoned two large shurikens, sharp metal glinting in the small amount of light from Hinata's flashlight. Using wire to aim, Sasuke sliced through two of the four arms on the large, mutated white zetsu. Meanwhile Hinata knocked the smaller one out cold with a deceptively gentle touch to its chest, still carrying the flashlight in her other hand.

The still conscious white zetsu bellowed, its two remaining arms raised above its head. It slammed its fists to the ground in a childish fit of rage, shaking the entire cavern. Small rocks and pebbles dropped from the roof.

"Oh."

Sasuke turned at Hinata's voice, following the path of light from her flashlight as it shone on the coagulated mass of white zetsu. Pitch black eyes slowly began to open along the white matter, limbs extending as bodies started to take shape.

"Shit."

The large white zetsu came at them again and Hinata and Sasuke both leapt back to avoid it.

"I can handle this one," Hinata said softly.

"Then I'll get the rest," Sasuke agreed.

"Amaterasu." He felt the blood drip down from his eye as concentrated black flames bloomed along the roots in the cave. The awakening white zetsus began to wail as they caught fire. His eye continued to bleed as he spread the blaze with single minded focus, making sure to cover every inch of the mutated growth. Satisfied, he shifted his attention to the fight behind him.

The flashlight was on the ground, its beaming light pointed to Hinata and her opponent. Hinata was ducking under a monstrous arm and throwing a fist enforced with enough chakra that it glowed indigo in the shape of a lion. She hit the white zetsu directly in the chest and it fell back. Cracks appeared down its chest where her blow had landed, but then it broke apart down the middle, dividing into two white zetsu that immediately sprang at Hinata.

Hinata's taijutsu was a graceful and deadly dance, even more so now that Sasuke could witness it from an outside point of view.

When she kicked up her leg, one of the white zetsu caught her left ankle in its hand. It's long, spindly fingers wrapped around and grew back into itself, effectively shackling her foot. Hinata twisted around, aiming a chakra-laced fist at its head while smoothly evading a punch from the second white zetsu behind her.

Suddenly the glow of chakra around her fist flickered. Hinata hesitated for half a second, but let her fist connect without chakra. The force of the punch was enough to knock the white zetsu's head back, however, she didn't account for the other white zetsu growing yet another limb while her back was turned and her ankle trapped.

Sharp roots shot out towards her unprotected back.

With a flash of the rinnegan, reality shifted.

Sasuke bore through the claw-like fingers scratching the skin on his side and against his ribs without flinching. Hinata's horrified face stared back at him over the white zetsu's shoulder from where she was now standing where Sasuke had been just a second ago.

Sasuke yanked the wires in his hand and his twin shuriken came hurtling towards him. One cleaved a white zetsu's head off its shoulders while the other cut through the arm holding Sasuke's foot captive. Now free, Sasuke jumped back to stand in front of Hinata. "Amaterasu." Sasuke ushered Hinata backwards as he set the last two white zetsu on fire.

They hurried back through the tunnels, retracing their steps, but with Hinata leading this time. The crooked, uneven path was no easier to get through, especially at a faster speed and with no light to guide them. Sasuke found himself crowding against Hinata at each sharp turn and trying his best to cushion her from the rocky walls whenever the tunnel got narrower. They spilled out into the entrance, the thin shaft of moonlight peeking through the leaves now appeared blinding in comparison to the darkness they'd just navigated.

Hinata stopped below the opening. "You should —"

Ignoring her gasp, Sasuke gripped her right hip with his hand and lifted her up above his head. She scrambled out of the hole and then reached back for him, upper body leaning down as far as she could in order to close the distance between them. Using the cave's wall for leverage, Sasuke kicked up and grasped onto her outstretched hand. Hinata lurched forward with the added weight, but quickly recovered and pulled him up.

Sasuke landed on his front in a thin layer of snow. Sitting up, he saw that it was snowing.

Slumping, Sasuke allowed himself a wince at the injury on his side.

Soft sounds alerted him and he straightened. Hinata was walking away in an uneven gait. She left messy footprints in the snow as she tried not to lean on the ankle the white zetsu had grabbed onto.

If she were anyone else, Sasuke might have thought she was storming off.

Adrenaline still coursing through his body, Sasuke leapt to his feet and ran after her.

"Hinata," he called as he caught up to her. "What was that back there with your chakra?"

Her shoulders were trembling. Sasuke unclasped his cloak in a practiced movement and settled it in the crook of his elbow. "Here," he said, reaching out to tap her shoulder.

Hinata whirled around before he could make contact, avoiding his touch. Tears pooled in her crystalline eyes and her gasping breaths turned to white vapour in the cold air. The pale moonlight reflected off the white of the snow and the white of her skin and the white of her eyes, bathing her in an ethereal glow.

Sasuke's cloak dropped to the ground. "Hinata?"

Hinata took a shuddering breath, tears overflowing and slipping down onto her cheeks. She shut her eyes, hands coming up to wipe at her face. "I'm sorry," she whispered.

"Are you hurt?" Sasuke tried to take hold of her arm, but she avoided him again, backing away. A pained gasp left her lips as she wobbled on her injured ankle.

"Sorry, I'm sorry," Hinata repeated. Her entire body was trembling. When she tried to take another step back, her legs seemed to collapse under her weight and she dropped to the ground.

Sasuke floundered, nearly reaching out again only to stop himself.

Hinata's face was hidden in her hands now. "I'm sorry. I'm so useless, you could have died. I'm so sorry Neji-nii-san!"

Sasuke watched Hinata cry into her palms, feeling like a heavy stone was sitting in his gut. Slowly, he kneeled down in front of her.

"I keep seeing him die," she said, voice wavering from her tears. "Every night after it happened, I'd see him jumping in front of me, the wood piercing through him, the blood he coughed up, how lifeless his eyes looked. And in my dreams he'd die. For months, every day I'd see him lying in that hospital bed looking so close to death and then every night I'd go to sleep and see him sacrifice himself for me over and over again."

Her face was still buried in her hands, shoulders shaking from her sobs. "Nii-san is so special, he was the strongest Hyuuga in generations and now he can't hold a brush for too long without shaking…all because he saved my worthless life. Why? Why would he do that?"

Every word she spoke about her cousin brought the image of another prodigy to Sasuke's mind. Itachi's immeasurable talent, his senseless sacrifice, the smile on his ashen, bloody face when he died.

Finally, Hinata lowered her hands and peered up at him with teary eyes. "Why would you do that, Sasuke?" she asked. "You got hurt…because of me."

Hinata's gaze fell to Sasuke's injured side, a small pale hand reaching out to hover over it. Sasuke could feel the warmth from the nearness of her hand, but he couldn't look away from her face. His fingers dug into his palm with the restraint it took to stop from reaching out, nails biting into flesh.

Hinata dragged her eyes up to his face, mouth parting in a soundless gasp. "Your eye," she said.

Sasuke realized with a start that his sharingan was spinning. He didn't know how long he'd had it activated.

The gentle touch of her fingers on his face was a shock to his system. Hinata's fingertips ghosted over the skin under his right eye, where he knew the blood from using amaterasu must have dried. Sasuke's sharingan continued to spin as he leaned into her touch just slightly.

This was the first unprompted skin contact they'd shared since he'd been back.

Cautiously, he moved his hand up and, when Hinata didn't shy away, he covered her hand with his.

"Hinata, I'm fine," he told her. Sasuke squeezed her hand with a gentleness he didn't know he was capable of. He looked at her face, flushed from the effort of crying. Small droplets clung to her eyelashes, but she seemed to have run out of tears. Still, misery was painted across every inch of her face and Sasuke didn't have any words of comfort to offer her.

He thought back to the sight of the white zetsu attacking her from behind and he knew without a doubt that he couldn't have watched Hinata get hurt.

Hinata wanted him to tell her that, given the choice, he wouldn't do it again. That he wouldn't put himself in harm's way to protect her.

Sasuke couldn't tell her that.

Slowly, he released her hand. "How bad is your ankle?"

Hinata blinked in confusion before realization lit her face. She jerked back and drew her hand against her chest. "I-It's not too bad," she murmured, eyes averted. "I can heal it."

Sasuke frowned. "Your chakra reserves are low." He didn't think she was suppressing her chakra anymore. It had been a long day. They had pushed through their journey instead of stopping to sleep, having only a quick dinner of rations before investigating the Mogami house and Hinata had been using her byakugan on and off the entire day. He'd seen her chakra falter against the white zetsu for a moment. Now after liberal use of amaterasu, not to mention the portals he'd opened this morning and the evening before with no sleep in between, Sasuke himself was fatigued. "If you use iryō ninjutsu you'll be tapped out. I guess we could camp here."

His eyes strayed back to the trees that hid the cave they'd just climbed out of and he grimaced. Sasuke didn't relish the thought sleeping above a bunch of burning, mutated white zetsu corpses.

"Ah, Sasuke-san," Hinata started. Sasuke's brow twitched at the return of the honorific, but he kept silent due to the urgency in her voice. "When we were down there, I had my byakugan activated and I…I think I saw something."

"Saw what?"

Hinata worried her bottom lip. She still wasn't looking at him. "…I'm not sure. But I feel that we should take a look."

Sasuke sighed. "Can it wait till the morning?"

Hinata pursed her lips and gave a reluctant nod.

Rolling his shoulders, Sasuke felt every bit of exhaustion in his muscles. The knees of his pants were wet and cold from kneeling in the snow. He wondered how Hinata was doing with her fishnets and the sliver of bare skin between her stockings and shorts. "It wasn't enemy ninja?" he checked.

Hinata shook her head.

"I'm no good at iryō ninjutsu," Sasuke said. "Can you patch your ankle up without using too much chakra? Even if you don't think you saw any ninja, I'd rather be prepared for the worst."

Hinata met his gaze in surprise before nodding seriously. "Mm."

She sat down more comfortably, gingerly maneuvering her left leg in front of her before sliding off her shoe. Her ankle was red and a little swollen. Sasuke observed with mild interest as Hinata packed some snow around it and then pressed faintly glowing fingertips to the swollen joint. She used such a minimal amount of chakra that he could barely make out the indigo colour of it. She proceeded to pull a roll of bandages out of her thigh pouch and, after brushing the snow off, wrapped her ankle with precise movements. Once she was done, Hinata packed away the bandages and moved her left foot in small circles.

Satisfied with her work, Sasuke hauled himself to his feet and retrieved his cloak. Returning to stand in front of Hinata, he held his hand out.

Hinata visibly hesitated before taking his hand. Sasuke pulled her to her feet with a firm but controlled tug.

"Let's get this over with."

They had already been at the edges of the Mogami land so it didn't take them long to cross over. There was no physical indicator when they stepped into the Fujiwara land, but the difference in upkeep was evident. Unlike the rich crop fields belonging to the Mogami, this land was filled with overgrown trees and shrubs, nothing that would bear fruit to be eaten or sold.

Sasuke walked slowly both from weariness and so as not to push Hinata on her wrapped ankle. Within a few minutes a gated manor came into view. The Fujiwara land was small indeed in comparison to the Mogami and the house too was no exception.

The wooden gates were open, an undone metal lock glinting ominously under the moon. It had stopped snowing and the wind had died down. The sound of Sasuke and Hinata's feet in the snow was the only interruption of the heavy silence.

Hinata stopped at the gate, byakugan flickering to life briefly. The veins on her temple were more distended than before and Sasuke wondered if it was due to overuse.

"Sasuke…" Hinata started, but Sasuke was distracted by the brownish red stain on the wood paneling of the gate doors.

A bloody handprint.

Like something possessed, Sasuke began to walk forward, deaf to Hinata's plaintive calls behind him.

Past the gates, the small courtyard was covered in a thin layer of untouched snow. The footpath from the entrance leading up to the house was barely discernible under the snow, only the raised borders giving it away. A few meters in, sprawled out on the footpath like he was making a run for the gate, was the body of a man.

Sasuke stood over the body's turned head, taking in how snowflakes had settled into the lines of the decomposing skin, emphasizing the agonized expression. Old blood was visible on the neck, protected from exposure by long green hair.

Pulling his eyes away, Sasuke stepped over the body and up to the engawa. The hisashi hung over his head, blocking the moonlight, but Sasuke had no trouble making out the second body lying on the wood floor. A young woman in a silk kimono, the once beautiful blue material ruined by frayed sleeves and blood stains. Green hair fell messily from an undone topknot but did not obscure the sagging face frozen in a scream.

Sasuke raised his head slowly to the blood splattered shoji in front of him. His vision shook as he fumbled to slide open the door with an unsteady hand. He couldn't hear anything over the blood rushing in his ears and his heart pounding against his chest.

It was like opening a door eleven years into the past. A grotesque tableau of blood sprayed over the floor and across the translucent paper walls, rotting corpses slumped in various positions with gaping wounds ripping through fine clothing. The foul stench hit him like a wave, suffocating him.

Suddenly Sasuke was seven years old again and it was the worst day of his life. Visions of his parents' death played on a loop before his eyes like he was trapped in Itachi's tsukuyomi. He dropped to his knees and began to scream.

And then the scent of lavender and chamomile pierced through the haze of blood soaked memories. A curtain of indigo hair fell across his face, thin arms circling his head and cradling him to a soft body. Sasuke shut his eyes only to see his brother's mangekyou sharingan glaring back at him, ANBU uniform pristine but sword wet with their parents' blood. He folded into Hinata's embrace and continued to scream until his throat was hoarse.

We're out here unpacking some trauma. My light hearted fic about tea is getting a bit heavy, but it's all for the sake of character and relationship development!

Once again, thank you to everyone who takes the time to read and leave a review! I really enjoy reading your thoughts ^^ (except for the death wishes from antis - you guys can go.)

MVH