"Kagane-san."

Natsume looked up, startled to find Hinata in her office.

"Hinata." She greeted, instead of thehow did you get in?that was on the tip of her tongue. She'd locked the door,after all, and one glance behind Hinata proved that the door was still locked. "You don't have an appointment."

"No, I know." Hinata replied, her gaze still on Natsume, a seldom-seen intensity in her eyes. The absence of any sort of apology for breaking into Natsume's office was also interesting. "I wanted to ask you something."

Natsume glanced at the clock above the door, considering. She had twenty minutes until her next patient – would it be enough for whatever questions Hinata was willing to forget her anger for?

"You have fifteen minutes." She offered after a beat, gesturing to the seat the girl usually occupied by her desk, though she wasn't exactly surprised when the Hyuuga remained standing.

After almost half a minute of Hinata simply watching her, the girl finally asked; "Why did you do it?"

Natsume had been preparing for something similar, so she hardly blinked at the question, though she couldn't help but push. "I'm afraid you might need to be more specific."

"Why did you lie to me?" Hinata rephrased, and while her first question had been quiet, almost a plea, this one was sharper, practically a demand. "Why—why did you tell myfriendsto lie to me?"

Natsume wondered at the merits of pointing out the difference between lying and obfuscating, but decided against it. There would be time for that, if the fact that Hinata was willing to seek her out for answers was any indication. Either the girl wanted closure, or she wanted to bridge the canyon that Natsume's actions had created between them – whatever the case, it wasn't the definitive end to their relationship that Natsume had expected after the truth came to light.

So she stifled a sigh, resting her elbows on the desk and her chin on her steepled fingers, and regarded Hinata seriously.

"As your psychiatrist, my primary concern is your mental and physical wellbeing." She announced frankly, not willing to leave any room for misunderstandings. "I wanted to keep you in the dark because you have not set a precedent of caring about yourownsafety when the wellbeing of those dear to you is threatened."

Hinata opened her mouth to respond, but Natsume held up a hand, months of familiarity allowing her to make an educated guess as to what the Hyuuga wanted to say.

"Your sister and Hideki, your sensei and the Uchiha, your Kiri friend and the Kumo-nin." she listed, watching as Hinata twitched at each reminder. "Need I continue?"

Hinata frowned, though the expression was more confrontational than cowed.

"I don't see the relevance." She replied bluntly, and Natsume bit back a pleased smile. She would take the show of attitude any day over the meek, cowering child that Hinata had been when she'd first stepped foot in Natsume's office.

"At the same time Tsunade and Hatake were fighting Danzo, his assassins were targeting anybody and everybody he suspected of being involved in the plot against him." she revealed, watching Hinata intently, curious as to the girl's reaction. "Shikaku, Inoichi, Shiranui, Maito Gai and Koharu were but a few of the various people who were attacked in-Village or had their homes ransacked once the accusations against Danzo were made public."

Hinata had gone pale at the news, her eyes wide and scared, though there was also a hint of suspicion in the curl of her lips and the frown that refused to fade that Natsume blamed on the loss of trust between them. Still, she had a point to make:

"How do you think you'd have reacted if I'd told you about what was happening while you were recovering?" Natsume concluded, and the words seemed to remind Hinata about what they had initially been talking about, for her expression smoothed out to that eerie blankness Natsume would forever blame Uzuki for.

"It should have still been my decision." Hinata finally uttered, the words quieter than before, and the lack of an actual answer to her question told Natsume that the girlunderstood,and that was almost good enough.

Almost.

"Maybe if you'd had a Yamanaka as your shrink, it would have been." She agreed, and this, it seemed, was something that Hinata hadn't been expecting, because she twitched, her gaze snapping to Natsume's once more. "But you choseme. And I don't like to let my patients die due to their ownstupidity."

Before Hinata could reply, Natsume lifted her head from her hands and offered the girl a sharp smile. "I understand that you do not care about your life beyond its use to others, but I will not let you just throw it away."

With that, she settled more comfortably against the backrest of her chair and watched Hinata absorb the words, keeping half an eye on the time they had left.

For a beat, Hinata just stared at her, her shock clear. When she finally spoke, her words were hesitant, as if uncertain of how they would be received. "You…care about me."

"I do." Natsume nodded, the admission blunt and honest.

"…Oh."

This time, Natsume didn't bother hiding her smile as she watched Hinata process the words.

After a few seconds, the girl blinked, her focus visibly returning to the conversation, and though the look in her eyes was a mix of touched and sheepish, her words were pointed. "I still would have preferred if you hadn't lied."

Natsume nodded – she'd known even as she'd done it that Hinata wouldn't ever thank her for her decision, so this was hardly unexpected. "Understandable."

Hinata smiled then, small and a little wry, but it was more than Natsume had expected to see directed at her, and she sighed. They only had three minutes left, but there was one more thing she wanted to say, the headway they had made into rebuilding what she'd broken giving her hope.

"I want you to know that I am proud of you." She told Hinata quietly, letting her smile fade in favour of a more serious, but also more honest expression, leaving herself open to Hinata's scrutiny, no matter how much it went against her very being.

Natsume reasoned that she was probably one of the few in the Village who knew what Hinata's recent achievements had cost her. Having known the girl since her early geninhood, Natsume had had a front row seat to the months of hard, thankless work Hinata had put into accomplishing her goal. The obvious products of that hard work alone were hardly something to scoff at – jounin at fourteen was one thing, but Clan Head? Natsume couldn't remember anyone managing both since the War.

TheSecondWar. And even then, it had been by necessity, more than merit.

But the more important thing in her eyes was the fact that ever more Hyuuga – Hyuuga Natsumeknewhad been Branch members – were walking in the streets like Hinata, with their hitai-ate tied around their necks instead of their foreheads, because their foreheads werebare. No slavery seal to be seen anywhere on their skin.

Thatwas an accomplishment only a few would appreciate to the extent that it deserved to be appreciated, and Natsume would be damned if she weren't one of those few.

"You have proven yourself to be a talented kunoichi, both on and off the battlefield." Natsume continued, meeting Hinata's startled gaze with her own steady one. "But more importantly, you have proven yourself to be a woman of your word. There are shinobi thrice your age who cannot claim the same. I am proud of you, Hinata, butyoushould be proud of yourself, too."

And then, for the first time since appearing in her office, for the first time in many months, in fact, Hinata's lip wobbled, her eyes filling with tears. Natsume watched as the girl roughly wiped them away even as her shoulders shook, and with a minute left on the clock until Natsume's next patient would come knocking, Hinata took a shuddering breath and uttered the words Natsume hadn't thought she'd ever hear again:

"Can I- Can I make an appointment?"