SasuHina Month 2020 #15: Free Day

SasuHina Month 2019 #3: Post-war

SasuHina Month 2018 #9: Post-war

A/N: Takes place Pre-Ch.699 in the manga, based on Episode 479 in Naruto Shippuden. Inspired also by "Fifty Days" by ohgoditsbriony on . Super late but oh well. It's been sitting around for ages. Like. Almost 2 years. Yikes, sorry.

In which: Hinata is enlightened.

They say it takes twenty-one days to form a habit. And a habit this had become, although more so out of force than anything, and lasted far longer than twenty-one days.

Still, going through the same motions gave her days structure, a purpose, and having to change now after everything, well…

Hinata shook her head, clearing it of all distracted thoughts as she waved to the auntie in the produce stall.

She tried to believe the ache she felt brimming in the bottom of her soul was relief. Rather, she thought, as the lump in her throat grew the closer she was to her destination, it seemed more like a sense of hopelessness or dread. They were emotions she had kept within the depths of her heart, emotions she could no longer ignore as she made her way for the last time to arguably the darkest place in the village. It was a burden, pressing on her shoulders, weighing her feet with every step, almost as if she were trying to run through mud or water.

How many days did it take to break a habit again?

It seemed as though the habit had broken her.

"Ino-chan, Ibiki-san," she greeted as she entered the Torture and Interrogation Force Headquarters.

There was always a question in Ino's eyes like "How is she still doing this?" or "Why is she still coming?" before the blonde flashed Hinata her signature heart-stopping grin.

"I never go back on my word. That is my way of the ninja," she had explained back then, when Ino had first asked her, but the words had slipped out of her mouth, robotically, automatically. Empty like the feeling in her chest.

She didn't even know what was her way anymore.

"Back again?" Ibiki asked, like he always did, peering up from the stack of papers on his desk. He had recently begun wearing reading glasses and they sat now perched at the edge of his nose.

"Of course," she smiled, placing a bento in front of them. "Here, for both of you."

"The seals make him weak. He needs to eat. I will feed him," she had explained when Ino and Ibiki had searched her bags the first time she had brought them in. She took it upon herself to bring him more nutritious meals than provided by the T&IF and promised to bring them some as well.

"Hinata, you didn't need to do this," Ino clucked, like she always did, yet eagerly reached for the food, her mouth already watering at the tantalizing scents of Hinata's cooking.

"Be careful, Hinata-san," Ibiki warned, like he always did. Though by now, she still appeared mentally, physically, and emotionally intact. "If he tries anything…"

Appeared.

She had gotten better at hiding things.

"I'll be fine," Hinata reassured, like she always did, before disappearing through another hallway.

A habit this had become, for all of them.

And a habit it had become for him.

By now, Hinata could probably find her way around with her eyes closed. The light was already scarce and she had memorized most of the twist, turns, and corners. Left at the first, straight three hallways, right the next, special seal passcode for the next, down a flight of stairs, undo genjutsu to the next false hallway, activate trap door three steps to the right...she chanted in her head, making her way deeper and lower until she reached the furthest cells and descended another set of final stairs.

Her hands moved by themselves, and after a series of seals, the locks on the prison doors were undone.

He was, like he always was, only a darker shadow in the corner, shifting slightly when she came.

"I'm back," she announced, unnecessarily, but a reflex nonetheless, and her voice echoed through the empty walls, drowning out the much quieter, "Sasuke-kun," of her greeting.

She slid the cell doors open, stepping through and setting down her bag, and lifted out another two bentos and a thermos of hot tea, while the prisoner listened on. She placed her scrolls in a row, a pen neatly beside them, and finally, with a stethoscope around her neck and a sphygmomanometer in her hand she made her way to him.

Hinata closed her eyes, and with another set of hand seals, the restraints around him were unbound. Her eyes opened with her byakugan activated, seeing the thrum of chakra essentially halted within him, and she reached out to pull the deactivated blindfold from his eyes.

He blinked, once, twice, his surprisingly long lashes untangling and freeing themselves from the sticky skin of his eyelids, and his body relaxed. He sat patiently as she worked, obediently following her commands to open his mouth, turn his head this way, that. He kept his eyes on her, probably studying her as well, lifting up his remaining arm so she could take his blood pressure as she checked his vital signs. Sasuke was still as Hinata pressed a hand to his ribs to monitor the body fat there, doing her assessment with only silence between them. Finally, she shined a small light in his eyes, signaling the end of her check up.

A familiar routine, a break in the lull.

"Eyes are doing much better than last week," Hinata said, more to herself than anything else as she scribbled notes on her scroll, veins around her temples receding back into place. "Doesn't look like the optic nerve has weakened a whole lot since then. Chakra levels are better, too."

"They've decided to let me go," he said when she turned around, away from him.

Her pen paused for a moment. "I know."

"They've pardoned my crimes. Kakashi says it's because he is the hokage and the council has relented." He never took his eyes off of her. "Did you attend the last trial?"

"No," she set her scroll down, turning back to face him. "I haven't attended since—" her eyes met his. "Since the start."

His face was impassive, waiting for her to speak again, the soft light of the small light Hinata had set in the corner of the cell glowing in the black reflection of his stare.

These are the eyes of a man whose spirit had been defeated.

"I am to release the seals permanently." She wondered if he could hear the hollowness in her voice. "Hokage-sama and Naruto-kun will escort you out of the prison along with Ino-chan and Ibiki-san. Tsunade-sama will be here as well to review what I have researched," Hinata gestured to the scroll. "This is my final report."

"Well, what do you think? Have I been punished enough?" Though his tone was flat, she couldn't tell if there had been a hint of bitterness underneath.

She pressed her lips together. Punished.

There it was again. The ache weighing in her heart. Was it for him and his fate? Or hers?

The first day of the trial was as seemingly peaceful as it got. Village streets were emptier than usual, the chatter quieter. Missions were scarce, as most of the shinobi were at home. All attention had been focused on the trial of Uchiha Sasuke. Clan heads, old and new, kage, and other respected shinobi had made their way from their countries to Konoha by invitation to attend and participate in his judgment. The Council of Konoha combined with the councils of other countries to form the Allied Shinobi Council. Tsunade sat at the forefront, facing the large room, with Shizune and Kakashi beside her, and on their left and right sat all the selected members of the Shinobi Council.

Naruto and Sakura sat facing them, and across them, Sasuke with Ibiki and other jounin. ANBU presence from all the hidden villages were posted beside their respective kage and clan heads.

The room had been in a raucous frenzy for hours, debate after debate with no direction. Every person in the room sat at the edge of their seat, the sharp remarks and their rebuttals exchanged from every end of the room increasing the tension in the air.

"He should be killed, along with the rest of his clan!"

"I will not have the last sharingan be lost-"

"You will not?"

"What gives you the right-"

"The Uchiha clan has always made Konoha their home. As the last Uchiha, he belongs here, in Konoha."

"The Uchiha clan has never been more than trouble-"

"Without him, no one would have escaped the Infinite Tsukiyomi!" Naruto, who had been (admirably so) patient and quiet as he listened to these pretentious pricks, finally couldn't hold back a snarl, standing up and pounding his fist on the table when the insults to his friend only increased.

An elder sneered down his nose with a huff, "Why, pray tell, Godaime Hokage-sama, are there mere children at this trial?"

"Children? We are his friends-!" Sakura gaped, at the same time Naruto howled angrily, "Children?! We fucking saved your fucking asses-!"

"Naruto." Kakashi interrupted sharply.

Naruto ignored Sakura's grasp on his elbow, yanking it away. The chair squealed as he slammed backward into his chair, crossing his arms and scowling, muttering obscenities under his breath.

"We've never been children more than we have been shinobi." Tsunade frowned, turning her head towards the elder. "And how can you call this group of capable shinobi mere children when they just finished fighting in one of the most devastating wars? When they are the victors? Our saviors?"

Another elder turned towards the orange-clad ninja. "Naruto-kun, the world will be forever grateful for what you have done to save us. However, you claim to be Uchiha Sasuke's closest friend, and I feel as though your emotions will hinder your clear judgement. In the end, he is a criminal and will be tried as such."

"I won't let you kill him!" Naruto hissed, hands forming into fists.

"Shinobi do not have to be killed to be broken," he responded, a flat, ominous threat to his voice.

Still, it echoed loudly throughout the silent room, and not even Naruto could find the words to answer.

"This ends today's trial." The elder waved to Tsunade, and she got up and stormed out of the room, Shizune trailing after her. "Everyone is dismissed!"

Sasuke was silent the entire time, listening and making no hint of a reaction, although chakra enforced chains, blindfolds, restraints, and seals didn't allow him to do much at all.

Hinata had sat with Kiba, while the others sat with their families next to the head of the clans closer towards the front. When the trial ended, they were one of the firsts out the door.

"Damn, I thought we'd never get out. Those people sure know how to keep talking." Kiba yawned, stretching his arms out and scratching his belly. "How do you feel about him, Hinata?"

She began slowly, "He was always Naruto-kun's friend and Naruto-kun worked so hard to get him home-"

"I didn't ask how Naruto feels about him," he gave her a funny look. "What do you feel about him? Do you think he should die?"

"I don't know about putting him to death, but…" Her eyes traveled in Sasuke's direction, where Ibiki had placed him in a wheelchair, restraints and all. "They would tame him, like a dog?"

"Even dogs are treated better here in Konoha." Akamaru, who had been patiently trotting beside them at their slow pace, barked in agreement. "Besides," Kiba snorted, "What else does he deserve?"

"Kiba-kun," she reprimanded. "This is his home."

"This stopped being his home once he decided to desert it for personal reasons. And willingly decide to be our enemy. Or have you forgotten that?"

"He's lost his entire clan. I can't imagine how—"

"There ya go again, can't help yourself from sympathizing," her teammate sighed. "Anyway, even if they don't kill him, he's going to serve Konoha for the rest of his life."

"He looks so...," she murmured softly as she watched him be escorted out of the trial room.

"Pathetic?" Kiba rolled his eyes.

Sad, was what she was going to say, and there was something that made a piece of her heart want to reach out to him. Like a baby bird that had fallen out of its nest, something that she had felt when she had first seen after his clan was massacred. It was an eerie feeling, a reminder of how she could have been easily watching herself.

"Hinata," Kiba's eyes were burning as he turned to face her. "I almost died bringing him back. Akamaru almost died. Forgive me if it's taking awhile to get over it."

Hinata sighed guiltily. "I know. I'm sorry." She gave him an apologetic smile, reaching to caress his tattooed cheek with her hand, which he leaned into, before resuming their walk. "You're not interested in how it turns out?"

"Nah," he shrugged. "These things take for-fucking-ever, especially with missing-nins like him. Whatever, I've had enough of that shit. Tomorrow I'm out," Kiba declared. "How about you? Hey!" his face brightened. "Shino and I are taking Mirai to that traveling minstrel's show with Chouji and Kurenai-sensei. Come with us!"

"Well," she began hesitantly, "Father took Hanabi to give her a sense of what trials like these entail with clan heads. I don't need to be there…" Kiba's eyes looked hopeful before she pursed her lips. "But I do want to support Narut — the others," she caught herself, "by being there —"

Suddenly, they were stopped in their tracks by a masked ANBU member flashing into existence in front of them. They couldn't help but jump in surprise, not knowing whether to attack or defend after a day of being crammed into a room full of high-ranking shinobi with threatening levels of chakra.

"Whoa! What the fu-" yelped Kiba.

"Hinata-san. Hokage-sama has requested your presence in her office. Immediately." The masked face looked back and forth between her and her companions. "Alone."

Akamaru whined as Kiba threw a questioning look at her.

"Um, o-okay." She gave an even more confused one to her teammate. "I'll see you later, Kiba-kun."

The ANBU member disappeared just as quickly as they had appeared, and Hinata turned on her heel, changing her direction towards the hokage tower after a quick goodbye.

She frowned as she made her way to Tsunade's office. She hadn't been on any solo missions since before the war, and even then, they weren't very high ranking and usually regarded matters of politics and clan relations. How could she possibly be of use at this time?

Hinata rapped sharply on the door.

"Come in!" came a bellowing voice.

"Godaime-sama." Hinata knelt, bowing briefly before her superior waved her formal greeting off with a "Get up, get up."

Tsunade was rummaging through some paper, scratching some notes in the margin. "Your father says you've been learning about seals," she said without preamble.

"Hai, Hokage-sama."

"And as a main branch member, you've experience controlling the caged bird seal, yes?"

"I-I..." Hinata's eyes dropped to the floor. "I've been taught how to use it, yes."

"Uchiha Sasuke."

There was a pause, a question hanging in the air.

"You have no emotional connection to him."

Hinata's brow furrowed.

Before she could open her mouth to respond, Tsunade went on, "What I mean to say is, you were never in love with him, right?" The hokage never looked up from her desk, so she couldn't see Hinata's face turning bright red. As if it was a secret she had ever loved only one person.

She shook her head. "No—"

"Good." Tsunade slammed the file she was reading over shut and Hinata jumped. "Then I have a mission for you."

The Godaime leaned onto the desk with her elbows, lacing her fingers and placing her chin on top. "As you have probably heard by now, I will be stepping down as hokage soon and handing the title over to Kakashi."

Hinata nodded hesitantly.

"But before I do, there is something that the Council has requested of me. My grandfather had developed seals in case he needed to use them against the Uchiha. Now, he never used them, never wanted to betray their trust. He had them put away, and they were forgotten. The Uchiha and Senju united, there was a time of peace, Konohagakure was founded — you know the story." She flapped her hand as she talked. "And they were never necessary. Made obsolete. Put away. Forgotten. When they asked me what we were going to do with Sasuke, I wasn't sure. Until I remembered these seals."

Tsunade reached over to a white cup at the edge of her desk and took a long sip, closing her eyes before continuing. "I don't think my grandfather dreamt that these seals would eventually ever be used for what they were intentionally designed for. I think he imagined a better place for shinobi. But the Uchiha…" she trailed off, eyes staring blankly at a spot beyond Hinata's face before she blinked rapidly. "Anyhow, Sasuke. He is no ordinary shinobi, no ordinary criminal." She sighed. "We're lucky enough as it is that he's even cooperating with us, and we have Naruto to thank for that. I doubt these seals even have an effect on the rinnegan." Her hands traced the edges of the cup before setting down on the desk with another bang. "We just don't know. And that, my dear Hinata, is where you come in."

"The seals." She reached down to pick up a stack of scrolls in both arms and dumped them on the desk. "These will have the necessary information. Build on them if you have to. Add to them. I want to know it all. You will monitor their effectiveness. You will monitor their effects on his body, his eyes — side effects, what have you, if any. You will study them, learn from them, improve them, make changes to them as necessary, either to strengthen them and/or weaken him. And lastly," her eyes bored through Hinata's. "You will use them against him if you have to."

She winced, thinking about her family members that had writhed in pain on the floor before her father, remembering the agony on Neji's face. "Will they hurt him?"

"They're supposed to. Only those who need to know how to use them know how to use them, including myself."

"T-Tsunade-sama," Hinata swallowed. "I-If I may ask...why me?"

Tsunade brought up her hand, ticking off her points with each finger. "One, you were recommended by many capable jounin. You have improved greatly as evidenced by your competency during the war. Two, I have not seen you show any amount of care towards him, so that leaves out any chances of bias. Three, you have one of the best chakra control as a Hyuuga, and most importantly," the fire in her amber eyes softened, "Four — doing this may gain you a favorable position in your clan, or at least prevent yourself from being sealed yourself."

Hinata's head hung, realizing the ambiguity of her future was not as secretive as she hoped it was. Truly, it was an unspoken issue that no one wanted to bring up.

"I know that this has been a hard time for you, adjusting to Neji's death and not having...a true role in the clan. I have read your appeal," she pulled out another scroll. "Does your father know about this?"

"N-no! I didn't even think — it was a futile attempt —" she stammered as she recognized it, fighting to glue her arms by her side instead of dashing forward in embarrassment to rip the scroll to shreds. She had sent it in a fit of emotion, begging the hokage to start reform of the clan by requesting a series of negotiations with her father and the Hyuuga elders, hoping they would come to an agreement of some sort to prevent further sealing of the branch members. But there had been a lapse of time, and with the buzz concerning the trial and the focus of her clan instead on her sister's grooming, she had given up on a response. Instead, she had put her concerns out of sight, out of mind.

"My grandmother was an Uzumaki, Hinata. You know what the Uzumaki were known for?"

When Hinata gave another hesitant nod, Tsunade went on, "Seals. Your father is a very stubborn and traditional man, as are many in your clan. Input from an outsider, even the hokage, is not welcome and hardly will they even take the time to listen. This mission can give you the opportunity to find answers for your own clan. And maybe you can help change your clan yourself. I will use your findings to support you. As Hiashi's firstborn, you are still important. To the clan and this village."

The softness and reassurance she heard in Tsunade's voice almost made Hinata's eyes water and she clenched her hands into fists. "Thank you, Hokage-sama."

Tsunade gave a satisfied nod. "Only those who need to know about this know about it. You are to tell no one of this mission. Not your teammates, not your father, and especially not Naruto."

Hinata's eyes became hard like diamond, as she gave her promise, steeling her resolve, "Hai, Hokage-sama."

"Do your best, Hinata."

It had been easier said than done. She reviewed the contents of her mission's objective and realized that it was primarily medically based. There was a time when she had been interested in being a medic-nin, when her skills as a shinobi were questionable and uncertain, though it proved to be more Kiba's thing than hers. Along with her self-study of the optic nerve and its chakra use, particularly with dojutsu users, it was no wonder Tsunade had chosen her for this mission. Hinata couldn't help but feel a mixture of pride and embarrassment. If there was anyone that could have truly guided her with her studies, it would have been Tsunade.

The Torture and Interrogation Force was a strange, new place. She had only heard how effective its members were. Rogue shinobi never stood a chance. Rare was the chance for a shinobi who was not from a high position in the village to be invited within its walls.

Ino was waiting expectantly outside the building. "Hinata!" she waved, her hair reflecting the midday sun, the last of the light Hinata would see that day.

"They said you were coming," the blonde engulfed her with a big hug as soon as Hinata neared the building. The light floral scent still lingering on Ino's skin was familiar and soothing.

"Ino-chan," Hinata began as she followed, hands toying with the strap of the bag she had brought to place her scrolls in. "Can you… come with me?"

Ino's expression softened sympathetically. "No, I'm not allowed to. I'm sorry, Hinata. Tsunade-sama forbade it because I used to love him."

"Is it hard, working with him? Since you — since you did love him?"

Ino wore a weary smile as her exhausted blue eyes looked ahead of them into the darkness. "I'm just...not that kind of girl anymore."

No, Hinata thought to herself. You are a woman. And for a moment she wished she was as strong as Ino, strong like Shikamaru, leading their clans into a hopeful future, while working in significant positions in the village.

And Hinata could barely even face Naruto in embarrassment. He hadn't even answered — or even acknowledged, for that matter — her confession. The warmth of his hand holding hers was just what it was — a fading memory. He stood next to her during the memorial service after the war, gave her a hug and said to her, "I'm going to miss Neji. Stay strong, Hinata."

Her heart clenched painfully and she willed all thoughts of him to disappear as the corridor became colder and mustier.

Neji had died for her because she was willing to die for Naruto. And that was it. She had spent nights in tears realizing the one who actually, truly loved her was dead. She was so pathetic.

And yet.

And yet, she could do nothing but sit around, helpless and unheard, feeling that Neji's death and what it signified was fading, too. How much longer could she keep telling herself she had no choice but to carry herself with the grace of the nobility she was, the pride of the shinobi she had become, and the hope of the shinobi she could be? The words were empty promises, empty words of encouragement. She was in limbo, floating with uncertainty between the present and future.

Always in constant emptiness, like the darkness before her.

It was getting harder to see, and she could tell they were nearing the depths of the prison.

Ino introduced her to the rest of the jounin on the force after a quick debriefing with Ibiki, a man with hard lines and scars on his face that told of a lifetime of seeing the horrors of shinobi.

Ino gave Hinata's shoulder a gentle squeeze, "Good luck, Hinata," before leaving her with Ibiki.

"Ready?" he had asked, though he hadn't waited for an answer. You were never ready as a shinobi.

Sasuke was in the same restraints she had seen in the trial room. His head angled in their direction as they approached.

Ibiki handed her a key. "I doubt he will try to escape or fight, but there is always a chance." He eyed her. "Are you okay with that?"

"Yes."

"I have also been trained to utilize the seals, Hinata-san," he said seriously, "And I am not afraid to use it." Ibiki's eyes flickered to the frown on her face. "You should not be either."

"Yes." She inhaled slowly, trying to remember the few things she had glanced over in the scrolls.

"Are you afraid?"

Her eyes widened. The question had surprised her. She was not afraid. Well, not of Sasuke at least. Not that he would hurt her. Not that that was something that he could do.

She shook her head. "No."

Ibiki gave her a skeptical glance, but nodded. Her voice seemed strong, and the whites of her pupil-less eyes appeared hard enough. This was the girl who jumped in front of Pein, after all.

The noise of the prison cell filled the air, its metal shrieking as it opened.

She could feel Sasuke testing what little chakra she allowed to seep through her pores, trying to identify her.

"What do you want?" he asked tonelessly.

"I am here to monitor you," she said, hyper-aware of her voice reverberating through the empty walls.

His head leaned slightly to the side, now sifting through his memories to match her voice to a face.

"Are you a medic?"

"No."

It was quiet again as she set up her equipment. She opened a scroll, muttering to herself the information she wanted to remember, and when she finally made her way to him, she realized she had never been this close to him before.

His brittle hair was longer, bangs brushing the end of his chin, and his skin even more pale, with fading bruises and scars of various colors littering his body. His lips were chapped, probably from being on the edge of dehydration, his cheekbones were more prominent, and the points of his shoulders and ribs were sharper.

Hinata bit her lip, taking the stethoscope and warming the end in her hand. "I will begin," she said before slipping the tips into her ear and pressing the end to his heart.

"Byakugan," she whispered, and her vision concentrated onto the steady pumping of his heart, matching it to the lub-dub she heard.

"Of course," he said, with bitter amusement. "They send a Hyuuga."

She flinched at the accusation, but continued. "Please take a deep breath."

But he was right.

The Uzumaki were the masters of seals, but it was the Hyuuga who were its slavemasters.

She worked in silence after that, pausing to write notes in her scroll. She kept her touch light and brief, noting the stiffness in his posture when he felt her near him. Hinata jotted down various herbal supplements and vitamins he would benefit from, as well as potential medications he might need. There was a slowly-healing gash in his side, on the verge of festering, and she pressed her fingers there, feeding her chakra into the wound. His physical assessment was otherwise on the extremely low end of what was considered 'healthy,' by shinobi standards. Passable, at the most. It was obvious that Konoha had done the bare minimum to keep him alive. She frowned sympathetically, knowing that he was a prisoner, after all. What remained of his left arm seemed to be healthy, the pink there showing promising signs of repair.

She focused on his chakra and the seals next, though it took longer to learn about them. She came every day, each day staying longer than the day before as weeks of the trial dragged on, spending her time with only a dim lamp and Tsunade's scrolls in the cell with Sasuke.

There were seals on his wrists and ankles, a seal on his abdomen at the center of his chakra, and one on his heart. Hinata found that Sasuke was particularly sensitive to the seal on his forehead, a slightly modified version of the caged bird seal. He had leaned away when she had pressed her finger to it, and it seemed to cause him more pain than the other seals. It took full control primarily of his chakra system. Coupled with the control of his nervous system and brain, he had no chance to activate any chakra at all, and even then, the seals on his extremities and abdomen halted any further chakra flow to his extremities as an extra precaution. In turn, the seals fed on his own chakra as a sort of loop, draining him of his own energy. With her byakugan, she saw the dim light of his chakra, basically stagnant and barely enough to keep a shinobi of his caliber alive. The last failsafe was the seal on his heart which, with a shinobi experienced in utilizing the seals, would be able to end his life immediately.

She would stay on the opposite side of the cell after every exam, and he would remain free from all bindings, except for the sealed blindfold around his eyes, until she left for the day. She wrote her narrative report, matched data from this scroll to that, and created a new scroll for her own discoveries. These would then be reported to Tsunade every other week. Now and then, she would hear talks of the trial from afar, from Ino and Ibiki, or snippets from her clan members at home.

Sasuke was ever-patient, quiet, yet he made no attempt to talk and neither did she, unless it was with purpose for the medical examinations. Hinata wondered what he thought about, if he was curious about what she was writing. She had no doubt he could feel her eyes on him, even from a distance. Only the sounds of the furling and unfurling of the scrolls, the scratching of the pen, or Hinata murmuring to herself became the norm, and her ears became attuned to his sighs of impatience, the clearing of his throat, and the pattern of his breathing. It was slow and steady with slumber, even and regular while awake.

But it was the ragged breaths of his nightmares that haunted her, terrified her when they happened. He would gasp, or cry out, and end up activating both the sharingan and rinnegan. The seals would glow in a sequence starting from the blindfold, lighting the pathway of the seals to his forehead, abdomen, heart, and finally his extremities, and he woke screaming, writhing in pain not unlike a seizure.

The first time she had jumped reflexively into a defensive stance, the lamp and pen clattering to the floor as she was broken out of her concentration, her heart racing as adrenaline flooded her system with the sudden noise. The lightbulb shattered and she was enveloped in an eerie darkness at once, before her vision turned into a world of distorted images with her dojutsu.

She swallowed, seeing the effects in her byakugan, almost as if his brain and chakra system were flickering.

This is what they wanted to know. This is why she was here.

Yet she was not allowed to stop the seals from activating or reverse its effects — not that she really knew how - only wait until it was over and then she was allowed to heal the pain. It felt like some kind of sick joke just to stand and watch him suffer like a twisted experiment.

As he lay convulsing on the ground, she approached cautiously, pressing her own trembling hand to his side. Hinata timed the length of the episode, recording his highest to lowest heart rate. She compared his vital signs before and after, as well as the strength - or weakness - of his nervous system.

And when he finally began to calm down, panting and exhausted with sweat cooling on his skin, she would wipe him down, bathe him, and redress him if needed, even as he jerked away from her touch. Oftentimes he could not control his bodily functions. Other times, he would turn his face away from her in not quite shame, not quite embarrassment before falling back into another fitful sleep. Like with her own clan members, she couldn't help but feel sympathy and something akin to heartbreak.

The cell was littered with scrolls of all sizes from her research, and Hinata shuddered at the knowledge that was in her grasp. The power underneath her own fingertips. How many people would race to use the secrets of the seals? To bend the Uchiha to their will once more?

All the while, her father was focusing more and more on Hanabi. Hinata felt as though she was going through the motions of clan meetings, while she remained largely ignored. She really did not know what her purpose was in the clan. Maybe her father kept her out of guilt, from the death of his twin and his nephew, or maybe for the remembrance of her mother. Since the war had ended she had hinted at the idea of joining ANBU or leading her own genin team, but her father hadn't seemed interested in whatever path she would have chosen, and even then, she still wasn't sure it was what she truly wanted.

Questions that had been mere whispers in the back of her mind since the end of the war were now deafening in the silence that surrounded her in the cell.

"Are you content doing nothing? To meander along while your peers accomplish?"

"Don't you have any goals? Any ambitions?"

"What wish do you want to bring about for yourself? For your clan?"

"It's a disgrace to have the eldest daughter of the head of the Hyuuga clan to sit idly. Especially while the younger is set to become the next head!"

"Failure after failure, disappointment after disappointment!"

She wondered if her father ever listened to the tittering of her clan members, whether he desired to seal her. Hinata didn't even know how he really felt about her and she wasn't sure she wanted to find out.

She could do nothing but bite her tongue whenever her sister used the caged bird seal on the branch members.

"How could you do that?" she asked once with frustrated tears. "How can you not care? How can you not think of Neji-nii-san when -." And then Hinata's mouth snapped shut as her sister fixed her with a hard, blank stare. She truly looked like their father at that moment and it scared her.

Hinata started again carefully, "How could we just go on like this? Isn't there a better way?"

Hanabi's expression relaxed only a little, and Hinata began to see the heiress, not her younger sister, in the way she stood, in the hard lines of her face and the set of her jaw. "Nee-sama, I really don't see another alternative. How can we keep the byakugan safe without any seals?"

She thought of Sasuke, she thought of his seals. She thought of herself and the fact that she had no answers. "I don't know," she finished lamely.

"And, well, do you want to be sealed?" Her sister asked, her eyes serious, a threat and a warning somehow both in her tone of voice.

Honestly, she didn't. And that made her feel guilty too.

And so she threw herself into mastering seals, trying different combinations of her own designs on various things, inanimate and animate objects alike, taking her study of Sasuke's seals in consideration. Yet, she was unsure if the information she gained would truly help. She spent hours rereading about the byakugan and other dojutsu and was allowed into the archives of the Uzumaki records. Her friends barely took notice, as they were busy with their own duties while the village slowly picked itself up and recovered, and her former teammates knew better than to pry more than necessary.

"Where do you go nowadays, Hinata?" Shino had asked during a much-needed training session, a break from the stale air of the prison and a relief from the strain of long hours of reading.

"Just researching the caged bird seal," she admitted, her eyes shifting downward.

"That's admirable," Shino nodded approvingly.

"And the requirements for becoming a teacher, Shino-kun?" she asked to change the subject. "Have you started?"

If he had noticed diversion, he hadn't commented on it, but obliged to launch into tales of his own studies.

Sasuke had surprised her by asking, "Who are you?" She had grown so used to the quiet, she had nearly jumped out of her skin with the sound, which in any other environment would have been not loud by normal measures.

"Hinata. Hyuuga, Hinata."

A pause. "I remember."

She had never really considered what he thought about her. She wondered briefly if he thought she was qualified enough, if he resented her because she still had everything he didn't. Her family, her eyes.

There were days when he was weaker and his breathing more labored. These days he slept more, and she knew that someone had used the seals on him. Hinata would spend extra time healing him and making him more comfortable, keeping her voice brighter, more cheery as much as she could. She realized that the more information she gave to her superiors, the weaker Sasuke seemed to be the next time she saw him.

So she began to write less and less in her scrolls, stating that most of the information was redundant, but really she couldn't stand the sight of him withering away.

Was she contributing to his suffering too?

It was after a few months when she walked in on Kakashi and Sasuke talking, and she clutched her bag to her chest at the top of the stairs.

She could hear Sasuke's voice rising in confrontation. "They know nothing of Konoha's crimes and still they punish me?"

"Sasuke—"

"Itachi is 'wrong,' and yet he killed his own family to keep Konoha safe." He spat. "Do they know that?"

Kakashi was quiet.

"No!" Sasuke sneered. "Because fuck the Uchiha."

"One of my closest friends was an Uchiha," Kakashi murmured.

"And he died, too, Hokage-sama, a Konoha lapdog like the rest of them!"

"A hero," the hokage corrected lamely, to which he earned another scowl.

"Except not," Sasuke bit out.

"My clan wasn't perfect. But they were the only family I truly had. And for them to be wiped out under a village that washed its hands of its crimes and forgiven for it, I cannot stand for it! Yet I—" her heart clenched at the anguish in his voice. "I cannot escape."

The gray-haired shinobi was quiet.

"If Obito had been around, Itachi would have killed him, too," Sasuke had said in a low voice, venom seeping from his words.

"Ah, Hinata-chan," Kakashi said with false cheer, as Hinata entered with her head bowed, as though they weren't able to hear her. As though she wasn't able to hear them. "I was just leaving."

Kakashi's eyes opened into a serious expression, a haunted look on his now-matching eyes as she passed. "Take good care of him, ne?"

Hinata could feel the anger rolling off of Sasuke as she approached. When her usual physical assessment was done, she couldn't help but be nervous as she reached out, and he stiffened, feeling the proximity of her hands to his face.

She released the seal and gently tugged the blindfold free. His eyes, one black, one purple, both filled with numbness and apathy, stared back at her.

There was no fury burning there, almost as if he had erased the emotion he had just displayed earlier in front of Kakashi or merely reined it in. It seemed rather contradictory. His actions during the war, and all the years previously for that matter, had proven that he had the capacity to be emotional, to be passionate about something — someone — that he truly cared about.

For once, Hinata felt guilty for being selfish on her own endeavors, while Sasuke was suffering more than she was. She was mesmerized by his mismatched gaze and she wondered if maybe she had misunderstood him in the past, when she only assumed he hated showing others how he felt. Moreover, the words that he had said to Kakashi raised bumps on her skin, as if she was missing something critical.

To her surprise, there were two more seals, one on each eyelid, another variation of the seal on his forehead. From her studies, the seals as a whole on his body were on par with those meant to control jinchuuriki. She swallowed, seeing the power restrained tightly there behind his eyes in her byakugan gaze even more so with the blindfold off.

"The focus of our assessment will now be primarily on your sight," she informed softly, professionally. "Please stay still." She raised a light, shining it in his eyes. With her byakugan still active, she traced the path of light through his nerves and into his brain, watching how it interacted with the seal.

"I need you to activate both the sharingan and rinnegan," the apology already in her tone of voice.

He gave a short, sarcastic laugh, and in an instant, red and purple glowed fiercely in the backdrop of the dark prison. He fell in agony to the floor, mouth open in a silent scream.

She ran to him, reaching for his head, though some part of her knew he was trying to control his true reaction to the pain. No apology could make it better. Nothing would absolve everything he had gone through, everything he was going through. But still, she couldn't help fighting back the words that forced themselves out of her mouth. "I'm so sorry," she whispered hollowly into deaf ears, feeding more soothing chakra into his temples. Her byakugan saw the continuous gruesome interruptions and spasms in his chakra flow, mostly around his eyes and his brain.

His body shuddered for a few moments as he tried to catch his breath.

"Do you pity me?" Sasuke asked, his voice as empty of emotion as his eyes, when his pain had eased. She had sat him up and they faced each other kneeling on the floor. She pushed the bangs obscuring his face, smoothing it back, the hairs there sticky from sweat.

"Pity?" her face flushed, but his serious stare never faltered, and she crumpled the blindfold in one fist.

"Pity?" she asked again, mostly to herself this time. "No," she murmured, "It's all too familiar. The burdens of a clan are much too heavy." One hand went up to touch her own eyelid, her calloused fingertips tracing the lashes there, following the path of the veins that streaked down the side of her face. "I think I know the pain they cause. "

A small scoff escaped him, and she thought she saw a glimmer of real hatred in his eyes. "What do you know of pain?"

His words cut deeply, but still she knew there was some truth to them, even if she wished there wasn't. "I see yours," she whispered, with eyes almost as tortured as his.

It was a color darker than black, a stretch of nothingness that seemed to extend forever in every angle. It surrounded her like a smothering fog, the stale air icier than she remembered within the prison walls. Her movement seemed sluggish and it seemed as though she were trying to breathe underwater. The prisoner in the cell looked almost faceless, his face shadowed even more in her obscured vision. She tried to open her eyes wider, to extend her byakugan further, but her sight seemed to only dim the harder she tried. Her hands were odd and distorted as she neared her patient and reached for him.

Hinata lifted his face upward and stepped back gasping in horror, snatching her hands away. Only now she noticed the rotting corpse was not Sasuke. It was Neji's face instead, with empty sockets filled with cobwebs where his eyes should've been. She tried to scream but the darkness seemed to clog her throat.

"Is this my destiny, after all," Neji asked, his voice gargling, obscured by the river of blood rushing out of his mouth and pooling at her feet, "Hinata-sama?" He kept trying to reach for her and she tried to back away, but it felt as though her body had frozen in place, the blood tethering her to the prison's floor. Blood kept pouring out of his mouth and out of the ugly gash through his chest until it flooded higher and higher to her chest. And he kept reaching, reaching until his body crumbled into dust, piece by piece. Black shadows that somehow Hinata recognized as other branch clan members who had died for the main branch flew shrieking out of his mouth, attacking, engulfing her, and drowning her.

"Hinata-sama?" the deep, distorted voice echoed as she was swallowed up in the torrent of blood, her cries smothered in the flood.

Hinata woke up with a start in cold sweat, her heart pounding in her chest and the voices deafening in her ears. When she put a hand to her mouth, she discovered the screams were coming from her own mouth.

Sasuke was awake and at attention, his body posture stiff, although he didn't make a move towards her.

He had been sleeping soundly when she arrived, so she hadn't bothered to wake him. His chakra levels seemed to be lower than usual and she wanted him to get as much rest as he could. Instead, she spread her scrolls from one end of the table to the other. Eventually, the ink on the paper blurred together and her eyelids grew heavy. She had fallen asleep on the scrolls, the top portion of her body draped over the table. She hadn't had an episode like this in a long time. Sleepless nights had finally caught up with her; Hinata didn't realize how exhausted she was.

She sat up quickly, wiping her mouth with the back of her quivering hand. "I'm sorry," she whispered, between gasps for air, discovering that her voice was shaking, too.

Finally, the tremors eased and she stopped hyperventilating. Her eyes squeezed shut as she willed her pulse to slow.

"Don't be." His voice sounded a little cold. She focused on the sound of his breaths, matching hers in time, feeling his eyes on her.

After a moment, the screams ringing in her ears quieted and she finally opened her eyes. Taking the edge of her sleeve, she wiped her face and drank some water, the liquid spilling over the edge of the cup as she raised it to her lips.

She was calmer when she approached him and kept her face as neutral as she could, ready to start her routine and silently hoping they could pretend like it never happened.

"Maybe our eyes aren't so different after all," he said, scrutinizing her as she reached him.

She dropped her gaze to the floor. "Maybe."

"Tell me - when you dream, what do you see?"

The black in his eyes seemed so gentle for a moment that it made her want to cry.

The next time she came, she had brought food. With the blindfold mostly off and finally allowed his sight, what little chakra was left pulled constantly from the seals at a staggering rate higher than usual.

She was feeding him when he asked, testing her, "Is it a curse to have a kekkai genkai as powerful as ours?"

"Is it not?" she asked, chopsticks paused in the air. "These eyes only haunt those who bear its sight."

He grunted in agreement as they stared at each other, knowing the answer even before he finished his question.

He ate some more with Hinata's insistence before asking her, "If you knew something debilitating about your clan, would you stand for them or against them? Even if it meant costing you the village?"

Her eyebrows turned down as she frowned. "I think I have an idea what it might feel like to suffer under your clan and yet the village doesn't bat an eye." She thought of the bright green on her families' foreheads.

"For all their talk about the village not interfering with clan matters, the village sems to win over the clans every time." His hands clenched into fists on his lap. "They don't allow me to speak at the trial, allow me to defend myself. To defend my clan." His shoulders sagged in defeat and he relaxed his fingers. A dead expression returned to his eyes returned as he studied the ink there. "But maybe it's better if I don't."

With his restraints mostly unbound, they spend their days sitting in an almost comfortable silence together. He was a little more open with her than he used to be.

Was it wrong to feel a sense of companionship with someone like him? To feel some kind of connection in the pain their eyes brought them in the night, in their dreams?

It was almost as if she was making amends with herself for failing Neji by caring for him.

In time, she was satisfied that his cheeks had filled out a little and his ribs weren't as prominent as they were when she first started. Hinata cut his hair, snipping the dead ends and combing it through. She gave him a sponge bath, preserving his dignity as much as she could. And though he seemed uninterested, she gave him some news of the outside world.

When she talked about Naruto, he would let his guard down, but only for a little.

"He's been working closely with Hokage-sama lately, though I hear he doesn't seem to like the paperwork very much," she said as she shaved him carefully, the touch on his jaw gentle as she scraped the blade over the stubble.

Sasuke snorted, his head tilted away from her as she worked. "The dobe probably didn't realize how much work it requires." He paused, seeming to choose his words carefully before he continued in a low voice, "As a jinchuuriki, you'd think that maybe he would understand - how Konoha owns us. Maybe he did understand. But now, he's their savior and he got everything he ever wanted from them - their acknowledgement and love. Maybe that's enough for him."

Hinata was quiet as she put a gentle pressure on his chin with her fingertips, turning his face towards her, studying her handiwork. "Would he give it up for you?"

His eyes slid over to meet hers. "What do you think?"

She wiped the blade on a washrag. "No," she said quietly, after a moment. Hinata reached for some cream to soothe his dry skin, warming it up between her hands before she smoothed it onto one cheek first, tracing the black of the ink there.

A small smile, maybe what could have been a brief flash of hurt in his eyes, and then - "No. Not even for me."

Her hands faltered a moment with the brief show of emotion.

"If it wasn't for Naruto…" He only wore a distant, glazed look on his face as she continued to work. Sasuke's chest rose slowly before he let his breath out in a small, puff of air. "Well, there wouldn't be a lot of things." He straightened up as Hinata finished, stepping away from him and reaching for her small bag of toiletries.

"I think," she began slowly, "That he loves you and the village." She screwed the cap back on the container of the cream. The soft, subtle fresh scent lingered in the air and on his skin. "He'd die for you both. I-if - If it's alright for me to say."

"His love is almost manic." Sasuke's lips seem to flatten. "Our bond can never be broken, it's true. We've proven that many times over, and it's something that I can't deny. But at whose expense? Certainly not Naruto's. And certainly not Konoha's."

Once again, Hinata's eyes traveled up and down to the interconnected, bold, black lines on his body contrasting against the paleness of his skin, and she was reminded that he was right. It was at his.

Sasuke seemed to close in on himself then. He moved to put his old tattered prison rags back on, but Hinata stopped him with a hand on his wrist. "I know you probably don't want to wear someone else's clothes, but you seem to be the same size…" she trailed off hesitantly, as she presented to him fresh pairs of clothes and sandals. "And I tried to tailor it more for you as best as I could."

His mouth twisted into a frown. "I won't wear it."

"But - "

"I won't wear it." His voice rang in the empty cell. "I won't have my clan's symbol plastered on my back like a walking trophy for this fucking village," he spat angrily. "I might as well be branded with Konoha's symbol across my back! Are they going to do that, too? What, did you bring the iron? Go ahead! Do it!" Sasuke turned around, throwing his shirt to the dirty floor of the cell.

She unfolded a simple black shirt with long sleeves and lay it close to him where he could see. "There is no symbol," she said quietly. "I wouldn't… I wouldn't use a reminder of your family against you." Hinata touched his back gently where the crest would be, where she remembered it to be.

"I'm the last Uchiha this village will ever hurt." The rage in his body seemed to fade after a few minutes, and the stiff posture of his torso relaxed. "And the last they will ever own."

She was sketching designs of seals when he asked, "Why is it you?"

The line of ink faltered as she dragged her eyes to meet his questioning gaze. A small laugh escaped her. "Why is it me?"

Her gaze clouded over and her grip on the pen loosened. "If anyone in the branch clan had issues with their sight, particularly after they had been...punished," she swallowed. "They would come to me. I would help them. My father did not like that very much. I could see how much damage the seal did, not just to their sight, but to the strength of their byakugan, to their brain, to their memory. Much like I can see with you." Her brow furrowed. "I wanted to stop that."

"And being here with me like this can help?"

"I don't know," she answered honestly. "Neji-nii-san." She paused as she knew Sasuke was conjuring up an image of him in his memory. "He wanted to change our clan." In a more bitter voice, "But now he's dead."

"Just like Itachi, I suppose," he muttered darkly. "How many more must die a slave for this village?"

She didn't press him for answers, though questions were evident in her eyes. She had never asked about the circumstances of his clan, and he never asked about hers.

"If it were up to me, I would have everyone in the clan sealed, if that's the way they choose to protect the byakugan. But we are of proud clans," she said with a bitter smile.

He grunted in agreement, and she went back to her scroll.

"Though I suppose I have learned that you don't need a seal to be controlled," she said faintly, after she sat staring at the markings on the delicate paper of the scroll for hours after that.

He gave her what looked like the beginnings of a twisted, almost maniacal, grin. "No, but it helps."

Her father had given her the floor during the clan meeting, and she had presented her research and findings. At first, she had been nervous, fighting the urge to poke her fingers together or wipe her sweaty palms on her yukata, unused to having all the attention focused towards her for this extended amount of time. But her determination was stronger than the crushing weight of expectation on her shoulders, and eventually, she treated it as another mission, like one of the many presentations she had given at other villages to various nobles and leaders. She pictured herself speaking in front of Sasuke in that lonely cell, knowing that he would listen intently to what she had to say and that he, though he had a different pair of mismatched eyes, understood her more than the people that shared her own blood.

She kept her back straight and professional, her voice level, and maintained eye contact, not shying away from the skeptical glances they gave her. As she talked, she pointed to the many examples of seals written clearly on scrolls that she had pinned to a large presentation board, some recognizable, some dating back to the days of the founding fathers of the village. Many of her relatives seemed surprised at the extent of her medical knowledge, the diagrams of the brain, eyes, and chakra system as detailed and precise as a highly trained medic, along with Hinata's description of the effects of the seal on the body. It was only a sliver of information that she had collected from her studies with Sasuke, but she had received permission from Tsunade and Kakashi to present only information pertinent to the Hyuuga's byakugan.

"Since much of the agreement in the clan is the retainment of the seal, I have been studying a way to incorporate a seal with far less harsher effects than I have seen. The final product of my research has come to this." She performed a small summoning jutsu, and with a puff of smoke, a kage bunshin appeared on top of a scroll. With more hand seals, a small seal appeared in the middle of her clone's forehead.

She nodded to her clone and the clone attempted, and failed, to activate its byakugan.

"As you can see, the clone is unable to perform the dojutsu. However, if you can activate your own byakugan and focus on the chakra inside this clone," she looked up briefly to see veins rising on the temples of many of her relatives' faces, and emboldened at their compliance, she continued, "you can see that with the seal activated, the chakra system is essentially suspended, its use kept minimal to allow for normal bodily functions with no harm or discomfort to the person. Based on this example, we can expand even further, but in contrast, it would almost be in reverse." She deactivated the seal, and with a series of hand seals, the clone disappeared in another cloud of smoke, and another scroll in its place. Hianta reached for the scroll, opening it and unrolling it, pinning it from one end to the other on the presentation board. On it was a drawing of a front, side, and backwards-facing outline of a body. "I propose an invisible seal on the abdomen that connects to the brain from the back of the head to our blind spot," her fingers traced the path on the drawing, "activated when the user dies or, in other words, there is no more source of chakra from which the seal can pull." It was the opposite of Sasuke's in which it it would activate from the extremities inwards, but she saved that information for another time, when the clan showed more readiness. "The seal would allow for normal shinobi-level chakra use, but would not require any more than the current seal does at this time. The marking ceremony is still held on the third birthday, and it includes every member of the Hyuuga clan. With this, we abolish the Branch system with the intermarrying of members of both branches. We can also remove the main branch familial lineage for heir or heiress as ruler of the clan. There can be a vote for ages 18 and up."

That caused a little murmur of disapproval, but Hinata ignored it and moved on. "The seal on the abdomen takes control of the entire chakra system, but by connecting it to the blind spot, it also encompasses the eyes and brain. There are no hand seals to cause damage from an outside source. It only keeps what is inside - our eyes, brain, and chakra system- protected from the outside. If anyone tries to remove our eyes or head forcefully, they would get severe physical and mental repercussions from the seal itself already being activated. For example, we can have the current effects of activating the caged bird seal afflicted on that person in a continuous effect - if that is something that we choose." She turned to face the rest of the room. "By using this blind spot, what we once called weak, we can make strong. And with that so-called weakness, we protect the secrets of our clan. No one can control it - in life or death."

"No one, except for you, it's creator? A marvelous idea, Hinata-sama," an uncle stated boredly.

"This proposition is if we must have a seal, Uncle. As you know, I would much rather have everyone without a seal." Or everyone sealed and be done with it, she thought to herself.

"That's easy for you to say," a branch uncle stated tersely, staring at her blank forehead.

"Our eyes - they don't belong to us," Hinata continued. "Not really. You say you want to protect the secrets by using the caged bird seal, but that seal or any other seal is another way Konoha ensures that our dojutsu - that we - are under Konoha's authority."

"On the contrary, my dear niece," an aunt called. "We are proud to represent Konoha with the strength of our byakugan."

"And if it means so much," her uncle continued, "then you should be the first to try."

It was meant in spite, yet she had balled her fists and with her chin held high she responded, "if it meant bringing change to this unmoving clan, so be it."

"We'll consider it." Hiashi shut the file and nudged it to the side.

"Father, you must." Her eyes darted towards her sister, pleading, 'Hanabi-chan."

"That's Hanabi-sama to you," another aunt corrected in a sneer.

Hiashi pursed his lips. "So choose your preferred seals specialist-"

"I will do it myself," Hinata rushed, "but we must prepare a contract in blood which everyone must sign for current and future generations."

An older cousin, "We are not a clan to be bound by blood contracts."

"You already were long ago, when you decided that half of your own blood would be subjected as slaves for your - "

"Control your emotions, daughter."

Hinata's mouth snapped shut and she willed the tears pricking the corner of her eyes to stay where they were. "If Neji-nii -"

"Do not use the dead as propaganda for your cause -"

"You are the reason they are dead!"

It was deathly quiet in the room. Her father said coldly, "You are dismissed, Hinata." Each white eye that stared at her was as uncaring as the next.

Dismissed.

And her face, like stone, was truly that of a Hyuuga as she bowed stiffly, gathering her items.

The shoji doors shut behind her, and with her clan, she left any last lingering feelings of connection or understanding. With every step farther from her clan's complex, she felt more and more alone.

Her movements were erratic, rough, and uncoordinated, and she had already dropped everything more than two times. She had slammed the cell doors open, her breathing ragged as she fumbled around.

Hinata's clammy hands were trembling as she reached to undo the blindfold. "I'm sorry I'm late."

Sasuke caught one of them in one of his. "What's wrong?" His head angled up towards her as she stood over him, her hair falling forward like a curtain on either side of them. His eyes were already searching hers as she let the blindfold drop.

She gave him a teary smile. "I was rejected."

Somehow he knew she wasn't talking about a boy. Still, he deadpanned, "He's not worth it."

A broken laugh escaped her, but she managed, "No, he's not," to which Sasuke gave her a questioning look.

Blond hair and blue eyes faded from her thoughts as she looked at him. With another hand, she reached to trace the seals from his forehead down one cheek. He closed his eyes under her gentle touch, conditioned to feeling the healing chakra that flowed from her fingertips. He shivered slightly in his sweat soaked shirt, and she knew that they were using the seals on him now more than ever. She could tell he was trying to control his breathing and her heart clenched at how he was hiding his pain because he could feel hers.

"My proposal...the clan denied it. I'm back to where I started. I'm going in circles." Her breath hitched as she fought a sob. "But I can't-" she swallowed. "How can I even begin to compare what hurts me to what hurts you?" Her hand stopped its path and she cupped his cheek gently. Tears filled her eyes again as eyebrows met in the middle.

His eyes fluttered open, seeking hers as understanding flashed through his features.

"If you were me, what would you do?"

The question was a familiar one that still surprised her even as he asked. She had never found the answer. Her white eyes were swimming as she pressed her lips together. "I-I...I'm not strong enough to know what I would do," she said. "If it were me."

Hinata hung her head, her hand falling from his hold as her arms dropped to her sides as she stood between his legs.

"I think you are."

The faint dripping of a leak in a pipe in the distance sounded like a ticking clock. "But what we would do and what we should do..." he trailed off. "Sometimes there's nothing we really can do."

For a moment, she thought she could see her own sadness reflected in his eyes before it was wiped away and became only numbness. With a hollow voice, he finished, "And then we just endure."

"But what if..." she trailed off in a whisper he had to strain to hear. "I don't want to anymore."

She lifted her head, waiting. But he had no answer for her. And there was just defeated exhaustion in his expression as he stared at their helpless hands between them.

They had broken him, she realized. After spending her days with him, she knew they had tamed him like they had wanted, until he was submissive to the village like they wanted. Like they had done every Uchiha before him, like they had done to her own clan and in turn its own members. It was a never-ending cycle. She might have never known it, without ever accepting this mission.

And now he was asking her if he had been punished enough? Hinata clutched at the fabric of her pants. The truth was, he would never stop being punished.

They never would.

"I think you have suffered enough," she whispered sincerely. She focused on the sound of his steady breathing, a sound to which she had grown so accustomed, a sound that now calmed her when her own thoughts tortured her. "What will you do?"

"I am going to travel around, learn."

"Away from Konoha, again?"

He nodded. "I need time to understand my feelings. How I should view the shinobi world, this world. Perhaps I'll be able to see things I couldn't see before. Things that can't be seen unless I do this. This will be a trip to atone for my sins (1).

"Your sins," she repeated skeptically.

He only stared at her, again with those emotionless eyes (submissive to Konoha, she reminded herself). "I hope you can bring a better outcome for your clan than I could mine."

"Maybe," she flinched. Perhaps she had been broken as well.

With practiced, gentle hands, she released the seals one by one until finally his face was clear from any markings, the bold lines on his skin fading gradually from sight. With her byakugan, she watched the flow of chakra return, weak, like the beginning of a trickling stream, but still there. And free.

"That will be all," she said, gathering her supplies. "They will be here within the hour. " She could feel him watching her, could tell he was testing the strength of his full senses.

"Hinata." She stopped before exiting the cell, the sound of her name sounding foreign with his voice. She turned and faced him. "Why did you not use the seals against me?"

Her face fell. "Why should I, when your eyes already cause you enough pain? Have already caused you enough pain?" She swallowed thickly. "And besides," their eyes met again for the last time. "The chain around your neck is tight enough."

She made her way back into the light, throat tight as she willed herself not to cry. The ache in her heart was now a weight around her own neck, pulling more and more. She saw herself in him and like him, as long as she had her eyes, she knew she would never escape either. Hinata wondered if she had to leave her eyes behind as payment for a life without chains.

And though there was no seal on her head, she knew she had already been caged.

1) Taken straight from the episode, dattebayo.

2) Anti-naruto ending, but a little bit of SasuHina in there. Mixing my passions, ya know

3) Errr, I also kind of took liberties on what the byakugan could see.

4) I've always wondered what Hinata was doing in the time between ch. 700 and the Last (besides probably doing missions? Maybe? But they're in a time of peace so how many mission realistically can they go on?), cuz Naruto still hadn't acknowledged her confession and her clan showed no signs of change other than that she or Hanabi weren't sealed yet and she never really had any sort of goal other than "get stronger" and be at Naruto's side/hold his hand…..idk. I just wished she was more passionate about like changing her clan for the better. Especially cuz like. Neji died.

5) So what should Hinata dooooo? Idk rEVoLUTIon?!

6) Or she just goes with Sasuke to wander the world (or become missing-nin AU). And they wander the world together and live happily (but not really happily because fck Konoha) ever after the end.

7) I wish I could write drabbles, but they all end up to be really long one-shots and I can never finish my multi-chapter series cuz of writer's block. Sigh. Also I lost my steam while trying to finish this up so sorry if it's kinda confusing and doesn't make sense. And please pardon my grammatical errors, I tried to edit it as much as I could everytime I tried to finish it up... the past 2 years...