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Adyen
Author of 19 Stories |
Chapter 3: Determination vs Reality
By Adyen
Many people told her that it wasn't practical for a ninja to wear something that made noises but for some reason, a majority of them never did figure out how she sneaked up on them without their knowing.
Naruto himself haven't changed much. Even with Hinata practicing with him, he only grew slightly in terms of height. Of course, that was only when Hinata wasn't punishing him for doing something stupid: like the time he painted each of the faces on the Hokage Mountain a different color - one of them was painted to look like a Hyuuga.
Near Hinata's 11th birthday, the pair made a rather amusing discovery (at least, in Hinata's point of view).
"No, I can't! I tried to dispel the jutsu, but nothing happens!" Naruto said, half annoyed and half scared. "I mean, I'm a guy, right? There wasn't some weird jutsu that turned me into a guy even though I was born a girl, right?"
Hinata fell backwards while laughing. They were sitting in a small clearing in a private training area the Hyuuga used, while Naruto was trying to explain to Hinata how he couldn't turn back, and that she had started bleeding for some reason.
"Hinata-chan! It's not funny!" Naruto whined, which only set Hinata off more. The rest of the day was spent between Naruto trying to figure out what's wrong and Hinata wondering if she should get someone to check if something's wrong with Naruto - even if the boy turned girl firmly said that she'd rather die before going to the doctors.
After a few days, Naruto was able to turn back to his own self. In the months ahead, they found that the jutsu somehow keeps track of how many days they spend in those different bodies, and Naruto would spend a few random days stuck as a girl and barely able to use any jutsu. Hinata just laughed and said that it was exciting since unless they keep track, they'll never know when Naruto's problem would come up - though he should stop using that jutsu after they graduate.
"Come on... it'll be exciting!" Hinata said, trying to convince Naruto to continue using the jutsu for now. "And, it'll make 'them' harder to connect you and your female self."
The emphasis on 'them' was not lost on Naruto. A week or so into their relationship, most (minus a very few who had no comments) of the Hyuuga elders did not want Hinata anywhere near Naruto. After seeing his jutsu, she had convinced him to pretend to be a girl so they could stay together in public. It was only after having another Hyuuga commenting on Naruto as Hinata's friend of the same sex and age that she realized Naruto's jutsu had somehow fooled even her clan's legendary eyes.
The fact that Naruto was having a period only confirms her own theory behind the jutsu.
"But..." Of course, this is still a boy having a period. "I mean, I don't want to randomly have this... thing..."
Hinata rolled her eyes and tried to remind herself that this was Naruto. "And you think I do?"
"Ah..." At least Naruto knew when to shut up now.
Most of the ninjas at the Academy had gotten used to seeing a female Naruto dragging her feet into class and Hinata ignoring her for the rest of the day. Between the students and teachers, though, they wonder if Hinata didn't really swing 'that' way as well, and was just using Naruto to have the best of two worlds.
Of course, nobody was STUPID enough to say anything like that: not after the last teacher who said it had his home blown up due to a freak power-outage that somehow caused his water-pipes to explode and trip all the ninja traps that he just so happened to have kept near the pipe.
At least, that's how the story goes.
Some of the main branch members were not thrilled about that, but since it was not time to actually decide anything about the heir(s) anyways, they allowed it for now.
Hinata spent much of her time at home with Hanabi, teaching her the things expected of her as Heir and the arts of a shinobi. Hiashi trained Hanabi in the Gentle Fist, as well as the uses of the Byakugan as there was no repeat of what happened to Hinata. What happens in the dojo during that time has been kept secret even to other members of the Hyuuga household, but household rumors range from Hinata was being tortured during those 'training sessions' to Hinata doing the 'whip and leather' - teaching Hanabi the finer points of lesbianism while Hiashi drools in a corner.
No-one was suicidal enough to even THINK of it near the three of them.
It was a month after Naruto's birthday that the Academy exams were taken. Unfortunately for Naruto, the day before he had pulled a prank on a Hyuuga who had spoke of said rumor - and unable to explain WHY he had pulled one on someone part of her household - Hinata had forced him to 'be girl' for a week.
"Umm... Iruka-sensei?" Naruto asked with a flush on her face. "Can't I take this again tomorrow or something?"
Iruka frowned. Sure he's USED to seeing Naruto as a female, but it was still weird to see the boy in front of him as a girl. It makes him think of things he'd rather not think of even if he's pretty sure it was just a henge.
Shaking his head, he answered, "Sorry Naruto, but are you going to ask a ninja to hold off their attack until some time that's convient for you? You're just going to have to do this today like everyone else is."
Naruto growled but held her word in. The blush on her face turned redder as the exam started.
Everyone else had finished their exams except for her, and both Iruka and Mizuki were mystified as to why Naruto was doing so badly. Normally, Naruto did badly on the theoreticals but made up on the practicals. Today, she was doing badly on both, and if she didn't shape up on this last test...
Hinata was watching from the side and was muttering something about "only him" and "what impossible timing", while many of the female students were also squriming uncomfortablely while glancing at Naruto. Seeing her during the practicals reminded them of something rather uncomfortable, but they all denied that it was possible.
Naruto took a deep breath and placed her hands together. "Bunshin!" She yelled, and a puff of smoke bellowed from beneath her. Moments later, two very much naked female Naruto-figures with what looks to be badly drawn faces were writhering on the floor, their arms and legs in wrong angles and unable to support the heavy bodies.
Iruka pinched his nose quickly and yelled, "NARUTO! FAIL!!!!!"
The two bunshins puffed away as Naruto dispelled them. "But sensei!!!!"
"You can do better than that!" Iruka yelled. "If you don't want to be a ninja, just say so!"
"Wait a moment, Iruka." Mizuki tried to pacify the rather annoyed teacher. "I'm sure Naruto has his... I mean, her reasons. Why don't you give her the chance?" He looked at Naruto questioningly, as if giving her the chance to explain.
"I... Uh... I..." Naruto stuttered as she looked at the teachers and students. She blushed full red and screamed out, "ARG!!!" before running out of the classroom, past a Hinata who was shaking her head and looked as though she wanted to follow him out.
"Hinata, wait." Iruka ordered. Hinata stopped and turned to the teacher. "Do you know what's bothering Naruto?"
Hinata glanced between the exit and Iruka before blushing hard. "Uh... I'll go check on Naruto. Please have my Head Protector sent to my home." She quickly dashed out, ignoring Iruka's protest and the other student's curious look.
"Well, that went well." Mizuki sarcasticly muttered...
Hinata found Naruto sitting crossed-legged and concentrating on a large scroll. The boy turned girl was frowning and had her fingers in a cross shape and muttering something indistinctively.
"Naruto?" Hinata asked as Naruto jumpped from her girlfriend's voice. "Where have you been? And what's that?"
"Oh, heh... Come take a look." Naruto said as she waved Hinata towards her. "Some of these jutsus are really impressive..."
Curious, Hinata approched the girl and glanced down at the scroll. At first glance, she couldn't figure heads or tails about it; after asking a few questions, she started seeing how the first jutsu, 'Kage Bunshin' worked.
"This is... pretty advanced. Looks like an advanced scroll for the 'kage' type jutsu we learned earlier this year." Hinata admited as she sat cross-legged besides Naruto. She opened the scroll further down to take a look at all the other jutsus there. "Who gave it to you?"
The small pause of silence was enough for Hinata to know something was wrong. "Na-Ru-To?" She asked with a squeeky cute voice. "Where did you get this?"
"Errr..." Somehow, the sitting Naruto managed to inch away from her girlfriend. "I borrowed it?" She tried to answer without making it seem like it's a bad thing. She failed.
"WHERE did you borrow this?" Hinata sweetly asked, pretty sure that she won't like the answer.
Naruto rubbed the back of her head. "Eh heh heh..." She tried to stall for some time. Hinata's glare told her that she's not going to get it. "Well... You know how I failed the test?"
Hinata nodded for her to continue. "Ah... Mizuki-sensei found me afterwards and we had a talk. After I... er... 'explained' why I failed, he said that if I can... um... 'borrow' this scroll without anyone figuring out it was me, then he'll treat this as a pratical test and pass me."
Narrowing her eyes, Hinata nodded with a 'ya right' kind of look. "And?"
"Uh... IhadtotakeitfromtheHokage'sroomwithoutanyonenoticing." Naruto blurted out, hoping to buy some time to figure out what to do.
Too bad Hinata is rather experienced in figuring out Naruto's single-word blurbs.
"You WHAT?!" Hinata screeched. "How COULD you! You could get expelled from the village for that!"
Naruto winced. "I'm sure Mizuki-sensei had his reasons..." She tried to pacified her angry girlfriend.
Hinata lifted an eyebrow and glanced down at the scroll, wondering why she's always so expressive whenever she's around Naruto. "Naruto... This is a very advanced ninja scroll. If it was a test, then it would probably be a fake scroll, which means that Mizuki used you to steal it!"
"Correct, and I do have to thank you for that."
Both Naruto and Hinata turned to the source of the voice. Mizuki stood on top of a tree-branch with a giant throwing star strapped onto his back. Hinata immediately snapped the scroll up and roll it with a simple movement that all students were taught in case they had to steal documents that were open.
"Now, please hand over the scroll and MAYBE I won't hurt you." He said with a small smile as Naruto and Hinata backed up a bit.
Hinata brushed her hair back with one hand and passed the scroll to Naruto with the other, her bells making a sweet twinkling noise as they jiggled along. She glared at the man who dared to use her boyfriend to do his dirty deed. "You could do it anyways if we handed it over." She said.
Naruto took a step forwards and nodded. "Ya! We're ninjas of Konoha, and your ass needs to be kicked for tricking me like that!"
Mizuki tsked and shook his head. "If only you didn't find him..." He muttered. "Ah well. We can't have any witnesses, now can we?" He drew his large throwing star and made a single seal. He threw the weapon and yelled out the strongest Jutsu, and the one that would take care of the brats quickest, that he knew, "Let me show you something that they don't teach you in the academy! Shuriken kage bunshin no jutsu!"
As Mizuki was drawing his large throwing star, Hinata narrowed her eyes and phased through the seals required to activate her Akaigan. Just before he threw the weapon, her eyes turned red and a small chime came from her bells that passed un-noticed by Mizuki. However, the teacher stared in shock as his jutsu seemingly failed as no extra throwing stars popped into existance, and both Hinata and Naruto easily dodged the single projectial.
Naruto threw his own kunai in mid-air which Mizuki easily dodged, while Hinata tried to get closer with him. However, Mizuki quickly got over his shock and tried to circle around her instead, trying to get to the scroll before Naruto runs away with it.
"Naruto! Don't let him get the scroll!" Hinata yelled as she moved to intercept, only to find that it was a bunshin when she surprisingly landed a hit on him. The cloud of smoke obsured her vision for a moment, and she mentally cursed that she didn't have her family's Baykugan that would easily pierce through the smoke. She jumpped to the side as a trio of shurikens ripped through the place where she was just seconds ago, and found that Mizuki had taken advantage of her dodge to pass her.
She glanced towards Naruto and, to her dismay, noticed that Naruto had not ran with the scroll, but was trying to attack Mizuki head on. "Naruto!" She cried as she tried to catch up with Mizuki and maybe catch him in a pincer, but dodging the shurikens had gave Mizuki just enough distance to reach Naruto first.
With one of Naruto's hand being occupied with holding the scroll, the teacher quickly managed to knocked Naruto back into a tree with his attack, trying to snag the scroll in the process. Luckily, the blond somehow managed to hold onto the scroll even as she went flying, giving Hinata a few seconds to try to reach Mizuki; She could tell that he plans to just grab the scroll and run, as ANBU will become involved as soon as the scroll is found missing.
Just as she thought, Mizuki quickly attempted to follow up his attack by dashing towards Naruto. Naruto winced slightly from the crash landing and got into a defensive position, but a sudden line of kunais forced Mizuki to dodge right and abort his attack.
"Naruto!" Iruka yelled as he jumpped down from another tree. He quickly launched another spread of kunais at Mizuki, who easily dodged it again and grabbed his oversized throwing star while he was at it.
"Shuriken kage bunshin no jutsu!"
This time the jutsu worked and a half a dozen of the large throwing stars appeared, flying towards landing chuunin. Iruka quickly dodged to the side while protecting his vital points, but the ninja stars were just too large to dodge, and two of them managed to hit him on the arm and leg. Unfortunately, they were ones that were summoned, so they faded away after dealing damage and leaving holes that had blood flowing out.
"Iruka-sensei!" Both Naruto and Hinata exclaimed as they took up positions in front of the wounded teacher.
"Looks like the game's come to an end." Mizuki sneered as he looked at the two academy students trying to protect their teacher.
"Naruto, Hinata, go find an ANBU or the Hokage!" Iruka grunted out as he stood wobbiliy on his wounded leg. "You can't let Mizuki take the Scroll!"
Mizuki laughed as he said, "Oh stop with the heroics. You know you hate the brat as much as everyone else does."
"What?" Naruto exclaims, eyes wide. Hinata merely frowned, but a ninja can see that she's grinding her teeth in anger.
"Don't believe him, Naruto. He's just trying to get the scroll from you!" Iruka reminded her.
Mizuki laughs again. "Oh really? Maybe he'll see 'the truth' after I tell him who he really is."
Iruka's eyes widened in shock. "You wouldn't dare!"
Mizuki snorted. "HA. Naruto, a rule was created after your birth 12 years ago. It is a rule that only you cannot find out about."
"A rule that's only for me?" Naruto, forgetting momentarily about their current situation due to her wonder. Hinata, on the other hand, seemed to get a headache as she was not quite sure what she's feeling.
"Mizuki! Stop!" Iruka yelled, trying to stop him from continuing. He pressed his wounds and tried to quickly stop the bleeding.
"What can you do to stop me?!" Mizuki laughed as he continued. "You see, the rule is to not tell you that you're the the Kyuubi! That is the reason why no matter what you look like, we still hate you! You're the one who killed Iruka's parents and destroyed our village, so it doesn't matter what you look like, you're still the demon that destroyed our lives all those years ago!"
Naruto's face paled to the point where it seemed like there was no blood going to it. "No... it can't be..."
"Yes! And I'll kill you now for all those lives you destroyed back then!" Mizuki hissed as he brought his hands up, each hand holding four smaller shurikens, and yelled, "Shuriken kage bunshin no jutsu!"
The sudden attack of shurikens caught everyone off-guard... That is, everyone except Hinata. Before Iruka could move to protect the two students, Hinata had jumpped forwards in front of the line of attack.
"Kaiten!"
Hinata had been trying to use the Hyuuga ultimate defense for the last six months, and had been told repeatedly that since she did not have the Byakugan, she would not be able to see her opponent or resist becoming dizzy afterwards. She had still attempted it, but haven't had much success with those attempts.
Even if the technique was not a perfected form, most of the shurikens popped out of existance upon touching the white-ish blue dome created by Hinata's chakra. Unfortunately, more than a few pierced through the incomplete technique.
When the sphere finally ended, Hinata was kneeling on the much smoother ground, cuts all over her body and had a long scar that ran across her bare forehead that was bleeding heavily.
"I..." Hinata tried to hold her focus from all that spinning and swallowed. She was starting to get light headed, and knew it was from losing all the blood that was splattered all across from her Kaiten. She turned to look at Naruto and idlely noticed that some of her blood had managed to hit him on the face. "I don't care what Naruto looks like... no matter who he is... what he does..." Her world started spinning more, and she knew it wasn't because of the dizzyness from using the Kaiten. "All I know, is that I love him, and nothing will change that. Not now, not 16 years later."
She tried to stand, but felt her sense of balance become lost in the many trickles of blood dripping out of her body. As her eyes lost the red color, she noticed Naruto looking at her and then at the hand that she had used to wiped off the liquid that had smack her in her face. Hinata's last throught as she lost consciousness was that a female Naruto looked cute with his eyes all wide and panicky.
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