Naruto : Struggle Of Childhood

Dark Night

Hyuuga Compound: 10:34 PM

Hyuuga Hinata stood in horror as she watched her cousin stand in front of the elders. It seemed like the entire Hyuuga Head Family was there to see his punishment. For the six year old girl, the whole thing was overwhelming. She remembered the first time she saw the Cage Bird Seal activate when she was three. It had frightened her so much that sometimes, she would still have nightmares about it.

It wasn't like Neji had really done anything wrong, Hinata found herself thinking, he had only forgotten to address her as Hinata-sama. But it seemed that the elders would take any excuse to remind the Branch Family of what the Head Family was capable of.

Neji stood defiantly in front of the elders, headed by Hyuuga Hiashi, Hinata's father. His white eyes displayed only one emotion: hatred.

"You know the punishment for insubordination," Hiashi was saying coldly, "and you have seen if before."

Hinata's stomach clenched.

Neji's eyes found Hinata's and held them. She could feel the malice in his gaze, yet for some reason, she wasn't able to return it. Her father would have told her she was weak, he would have been angry that she looked at him with sadness, but it was impossible for her not to. Neji was the closest thing Hinata had to a brother, and strangely enough, he was the only one who truly understood the emotions she felt. That was why she couldn't hate him. Because he had felt the hopeless, frustrated anger that she had all her life. The anger that sometimes reduced Hinata to tears when she was alone after a training session had gone badly.

He was probably the only one who had known her feelings when she had been shuffled aside in favor of Hanabi, who now stood at her father's side with an unreadable face.

She looked sadly at Neji, wishing that she wasn't such a failure.

Maybe if she was strong, like she was supposed to be, she could stop this madness.

"Have you anything to say before the seal activates?" Hiashi asked.

"I have nothing to say to you, murderer!" Neji spat.

Hiashi's eyes narrowed, and Neji crumpled to the ground screaming and twitching.

Hinata felt bile rising in her throat. This was just like the time when she was three, and she had watched Neji's father writhing on the ground in pain. She felt hot tears coming to her eyes as she watched. Hinata didn't have to look around to know that the looks on the others faces were cold, hard, and completely uncaring. Her hands clenched into fists and she turned her head away.

Hinata knew she was weak, and she knew that she should feel satisfaction that her cousin was getting punished for his insubordination. She knew that Hanabi would never have felt the way that she did, and her father would look down on her further if she tried to stop him. She was too weak to be a true member of the Head Family. She remained unbranded simply because she would be more useless as a Branch Family member. She would be too weak to accept that way of life anymore then the one she had been born into.

But was it so bad to be weak?

The through sprang up in Hinata's mind before she could repress it. Was it so bad to be compassionate? Was it so wrong to be kind?

"No," Hinata whispered, so quietly that no one heard it, "I can't believe it is."

She remembered when, before he father had given up on her, she had been asked a question in her training.