Distant Echoes

52 - A new meeting for Hinata

The sun was shining that morning in August. Five days had passed since they left the Snowland. They bathed in seawater or rivers almost every day, the heat seemed to hold little both. Sasuke observed Hinata walking slowly by the sea, her feet leaving footprints in the sand, her long, flowing, dark hair caressed by the breeze. Now she was signaling him to join her. Sasuke shook his shoulders before getting up from the towel. He detested that excessive heat, there was no cooling except in the water. They had bought new bandages for the rebuilt arm, it was frighteningly white under all those bandages.

- It's too bad he can't tan even that reconstructed limb - Hinata said as if she had read his mind as he saw him approaching her.

- Hmm - mumbled Sasuke, when he was in front of her. - Does that bother you? -

- No - she replied, shaking his head. - I always swaddled you - she said softly. - That was just a consideration. -

Sasuke went into the water with her and Hinata stood up on her toes and hugged him, tickling his neck with her breath, the next moment she squeezed her black locks between her fingers and the more she went out of balance towards him the more she found herself holding her to prevent her from moving away, while she laughed at her skin. Her feet rubbed the bottom, yet it was an implosive warmth that she felt, a warmth that gave the feeling of being at home with her. And if part of him hated his addiction to the ivy, Sasuke thought kissing her was as natural as breathing. And yet he hated her need.

Shortly after, she swam, trying to clear her mind and soaked more than an hour with her, until they entered the woods to escape the midday sun, which she beat too much. When they finished eating what they had bought, Sasuke decided to take advantage of those trees to prepare targets, training a little. Hinata opened her drawing album while waiting for him to return. And it was perhaps half an hour before I felt the signature of his chakra again.

- Hey - said Sasuke, as Hinata lifted her face from her drawing. - Ready to hit targets? -

- Do we still hit them today without using our powers? -

- Yes.-

They had that habit in those days, they didn't use their eye powers, it was more challenging to train without those facilities. Both leapt from branch to branch, as stumps appeared to strike. Sasuke then crossed his arms as Hinata drank from her canteen.

- Train with Lightning now - he told her monochord.

Hinata sighed. Not a day had passed without training with the Chidori.

While he stared at her movements, she concentrated the Lightning in her palm, Sasuke wanted her to learn quickly, but it wasn't that easy.

- Hmm.-

- What? -

- You're doing it wrong - Sasuke said, standing next to she. - Look at me with the Byakugan activated, as I call Lightning.-

Hinata did as she said and Sasuke accumulated electricity in his palm. The next minute she tried to do it, she had understood more by looking at him with her power and the results in fact did not delay to arrive.

- Look look! - she exclaimed enthusiastically, while the Lightning was increasingly luminescent in his palm. - Have I not improved? -

- Yes - Sasuke confirmed, smiling.

- This Chidori can also be used for medical things in my opinion as well as to destroy - conjectured Hinata. How could Master Kakashi teach such a dangerous technique to Sasuke, who years before was a child wounded by the thirst for revenge? Hinata really thought that Master Kakashi had done something stupid.