A strange new life

5.18

I stared at the wooden ceiling of Yamato’s mobile home base. I was on my bed, tucked in comfy warm blankets. That had been a nice touch from the stoic jounin. My evaluation of him had to change a bit. I once thought he had no dad energy, but now I knew the truth: he just had hidden dad energy.

Time had been hard to keep up with. I wasn’t about to lie and say I didn’t remember anything. There was no timely loss of sanity this time for me. No passing out and dealing with dreams, no merciful oblivion of unconsciousness. I was all too aware that some part of my mind couldn’t deal with what we found in the lab. That same part refused to let me forget.

My throat was a stinging, agonising mess, that not even my enhanced regeneration had been able to keep up with. Not when I screamed for hours, until I couldn’t anymore. After that, I just hadn’t the will to move. Yamato carried me out of the Hideout, tucked me in bed. I didn’t resist, even if the screaming hadn’t stopped.

I did, however, hear Yamato’s explanation of the situation to Sai and Hayase.

He was kind enough to fudge the truth. I wasn’t having a mental breakdown, no, in his version of events I had fallen prey to an insidious trap when trying to enter the labs. For that reason, that wing the hideout was off-limits for now. Too dangerous to explore alone. My guess was that Yamato wanted to keep the others away from learning about the clones.

It was a good plan. That was a disaster waiting to happen.

Was that Orochimaru’s plans here? An army of cloned Hyuga? Somehow, that didn’t seem to fit my idea of the murder-hobo. He was evil, not burdened by morals or sentimentality, he didn’t mind killing, nor did he mind bringing back the dead. He didn’t mind using people, then discarding them. But an army of clones? Maybe I was jumping the gun here.

How long had it been since I was placed on this bed? I considered getting up, but just wasn’t feeling up to it. My eyes were dry, and stung every time I tried to blink. My stomach roiled. It felt like I was about to spill it at any time.

There was a cup and wooden jug of water by the bed, a bowl of some soup I couldn’t identify. I really wanted a sip of water, but the cup was too far away. The effort to get up and take it didn’t seem worth the hassle of getting out of the bed.

While I contemplated what I should do, the door to my bedroom opened. Yamato walked in, holding a bowl. He walked to my bed, removed the old bowl, placed the new one there. Steam billowed out from the container, the smell of veggies and cooked meat reached me.

My stomach protested. I looked away.

“Hinata-san?” Yamato called out.

I didn’t answer. If I tried to talk, I’d start screaming again. Probably. And I was too tired to talk, really. I just wanted to sleep. Not that I was feeling sleepy. Yamato stayed for a moment longer, tried to talk a few more times, but in the end, he left me alone. Which I was glad for.Nôv(el)B\\jnn

This state of events couldn’t keep going. I knew that. I was on a mission, and I didn’t want to mess things up so much we had to abandon our orders and return. More than that, I needed to go back inside that lab. Whatever else were Orochimaru’s plans for the place, I couldn’t let go of the opportunity to learn more about the man’s seals. I still had one active seal trying to kill me. It hadn’t caused me any problem yet, but I wasn’t about to leave a primed bomb inside my body.

Which brought me back to what I had to do. But first, I somehow had to deal with my other self.

In all these years, there was this part of me that reacted to things and I often thought about that part as the original Hinata. I had no idea if that was true, or if it was just a representation of all the things I was suppressing. In the end, it didn’t matter right now. That other side of me was in a constant state of panic, which took all my will power to appease. Seeing other cloned me’s in that lab freaked the shit out of me.

Worse were the questions it raised. Was I the original Hinata? Was I just another clone?

I didn’t think I was a clone of the original. I had memories from even before being kidnapped. There was this gap, between being taken at age of three, and waking up at age of five. But I knew those memories weren’t gone, just suppressed. Part of those came again to the front of my mind after Orochimaru’s attack in the Forest of Death. Back then, I thought it was a genjutsu, but what if it wasn’t? What if being subjected to Orochimaru’s killing intent was the trigger that unsuppressed and brought those memories back?

What if that first day when Kakashi-sensei rescued me wasn’t when I first woke up in this world?

All of those questions were important, but not urgent. Right now, I had to find peace with myself. I tried to go about it in the most simple way I could.

Did I care if I was a clone? Honestly, I didn’t. It didn’t change anything for me. I was still myself. If one really thought about it, wasn’t the act of conception just an organic way of creating a copy of two other people, mixing their genes? Framed like that, being a vat grown clone wasn’t something that bothered me. Everyone was just a copy of two other people. Being a copy of Hinata also wasn’t bad. She was, after all, my second favorite female character in the show. I loved her. She only lost to best girl Ino.

Did I care about the clones in the lab? Yes, I did. But mostly, I was sad and angry, frustrated? Not about them being created, but at the loss of life, and the despair of it all. It seemed that, when the complex lost power, the clones drowned inside their container, never even given the chance to live. That, above all else, filled me with so much angst I wanted to kill someone. Someone called Orochimaru. Maybe someone called Kabuto, or Danzo. Those fuckers.

Given this new development, was I going to give up on my ninja life? I remember the Third asking me this when I was five. At the time, I had the option to put all that away and just be a civilian. I don’t think it would have worked, not with all that I knew now. Danzo wouldn’t have left me alone. The Hyuga clan probably wouldn’t either. But more than that, I couldn’t see myself living a normal life anymore. No, I wasn’t ready to hang my kunai and become a normal girl. I still wanted to do more awesome ninja stuff.

How was I going to solve this problem, then?

I ignored all the world shattering, mind-boggling and trauma inducing revelations and questions. Put away my anger, and resignation, and sadness at the loss of life. I –very reluctantly– shelved my burning need to be a good shinobi and obey my orders. In the end, what did I want right now?

Unburdened by all those thoughts, the answer was simple, and sad.

I just wanted someone to hold me.

With difficulty, I climbed to a sitting position. While I was there, I stretched toward the small table by the bed, took the cup and sipped the water. It hurt going down, but that was fine. I placed the cup down again, settled once more on the bed.

It was ironic that my solution in the end involved clones, when this whole mess also started with clones. My hands flashed, my chakra churned. In front of me, there was another me. Round face, black eyes, black circle under her eyes, face pale and wan.

This time, I didn’t change her name. No cute, endearing nicknames today. Today, we faced the truth. “Hinata-chan,” I whispered.

My other self nodded. Tears welled in her eyes.

I scuttled closer, pulled her on a tight hug. She placed her arms around me, trembled at the contact, or maybe I shuddered, I wasn’t sure anymore. We didn’t talk, there was no need to. We went from sitting down to laying on the bed, still clinging to each other. I wasn’t sure how to convince myself everything was alright, even if I knew it wasn’t. At some point, I started to shower her face with small kisses. Her forehead, eyelids, cheeks, nose, chin. It wasn’t the passion-filled kind. I just couldn’t think of any other way of saying what I needed to say.

There was this old adage, actions speak louder than words. I just wanted me to understand that I still loved myself.

At some point, not sure when, we fell asleep. I had a nice dream.