Alchemy

9,3) ADMITTANCE

[A/N: Merry Christmas. Don't forget to check the full A/N: in the info chapter after this.]

⚜️⚜️⚜️⚜️⚜️⚜️⚜️⚜️⚜️⚜️⚜️⚜️⚜️⚜️

Hinata:

I jumped out of bed rustling the sheets. Relax-breathe-it was just a dream. No a nightmare.

But as a low roar sounded outside I knew that it was not a dream but a premonition.

As I lay awake I could hear it-something scampering it the hallways leaving absolute destruction in its wake.

A part of me, a curious part, wondered what it was but deep down I knew.

I knew what lurked in the darkness of this starless night. I looked over at my bedroom door which was bolted with a myriad of locks and latches of many different shapes and sizes.

It was but one of the precautionary measures Naruto had insisted upon. Naruto-

"Who are you? What are you?" I whispered.

Those questions amongst others swirled around in my mind during the series of weeks I had been here.

However a part of me knew exactly what every presence lurked in these hallways. The same feeling pricked into my skin, raising the hair on the back of my neck, that had been here on the night I had arrived.

The thing that prowler under Naruto's skin and and preyed on his mind was lose-and rampaging.

I had forgotten about it. It was easy to forget about it everytime Naruto idly joked or smiled. It was easy to forget about it when it miraculously hadn't made an appearance since I had arrived.

I had thought... thought that perhaps through some shear miracle Naruto had managed to fully control it.

I thought that it was a thing of the past.

It was easy to forget about the immense severity of our circumstances every time I gazed into Naruto's immensely deep blue eyes as if they were a sea of stars which I was trying to fathom into constellations.
Every time I looked at his grown yet simultaneously childish face it was very easy to forget.

Yes an ignorant part of my mind had indeed forgotten but my mind could never forget.

I still awoke covered in sweat at the vision of those crimson eyes that burned hotter than the sun. I still shivered as if I could feel the sensation of those claws being dragged across my skin tearing it apart as if it were mere paper.

If I listened hard enough I could still hear its deep laughter at the sick crack of my bones echoing.

But that wasn't Naruto. He could fight it. I know he could. I could help him.... No I would help him.

I was finally free-free of all obligation, my doubts, my insecurities-but my freedom meant nothing without him.

It meant nothing without the one who had helped me. The one I had fallen in love with.

Fallen in love with.
I think I had realised the fact that I liked him for a while now. Perhaps that day when he rescued me in the snow many years ago I had begun to develop my long-lasting crush on him. But it was during my days here that I had grown to love him.

Freedom was a light, airy feeling that was both reassuring and exhilaratingly terrifying.

I smiled but my smile quickly faltered as I pictured two pairs of lavender eyes.

Neji. Hanabi.

I was free but they were not.

Selfish. I was so selfish not to think of them these entire few weeks.