Hannah Hyuga was sitting in the garden taking a rest, she did that a lot these days it seemed. She had been going in for treatments but she wasn't getting any better in fact she was just getting weaker and some days she couldn't even get out of bed because of the pain she was in was too much for her at times. She tried to put on a brave front along with her husband but she knew that even Hinata knew something was wrong. The doctors had told her that her conditioned had worsened and that taking her eyes was no longer an option.
It had run too far too fast in her and was now attacking her brain. But today was one of her better days, they were looking for a new healer from outside the village who might be able to help her. She didn't want to just give up and die she wanted to stay with her family. She watched the flowers blowing in the soft wind and she could see how beautiful the day was it was one of the things she loved about this village there was just this timeless beauty to it all.
"Hannah-sama."
She turned to see one of the Branch members bowing slightly to her.
"It is time for the meeting now."
"Yes I'll be right there," she stood up and walked there making sure that any sign of her weakness wasn't showing. She was a proud Hyuga and wouldn't look weak in front of others and besides she was the Matriarch of the clan and she couldn't be seen as weak. But it wasn't easy even though her husband had asked her to take a few days rest now and then but she didn't like being in a bed all day, she couldn't stand that.
She was just walking when she felt another stab of pain in her head but this time it was much worse, she felt sick to her stomach and her nerves were on fire. She only made a chocking sound before she fell to the ground. The Hyuga member was scared to death at this and ran to her calling her name, when he put her onto her back he noticed a trail of blood coming out of her nose and ears. She wasn't waking up and he yelled out for help.
Across the village in the ninja academy Hinata was spacing off as Iruka was going through a lecture on concealment. She had been having trouble focusing lately and she didn't know what to do, this thing with her mother was scaring her. Her mother kept saying that she would get better but she didn't seem to be, in fact she only seemed to be getting worse. She was scared and didn't know what to do. It didn't go unnoticed as well among her friends, as they saw the change in her as well.
Normally she was just the shy girl but now she was practically withdrawn most of the time, it was really worrying for them to see her like this. Naruto had even tried to cheer her up with his usual attitude and threw in a few pranks but she never once reacted. Of course everyone else did and he got his usual detention after school but he was still worried about her, he had talked to his dad and he didn't know much about what was going on either.
Naruto had talked with his close circle of friends and no one seemed to know other than she was worried about her mother. Ino's mother heard that Hinata's mother wasn't feeling well lately and no one could remember the last time she had came to the school to pick her up. Usually it was her father or her uncle.
So they would watch and see if they could try and be helpful for her, Naruto however wanted to know firsthand what the problem was. After all Hannah Hyuga was one of the first adults that he had made friends with and he was worried too if she was sick. He waited for the last bell to ring as he packed away his school stuff and saw her slowly walking to the door.
"Naruto you think that Hinata will be okay?"
He turned to see Ino there with Sakura looking just as worried.
"I don't know but I intend to find out for sure what's going on Ino." He told them and both girls nodded wishing him luck they knew how close the two were.
Naruto managed to catch up with Hinata as she was waiting for someone from her family and he walked up next to her, "Hinata-chan what's wrong? You've not been yourself for awhile and it's starting to worry everyone."
She blushed a bit and she looked at the ground, "I'm sorry I-I-I didn't mean to w-worry everyone. I'm just w-w-worried for my mother."
She then felt a warm hand grab hers and she gasped looking at him in surprise as she stared into his blue emotional eyes and she felt the warmth and comfort coming from them. She gave a small smile as she felt his strength reaching out to her.
"Hinata-sama," a familiar voice said to her.
They looked to see Neji there but there was something wrong. His face was grace and there was just something about him that said there was something really wrong going on.
"N-Neji-nichan?"
Neji looked crest fallen as he spoke the words to her, "Hinata there's...Something happened to Hannah-sama..."
It was then that Naruto felt Hinata grip his hand tightly and he squeezed it back letting her know that she wasn't alone.
-Hyuga compound-
Hinata ran into the compound hearing about her mother, thankfully Naruto was there with her as she wasn't sure if she could have made it back on her own. The sky was getting dark and she wanted to know where her mother was. Finally she saw her uncle there and ran over to him.
"Uncle Hizashi!"
He knelt down to the young girl as she came running up with tears in her eyes, he noticed his son and Naruto with her both had on looks that wanted to know what was going on. He sighed as he placed a hand on her shoulder seeing her nearly break out into sobs.
"What's wrong with mother?" She asked him.
"Hinata...As you know she's been very sick lately and, it looks like it's been getting worse. You're mother didn't want you to worry and she put on a brave face she wanted to fight this and hope that she could beat it, but..."
"She's going to be okay though right? She'll get better?" Naruto asked him and Hizashi couldn't lie to them. They were all going to be ninja one day and they needed to face the reality that people died. He just wished it wasn't such a harsh lesson on them especially his niece who was the kindest person he had known in his life. Looking at her face broke his heart inside and he sadly shook his head.
Hinata broke down into sobs as her uncle cradled her against him.
Inside one of the rooms of the mansion Hiashi was with his wife who was sleeping now as the healer had given her something to take away the pain she had been feeling. He looked down at his wife, she was so very pale and so very weak. They had both been hoping that they could have beaten this but the healer didn't look like he could do anything.
"I'm sorry Hiashi-sama but it's gone too far, I'm afraid that the disease has just spread too far, too fast. There is nothing more we can do other than make her comfortable."
Hiashi didn't want to admit that his wife was dying, there had to be something that could be done something that could save his wife. But he knew they had tried everything they could think of, they tried looking for specialist in this but the few they were able to find hadn't been able to do anything. Bloodline poisoning was a rare disease and so little research had been done into it, plus it was devastation sometimes it wasn't caught in time so there had been deaths that until after an autopsy revealed what had caused the death.
He walked over to her and stroked her long hair lovingly, "How much longer?"
"I'm sorry but it's in the final stages, she may or may not last the night."
Hiashi nodded his head closing his eyes and told him to leave. When the man was gone that's when he lost all the strength in his legs and he fell down next to her, he never cried in public but for the first time in years he felt the sting of tears on his face. He held her hand and kissed it knowing that this was the last night he would have with the woman that was the love of his life, the bright spot of his soul, the only woman he had and would ever love. She was everything to him, and the mother of his precious daughters and he couldn't bare to lose her.
It felt like someone was ripping his insides out, like he was falling and the end was not in sight. He didn't know how long he knelt there until he felt a hand gripping his own and he looked up into his wife's face.
"Please my love I don't want to see you like this," she told him.
"I can't help it, the healers..." he couldn't even finish the sentence.
"How long?" she asked him knowing full well what was happening to her. It was strange she had known she had been dying for months and yet here she was on death's door and she was strangely calm about it all. Maybe it was because she could finally stop fighting, she could finally just stop and rest, she was so very tired of fighting this. She was tired of the near constant pain, the tiredness, and the worry of what would happen to her and her family.
Now she didn't have to fight anymore and she knew her family would be in pain but it would endure. They were strong and she knew that they would live on, and it wasn't like she had a bad life, she found love and had two beautiful daughters. She just wished she just had a little more time, she wanted to see Hanabi take her first steps, to see her girls' first crush, first date, first heart break, first time she caught them doing something inappropriate with a boy like her own mother had with her.
She wanted to see them fall in love, she wanted to see them get married and to see grandchildren that she could spoil rotten. She wanted to be with her husband through all of this, to calm him down the first time the girls would bring a boy home. There was just so much but now there was just no more time for it.
"Please Hiashi-kun...I want to see my family. I want to see them one last time before the end."
He nodded his head and kissed her lips and she kissed them back, it would be their last kiss and she felt so sad at that. She wanted to say so much to him and yet there were only a few words that could say what she felt for him.
"I love you so much, you made me happy and I'm glad that I had you in my life."
"I love you just as much Hannah-chan, and I'll love you forever," he told her as he caressed her flawless face burning the feeling of it into his mind. He went to get the others and gather them, he found that Naruto was with his daughter and had thought of telling the boy to go back home but seeing how he was comforting his daughter maybe it was alright to let him stay. After all in a way he had become 'family' to the Hyugas, he had befriended both Hinata and Neji and he knew that despite his attitude and those pranks of his, he had a good heart.
He turned to see his brother there and he asked him to get Hanabi from the nanny that was looking after his youngest daughter. It was time to gather up the family for a final farewell.
Hinata came in seeing her mother propped up on her bed holding her baby sister, she looked so pale and weak and she was glad that she was holding Naruto's hand. She needed him here for this as she walked over to her bed side seeing her entire family in the room.
Hannah looked over at her oldest daughter and smiled at the sight of her holding the boy's hand. It was so cute and she was happy to see it, for one of the last things she wanted to see was that her daughter would be cared for.
"Hinata come closer."
"Y-y-yes mother," Hinata said trying not to break down again.
Hannah reached out and caressed her daughter's face and smiled at her, "I'm so sorry that I won't see the beautiful woman that you'll grow into Hinata my dear. I'm sorry that I won't see Hanabi either and I'm so sorry that I have to leave you all."
"No! I don't want you to go mother!" Hinata cried out clutching her mother's arm.
"I don't want to either dear but my time is nearly up and I wanted to spend my last moments with the people I love the most. I tried to stay strong and to keep myself alive, I never gave up but I guess I wasn't strong enough. Hinata just know that I'll always love you and your sister and that I'll always be watching."
Hinata just nodded her head crying her heart out, and Hannah looked over to Naruto seeing the red eyes the boy had from his own tears. She smiled at the boy with the mask on and she remembered that first day when a curious child with whisker marks on his face came up and asked who her daughter was who had been hiding behind her legs. They had been good friends for one another and Naruto had always been there for her daughter.
"Naruto-kun..." Hannah said to him.
"Y-yes Hannah-san?" Naruto said to her it was the few times he ever used the term 'san' with someone and meant it.
"Please look after Hinata for me, watch over her while I can't be here physically. Be there for her and always be someone she can depend on." She asked this child.
Naruto nodded, "I promise and I never break my promises..."
"I know that's why I asked," Hannah said with a small smile.
The night was a cold one, there was no moon in the sky as it was blocked by clouds and they were there to help make Hannah more comfortable. Hannah talked to her family and she didn't look sad she didn't want their last memory of her being sad. But then she was feeling so tired, she wanted to rest she just wanted to rest a bit before the end.
"I'm...so tired..." she said weakly.
"I know you are," Hiashi said trying to not chock on a sob that he was holding back and held her hand. "Rest now my love."
"I always loved you my husband, look after our family...I'm...I'm happy to have had...a family like this...I love you all so...very..." She closed her eyes and she looked like she was falling asleep. Hiashi with a shaking hand felt for his wife's pulse, there it was but it was weakening. It was slowing down more and more and then finally it stopped.
He waited for a minute but the life was gone, he used his Byakugan and he saw the fading light of her chakra, he watched as it slowly dimmed to nothing. Then he deactivated his eyes and hung his head as his wife was dead. Hanabi suddenly broke out crying in her uncle's arms almost as if she could sense that her mother was dead.
Hinata felt her eyes water up and when Neji tried to put a hand on her shoulder she turned and ran.
"Hinata!" Naruto called after her watching her go he turned to see Hinata's father fall gently to his knees holding his dead wife's hand. Hizashi looked at the two boys.
"Go and find her," he said to them gently and they nodded and ran off. He walked over to his brother and knew the pain he was going through, when he lost his wife it had nearly devastated him as well. He would let his brother grieve for his wife and then he would help him deal with her loss, he had helped him when his own wife had died and now it seemed fate was switching the positions. He walked out of the room to help and put Hanabi down for bet and maybe see if he could make the child less upset.
Naruto ran through the night looking for Hinata, he tried the playground first but she wasn't there and then he tried the ramen stand, the school, and anywhere else he could think of. He wanted to find her and he wanted to make sure she was safe. He was still trying to process that Hinata's mother was dead, it just didn't seem real to him. She had been one of the adults that always had been nice to him and she was everything that he figured a mother should be. Sometimes he was envious that Hinata had a mom like that but now she was gone.
He felt his tears sting his eyes feeling like someone had ripped something out of him, he hated this feeling but he had to search for Hinata. Then he remembered one of the areas they played together since they were younger it was an open area in a forested part of the village, his dad took him there to train sometimes for teaching him wilderness stuff, although to Naruto it had been more like camping with his dad. He had showed Hinata that once and he made a promise to her that they would camp out there one day.
He ran to that place and his lungs were burning and he stopped scanning the darkness. He thought that he had guessed wrong and was about to move on when sobbing noises got his attention. He followed them around a tree and there huddled there was Hinata crying. He hated seeing Hinata cry, he felt like crying himself and he did something he hadn't done in a long time, he pulled down his mask for her to see his face.
He bent down next to her and gently touched her shoulder, "Hinata-chan..."
Hinata jumped at the touch and turned to see who it was, she slowly saw in the moonlight that it was a boy but then it took her a moment to know who it was. It was Naruto but without his mask, she hadn't seen his face in over a year and she had missed it, she missed seeing his smiles and those whisker marks on his face. His blue eyes which usually were full of energy and happiness were filled with sadness. She tried to speak but her throat had a huge lump in it, and she just lunched herself into Naruto burying her face into his chest.
Naruto was shocked by her sudden movement but hearing her cry like this was tarring him up inside. He just held her close trying to comfort her but he felt his own tears falling as well. He cried for her pain, the pain of her family and for his own pain at having one of the precious people in his life taken away. They just held each other as they cried on each other trying to find comfort with each other.
"W-w-why!?" she sobbed into his chest, clutching at his clothing with her fist.
"I don't know," he said softly chocking back his tears holding her tightly to him.
"Why my mother?" she asked again.
"I wish I knew Hinata-chan, she was the best mother I knew." He told her as she was shaking a lot from her crying. "I know this; I wish I had a mother like that. I never knew my mother but there were times that I wished I had Hannah-san as a mother. You were so lucky to have a mother like her."
Hinata buried herself even more into Naruto, his warm body helped to keep the cold she was feeling away, and it wasn't just the cold of the night but from the death of her own mother that was affecting her. She didn't want to let go of Naruto, she felt safe in his arms, she felt like he could help keep the pain from swallowing her whole. She felt his hand stroking her hair and her back and she cried herself into exhaustion.
Naruto heard that she had stopped and looked down to see that she wasn't awake anymore he pulled on his mask and hoisted her onto his back as he started to carry her all the way back to her home. It was long and hard since he wasn't used to having all that weight on his back but he endured. He wanted to see her home and when he got to the gates the guards let him in immediately as they went to send word to stop looking for her. Naruto found Neji who had on a sad look in his eyes, they looked at one another not sure what they could say in a moment like this.
"Can you help me put her to bed?" Naruto asked him, he nodded his head as he led the way without a word. They got to her room and Neji pulled back the covers as Naruto placed her in there, they took off her shoes and covered her up. Either one knew what they could do for her, although Naruto didn't want to go home he didn't want to leave her alone. Thankfully his father came to find him and when he learned of everything they both stayed to look after her for the night.
Hinata's father had not been seen, he had been too wrapped up in his own pain to function in public for the moment. His brother was standing guard over his room with a grim look on his face, the loss of Hannah would hit the clan hard but it hit family the hardest. She had always treated him and Neji well and he respected her, to lose your wife was the greatest pain a husband could endure just as he knew his twin was enduring this dark night.
The next day and for the rest of the week Hinata and Naruto didn't come to school, their friends found out by the end of the day why when Iruka told the class about Hinata's mother. Those that knew Hinata felt horrible for the girl. Someone was asked to bring the school work to Naruto and Hinata so they didn't fall behind and Ino and Sakura were the first to do it. Everyone went to visit Hinata the next day and they found her with Naruto as he was helping her through it all. They had never seen Hinata look like that in their lives and the image would be burned into their memories.
They were there for her and even though she didn't show it, she was thankful for the support of her friends. Naruto refused to leave her side for long periods of time, for the first few days he actually stayed with the Hyugas in a spare room as Hinata had trouble sleeping. He would always be there for her and she would use him to cry on.
After the funeral Hinata was in a deep depression, Neji knew what it was like to lose a mother at a young age himself was a very strong comfort for his cousin as he knew his father was helping Hinata's father as well. That whole year was tough all around on Hinata and her friends kept by her side and Naruto most of all was always there for her. It took time but Hinata finally did smile again and laughed again, but the pain would always be there for her.
Naruto could see when she was starting to feel that pain and would do everything to cheer her up. But by the end of the first year in school Hinata had managed to cope with her mother's death and was thankful for having so many people there for her.