Frailty

AN: Very simple style, very simple fic, very straightforward. Very disliked by moi. (Probably because of the simple style. I'm always very lost without random pretty metaphors. Hah, I'm a metawhore! …Right)

Enjoy!

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Hinata stood at her father's elbow as he drank himself into oblivion. She hadn't moved or spoken or given much indication that she existed at all, kept her breathing shallow and didn't fidget. After a time, it seemed that he'd forgotten that she was there, save that with their eyes, the only things they didn't see were the things they wanted to stay blind to.

Hinata had never seen her father like this before, never known that Hyuuga Hiashi had his own nightmares, and it scared her more than anything had ever before. It scared her more than Neji-niisan's screams, when the curse seal was activated with an intent to cause pain. It scared her more than when she caught her mother looking fondly at a member of the Branch House, and how her father glared at her furiously with his lips pressed into a thin line when he noticed.

The Hyuuga were genetically perfect, but their personas could not boast such stigma. They had their flaws, their sins, their strengths. The weaknesses that would eventually push them off the pedestal of grace, that would give them cause to stumble until they fell hard to earth.

And though she saw the tears on his cheeks, by way of her fledgling Byakugan, she didn't comment, for she didn't have anything to say.

"This," her father began after a while, and she snapped quickly to attention, bridling her wandering eyes. "This is how we must live, my daughter. Do not forget it." He turned to her so fast that she missed his movements, and caught her chin and jerked her close, and she squeaked and almost toppled over. When he realized what he was doing, he lessened his grip and she tried not to whimper.

"Do you understand what happened today?"

No, her eyes said, and he knew from the way that they shifted immediately to the left that it was true. She didn't know. Didn't understand. Was too young, or too foolish. Disgustedly, he shoved her away. How could this child succeed the legacy of the most prestigious clan in Konoha?

"Summon Neji, Hinata," he told her finally, turning back around to the low table upon which he'd set out his glasses of sake, all in a perfect row that defied logic.

Hinata stifled another squeak, gave a quick nod and darted for the door.

Neji-niisan was on the roof, which she hadn't expected. She'd looked all over for him, in his room, in the gardens, in the cellar where they'd met once, secretly, and played together. When she was about to give up, prepared even to face the fiercely quiet wrath of her father for her failure, she decided to use Byakugan. It was tiring, and she couldn't hold it for longer than a few seconds, but perhaps it would be enough to find him.

And Neji-niisan was on the roof. She clambered up clumsily, almost toppled off and was caught only by Neji-niisan's quick reflexes. He held her by one arm as she dangled over the edge and squeaked in fright. His eyes were cold and hard in the moonlight, but Hinata wasn't afraid, because Neji-niisan never looked at her with eyes like that.

With a grunt, he hauled her up onto the roof, steadied her until she gained her balance and then stepped back and away from her, turning his face upwards once more, as if he were watching the stars in the sky.

She tried to smile at him, shyly, and was cowed immediately when he returned aught but a glower, though it was characterized only by the downwards quirking of his lips and the vaguest narrowing of his eyes.

"What is it?" he asked sharply, and without the respect in his voice that she'd heard so often before.

"F-father…" she murmured softly. "Father wishes…to t-talk to you, Neji-niisan."

"Tch." He didn't move. Hinata blinked at him in confusion. Hadn't she said that right? She was sure of it, she was! So why wasn't Neji-niisan going to go see Father?

"Neji-niisan?"

"Hinata-sama," he murmured finally, turning to look at her. "Tell Hiashi-sama…" he trailed off, didn't speak. The childish demeanor that she'd known for so long had vanished utterly. He was all hard lines now, instead of soft angles. His chakra flared briefly, as if out of control, and Hinata sensed more than saw it.

"Neji-niisan…" she said quietly. "A-are you a…ghost?"

He gave a sharp, dry bark of laughter. "No, Hinata-sama."

"Oh." She sat beside him and watched him with wide, round eyes. "Aren't you going to see Father?"

He hissed vehemently, and she almost recoiled. But then she told herself that this was her Neji-niisan, and maybe there was simply something wrong with him, and maybe all she had to do was hold him close like a favorite toy, and maybe he'd be Neji-niisan again.

"Neji-niisan?"

He didn't answer, and when she looked up at him again, studied him closer, she noticed something strange. There were little rivulets of moisture on his face, barely visible in the darkness. Hesitantly, Hinata reached up one small, chubby hand to wipe away the strange rain. She put one finger to her mouth and started, because it tasted just like the tears she shed sometimes when she proved that she wasn't good enough yet again.

"Neji-niisan, are you…are you crying?"

"No. Go back inside please, Hinata-sama." He wiped his face against his sleeve and didn't quite seem as composed as before. Hinata frowned a little at him, just a little, and was about to speak again when he suddenly cried out. Clawed at the bandages on his forehead and screamed inarticulately, pain sketched across his face and body like the floral prints on the screens in Hinata's bedroom. She yelped and reached for him, only to be batted fiercely away.

"Neji-niisan!" She whimpered, and wrung her hands and wondered if he'd been broken somehow, and how she could fix him.

After a moment, the pain seemed to stop, and Neji-niisan lay on the tiled roof and panted and groaned and pressed the heels of his hands against his forehead and whimpered much like she had only a few moments sooner. She reached for one of his hands and he smacked her reflexively across the cheek. Dazed more than actually hurt, she skittered away from him, tears welling in her eyes.

"Don't…touch me," he gasped. And then, rather suddenly, Hinata heard her Father's voice from down below them. She didn't know how long he'd been there, and felt suddenly wildly fearful. How much had he heard? Seen?

"I believe my daughter told you to come to me, Neji," Hiashi said lowly, with a sort of pain in his voice that was entirely different than the one that had been in Neji-niisan's. And then Neji-niisan snarled, very quietly, like he was trying not to be heard by her Father, and then he stood, very slowly, turned to look down at her and smiled.

It was not a nice sort of smile.

"My apologies, Hinata-sama," he said stiffly. "Good-day." He walked a few short steps away from her and leapt from the roof to the ground. Hinata scrambled after him on her hands and knees and watched as her Father set one hand atop Neji-niisan's head.

"What do you wish of me, Hiashi-sama?"

Her Father paused for a very long moment, his face expressionless. When he spoke, his words reminded Hinata of frost over a pond in the winter, cold to touch, but easily fractured. "…Neji, come inside, please."

"As you wish." And Neji-niisan's shoulders were rigid as he followed her father indoors, stiff and straight like the scarecrow that her mother had made and put in the gardens to scare away birds that would come and raid the vegetables.

And so Hinata huddled on the roof and wondered why Neji-niisan was broken, and how she could fix him.