After being briefly patched up, Naruto ascended the stairs with a limp, sore and worn out. Sakura smiled, clapping excitedly.
"Naruto! You did it!" she said. "You know, for a moment. I just didn't think you'd manage it, but then...!"
"You were alright, usuratonkachi."
"Gee, thanks, you prick."
"Now, now, children..."
--
The proctor coughed, and the computer whirred for a couple stalling moments, before it came to rest on two fated names. The proctor spoke, but Naruto did not hear him. The screen read:
Sabaku no Gaara vs Hyuuga Hinata
There was the brief buzzing of conversation that Naruto could barely make out, and then he looked to his right, and saw Hinata, meek and quiet and everything soft, walking towards the stairs. He all but ran to her.
Hinata turned her head, cheeks flushing at the sight of Naruto's gentle smile.
"A-Ah! Naruto-kun," she stuttered. "I-I, um..."
Her index fingers tapped together as her gaze shifted to various points on the floor. Her cheeks were a bright red.
"T-Thank you for standing up for me," she said. "I-I..."
Naruto rubbed the back of his head with a smile. "It's alright, you know? Your cousin is an asshole, but I was just telling him the truth!"
She smiled, cheeks flushed.
"T-Thank you, Naruto-kun."
"Anyway," he said, "what I really came to tell you was that, well..."
'Please, God, don't go down there. He'll kill you. He'll rip you to shreds in seconds. He's a maniac. A psycho. A murderer. Hinata, please, for me, don't.'
Naruto gave her a bright white smile, and a thumbs up.
"You can do it!"
The girl stepped back, blinking, before she smiled and nodded fervently, a renewed strength in her tone.
"Y-Yes! Thank you!"
As Hinata turned to make her way down to the stadium in little elegant steps to the red-haired demon below, Satsuki glanced at the white-knuckled, quivering fists at Naruto's side.
His eyes followed Hinata until the very last step.
--
Gaara's flitting gaze was unsettling. Naruto could see it trailing after Hinata, and somehow the swirling of sand about Gaara's back reminded him of the impatient tapping of a foot.
(Naruto did know those eyes.)
"Commence."
(Perhaps that was why he was so scared for her.)
Gaara did not move, and Hinata waited for a moment, in a defensive stance, before springing out of it to run forward with hands alight-
Gaara's sand snapped forward like a serpent and clasped her by the throat.
Her gargle resounded as it tightened, before it bent, swung, and released her to send her flying into the wall. Her back cracked on contact with the wall, and she peeled away from the concrete and fell to her knees, spitting blood.
Wiping her mouth and steadying her shaky knees to stand, Hinata narrowed her eyes, took a deep breath, and ran to the left. The sand was on her tail immediately, before it returned to float around Gaara.
'Protection,' she observed. 'He uses it mainly as protection...'
She began to move again, slower, withdrawing shuriken from her pouch and launching them at Gaara. They hit his sand shield - something she'd expected - but she watched as they were sucked into the sand itself, before being spat back at a barely visible speed. Hinata barely made the dodge, a shuriken nicking her shoulder.
In the moment of pain afterwards, Gaara's sand was above her, coming downwards before she changed her fall forwards into a speedy roll out of the way. It crashed into the spot where she had been and cracked the floor tiles.
Hinata shuddered.
She stood up properly, a kunai held in an ice-pick stance, when the rippling dome that swayed around Gaara let loose a mass of sand shuriken. Hinata quickly dodged the majority but had to slice through one with a kunai. 'It's tough,' she thought, 'but not impossible to break through. At least, these aren't.'
As she ran along the perimeter of the wall, Gaara still situated at the centre, he sent more sand shuriken, cornering her like a lamb with careful throws. Hinata activated her Byakugan.
'They're reinforced with chakra,' Hinata thought as she dodged and parried hits, 'that explains why they're so hard to break through...'
The practice soon became exhausting, and Hinata altered the range for a moment, moving forward and then quickly back. 'This distance is less risky, but I have to get up close.'
Hinata rolled beneath another barrage of sand shuriken, jumping when they collapsed and coalesced on the floor into a hand that attempted to grab at her foot. She began to advance, running towards him and quickly dodging a wave of sand that moved to envelop her.
Gaara looked at her, bored, and the sand swirling forwards offensively to her drew back to encircle his form. She frowned.
"How boring."
He closed his eyes, and Hinata smiled slightly.
'This is my chance!'
She pushed her right palm forward -
Only to be met with the sand once again. Hinata blinked, stepping back.
"His sand moves independently of what he can see?"
The wall of sand formed a spike just beyond her fingers, and shot out abruptly. Hinata leaned back, the spike skimming her arm and leaving a long, shallow cut. The opening was obvious, and the sand grabbed her by the arm and lashed her to the other side of the arena.
Hinata's back slammed against the wall, and she saw stars.
'He's playing with me,' she realised. 'He could have easily killed me with that hit.'
She stood up, gasping at the pain and activating her Byakugan once again, and stopping.
Where she had struck Gaara's sand, there was a small pile of sand on the floor. She could see that - compared to the rest of the sand - it had almost no chakra in it. Viewing it for a moment, Hinata saw it glow in the view of the Byakugan.
'The chakra is what moves the sand,' she realised. 'And if that's the case...'
Gaara opened his eyes, and a swarm of sand shuriken headed straight for her still form.
'I might just be able to win.'
"One palm!"
She contacted a chakra-infused palm with the bullet. It shuddered to a stop, paused, before drifting down to the ground in a softly sifting pile of sand.
Gaara's eyes narrowed, the incoming bullets returning to the cloud around him. She allowed herself a victorious twitch of the lips.
But even now, she could see the chakra leaking to the sand bullet she'd left as a pile on the floor. Hinata knew she was at a disadvantage. She didn't have the advantage of anatomical knowledge, nor did she have the advantage of speed. There could be no breaks in either of those palm strikes.
And she had only hope that the chakra regenerated at a pace slow enough for her to secure a safe win.
Hinata settled herself into the stance of the gentle fist, palms forward, when she rushed to Gaara.
'The chakra is gathering,' she realised, before swallowing dryly and diving to her side. It wasn't fast enough. 'No... it's going to-!'
Hinata was reminded of the difference in speed alone as Gaara's sand abruptly separated, grabbing her from behind and gaining a tight grip on her chest.
She gasped, momentarily winded, before she brought both palms to the binding and nullified the chakra in the sand, sliding out of its grip as it sifted onto the floor.
Hinata kept her eyes locked on Gaara; he was staring at her.
"You're slow," he said. "And weak. You are almost certain to lose."
Hinata gritted her teeth.
"So why do you continue to fight?"
Her heart stuttered in her chest. With Naruto's eyes on her, she was terrified, and yet when she spoke, she spoke with more conviction than she'd ever had in her life.
"B-Because giving up now," she said, "would be going back on everything I've ever resolved to believe! I-I won't give up, and I won't go back on my word! That's my ninja way!"
Gaara's sand rippled ominously about his form.
"Foolish words that I've heard before."
Hinata watched as Gaara's gourd crumbled into sand as well, joining the cloud. She bit her lip.
"It's not foolish," she said. "I-If I didn't stand up for what I b-believe in, then-then I wouldnt be a n-ninja w-worthy of respect!"
"Respect?"
Gaara grinned.
"Y-Yes! I..." Hinata took a deep breath. "I want to b-be a ninja worthy of N-N-Naruto-kun's respect! S-So I can't... I can't just give up! I'll p-prove that I'm not... that I can win!"
Gaara's smile was sickly.
"How pathetic."
His sand lunged for her, and she barely dodged. It slammed into the wall, leaving a cloud of dust behind, and removed itself from the cracked stones before rushing for her again. Hinata composed herself and rolled quickly. The boy's eyes followed her.
'He's focusing his attacks on brute force. He's serious. I'm in trouble.'
Hinata's broken rib sent a wave of pain through her left side as she landed. Her movement halted as she wobbled on her feet.
Gaara smirked, and she was cloaked in darkness.
She gasped at the sudden black, before attempting to move her arms and legs and finding them paralysed.
"This is the end for you."
Her eyes widened. "He's trapped me in his sand...!"
"Die painfully," he said gleefully. "Sand Coffin."
--
Sakura, at Naruto's side, gasped and covered her mouth. His eyes widened.
"Hinata!"
The sand did not crush Hinata into pulp. He waited a moment with bated breath, before the sand slowly began dropping to the floor. Bit by bit, it slowly drifted away, until Hinata landed on the floor heaving for breath.
Sakura exhaled deeply, turning to Kakashi. "What did she do?"
Their sensei shrugged.
"It seems she used that same nullification technique she used earlier," he said. "The Hyuuga are renowned for their control over each and every tenketsu."
"You never told me that before I fought that Neji guy," Naruto grumbled.
"You rushed off, and you would have hardly listened anyway."
Naruto pulled a tongue at Kakashi, before turning back to the match.
Gaara was visibly shocked by the turn of events, and Hinata took advantage of that, rushing forward with her fists blue with chakra. The most of his sand lay in a useless lump behind Hinata, and she ran straight forward for a direct attack.
"That's not going to work," muttered Satsuki.
Hinata's palm met first with a small wall of sand. It crumbled before her palm, and she quickly lunged forward once more, the sand protecting him once more and joining the small pile on the floor.
She watched the worry on Gaara's face fester, before, with a victorious grin, Hinata advanced forward with a step.
His sand instinctively rushed to grab her knee, and she slammed her palm straight through it, and carried on.
The blow to his gut sent him skidding across the floor, and Naruto grinned.
"Man," he said, "Hinata's kinda cool, isn't she?"
Satsuki rolled her eyes.
Hinata pulled back her palm, alight with chakra-
"It's over!"
-and ran.
"Hinata!"
--
Her hand shook, quivering, hovering over that tiny tenketsu in the heart. The strike of victory, withheld by the mere millimetres between her fingers and that hit - why couldn't she reach?
Her legs weren't working. She tried to reach forward, and was rewarded with a sudden shock of pain. Hinata gasped.
She looked to Gaara to see his lashes stained with red as bright as his hair. Her heartbeat thrummed in her ears, and then all of a sudden she was horribly aware of a hot, thick warmth sliding over her abdomen.
As she looked further down, Hinata was met with that small pile of sand she had deactivated first from the wall. She understood now; that pile that had formed the Sand Coffin had returned to Gaara's ultimate defense, but this small pile had taken too long for that. Rather, it had regained chakra and movement just in time to-
("Hinata," he said, lips barely meeting. "Hinata. Hinata.")
impale her, straight through the gut
Hinata could feel the warm-wet stickiness of blood seeping through her toes. She couldn't breathe. Couldn't make any noise at all.
She felt cold.
Gaara's eyes followed the dripping of blood so intently that Hinata thought he might have opened his mouth and licked it off the floor.
'Naruto-kun... I thought I was always watching over you, but this time...'
Her knees buckled.
"HINATA!"
'...your eyes were on me, weren't they?'
The world was distant now. Footsteps, yelling.
He was holding her hand, now, and it was the moment she'd dreamt of if only she could feel that touch a little bit more. She tried to memorise the feel of his skin.
Someone was putting a stretcher beside her.
'I can't hear you.' Hinata tried to squeeze his hand. She couldn't even tell if she'd managed to. 'I can't hear anything.'
Hinata's cheeks were wet now. If she was crying, she couldn't feel her tears. She was lifted onto the stretcher; someone was moving beside her.
'Neji-kun?'
It felt like she had tuned into an irrelevant radio broadcast, filled with words and uproar and events and she was just the listener, but now she wanted to speak.
"I'm fine," she said. "I'll be fine."
She couldn't make anything of the noises that came from their lips. Were they speaking the same tongue? Could they understand her words?
"I won't give up now," she said, clasping his hand. "I won't die here..."
Naruto's voice hit her like the final bounce of a distant echo.
"-Hinata!"
His voice was desperate.
"So don't worry," she said. "I won't give up... I won't go back on my word... because that's my ninja..."
Way.
Hinata died.