Chapter Text
"I can't believe he is about to be fifteen already," said Ino, refilling their glasses of red wine. "It felt like yesterday, you guys showed up in town."
Hinata hummed, strumming her fingers along the patio table. Summer nights were perfect in Konohagakure. A light breeze from the East cooled the heated evenings, the stars still glimmered over the bustling city. The air was sweet, it felt like opportunity waiting to happen. Thrill hidden in the underbelly. That was then...when she craved that. Tonight, peace was divine.
She watched her son jumping in the pool. Inky black hair clinging to the brightest smile. He cheered as the older blond boy by two months flipped into the water.
Her thumb moved up and down the wine's stem. Her heart steady. Her mind clear. Her best friend sat beside her, legs crossed, fruit tray and shitty wine.
This was the life.
"Yeah, time is...moving," she sighed.
Ino popped a grape in her mouth. "Barely for you, you look great," she motioned.
Hinata looked over at the woman, her brows pressing, "Ino, look at you... I'm honored you think that."
Ino laughed, flipping shiny blonde hair over her shoulder. "I know I look amazing but," she tilted into Hinata's face. Her turquoise eyes narrowed at the woman. "I've known you for fifteen years. Not nary a wrinkle, a gray hair--not even a chin hair."
Hinata leaned away. "I will send you a picture of my next chin hair."
"Please do," Ino crossed her arm, lifting her glass. "Otherwise people will think you don't age."
Hinata smiled before turning her attention back to the laughing boys. "Don't be ridiculous."
The night stretched on and the bottle of wine emptied. Hinata stood, stretching her arms, pretending to be a bit tipsy. Ino had wrapped a blanket around herself a while ago, her eyes heavy from sleep and alcohol. "Kasai," she called.
The boys had gotten out of the pool at some point and sat on two pushed together lounge chairs listening to music. Her son looked over, grumbled before reluctantly standing. The boys did their infamous hand shake. Slide, grip, shoot two fingers out, grabbed the two fingers with the opposite hand...then a shake down twice then high five... before Kasai jogged over. "Mom, it's barely nine," he motioned to the sky.
Hinata threw a towel on his head with a grin. "Yes, well, Miss Ino is sleepy. We shouldn't overstay our welcome."
Ino yawned, nodded. "God, how did I get so drunk?"
Kasai pulled the fluffy blue towel over his mop of dark hair. "Thank you for having me, Auntie."
Ino grinned. "No problem, Kasai," she said sweetly. "Hey, you, Squirt!" She pointed to her son. "Time to go in the house."
"Could you not call me that?" He hissed, walking up on the patio. "Auntie Hinata doesn't call Kasai embarrassing nicknames."
Hinata wrapped her arms around her son's shoulders. "I do," she said, kissing the back of his head.
"Gah, come on," the young boy moved away from his mother's embrace. His nose wrinkled. "Geesh."
Hinata clasped her hands. "Ne, let's head home."
After their final goodbyes, Hinata and her son started their journey home. Really, they lived two streets over. Kasai's flipflops squished as he walked along the sidewalk. Hinata arms firmly clasp behind her back. Opal eyes lifted to the shimmering stars, narrowing at one in particular.
"Mom?"
"Mm?" She hummed, bringing her focus on her boy.
He was walking backwards. "So, as you know, my birthday is coming up."
"As I do know," she smiled.
He nodded, his dark eyes full of wonder. He rotated his wrists. "Yes, so, I was thinking of having a party--small!" He pinched his fingers. "...just a few friends! Pizza! Perhaps, me and Inojin can...oh, I don't know...perform." He pretended to play the drums.
Opal eyes lifted, amused. "Perform? And where would you--"
"In the old shed! Before you say no, I will personally clean it out--" He clasped his hands, squeezing them tightly. "I can--"
"I am fine with the party, Kasai," Hinata interrupted. "...but the shed is full of family heirlooms. You know that."
He rolled his eyes. "I wouldn't know that since you keep it locked up. What's the issue? It's just a bunch of old junk." He said, popping on the sidewalk as a car bend the corner. Hinata pressed her lips at her son's words. The car's headlights nearly blinding her as it swerved from one side of the road to the next. "But Mom--"
"Kasai, watch--" her eyes widened when the car came swerving towards him.
He blinked, turning over his shoulder. His eyes dilated as piercing lights shined on his face. Frozen in place. Kasai felt an impact at his side, his body flinging into the nearby bushes. His bare back scratching through leaves and thorny branches. He heard himself scream. The smelt of metal and grass filled his nostrils. The impact knocked the air out his lungs. "M-mom," he cried, his body had tore a hole in the bushes.
He saw her.
"You almost killed my son," whispered Hinata. A single hand lodged inside the front of the car, the metal bent around her arm like it was nothing more than crumpled paper. Dark smoke filling the night.
"I...I... I'm sorry," the person inside blinked rapidly.
She dislodged her arm from the vehicle and walked around the side of it. Kasai watched his mother, the woman that raised him, the woman that used to kiss his bruised knee and made him banana bread when he was feeling sad... he watched her punch through the glass of the driver's seat. Shards shattered around her feet. Her body seemed to be glowing purple, the ends of her hair curled in fury. Kasai struggled to blink, to sit, to do anything.
"Drunk driving?" She gripped the front of the man's shirt and pulled him half through the window. His torso hanging out of the car. "You...vile human."
"M-mom?" Kasai coughed.
The lights of their neighbor's houses started to flicker on. Hinata turned to her son. The sundress around her body flapped wickedly with energy. Her eyes pure white, angry, thick veins protruded around her face.
He looked at her with terror. "Mommy?"
She blinked. "Kasai," she gasped. Her glowing fist released the man. He fell out of the window, crying. She glanced around as front doors started to open.
Kasai couldn't breathe.
He couldn't blink.
His mother moved within a moment. His eyes didn’t see her move. She carefully picked him up in her arms. "I...didn't want you to find out this way."
It was the last thing he heard before his world went black.
:::
:::
"-him... you can't!"
Kasai woke up in his bed. His bruises and scratches had smiling Band-Aids on them. His memories pressed at the front of his skull. His mother stopping a car with one hand, her punching out the window and dragging that man out. She said she would kill him. Not his mother? The one that made him walk out spiders and help old ladies put groceries in their cars. "Mom?" He leapt off his bed and swung the door opened.
His mother was standing there, her arms outstretched. "Mom?"
"Go b-back inside, Kasai," she turned for a second, before returning her focus in front of them. "Go back."
"You have breached the rules," a male's voice bit.
Kasai looked under her arm to a tall man, long dark brown hair...and moonstone colored eyes like his mother. She shook her head. "He...he was in danger. He would have--"
"You have breached the rules," the man repeated.
"Neji, please," she begged, hot tears poured down her cheeks. "Please... you can't take him."
His eyes glowed in the same fashion. Kasai gripped the back of his mother's tattered sundress. Blood filled the fabric but she didn't flinch. She didn't wince. Had she been fighting? "Mom, wh-what's going on? Take me?"
"No one is taking you," said Hinata, her voice shaky. "Neji, I...I had to save him."
The man in the white robe hand's glowed, he slid into a stance. "You have breached the rules," he said.
"I know! I know! He is innocent! He doesn't even have... he is just a boy," she cried, her arms outstretched as if she could wrap them around his room as a whole. "Please...have a heart, brother. Please."
Kasai blinked. "Brother? Mom."
"Hinata," he finally said. "The rules were clear. He said--"
"He? He!" She shook her head. "He can't do this! I--"
"Step aside, Hinata," Neji said, his eyes narrowing. "Or you will be removed without mercy."
"No!" She put her hands out.
Kasai moved under her arms in a moment. Hinata's eyes widened, she flicked her chin. "Kasai, stop it. Get back inside."
His heart was racing in his ears. He clutched his chest. Something told him that this man was serious. He would remove her...he was terrified to even think about that. He had to do something. Anything. "If I go with you...you won't hurt me or my m-mom?"
Pure eyes fell on him. He pulled himself upright. He gave a curt nod. "I will not."
"Kasai, no," she whispered, clutching his wrist. "J-just get back inside, please." She fell to her knees, hugging her son. "Kasai, you can't..."
He hugged her, but his words felt foreign, "I...don't even know who you are..."
The words gutted her, they forced her to look at his saddened dark eyes. She shook her head, strands of navy sprayed across her face. "I... you weren't supposed to find out like this."
Neji placed a hand on the boy's shoulder. "We must go."
Hinata shook her head. "I'll come get you, Kasai. I will--" she watched her son disappear into thin arm. Her arms fell to her lap. Navy hair poured over her shoulders, tears stained her dirtied sundress. Her hands remained empty.
I don't even know who you are...
She doubled over and screamed. The glass upstairs cracked along the frames. Hinata pulled herself up like the solider in her blood and appeared in front of the shed outside. Her chest heaved, tears still hot against her cheeks. She crushes the lock in her palm and forced open the dark, dank shed. The smell of old wood and metal filled her senses. She hit the light switch. Several flickers and the light hummed on. Clicking over the room and it looked ordinary enough. Rakes, shovels, lawn mowers and things.
An old car, broken down, rusted sat in the corner.
She walked towards it, yanking open the angry, old door. The young woman climbed inside and pulled off the tarp. Shiny silver laid in its wake. Technology beyond human's imagination beeped and flashed. Hinata took a deep breath and began tinkering with a system that she swore she would never need again. Pressing buttons, she promised she'd forget how to use. A projector lifted front the center console.
The thrilling filled her with absolute dread.
Hinata closed her eyes. She had to calm down. She had to.
The screen clicked.
And there he was...
The reason for Kasai's dark hair, his longer than she remembered, framing the same dark eyes.
Kasai's father.
"What?"
It was the first words he's said to her in fifteen years.
"Sa...," she hadn't said his name in fifteen fucking years. "...they took him. My baby," she pressed a hand to her heart. "Our son."
His expression didn't change from indifferent. He folded his arms, his navy suit was still skin tight and still stupid. "Who took him, Phantom?"
She flinched at the name. Her old name. A dead one. Retired the moment she told him that she was having his child. The moment when he realized everything that he had ever worked for was potentially going down the drain. His precious leadership role in a broken system. He wasn't a leader, he was a jackass with powers and a super-stupid suit. Their government were the leaders and they...
"My family," she bit.
He closed his eyes. "Your family? And what is it that you want?"
"I..." she clenched her fists in her lap until the knuckles turned white.
"You need help?" He tilted his head. "My help."
"They took our son."
"A son that you decided would be safer on that feeble planet," his brow twitched. "A son you refused to legitimatize as one of us. A son--"
She slammed her hands down, denting the metal. Her skin glowing in that ghostly hue. He tsked. "You haven't changed at all, have you, Phantom?"
Hinata took a breath. Two. Then three. "Neither have you, Obsidian."
He watched her through the projector screen. "I will help get our son back," he paused. "Then he will live with me."
She gasped, her heart felt like it was shattering all over again. "...he's just a boy. He doesn't have powers. He doesn't know you. He...he didn't even know I had powers."
Sasuke tilted his head. "He has until his sixteenth birthday." She didn't need the reminder. She had until her sixteenth birthday too, and her family forced her powers. If Kasai wanted to be a normal human boy that would be her greatest gift. "I will grant you entry onboard. Do you accept these conditions?"
"Okay..." she whispered, refusing to cry in front of him.
"He will hate you after learning the truth," he said, averting his eyes. "Just as I did."
He hung up and her throat tightened. She sat there. Alone.
The screen before her turned on again: A woman's voice:
"Phantom: Level 5: Extreme Danger: Exiled."
It blinked. "Phantom: Level 5: Extreme Danger: Temporary Entry."
She rubbed her face. Her son's face... "I don't even know who you are..." She knew it was fear and confusion that buried those words in her soul.
"He will hate you after learning the truth...just as I did." He was just a bastard.
Hinata clutched her chest. "I'll make this right," she wiped her face. "...I'll bring you home."
She betrayed Sasuke once, she could do it again if he thought she was parting from her son. The one she raised. She changed his diapers. She comforted him when he was sick. She was at recitals, PTA meetings, dances. She picked him up. She wiped his tears.
They wanted her to be the villain.
They wanted Phantom. Needed.
They would need to create a new level of threat when she was done.
"Hang in there Kasai," she got out the old, rusted car. "Hang in there."