[Meme + Drabble-type meme answers]
Mar. 23rd, 2007 02:50 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
runespoorOkay! Here are the answers I wrote for the Ask a Character a Question meme.
[Celebrationverse. Answers totally contain things that could be construed as potential/implied spoilers. weeee, rhetorical precautions!]
Neji: How would you react if Hinata began a serious and loving relationship with someone else after her return? And how do you feel about her now?
[more-or-less Day in the Life time set.]
I have serious doubts about that ever happening.
But, on the off-chance that she ever gets well enough to open up that way, and foolish enough to fall for someone who wouldn't have the good sense to step back, my place wouldn't change unless Hinata-sama herself required it of me. I have been told that she's compartmentalising in order to deal with things that have upset her, and particularly with her duties as a member of Interrogation, so I will, of course, still perform the same services – it is part of my duty as her shadow – unless her boyfriend takes these responsibilities over. Which, for a variety of reasons, is not happening. Premium among these reasons being that the boyfriend would never be Yakushi Kabuto. And that is enough to make the whole discussion pointless, isn't it?
She wouldn't be able to carry on with something as simple as 'a serious and loving relationship'. She would turn to me, or to who-knows-what-else, and after a while she would either feel too guilty to continue or she would be caught. She would separate even more the different parts of her life, and this would leave her even more vulnerable.
I would let her do as she chooses, and take her own decisions. Hopefully. I – my control is still not as foolproof as it should be.
Whatever my feelings for her are, they matter less than what I can do for her.
Hinata: What was the worst thing that Kabuto did to you during your captivity? The best? And what do you believe was his ultimate purpose for you?
I-I have no idea.
I don't remember it all that well, really. Sometimes I have dreams, and – they're very realistic, it becomes a little difficult to differentiate if I'm not concentrating. I think they're dreams. They're not memories – at least I don't think so. I mean nightmares.
But apart from this aspect of the question, I – don't know. Everything he did – or may have done – gets blurred, in the sense that it was always Kabuto-san who did it – every single part of it, it didn't matter what, it was always him. I think that was much more important than what he did. It's the only reason to explain some of what he did, anyway, that he was Kabuto-san and I was a prisoner.
I suppose I must have amused him, otherwise he wouldn't have spent so much time talking with me, admitting it wasn't a genjutsu or merely to make me relax – or tense up. I must have been very entertaining a prisoner, because I can't ever remember not second and triple-guessing myself whenever he said something and I somehow reacted, and I know Kabuto-san was interested in the human psyche as well.
Oh, no, that's right, his goal was to study the Byakugan. Orochimaru wanted him to study it as extensively as possible so he might be able to copy it. It slips from my mind sometimes.
Kabuto (through the help of a medium, I suppose): Did you at all grow fond of Hinata during her stay with you? And in the end, did her final act of strength towards you take you by surprise?
Yes, of course. She's a very likable young woman. *smiles* I must say that I was more surprised by the desperation of her gesture. I didn't expect her to have shinobi instincts of ranking one's mission above one's life ingrained quite so deep. Obviously. I didn't imagine she would be quick and unpredictable enough to pull it off, either; it really is one of the things she had in common with Naruto-kun after all.
Sasuke: Did you take any notice of Hinata AT ALL when she was at the Sound?
I wasn't in Sound. Orochimaru attacked Konoha because I had left Sound and she was captured during the war. I'm sure it made sense to him.
[From the Things that could have happened had Hizashi been the older son drabbles]
Neji: After you noticed your cousin was pretty during the Chuunin exams, were you ever tempted to make any, ah, arrangements with her? ;)
We have taken to training together. Is it the sort of arrangement you are referring to?
Hinata: Do you believe you would have been any happier if you were in the main house?
[this is a little difficult considering the particular verses all diverge at different points in time, and so she wouldn't always give the same answer, but the most likely one is:]
No, why would I?
Hiashi (through a medium again!): Would you have been proud if you saw the person Hinata has turned into now? ...Or worried about her?
[again, heprobably wouldn't answer the same thing every time, but the gist of it is:]
That was never what I wanted for her.
Ten Ten: What went down after Neji took the scroll from Hinata in the forest of death? And how did that affect your view of him?
…We fought it off. I mean we had a row. And Neji just didn't understand that there was anything wrong with what he had done.
I mean, I know I used to joke about entitlement issues from time to time, but I'd never have guessed – he was never like that with us. Or with anyone else, for that matter.
Though – you know, retrospectively, I wonder.
Maybe there were things during our missions, when we talked with civilians, hints, maybe I just didn't realise what was going on. I can't believe Lee and I were that oblivious. I mean, how were we supposed to figure something like that out?! He's my teammate, not – it's not as if our souls were forever bonded or I don't know what crap! I know how he works, how he reacts, I know his strengths and his weaknesses, I know what he doesn't like having to deal with – the three of us. A team, that should be enough, right?
Guess I can't help but feel betrayed. (And guilty, okay, but honestly how could we possibly see that one coming?)
Lee and I, we trusted him. And maybe it's because he's our team leader – and you know, he earned that, neither Lee nor I are really the type to cower and roll over just because someone tells us so, and the only reason he became our leader was because he made good plans and he listened when we argued he'd overlooked something or we had a more workable idea – but I felt betrayed. It was like he was betraying the team.
He was taking a decision that wasn't just his, he just went ahead.
And like Lee said, on top of everything else it was a short-cut. A short-cut. Like any of us had got where we were because we'd taken short-cuts!
Except him, for all I know now. I would never have believed that before, because he had a very strict work ethic and he's never been into slacking off – it's gonna sound strange, but I thought he had honour, you know.
I mean, he's a competent ninja so we always sneaked around and everything if we could avoid straight fights, but you could see he didn't like that. And even when he fights – he never attacks without a warning. Which I always thought makes him sound kinda pompous because he always announces that he is a Hyuuga blablabla, and that was out of place for a shinobi, but yeah.
Honourable.
And that poor girl – Hinata, right – it was as if she wasn't even a person, the way he treated her. I don't know what I'd have done in her place. Okay, I'd probably have gone for my shuriken, but when I think about it – if I'd been treated like that all my life? I have no idea what I'd be now.
I just hope her teammates stuck by her, because… yeah. Poor girl makes it to the second test of the chuunin exam, she's a rookie, everything's going just fine, and then – wham. End of dream.
So if on top of that her teammates hated her after that… I couldn't blame them for it, though. Kami know how I'd have reacted if it had been Neji giving our scroll over.
Not sure though, because after all she's the victim there – and I don't know how the Hyuuga works but I've got to say, if it's a matter of breaking up one's team vs politely telling the stuck-up heir that he can go and find his own roll and put it up his ass, and 'betraying one's team' sounds like the better option? Yeah, something's seriously wrong.
But he just didn't get it.
And – well, okay, I'm not especially proud of it now, at least I wish things could have been different – but in the end Lee and I just took the pouch in which he'd put the scrolls – Neji wasn't that far gone that he'd attack us himself, I think, or else he was just dumbstruck, and I had shiny pointy things aimed straight at him – and I think we were going to go after the rookies and give it back, and you know, if Lee insisted I'd have been ready to give them ours as well, and then he tried to take it back, and that may have been panic or maybe Lee just slipped, which if you know him at all you know is unlikely as me going blonde, because Lee? Taijutsu master, and perfect physical control? You can bet, and panic? Panic? Lee? Ha right.
So anyway, we had the scrolls in our hands and Neji tried to take them back, and the scroll –
It opened, okay?
Next thing I know I'm in the hospital and the second trial is over. So we never made it to the third test, in the end.
But you know, in a way I think perhaps it's not that bad.
I mean sure, technically we'd lost six months.
And okay, Gai-sensei hasn't let us take that exam – because you can bet Lee and I told him everything about why we'd acted the way we did. I'm not sure if he was really ecstatic about what we'd done, but I can tell you, he was much more angry/disappointed in Neji right then.
He's not going to recommend us for another exam until we relearn how to work as a team, he says.
I know that for Lee and I, it means that we have to relearn how to trust Neji again, and that is never going to happen unless Neji clears whatever's his deal in his clan. I have no idea how long that's going to take, but Gai-sensei's already told us that he's ready to recommend Lee and me if we want to take part in an exam as members of another team.
Maybe that's what we're going to do. Yamanaka Ino has been made a chuunin in the latest exam, so that leaves only Akimichi Chouji as a genin in that team.
I don't know, I haven't talked to Lee about it yet. In a way it'd be depressing, but in another –
I know that Hinata's team hasn't been allowed to take last exam either; supposedly because it was taking place in Mist, and the Hyuuga has history with Mist. So if we do enter this session, maybe we'll meet them. If the Hyuuga allows her to enter, that is, and if they don't I don't know what I'm going to do, but it's not fair that she gets punished for something Lee and I did because of what our teammate had done. Luckily her sensei's Kurenai-san, and she's never been the type to let herself be bullied by big clans and names and jackasses who treat people as if they were pieces of furniture.
If they do enter, though – and maybe even if they don't, I don't know yet, maybe I should talk with Lee, people make fun of him but he gives good advice, sometimes – then I'll talk to them. At least to tell them I'm sorry, even if that's not going to help anything.
Wow, I've really rambled. And usually that's not my thing, but I guess I just needed to get it off my chest. Not sure if that answers your questions, but… *shrugs* See you again, maybe.
Hiashi: Why did you then sacrifice yourself when you knew Hinata probably needed you so badly as a child? Do you think her newfound strength after you were gone was worth the degradation she suffered without you as her buffer towards the main house?
I expect these questions cannot be avoided.
The truth is, I never intended things to go as they did; I think I must have hoped for my brother to find the strength to stand up to the Council after I had done the same to him, and not to live his life and his son's – and… Hinata's and her mother's – according to these same rules I died precisely to make him realise weren't enough.
I did think what I was saying; I was indeed willing to die so my brother would live. And… Hinata… My daughter was probably not as present to my mind as I spoke as she should have, but I was nevertheless convinced I was doing the best for her. Do you imagine for even one moment the Main House would have allowed their clan head to just die? And – if they had – do you have any idea of how the clan would have gone, under the control of the council?
My father was the one who separated my brother and me. He was the one who ordered me to be branded into the Branch House. Do you imagine how life would have gone had the clan head's power suddenly disappeared? Do you truly think my existence wouldn't have singled her out and made her a perfect target? – and Hizashi's son would never have forgiven me and would have likely transferred his hatred onto her as well.
Hinata had a mother. She had a mother, an uncle and his wife, and a cousin who was only older than her by one year. I wasn't – or at any rate I never should have been – my daughter's only support in this world.
And she was two; too young to be sealed.
Somewhere I hoped that Hizashi would find the strength to take her in as his daughter.
It is too late to have regrets or second thoughts. Yes, I dread what could happen to her – the clan's punishment if they learn she betrayed its heir; my brother, his son. I dread both of them. And I fear where this – whatever it is, this anger of hers, this willingness to break the rules, her disregard of the clan – may take her. How easily she might stumble on a wrong path. She is my daughter and I hate having to acknowledge it, but – how much farther can she go?
She has disobeyed the clan.
Worse, she has been disloyal to someone – a person, her cousin. Her circumstances were extenuating, I'll give her that. But she has. And there is only one step between disobeying the clan and disobeying the village.
And… at same time… I am astonished at the resources of strength, fortitude, and determination she found and showed. I am wary of what may become of her – but I am also proud that she found both the will and the way to carry on her dream.
I can only hope it will not be her downfall. I do not want her to prove me right after all, that maybe she would have been happier if she wasn't a shinobi.
But then, there was never a choice.
Another meme ganked from![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
mariagoner again, because the fics are kicking my ass:
If you make up titles for stories I didn't write, I will respond with details of those non-written stories.
[Celebrationverse. Answers totally contain things that could be construed as potential/implied spoilers. weeee, rhetorical precautions!]
Neji: How would you react if Hinata began a serious and loving relationship with someone else after her return? And how do you feel about her now?
[more-or-less Day in the Life time set.]
I have serious doubts about that ever happening.
But, on the off-chance that she ever gets well enough to open up that way, and foolish enough to fall for someone who wouldn't have the good sense to step back, my place wouldn't change unless Hinata-sama herself required it of me. I have been told that she's compartmentalising in order to deal with things that have upset her, and particularly with her duties as a member of Interrogation, so I will, of course, still perform the same services – it is part of my duty as her shadow – unless her boyfriend takes these responsibilities over. Which, for a variety of reasons, is not happening. Premium among these reasons being that the boyfriend would never be Yakushi Kabuto. And that is enough to make the whole discussion pointless, isn't it?
She wouldn't be able to carry on with something as simple as 'a serious and loving relationship'. She would turn to me, or to who-knows-what-else, and after a while she would either feel too guilty to continue or she would be caught. She would separate even more the different parts of her life, and this would leave her even more vulnerable.
I would let her do as she chooses, and take her own decisions. Hopefully. I – my control is still not as foolproof as it should be.
Whatever my feelings for her are, they matter less than what I can do for her.
Hinata: What was the worst thing that Kabuto did to you during your captivity? The best? And what do you believe was his ultimate purpose for you?
I-I have no idea.
I don't remember it all that well, really. Sometimes I have dreams, and – they're very realistic, it becomes a little difficult to differentiate if I'm not concentrating. I think they're dreams. They're not memories – at least I don't think so. I mean nightmares.
But apart from this aspect of the question, I – don't know. Everything he did – or may have done – gets blurred, in the sense that it was always Kabuto-san who did it – every single part of it, it didn't matter what, it was always him. I think that was much more important than what he did. It's the only reason to explain some of what he did, anyway, that he was Kabuto-san and I was a prisoner.
I suppose I must have amused him, otherwise he wouldn't have spent so much time talking with me, admitting it wasn't a genjutsu or merely to make me relax – or tense up. I must have been very entertaining a prisoner, because I can't ever remember not second and triple-guessing myself whenever he said something and I somehow reacted, and I know Kabuto-san was interested in the human psyche as well.
Oh, no, that's right, his goal was to study the Byakugan. Orochimaru wanted him to study it as extensively as possible so he might be able to copy it. It slips from my mind sometimes.
Kabuto (through the help of a medium, I suppose): Did you at all grow fond of Hinata during her stay with you? And in the end, did her final act of strength towards you take you by surprise?
Yes, of course. She's a very likable young woman. *smiles* I must say that I was more surprised by the desperation of her gesture. I didn't expect her to have shinobi instincts of ranking one's mission above one's life ingrained quite so deep. Obviously. I didn't imagine she would be quick and unpredictable enough to pull it off, either; it really is one of the things she had in common with Naruto-kun after all.
Sasuke: Did you take any notice of Hinata AT ALL when she was at the Sound?
I wasn't in Sound. Orochimaru attacked Konoha because I had left Sound and she was captured during the war. I'm sure it made sense to him.
[From the Things that could have happened had Hizashi been the older son drabbles]
Neji: After you noticed your cousin was pretty during the Chuunin exams, were you ever tempted to make any, ah, arrangements with her? ;)
We have taken to training together. Is it the sort of arrangement you are referring to?
Hinata: Do you believe you would have been any happier if you were in the main house?
[this is a little difficult considering the particular verses all diverge at different points in time, and so she wouldn't always give the same answer, but the most likely one is:]
No, why would I?
Hiashi (through a medium again!): Would you have been proud if you saw the person Hinata has turned into now? ...Or worried about her?
[again, he
That was never what I wanted for her.
Ten Ten: What went down after Neji took the scroll from Hinata in the forest of death? And how did that affect your view of him?
…We fought it off. I mean we had a row. And Neji just didn't understand that there was anything wrong with what he had done.
I mean, I know I used to joke about entitlement issues from time to time, but I'd never have guessed – he was never like that with us. Or with anyone else, for that matter.
Though – you know, retrospectively, I wonder.
Maybe there were things during our missions, when we talked with civilians, hints, maybe I just didn't realise what was going on. I can't believe Lee and I were that oblivious. I mean, how were we supposed to figure something like that out?! He's my teammate, not – it's not as if our souls were forever bonded or I don't know what crap! I know how he works, how he reacts, I know his strengths and his weaknesses, I know what he doesn't like having to deal with – the three of us. A team, that should be enough, right?
Guess I can't help but feel betrayed. (And guilty, okay, but honestly how could we possibly see that one coming?)
Lee and I, we trusted him. And maybe it's because he's our team leader – and you know, he earned that, neither Lee nor I are really the type to cower and roll over just because someone tells us so, and the only reason he became our leader was because he made good plans and he listened when we argued he'd overlooked something or we had a more workable idea – but I felt betrayed. It was like he was betraying the team.
He was taking a decision that wasn't just his, he just went ahead.
And like Lee said, on top of everything else it was a short-cut. A short-cut. Like any of us had got where we were because we'd taken short-cuts!
Except him, for all I know now. I would never have believed that before, because he had a very strict work ethic and he's never been into slacking off – it's gonna sound strange, but I thought he had honour, you know.
I mean, he's a competent ninja so we always sneaked around and everything if we could avoid straight fights, but you could see he didn't like that. And even when he fights – he never attacks without a warning. Which I always thought makes him sound kinda pompous because he always announces that he is a Hyuuga blablabla, and that was out of place for a shinobi, but yeah.
Honourable.
And that poor girl – Hinata, right – it was as if she wasn't even a person, the way he treated her. I don't know what I'd have done in her place. Okay, I'd probably have gone for my shuriken, but when I think about it – if I'd been treated like that all my life? I have no idea what I'd be now.
I just hope her teammates stuck by her, because… yeah. Poor girl makes it to the second test of the chuunin exam, she's a rookie, everything's going just fine, and then – wham. End of dream.
So if on top of that her teammates hated her after that… I couldn't blame them for it, though. Kami know how I'd have reacted if it had been Neji giving our scroll over.
Not sure though, because after all she's the victim there – and I don't know how the Hyuuga works but I've got to say, if it's a matter of breaking up one's team vs politely telling the stuck-up heir that he can go and find his own roll and put it up his ass, and 'betraying one's team' sounds like the better option? Yeah, something's seriously wrong.
But he just didn't get it.
And – well, okay, I'm not especially proud of it now, at least I wish things could have been different – but in the end Lee and I just took the pouch in which he'd put the scrolls – Neji wasn't that far gone that he'd attack us himself, I think, or else he was just dumbstruck, and I had shiny pointy things aimed straight at him – and I think we were going to go after the rookies and give it back, and you know, if Lee insisted I'd have been ready to give them ours as well, and then he tried to take it back, and that may have been panic or maybe Lee just slipped, which if you know him at all you know is unlikely as me going blonde, because Lee? Taijutsu master, and perfect physical control? You can bet, and panic? Panic? Lee? Ha right.
So anyway, we had the scrolls in our hands and Neji tried to take them back, and the scroll –
It opened, okay?
Next thing I know I'm in the hospital and the second trial is over. So we never made it to the third test, in the end.
But you know, in a way I think perhaps it's not that bad.
I mean sure, technically we'd lost six months.
And okay, Gai-sensei hasn't let us take that exam – because you can bet Lee and I told him everything about why we'd acted the way we did. I'm not sure if he was really ecstatic about what we'd done, but I can tell you, he was much more angry/disappointed in Neji right then.
He's not going to recommend us for another exam until we relearn how to work as a team, he says.
I know that for Lee and I, it means that we have to relearn how to trust Neji again, and that is never going to happen unless Neji clears whatever's his deal in his clan. I have no idea how long that's going to take, but Gai-sensei's already told us that he's ready to recommend Lee and me if we want to take part in an exam as members of another team.
Maybe that's what we're going to do. Yamanaka Ino has been made a chuunin in the latest exam, so that leaves only Akimichi Chouji as a genin in that team.
I don't know, I haven't talked to Lee about it yet. In a way it'd be depressing, but in another –
I know that Hinata's team hasn't been allowed to take last exam either; supposedly because it was taking place in Mist, and the Hyuuga has history with Mist. So if we do enter this session, maybe we'll meet them. If the Hyuuga allows her to enter, that is, and if they don't I don't know what I'm going to do, but it's not fair that she gets punished for something Lee and I did because of what our teammate had done. Luckily her sensei's Kurenai-san, and she's never been the type to let herself be bullied by big clans and names and jackasses who treat people as if they were pieces of furniture.
If they do enter, though – and maybe even if they don't, I don't know yet, maybe I should talk with Lee, people make fun of him but he gives good advice, sometimes – then I'll talk to them. At least to tell them I'm sorry, even if that's not going to help anything.
Wow, I've really rambled. And usually that's not my thing, but I guess I just needed to get it off my chest. Not sure if that answers your questions, but… *shrugs* See you again, maybe.
Hiashi: Why did you then sacrifice yourself when you knew Hinata probably needed you so badly as a child? Do you think her newfound strength after you were gone was worth the degradation she suffered without you as her buffer towards the main house?
I expect these questions cannot be avoided.
The truth is, I never intended things to go as they did; I think I must have hoped for my brother to find the strength to stand up to the Council after I had done the same to him, and not to live his life and his son's – and… Hinata's and her mother's – according to these same rules I died precisely to make him realise weren't enough.
I did think what I was saying; I was indeed willing to die so my brother would live. And… Hinata… My daughter was probably not as present to my mind as I spoke as she should have, but I was nevertheless convinced I was doing the best for her. Do you imagine for even one moment the Main House would have allowed their clan head to just die? And – if they had – do you have any idea of how the clan would have gone, under the control of the council?
My father was the one who separated my brother and me. He was the one who ordered me to be branded into the Branch House. Do you imagine how life would have gone had the clan head's power suddenly disappeared? Do you truly think my existence wouldn't have singled her out and made her a perfect target? – and Hizashi's son would never have forgiven me and would have likely transferred his hatred onto her as well.
Hinata had a mother. She had a mother, an uncle and his wife, and a cousin who was only older than her by one year. I wasn't – or at any rate I never should have been – my daughter's only support in this world.
And she was two; too young to be sealed.
Somewhere I hoped that Hizashi would find the strength to take her in as his daughter.
It is too late to have regrets or second thoughts. Yes, I dread what could happen to her – the clan's punishment if they learn she betrayed its heir; my brother, his son. I dread both of them. And I fear where this – whatever it is, this anger of hers, this willingness to break the rules, her disregard of the clan – may take her. How easily she might stumble on a wrong path. She is my daughter and I hate having to acknowledge it, but – how much farther can she go?
She has disobeyed the clan.
Worse, she has been disloyal to someone – a person, her cousin. Her circumstances were extenuating, I'll give her that. But she has. And there is only one step between disobeying the clan and disobeying the village.
And… at same time… I am astonished at the resources of strength, fortitude, and determination she found and showed. I am wary of what may become of her – but I am also proud that she found both the will and the way to carry on her dream.
I can only hope it will not be her downfall. I do not want her to prove me right after all, that maybe she would have been happier if she wasn't a shinobi.
But then, there was never a choice.
Another meme ganked from
mariagoner again, because the fics are kicking my ass:If you make up titles for stories I didn't write, I will respond with details of those non-written stories.
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Date: 2007-03-27 05:46 pm (UTC)But I agree on the principle of the world needing more epic TemaShika. Or more TemaShika at all. ;_; (though to be fair, this would be more gen-oriented, in which the two main characters just happen to be together, more or less. Not for Temari and Shikamaru the existential angst - especially not when there's some enemy ass to be kicked.)