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Hinata is four when they dress her up like a doll, in an iromuji in a shade of lavender so pale it is almost white and a heavy maru obi with gold thread and bellflowers tied around her tiny waist. The kimono carries five crests; the official Hyuuga Clan crest that can be found on every single Hyuuga adorns both sides of her chest, the Main Branch crest for the select elite of her family on the backs of each sleeve, and her own, personal crest as Heir- a chrysanthemum- sprawled on her back.
Now, four years after she is born, there is only a slight cognitive dissonance when she looks in the mirror and sees lavender pale eyes and dainty features. Now, when she looks in the mirror, she sees herself, and not what she should be.
Eyes narrowing, she observes her reflection critically. If she were older, she’d look dignified and elegant. As it is, she looks too delicate and fragile like a flower. Turning and staring at the mirror from over her shoulder, her personal crest, the chrysanthemum, stares out at her like a weakness. It reminds her that although she’s seen as Heir and prodigy, her gender and her looks still mark her as a Princess when she should be a King.
It rankles. Hinata can’t wait to grow and fill out, to be lean and tall and vicious. With eyes half-lidded, she cocks her head slightly and imagines the cries of her enemies crushed underneath her foot.
A cough from one of the Branch members waiting on her, and she irritatedly turns away from her musings and sweeps out of her room.
They lead her to the main hall, where her cousin is kneeling in front of the Main Family of the Hyuuga in his most formal kuromontsuki kimono, forehead bare and eyes hard.
Neji, she recognizes, and her eyes narrow when she realizes just what she stepped in.
She might be four, yes, but she is also Heir. When it became clear that she was gifted (a prodigy on par with the Uchiha heir, the Elders had whispered as they watched her play with chakra and practice kata like a natural), her lessons had started as soon as she could walk and read. She learned about the Hyuuga’s history before anything else, as a way to tie her to the clan’s roots. Her father had taken pains to introduce her carefully to their tradition of branding their Branch members and Sealing their eyes. With a delicateness she didn’t know he possessed, he had phrased it in a way that the Branch members’ service to the Main Family was an honor.
A noble endeavor, he had told her solemnly, even as the rest of the Main Family ordered the Branch members around like slaves and tortured them for every small infraction.
The man needn’t have bothered with his sugarcoating. Hinata had never shown signs of altruism, after all. She was not interested nor cared for the weaklings in her clan being branded, because in her eyes, the strong always, always, stood on top and determined the natural order. Prior to this, even as she carried the title of Hyuuga and Heir, she cared little for her clan in general. It was not quite hers, not quite territory, not quite pack, because she didn’t pick them. They were connected only because of family, and Hinata did not care for superficial, flimsy relations of blood. Hinata judged the merits of a person through their will and strength, so obviously, she held no love for most of the Hyuuga.
Most of the Branch members were weak, too beaten down and resigned with their lot in life. Hinata had no time for those with no will.
But now, they are about to brand Neji. Neji, who was not weak.
No, Neji is a prodigy in the making, Neji is stronger than those decrepit Branch members that do nothing but show their bellies in supplication. Neji is her sparring partner, her cousin, her friend who sneaks her daifuku whenever the noise and irritating crowding in the compound gets to her and plays shoji and takes naps with her- hers. Neji is hers.
There is blood rushing in her ears, the very beginnings of rage pounding in time with her heart, and when Clan Elder Hiroko steps forward to seal her cousin, to brand him, to mark him as Hyuuga above all, above her claim to him, something in Hinata awakens.
It is the thing that had driven her to patrol her territory, vicious and unrelenting with enemies and interlopers. It is the thing that had driven her to madness whenever her people were beaten down by another, urging her to find the challenger and break their bones and their will. It is the thing that had led to her death in the life before this, raging and storming into battle against thousands when her Sky had fallen.
It is the thing that had named her a Demon before, whether of Namimori or Vongola or of the Hibari, and it is the thing that will name her a Demon in the Hyuuga now.
Hinata watches the way her cousin stiffens with every step that brings him closer to chains, sees the way the light in his eyes fades slowly when no one interferes.
So naturally, she does.
Hibari Kyouya had not let flimsy things such as tradition bend his will, and Hyuuga Hinata is the same.
It takes but a breath for her to dig into her soul, into her Will to awaken her flames, and she can barely hold back a shudder when roiling, possessive Cloud flames curl up in her veins once more. And within another breath, she pushes herself in between Clan Elder Hiroko and her cousin, multiplying her speed.
Before anyone can react, she slams her tiny, delicate palm into the man’s stomach, right into his tenketsu to destabilize him, propagating the sensation in the man to bring him the most pain without certain death.
There is a silence in the hall once the man falls, loud enough that it settles on her skin. Her father is staring at her like he’s never seen her before, and the rest of the Clan Elders and Main Family are gaping at her without the tiniest bit of propriety.
At their outstanding lack of decorum, a bloodthirsty smirk spreads her lips, and she stands tall, ready to tear and break and crush whoever stands before her and her territory.
“What are you doing, you foolish child!” Clan Elder Masato breaks the silence with a yell, veins bulging by his temple to glare her into submission. That prompts the others to start screaming at her, howling like a pack of wild dogs, every bit of poise gone. It is the first time she has actively stood against them, so their surprised anger is understandable. Hinata never saw the need to question their hold on the clan, preferring to train and learn and avoid crowding instead of submerging herself into the quicksand of clan politics, but now. Now, this is different.
This is personal.
With her anger spiking, she takes matters into her own hands.
Hinata narrows pale eyes and walks forward, towards the downed man gasping in front of her, and steps pointedly onto his throat.
The shrieks of the Elders die out at her implicit threat, cut off like a slit throat, and she barely resists grinding her heel into the man’s throat in glee.
“Esteemed Elders,” she intones solemnly, “it seems that you have gone senile in your old age. As Clan Heir, I graciously understand and accept your apologies, especially as time is one enemy that cannot be vanquished.”
She pauses at that, enjoying the flush crawling up their cheeks and necks, blotchy and a glaring target. She had never really been into politics, had always preferred to battle her opponents with her body, but just this once, she will try to dumb herself down for the Elders. There is no accounting for stupidity, after all. She doubts they will understand why exactly she will beat them black and blue if they seal Neji if she doesn’t spell it out for them.
Behind her small back, her cousin barely dares to breathe.
“Neji is mine before he is Hyuuga,” she bites out, and again the thought of Neji being sealed with a mark not her own, of being branded like cattle, makes her flames rage. “He will not take the Seal.”
“You-!”
Her patience has always been paper-thin, she muses, and shifts to stomp onto Clan Elder Hiroko’s collarbone. A deafening crack echoes in the hall when she presses her weight. The bodies in this universe are a lot denser, a lot stronger due to the selective breeding of the clan and the constant use of chakra from birth. It still takes her but half a second to break bone.
She had snapped it cleanly enough that if they tend to him properly, he will make a full recovery. But even with her generosity, the man still screams.
Irritated, she sends him a glare. This man is supposed to be a shinobi? Shinobi are supposed to endure, able to lose limbs and still come back up swinging to finish the mission. This man is just useless plant matter, not even fit for consumption. He had grown complacent and fat, hidden deep inside the village and clan compound with family treated like servants expected to die for him. To think that this man holds a position of honor in her clan… Hinata bares her teeth in annoyance.
“Be quiet, you spineless worm,” she hisses and breaks the man’s nose for good measure. The man’s scream chokes off into a pained whine as his eyes widen in fear. She knows what he sees, and why the rest of them pale when she looks up.
After the last Cloud Arcobaleno, Kyouya had been the strongest Cloud in the world. People whispered about him in back alleys and shadowed corners, and mafioso trembled in their boots whenever he walked past. Anyone sane already kept Clouds at arm’s length, what with their propensity for raging every time they felt their territory was being encroached, but Kyouya had been on a different level even amongst berserkers. He had made a name for himself for not tolerating weaklings and because his Sky was more suited to diplomatic overtures. It had been killing two birds with one stone; he did not have to deal with puny opponents and his Sky had the benefit of his reputation keeping him safe. So by the end of his life, he had almost the same notoriety as the World’s Greatest Hitman, Reborn.
Even now, Hinata knows exactly how terrifying her expression is. And with her flames propagating her killing intent, the air around her is hazy from the heat of her anger.
It seems as if she has been remiss in her duties, if she had unwittingly tolerated a feeble, doddering old fool to have power in a clan that is hers. The Hyuuga might not be her territory, but she is still Heir. She has a duty to ensure the clan prospered, and it definitely will stagnate and die out with herbivores in charge.
And she might hate politics, but disposing of the weak in her clan and ensuring the pecking order is sound doesn’t sound so trying. She once created the Disciplinary Committee and the Foundation from ashes, and had built her people into pillars of impregnable strength. Cleaning house and ensuring that the strongest, and not weak herbivores, are the ones who are on top of the hierarchy just makes her nostalgic. The Hyuuga might not be hers now, but that doesn’t mean they can’t be hers after she molds them in her image.
She also doubts the stuck-up Elders will let Neji off the hook, so she just has to take over the clan to ensure he stays safe.
There is no other option.
“I’ll tell you this one more time,” she says calmly into the quiet that is so loud it rings, “because it seems to me that you are hard of hearing as well. Neji will not take the Seal, not now or ever. He is mine and he is strong. I will not allow you to cripple his potential. Whoever tries to take him from me will be given one warning before I tear your limbs off and gut you like the worthless herbivores you are.”
Hinata takes a sweeping step away from the useless man under her and sinks into a familiar stance, her flames already baying for blood. She misses her tonfas, but she has never really needed them to destroy and rage. Even bare-handed, Hinata will show them just what it means to cross a Cloud.
Smirking, Hinata stares straight into the shocked eyes of her father and hopes they give her a good fight.
It has been a lifetime since she went hunting, after all.