[Fanfiction] The Ratio of Freckles To Stars
Title: The Ratio of Freckles To Stars
Genre: Romance/General
Pairing: Hanabi/Tenten
Rating: R
For: forever3330
Requested pairings: Sakura/Hinata, Hanabi/Tenten, Hanabi/Ino
Up to three things you want: Anything's fine.
Up to three things you don't want: Um. I'm good. Just no kinky sex, please.
Preferred ratings: I'd prefer no smut. :D;
The Ratio of Freckles To Stars
At sixteen, Hanabi is not a child.
This is a fact people tend to overlook when they see her standing in ranks, towered over by her fellow shinobi-at five foot one, she is the ANBU of the smallest stature in that year’s recruitment round. She knows they think there’s something intrinsicly limiting about living one’s life cosseted by your family, imprisoned by your own brilliance and the mores of your clan.
What a joke.
They forget her strength, her learning, her sight. They forget that she was the youngest in her class to graduate from the ninja academy, that at three she already had all the basic forms of the Juuken mastered, and her Byakugan fully activated at seven-a whole year earlier than her cousin Neji, the clan’s prodigy. They forget that a Hyuuga girl is by default a woman from the day she is born to the moment she draws her last breath, and every single moment in between.
The clan has no place for children, only for strong-willed adults made of invisible steel.
But she forgives the men for their guileless presumptiousness - even her superiors who treat her with kid gloves and view her, in spite of themselves and the mission reports indicating otherwise, as an amateur intruding upon their territory. After all, they are men, with far more swagger than sense, and she can afford to be tolerant because even the best of them are terribly naive in comparison with her knowledge. Forgiveness is easy when she walks among her male comrades knowing she has the potential to be stronger and faster than any of them can ever dream, secure in her ability to hold her own and - one day - rise above them all.
It is much more difficult to forgive when it is a woman who does the doubting. Especially if it’s the woman standing in front of her at this moment.
“Are you sure you’re alright with these terms?” Tenten asks, skepticism evident in her tone. “I know extrasensory vision gives you an edge and everything, but going against me weaponless in the dark… You know attacking a moving target is my specialty.”
“I know,” Hanabi replies. She likes the way her voice sounds, crisp and brisk like the mountain air, like a swim in the lake behind the Hyuuga compound which ought to be frozen over but is still magically liquid, even in February.
“You know,” Tenten mutters, slightly huffy, “I’m beginning to think you don’t have much faith in my ability.”
Hanabi secrets away a smile at the other girl’s miffed expression. Upon joining the ANBU, she soon discovered that Neji’s former teammate is the closest thing she has to an equal. Adult - practical right down to her insulated uniform - and even if slightly more rambunctious than Hanabi prefers, certainly sensible and not unpleasant to be around between missions and training. Even Neji speaks highly of her skills and endurance, such that Hanabi has never ceased to be amazed that his tolerance and respect for his teammate never allowed for the possibility of something more. Then again, her cousin is a fool.
Back to the matter at hand. “On the contrary, I hold your skills in the highest regard,” Hanabi finds herself saying. “Remember how you almost got past my Kaiten just the other day?”
“And I would have managed it, too, if I’d brought a bigger axe.”
“Well think about it. This way, we each both have an advantage over the other. You have your long-range weapons and I have my Byakugan. Are you ready?”
Tenten seems to consider this for a moment, and then shrugs easily and, slipping a summoning scroll into each hand, proceeds to disappear into the darkened treetops without a further word. Hanabi mentally counts to fifty before giving chase.
It is a clear and chilly night, and through the bramble of tangled branches, she can glimpse a patch of dark blue sky heavily dotted with stars. Pressing her body flatly against the shadowed trunk of a maple tree, Hanabi activates her Byakugan and begins surveying the surrounding area. Tenten is nowhere in sight, which also means that, wherever the older girl is, she knows that her target is out of range. They both have their chakra masked.
The game is just beginning.
As she moves silently through the forest, trying (successfully) to keep everything in sight at once, Hanabi allows herself to contemplate her new partner, and the tentative bond - friendship, if you could call it that - that they share between them, and only between them. Most of their male colleagues see this as arrogance and bigotry - that only a woman can make Hanabi reach out - and the more imaginative among them jokingly hint of lurid scenarios.
As if.
Hanabi tries to imagine a typical day in Tenten’s company. Naturally, there would be training - they would spar until their joints audibly creak, and they would shower and change and maybe enjoy a few hours of leisure down in the village. Tenten would laugh and nod approvingly when Hanabi points out the silly girls in the street with their paints and frills and utterly impractical manner of walking, that hip-centric way that should be less about swaying and more about holding a certain posture.
They would, in short, do all the things usually expected of kindred souls.
Hanabi thinks that she likes that, quite a lot. And would like a lot more.
But more doesn’t seem like a real possibility. Not when Tenten intently talks about Neji whenever Hanabi tries to get closer. She thinks Hanabi wants more from her than simply friendship, and while Hanabi does find her attractive…
She is not a child, and the older girl has much to learn.
A brief flicker at the edge of her field of view brings her up short, and with minimum effort, she instinctively focuses the chakra in her body into her eyes, pushing her bloodline limit to pierce through the heavy shadows. Still no sign of her target.
She moves on, careful to keep herself hidden. Without the aid of special vision, Tenten has learned to enhance her sense of hearing to help her track movements in the dark.
But exemplary kunoichi that she is, Hanabi suspects Tenten could do with a few lessons.
Yes.
She wants to see Tenten’s hair freed from the reserve, highly practical buns she keeps them in at all time. She wants the soft brown tendrils spread on a pillow, loose and streaming around the older girl’s flushed face. Wants to bury her nose in them, and smell sweet and clean and wholesome, all soft curves and hard muscles and burning want.
Yes.
Hanabi clamps a hand over her mouth just in time to stifle the almost-groan that threatens to slip from her lips. Nonetheless, she has given herself away, and has only a second to prepare herself before the assault commences.
She manages to dodge the flurry of shuriken by throwing herself to the left into a cluster of gnarled roots, and springs away again just as five barbed kunai stab heartily into the hard earth, missing her body by a hairbreadth. Escapes the shower of senbon needles with seconds to spare, and sees the double-moon boomerang in time to get out of the way.
Forgets about its returning arc.
The curved edge of the boomerang whizzes past Hanabi, grazing her right arm and drawing blood in spite of her best belated effort to jump out of its way. It’s only a flesh wound, and the bleeding appears to be negligible, but a hit is still a hit.
It’s a mistake that Hyuuga Hanabi, sixteen-year-old elite ANBU and newly-minted genius of Konoha’s most powerful and illustrious ninja clan, would never make.
It is unforgivable.
Furiously, Hanabi casts her eyes around the small clearing. And there, at the edge of her vision, enshrouded in the high branches of an ancient oak…
Got her.
Before the other girl has had a chance to blink, Hanabi is already beside her on the thick, mossy branch, twenty feet above the ground. With a delicate flick of her wrist, she neatly disarms Tenten, and presses her body swiftly to the tree trunk.
“Got you,” Hanabi says triumphantly. At close range, they both know that she has the clear advantage. This session is over.
In the dim light cast by the stars, Tenten smiles ruefully in defeat. “Well I got you first.”
They are so close-their bodies practically pressed up against each other inch for inch-that Hanabi could have counted the freckles on her nose. Tenten’s breath brushes hotly against her cheeks, a stark contrast with the cold night air. Hanabi feels something prickly draw its fingers down the length of her spine, one vertebra at a time.
Does she dare?
“What one earth could have made you that distracted, Hyuuga Hanabi?”
That’s not even a question.
“I was thinking,” Hanabi says, her voice oddly husky and low, “about doing this.”
With that, she presses her mouth against Tenten’s, hard, and swallows the other girl’s surprised gasp right off her tongue. Tenten’s lips are cold, but her palate is hot and wet against Hahabi’s darting tongue that flickers wildly in a promise to do the same to the rest of her body.
It lasts only for a moment. Then Tenten abruptly breaks the kiss and tries to push her off. Hanabi holds her ground.
“Hanabi, I…”
“You don’t need men,” Hanabi intones firmly, shoving her thigh between Tenten’s own.
Tenten makes a small choking sound in her throat, a broken protest, and then a flush is spilling rapidly across her cheeks, pouring into pale skin like red wine on paper, like blood. It makes the freckles leap from her face in a way that warms Hanabi more than all the layers she’s wearing. Almost as much as Tenten’s body, tattooed against her front.
Hanabi leans into that body, and murmurs softly in her ears, “I can show you why.”
With one hand, she reaches up to stroke Tenten’s neck, and then slips it lower. That’s where the warmth is, under Tenten’s clothes. She has to move quickly-she wants skin, and will have it. Applies her teeth and works at the thick material of Tenten’s winter qipao until a patch of pale shoulder is exposed, lightly sprayed with brown freckles. Scars. Each of them is like a star in the sky above their head, a pinprick of light. Little rips in the dark canvas of night. Holes to heaven.
And Tenten is…
Tenten is pushing back and writhing against her, small animal noises escaping from her lips to get lost on the blustery wind. Hanabi can feel the heat rising from between her legs. She gives up on all subtlety and thrusts her other hand into Tenten’s clothes. Tosses her hair back and rolls her hips, working them into the right position. Tenten is there, face flushed, freckles all in a riot-she is watching her, moving with her, and Hanabi wants to be beautiful for that.
She continues to rub, now gently, now urgently, until she feels the moisture soak through, feels Tenten’s head drop forward onto her shoulder, and hears the gasp that means she is so very close to coming. Tenten holds her breath for a very long moment, reaching for it; then she exhales and shudders in Hanabi’s arms.
The wind has suddenly gone quiet, the silence amplifying the sounds of panting breaths.
When they pull away from each other, Tenten puts her lips next to Hanabi’s ear and whispers, “My room is warm, and my bed is softer than the bark on this tree.”
It takes a moment for the words to sink in properly, and then Hanabi hears herself laughing. The sound is… exuberant. Almost childlike.
“What are you thinking now?” Tenten asks, her brows slightly furrowed in confusion.
Hanabi catches her breath and presses her still-smiling lips into Tenten’s cheeks, murmuring into her wind-chapped skin, “I’m thinking that I’d very much like to take you out for breakfast tomorrow morning.
Tenten chortles softly. Hanabi continues.
“And return the favor for the scratch you gave me tonight.”
-fin
Genre: Romance/General
Pairing: Hanabi/Tenten
Rating: R
For: forever3330
Requested pairings: Sakura/Hinata, Hanabi/Tenten, Hanabi/Ino
Up to three things you want: Anything's fine.
Up to three things you don't want: Um. I'm good. Just no kinky sex, please.
Preferred ratings: I'd prefer no smut. :D;
The Ratio of Freckles To Stars
At sixteen, Hanabi is not a child.
This is a fact people tend to overlook when they see her standing in ranks, towered over by her fellow shinobi-at five foot one, she is the ANBU of the smallest stature in that year’s recruitment round. She knows they think there’s something intrinsicly limiting about living one’s life cosseted by your family, imprisoned by your own brilliance and the mores of your clan.
What a joke.
They forget her strength, her learning, her sight. They forget that she was the youngest in her class to graduate from the ninja academy, that at three she already had all the basic forms of the Juuken mastered, and her Byakugan fully activated at seven-a whole year earlier than her cousin Neji, the clan’s prodigy. They forget that a Hyuuga girl is by default a woman from the day she is born to the moment she draws her last breath, and every single moment in between.
The clan has no place for children, only for strong-willed adults made of invisible steel.
But she forgives the men for their guileless presumptiousness - even her superiors who treat her with kid gloves and view her, in spite of themselves and the mission reports indicating otherwise, as an amateur intruding upon their territory. After all, they are men, with far more swagger than sense, and she can afford to be tolerant because even the best of them are terribly naive in comparison with her knowledge. Forgiveness is easy when she walks among her male comrades knowing she has the potential to be stronger and faster than any of them can ever dream, secure in her ability to hold her own and - one day - rise above them all.
It is much more difficult to forgive when it is a woman who does the doubting. Especially if it’s the woman standing in front of her at this moment.
“Are you sure you’re alright with these terms?” Tenten asks, skepticism evident in her tone. “I know extrasensory vision gives you an edge and everything, but going against me weaponless in the dark… You know attacking a moving target is my specialty.”
“I know,” Hanabi replies. She likes the way her voice sounds, crisp and brisk like the mountain air, like a swim in the lake behind the Hyuuga compound which ought to be frozen over but is still magically liquid, even in February.
“You know,” Tenten mutters, slightly huffy, “I’m beginning to think you don’t have much faith in my ability.”
Hanabi secrets away a smile at the other girl’s miffed expression. Upon joining the ANBU, she soon discovered that Neji’s former teammate is the closest thing she has to an equal. Adult - practical right down to her insulated uniform - and even if slightly more rambunctious than Hanabi prefers, certainly sensible and not unpleasant to be around between missions and training. Even Neji speaks highly of her skills and endurance, such that Hanabi has never ceased to be amazed that his tolerance and respect for his teammate never allowed for the possibility of something more. Then again, her cousin is a fool.
Back to the matter at hand. “On the contrary, I hold your skills in the highest regard,” Hanabi finds herself saying. “Remember how you almost got past my Kaiten just the other day?”
“And I would have managed it, too, if I’d brought a bigger axe.”
“Well think about it. This way, we each both have an advantage over the other. You have your long-range weapons and I have my Byakugan. Are you ready?”
Tenten seems to consider this for a moment, and then shrugs easily and, slipping a summoning scroll into each hand, proceeds to disappear into the darkened treetops without a further word. Hanabi mentally counts to fifty before giving chase.
It is a clear and chilly night, and through the bramble of tangled branches, she can glimpse a patch of dark blue sky heavily dotted with stars. Pressing her body flatly against the shadowed trunk of a maple tree, Hanabi activates her Byakugan and begins surveying the surrounding area. Tenten is nowhere in sight, which also means that, wherever the older girl is, she knows that her target is out of range. They both have their chakra masked.
The game is just beginning.
As she moves silently through the forest, trying (successfully) to keep everything in sight at once, Hanabi allows herself to contemplate her new partner, and the tentative bond - friendship, if you could call it that - that they share between them, and only between them. Most of their male colleagues see this as arrogance and bigotry - that only a woman can make Hanabi reach out - and the more imaginative among them jokingly hint of lurid scenarios.
As if.
Hanabi tries to imagine a typical day in Tenten’s company. Naturally, there would be training - they would spar until their joints audibly creak, and they would shower and change and maybe enjoy a few hours of leisure down in the village. Tenten would laugh and nod approvingly when Hanabi points out the silly girls in the street with their paints and frills and utterly impractical manner of walking, that hip-centric way that should be less about swaying and more about holding a certain posture.
They would, in short, do all the things usually expected of kindred souls.
Hanabi thinks that she likes that, quite a lot. And would like a lot more.
But more doesn’t seem like a real possibility. Not when Tenten intently talks about Neji whenever Hanabi tries to get closer. She thinks Hanabi wants more from her than simply friendship, and while Hanabi does find her attractive…
She is not a child, and the older girl has much to learn.
A brief flicker at the edge of her field of view brings her up short, and with minimum effort, she instinctively focuses the chakra in her body into her eyes, pushing her bloodline limit to pierce through the heavy shadows. Still no sign of her target.
She moves on, careful to keep herself hidden. Without the aid of special vision, Tenten has learned to enhance her sense of hearing to help her track movements in the dark.
But exemplary kunoichi that she is, Hanabi suspects Tenten could do with a few lessons.
Yes.
She wants to see Tenten’s hair freed from the reserve, highly practical buns she keeps them in at all time. She wants the soft brown tendrils spread on a pillow, loose and streaming around the older girl’s flushed face. Wants to bury her nose in them, and smell sweet and clean and wholesome, all soft curves and hard muscles and burning want.
Yes.
Hanabi clamps a hand over her mouth just in time to stifle the almost-groan that threatens to slip from her lips. Nonetheless, she has given herself away, and has only a second to prepare herself before the assault commences.
She manages to dodge the flurry of shuriken by throwing herself to the left into a cluster of gnarled roots, and springs away again just as five barbed kunai stab heartily into the hard earth, missing her body by a hairbreadth. Escapes the shower of senbon needles with seconds to spare, and sees the double-moon boomerang in time to get out of the way.
Forgets about its returning arc.
The curved edge of the boomerang whizzes past Hanabi, grazing her right arm and drawing blood in spite of her best belated effort to jump out of its way. It’s only a flesh wound, and the bleeding appears to be negligible, but a hit is still a hit.
It’s a mistake that Hyuuga Hanabi, sixteen-year-old elite ANBU and newly-minted genius of Konoha’s most powerful and illustrious ninja clan, would never make.
It is unforgivable.
Furiously, Hanabi casts her eyes around the small clearing. And there, at the edge of her vision, enshrouded in the high branches of an ancient oak…
Got her.
Before the other girl has had a chance to blink, Hanabi is already beside her on the thick, mossy branch, twenty feet above the ground. With a delicate flick of her wrist, she neatly disarms Tenten, and presses her body swiftly to the tree trunk.
“Got you,” Hanabi says triumphantly. At close range, they both know that she has the clear advantage. This session is over.
In the dim light cast by the stars, Tenten smiles ruefully in defeat. “Well I got you first.”
They are so close-their bodies practically pressed up against each other inch for inch-that Hanabi could have counted the freckles on her nose. Tenten’s breath brushes hotly against her cheeks, a stark contrast with the cold night air. Hanabi feels something prickly draw its fingers down the length of her spine, one vertebra at a time.
Does she dare?
“What one earth could have made you that distracted, Hyuuga Hanabi?”
That’s not even a question.
“I was thinking,” Hanabi says, her voice oddly husky and low, “about doing this.”
With that, she presses her mouth against Tenten’s, hard, and swallows the other girl’s surprised gasp right off her tongue. Tenten’s lips are cold, but her palate is hot and wet against Hahabi’s darting tongue that flickers wildly in a promise to do the same to the rest of her body.
It lasts only for a moment. Then Tenten abruptly breaks the kiss and tries to push her off. Hanabi holds her ground.
“Hanabi, I…”
“You don’t need men,” Hanabi intones firmly, shoving her thigh between Tenten’s own.
Tenten makes a small choking sound in her throat, a broken protest, and then a flush is spilling rapidly across her cheeks, pouring into pale skin like red wine on paper, like blood. It makes the freckles leap from her face in a way that warms Hanabi more than all the layers she’s wearing. Almost as much as Tenten’s body, tattooed against her front.
Hanabi leans into that body, and murmurs softly in her ears, “I can show you why.”
With one hand, she reaches up to stroke Tenten’s neck, and then slips it lower. That’s where the warmth is, under Tenten’s clothes. She has to move quickly-she wants skin, and will have it. Applies her teeth and works at the thick material of Tenten’s winter qipao until a patch of pale shoulder is exposed, lightly sprayed with brown freckles. Scars. Each of them is like a star in the sky above their head, a pinprick of light. Little rips in the dark canvas of night. Holes to heaven.
And Tenten is…
Tenten is pushing back and writhing against her, small animal noises escaping from her lips to get lost on the blustery wind. Hanabi can feel the heat rising from between her legs. She gives up on all subtlety and thrusts her other hand into Tenten’s clothes. Tosses her hair back and rolls her hips, working them into the right position. Tenten is there, face flushed, freckles all in a riot-she is watching her, moving with her, and Hanabi wants to be beautiful for that.
She continues to rub, now gently, now urgently, until she feels the moisture soak through, feels Tenten’s head drop forward onto her shoulder, and hears the gasp that means she is so very close to coming. Tenten holds her breath for a very long moment, reaching for it; then she exhales and shudders in Hanabi’s arms.
The wind has suddenly gone quiet, the silence amplifying the sounds of panting breaths.
When they pull away from each other, Tenten puts her lips next to Hanabi’s ear and whispers, “My room is warm, and my bed is softer than the bark on this tree.”
It takes a moment for the words to sink in properly, and then Hanabi hears herself laughing. The sound is… exuberant. Almost childlike.
“What are you thinking now?” Tenten asks, her brows slightly furrowed in confusion.
Hanabi catches her breath and presses her still-smiling lips into Tenten’s cheeks, murmuring into her wind-chapped skin, “I’m thinking that I’d very much like to take you out for breakfast tomorrow morning.
Tenten chortles softly. Hanabi continues.
“And return the favor for the scratch you gave me tonight.”
-fin