Solus

~~The first part of the chapter will be from the perspective of Hinata's mother, Honoka.~~

Ɛ!3

Hours upon hours the white hospital room was echoing with screams and moans of pain. Each contraction, each push ripped Honoka's sore and pink flesh. The seconds were hours and the minutes were days. The pain was bearable, however, because it had to be bared. Honoka couldn't merely stop the pain, and she didn't want to. The doctors had told Honoka how her baby was overdue, that it needed to come out tonight. If it didn't, it would be born with a neurological disorder, or worse, stillborn. The baby needed to come out, to see the world, and to live.

To live.

"Please, please you have to come out of me," Honoka yelled before pushing once more.

When Honoka first learned she was pregnant, she was scared. She didn't want to give birth to a child, not when the village, the baby's future home, was in such a state. It was still recovering from the war that had only ended a couple of months ago. The Kyuubi attack was only a month ago.

At eight months pregnant, close to the due date, Honoka didn't want to birth to her baby merely for the fact that she didn't want her child to leave her. To be so far away from her protection and love. Even living in the same house wouldn't be enough, she would be too far away. Honoka didn't want to lose her precious child.

Even now, she doesn't want to lose her baby, which is why she must give birth to it.

Another push and Honoka could feel the soft buzz of her daughter's chakra. It was small, so very small yet bright. That small lull of hope invigorated her to push even harder.

"Hyuga-san, just one more push now. Please give a big push," Bashira, her midwife, encouraged.

Honoka noticed the emptiness of her womb right away, just as she had felt it when the head was free. That final push was all it took for after, Honoka wasn't the only one wailing and screaming. A voice, so quiet compared to her own and unused, joined hers.

Honoka knew, merely by her chakra alone, that her daughter was an angel.

Naked and un-winged.

Ɛ!3

Her daughter cried. Honoka had heard it so much that she had become so exceptionally well at blocking it out. She was able to focus on rocking her baby in her arms and not the shrieking sounds she made.

Honoka, despite being a new mom, knew that babies cried. It was something even someone as idiotic and disconnected as her husband (god she missed him), knew. What she didn't know, was that they cried this much. She didn't think there was ever a time that her hospital room wasn't filled with noises of shrill whines and yells. Only when the doctors took her away did they stop.

The fear of something being wrong with her child was larger than her fear of dying. Honoka would gladly give up her life for her daughter to be happy and healthy.

"I'm sorry Hyūga-San, but we can't figure out what's wrong with her," with gloved hands one of the nurses handed her back her baby.

"We've conducted many tests. The problem doesn't lie with her physical health, of that we're sure."

Honoka took her baby, her Hinata, into her arms and held her close to her heart. Hinata's mouth was open in a loud cry, something Honoka was very much used to.

"What can we do then? She barely eats, and only cries. The only time she'll sleep is when she's cried herself into exhaustion," Honoka explained with disparity. She was truly at a loss. She had secretly wished it was something physical. Physical problems could be fixed. Mental or other unknown problems could not.

She began to rock Hinata gently as the nurse backed away for the doctor to reply, "Since the problem isn't physical, there isn't anything we can do. I'm afraid that she's just a fussy baby," Honoka's lips dropped down to a frown, surely this wasn't the usual behavior of a "fussy baby."

"We'll keep you two here though, just in case," The Doctor said before leaving along with the many nurses. Honoka looked from the closed-door back to her baby.

"My dear angel, please be okay," she whispered.

She knew that her child was experiencing pain. Because of what, she had no idea. The doctor and nurses concluded that it wasn't physical, but if not that then what else? Surely her baby wasn't experiencing mental pain, not at barely a couple of weeks old.

Honoka just didn't know. All she knew was that she was tired. She missed her husband and her house. She just wanted to sleep in her bed with her husband and child.

Most of all, she wanted her baby to be alright.

Ɛ!3

The endless darkness was all I could see, and the sickening sensation of being squeezed was all I could feel. The walls of flesh around me were warm. My body couldn't move, and the uncertainty of not knowing where I was and what was happening ate my hope up. The only thing I was entirely certain of was that I was utterly alone. And if I could cry, I would have been. The silence, the maddening silence, and isolation were far worse than the pain of dying, I decided quickly.

(She had never liked being alone).

My eyes had yet to close, however, I found myself opening them up. The world became born once again, (she became born once again). And suddenly, I was no longer alone. The desolate darkness disappeared. White, and blurry figures moved so quickly my eyes couldn't keep up, and sounds buzzed through my ears. A warm and light presence surrounded me, and I thought it must be a God, taking me into their arms so I may rest once more. I surrendered myself to the comforting eidolon, letting my weary body sink into theirs.

I was alive. I could feel my cheeks, my toes, my fingers. I could feel everything around me. The feeling of my body being fed through a breast, I could feel as well. During that one action, I came to realize two very important things.

The first was that the God that was holding me, wasn't a God at all. She was a person, likely the one that gave birth to me. Though she was a human, after spending time with her, I came to understand that she was the closest thing a person could get to being a divine individual such as a God.

The second thing I learned was that I was in a new body, that of a baby. That meant I had died, but was alive once more, in a different body and perhaps a different country. People talked all around me but I couldn't quite make out what they were saying. Their words were fast spoken, and not similar to English at all.

My memories were still intact. While I couldn't remember every single thing about my past life, I remembered who I was. The important stuff. Blurry images constantly flashed through my mind. People were among those memories but their faces were blurred and slipping away. The colors and shapes of their faces were fading and dripping. Like what my chalk drawings looked like after my dad hosed the driveway down until it was nothing but wet and clean. I had watched the once bright colors drip and slide down into small streams, making the water murky and muddled with full colors, many different times.

I clung to the memories that I shouldn't have had so much that my small, underdeveloped brain throbbed and hurt. My new body wasn't meant to hold so many memories and information.

The first year I spent in the hospital fighting against my own body and mind. Trying to hold onto the only things I had left of my (past) family and life. The fact that I had been born prematurely, certainly didn't help.

I cried, cried, cried. (And cried).

Fortunately, I didn't have to spend that time alone. My (new) mama, the not-God named Honoka, never left my side. Most nights I slept in either her warm arms or on the cold slab most known as an operating table with masked people staring down trying to figure out just what was wrong with me.

I dreaded the nights I wasn't with her because those were the nights when instead of falling asleep hearing her hum soft lullabies, I fell asleep hearing nameless, faceless people speak over me as if I wasn't a baby but instead a deer heart to be dissected.

The second year was the year I gave up and let my memories slip through my mind like so much colorful water. Mama smiled then, for the second time. The pain stopped. And I stopped crying too, and mama was able to take me home.

Ɛ!3