DISCLAIMER: I do not own Naruto it belongs to Kishimoto

Chapter 1

The Plan

Sakura waited at the gates waiting for the Sasuke retrieval team to come back. Ino was waiting with her and they hadn't talked much in the last few hours since Naruto, Shikamaru and the others had left.

As she looked Sakura saw a blur approaching, a flash of orange with it

'Naruto!' she thought excitedly.

Only for it to fall when she saw it was Kakashi Sensei carrying him.

"MOVE OUT OF THE WAY!" she heard as Kakashi ran past. She was able to get a good glimpse of Naruto before they ran past her. What she saw was something she wished she hadn't.

Naruto was covered in blood.

His orange jacket that he loved so much had mostly been died a dark red.

She watched as her Sensei carried her teammate towards the hospital. After they were out of sight she burst into tears and fell to the ground, screaming Naruto's name.

Ino who had seen the same thing as Sakura and looked at her friend crying as fear filled her. Her mind drifted to her two teammates.

Shikamaru and Choji. Were they okay?

After shaking her head for a moment she walked over to Sakura and helped her up as they walked to the hospital.

She had to believe that they were okay.

When they got to the hospital a nurse escorted them to the waiting room near the ER. When they got there they saw Kakashi just standing in front of the doors that led into the ER. His flack jacket and hands were covered in blood.

Sakura wasn't trained in medical ninjutsu but even she knew that loosing that much blood wasn't good. She began to cry again and after hearing her Kakashi turned to her. Looking at himself and all the blood he looked towards the mens restroom. After excusing himself he left only to come back a minute later having changed out into a sleeveless shirt from a storage scroll that he had spare clothes in.

"Sakura" she looked up at her sensei.

"Sensei…Naruto…what…how" she paused a swallowed a sob "What happened to Naruto!?"

"Sasuke" at this Sakura's eyes lit up in surprise and disbelief, then as the thought had time to totally be taken in by her mind her face took on a look of someone who's whole world had been shattered. Ino who had been standing back, yet still close enough to hear looked like she was about to puke.

"What?" Kakashi looked down at the ground. He didn't want to talk to her about this. Bending down on his knee, he placed his hands on his female students shoulders and looked her in her eyes.

"Sasuke wasn't kidnapped by the Sound ninja like originally thought, he voluntarily went with them."

Sakura started shaking her head, not because she didn't believe what Kakashi had said but rather she didn't want to believe this was actually happening. But she had already seen too much proof. Kakashi took a breath then continued.

"From what we can tell Naruto confronted Sasuke at the Valley of the End and they fought. While Naruto wasn't trying to kill Sasuke the reverse wasn't true, Sasuke was actually trying to kill Naruto. Eventually the fight ended with Sasuke being knocked out but Naruto was critically injured. When I arrived the fight was over and I summoned some ninja hounds to bring Sasuke back to the Village."

Seeing that his student was about to ask how badly Naruto and Sasuke was hurt Kakashi decided to go ahead and tell her.

"Sasuke mainly suffered a concussion and some broken bones, his left leg is hurt badly though I don't now to what extent." That was the easy part. But looking at his students pleading eyes for information on her blond haired teammate he braced himself. This wasn't going to be easy.

"Naruto on the other hand is in critical condition. Over 50% of his body is severely burned. He has broken bone and fractures throughout his body and some internal bleeding." He took another breath.

"Sasuke also used Chidori on him."

With those words Sakura went pale as she felt like her life left her. She had seen what the Chidori was capable and imagining that being used on Naruto was something that scared her.

"Sasuke's Chidori pierced Naruto's right side taking out his right lung."

As Sakura mentally listed all the injuries Naruto had she didn't need to hear his next words to know what this all meant.

"Sakura, it doesn't look good. Lady 5th is in their right now doing everything she can to save him but there's a large chance he won't make it and even if he does his ninja career will most likely be over." What Kakashi didn't say was that Naruto's Uzumaki blood and 9 tails Chakra gave him incredible healing powers but even that had limits.

Hours passed as Sakura, Ino and Kakashi waited.

Others came over time all of them were told of Naruto's condition.

Shikamaru was the first to arrive as he was nearly swallowed in a hug by Ino. He told them that Choji was going to be fine and that he was out of surgery. Naji came next in a wheelchair pushed by Ten Ten with Lee and Gaara walking behind her.

After hours of waiting and more people arriving Kakashi whispered something to Shikamaru who then talked Sakura into coming with him to get some food for everyone from the cafeteria.

They were walking past a small group of nurses who were gossiping. While Shikamaru wasn't interested in what they had to say something they said did draw Sakura's attention.

"So Sasuke Uchiha is down that hallway."

It only took Shikamaru a second to process what they had said and the fact that Sakura had heard them as well. He whirled around towards where she had been a second ago.

"Sakura don't…" but it was too late as she was already halfway down the hall running full speed towards a room that had two ANBU outside.

As she approached the ANBU didn't bother trying to stop her as she was a member of the same squad she was allowed in to visit him.

She threw the door open. Her eyes landing on a bruised and beaten Sasuke who was strapped down to his bed. He turned his head to look at her.

"How could you do that to Naruto he was your friend, he wanted to help you!?"

Sasuke merely looked at her as if she were an annoying insect.

"He had served his purpose and was in my way, he was an annoying bug that I crushed it's as simple as that."

These words made Sakura furious, more furious than she had ever felt. In that moment thinking over everything Sasuke had done to possibly the kindest person Sakura had ever met and he wasn't sorry at all sent an emotion through her that she never thought she would feel towards Sasuke.

Hatred, she hated him and she wanted to kill him.

With an angry yell she jumped up on Sasuke's bed and, pumping Chakra into her arms, began to pound Sasuke over and over again. She wasn't even thinking, she just wanted to hurt him. Soon enough the too ANBU began to pull her away as she found herself struggling against Shikamaru's shadow possession jutsu.

"Sakura calm down."

She looked back at Shikamaru, and saw that he wanted to hurt Sasuke too but restrained himself.

She looked at Sasuke one more time, then she spit in his face.

"Fine"

After they returned from their original destination, the cafeteria, Shikamaru went over and whispered to Kakashi who kept glancing at her. Afterwards Shikamaru left to go see how Choji was doing.

About two hours later Tsunadae exited the doors of the emergency room.

Everyone stood at attention. Bracing for the worst, hoping for the best.

"He's stabilized but he's still in the danger zone and is currently comatose. We don't know when or if he'll wake up." Sakura was the first to speak up.

"Can we see him."

Tsunadae nodded her head. "Team 7 can but I'm afraid everyone will have to wait a few days." With that she led Kakashi and Sakura to a room with two ANBU standing outside. Kakashi waved at the tiger masked one in greeting.

Inside the room lay Naruto, covered in bandages plugged up to a breathing machine and tubes that performed a large number of tasks.

To Sakura this looked wrong. Naruto had beaten Zabuza, Haku, Neji and Gaara, she had developed an image of Naruto being almost unkillable in her mind. So seeing him like this in such bad shape, shook her to her core.

After a while Kakashi grabbed her shoulder.

"Come on Sakura, I'll take you home."

"No" Kakashi looked at his student in shock. She had never talked back to him before.

"I'm not leaving until Naruto wakes up." Kakashi looked at the Hokage who merely shrugged.

"There will be nurses in and out all night."

Kakashi sighed in resignation.

"Ok Sakur you can stay I'll tell your parents what's going on."

After Kakashi left Sakura just watched the sleeping form of Naruto.

She knew he would wake up. He had to.

And she wanted to be here when he did.

Ok this will probably be just a two shot so be ready for that if you want me to go farther than that please review or PM me and let me know.

This idea came as I was thinking about Naruto's healing ability and wondering what the limits to it were. I never liked how when Sasuke shoved the Chidori into Naruto taking out a lung he was able to heal from all of the damages and still keep fighting as if nothing happened.

Plus Sasuke always struck me as more of a villain than hero. So I wanted to portray that in his confrontation with Sakura.

So please review and let me know what you think.