- Chapter One -
I swear to you
Every day, we'll be happy…
She never really liked the dark.
A ninja should be more comfortable in the darkness than the light (a rule later adjusted to 'as comfortable'), darkness was a shinobi's friend, and naturally a ninja like herself should seek it out when possible. She should like the darkness.
She never really had. She still didn't.
The light of a single candle wasn't enough to brighten the cramped and tiny room she'd trapped herself in. Shandows danced and flickered across the room like they might conquer the orange-red glow of the candlelight if she ever took her attention off of it and let down her guard. Considering where she was, she didn't think it was an unreasonable thought.
"Stop worrying so much…" Her whisper echoed off of the far wall of the cell, bounding back at her almost on top of her words. There wasn't room enough to delay any longer than that. "It's only going to be a little while…"
She'd only be there for a little while. That was why she came with him. He took her with him, and that meant…as long as she had a little time…she could convince him to come home after all, once he calmed down, once he saw that Orochimaru wasn't the only or the best way.
They'd go home soon.
"Aren't you ever disgusted with how pathetic you are?" That girl, Tayuya. She'd opened the door without Sakura hearing her, and now stood in the doorway, silhouetted in the brighter light of the hallway.
Sakura squinted up from where she sat on her cot, looking at the girl in confusion. Usually she only showed to bring her food. Others of the Sound Four did sometimes, too, but it was usually the same: people came to her to bring her food. It didn't make any sense why Tayuya's hands were empty this time.
"Ugh, you're just gonna sit there and gawk until I say something, huh? Lame as ever." Tayuya planted a hand on her hip and the reflections of light on the sides of her face suggested she scowled. "Well, come on. If you don't get up and come out here I'm just gonna drag you out myself."
"Come out…? Why?" She didn't really leave the cell. She felt more like a hostage than she did Sasuke's associate since she'd come to the base. It didn't seem like the kind of place they would worry about cleaning…
Tayuya groaned in annoyance, and started into the room, until Sakura slid off of the bed. Her legs cramped and protested their lack of use since the hectic flight through Konoha's forests, but it was better to stand on her own than wait and see what Tayuya would do. She wasn't scare of fighting the other girl…not really…but in the end she'd just be outside anyway. She'd figured that much out about her just running after the Sound Four (five, apparently, but she'd never met the fifth) in the forests.
Annoyance flickered in eyes that reflected dim candlelight, but Sakura didn't really care. She'd dealt with enough people like Tayuya before, even if Tayuya was stronger than her…that didn't mean she was intimidated.
The light didn't seem that much brighter than her room once she was in the hall, but at least there was room. Doors stretched off into the darkness on either side of the wall she'd come from, and torches propped on the opposing wall between every two. She wondered how anyone kept track of where they were, if everywhere in the base looked like the places she'd seen so far.
The red-haired girl appeared at her side after only a moment, heavy door slamming behind her, as she pointed down the left path. "Come on, it's this way." Tayuya started off in that direction, before shouting at her. "Hey! Hurry it up! I don't got all day to wait around on you shuffling everywhere. Man, you're really annoying, you know that?"
She glanced down at her hands briefly.
Annoying…
You really are…
She started after Tayuya just as she heard the other girl growl in exasperation. It wasn't like she wouldn't follow her, anyway. The cell was closed in and boring and she could only tell time by the number of meals she ate and the number of candles that burned away.
"I don't even get why he'd want to see someone like you, anyway." The girl squinted at her, skeptical. "I mean, can you even do ninjutsu, or are you just some kind of tag along pet?"
Before she could think about whether she should or shouldn't, she glared at the mouthiest member of the creepy 'team' who'd led Sasuke away, and snapped back just as loudly. "Of course I'm a ninja!"
Tayuya gave an unpleasant sounding laugh. "Guess it's no wonder why Lord Sasuke couldn't find anyone who advanced his skill in that crappy village of yours then."
"Don't talk about Konoha like you know it!"
Dark eyes turned toward her, brow knit with suspicion. "You sound pretty loyal to a village you betrayed."
She glanced away from the other woman briefly, so briefly it might have looked like a flinch to the other girl. Maybe it was one. It wasn't betraying the village…she didn't betray Konoha…the Hokage would understand. When she came home with Sasuke, she'd explain everything then. She was only looking out for her comrade. That's what being a shinobi was about, never abandoning her comrades, even if it meant breaking the rules, they were supposed to stick together and save each other, right?
She clenched her fist, the one furthest from Tayuya, and jerked her head away, tossed her hair with a huff. "I don't need to be loyal for you to be an idiot. Only an idiot would think that Kakashi-sensei and the Lady Hokage were weak."
"Hey, you watch your mouth, girl! If anyone's an idiot it's you, for trailing after Lord Sasuke like a puppy!"
She found herself glaring at the girl again before she realized it, hands clenched at her sides in retaliation. "Yeah? If I'm a puppy what's that make you, calling him 'Lord Sasuke' all the time!"
"What's that supposed to mean?!"
"Ladies." Kabuto. She knew that voice. The one who'd turned on them, who'd helped kill so many people in Konoha, and who'd tried to kill Naruto when he'd gone to retrieve the new Hokage. She remembered it from when he'd pretended to be their friend, and from when she and Sasuke had made it to the hideout.
His voice was very loud, to sound so calm. "I'm sure that Lord Orochimaru gave you something to do other than fight with one of our newest guests, Tayuya."
The redhead hissed at the taller ninja. "You don't get to tell me what to do, Kabuto."
Despite the defiance in her voice, something about her posture backed down anyway, and she looked away from the pale haired man. "I'm taking her to see Lord Sasuke, don't get in my way."
"Sasuke Uchiha?" Kabuto sounded thoughtful, as he turned a cold gaze on her. "I guess it's about time then."
Time? What time? To see Sasuke? She supposed…but why did it sound so ominous if that was all? The way Sasuke had been, she expected seeing him would be Sasuke's decisions, or ways she could find a way to make her see him, not them agreeing to let her see hm.
She didn't like that idea very much. Not if it had to do with Orochimaru…
Before she could say anything, Kabuto smiled, but none of it approached his eyes. "Well then, you two shouldn't keep him waiting."
"Well I won't!" Tayuya huffed, and grabbed Sakura's arm, starting ahead at a quick marching pace that had Sakura lurching forward and scrambling to keep up without being dragged.
In the distance she heard Kabuto's voice drifting up the hall in feigned concern. "You should try not to manhandle her so much!"
Tayuya's steel grip on her arm only tightened. Sakura couldn't say that was a surprise at all. "Buzz off!"
She tugged roughly at her own arm in an attempt to get free, but that did nothing but almost wrench her shoulder out of joint. She hissed through her wincing anyway. "Let go—I'll follow after you anyway, hey—!"
"Shut up, you're way too slow!" Tayuya looked back at her with an anger that seemed laced with a killer intent Sakura had never seen from the other girl before. The difference…stunned her a little, distracted her away from struggling for her freedom and ended up with her dragged for a few steps instead of keeping up with the insistent girl. "It's because of you that Lord Orochimaru didn't have the time to—"
"If you're going to gossip instead of being polite as I told you to be…I hope it's nothing about me, Tayuya."
She didn't read Tayuya's expression, when the new voice cut into the silence of the hall. When the cold voice slipped into her thoughts, it severed everything else she'd been thinking about. The temperature of the air around her skin dropped slightly, and around her, the room darkened in an almost perceptible way.
The casual, terrible deadliness in his voice, the subtle suggestion of a hiss in words that lacked one, she knew that voice even better than that of Kabuto. She'd know it anywhere, immediately. Alongside his words, his voice brought sudden dread and almost paralyzing fear.
Orochimaru.
Take me with you.