Warning: language. sex. violence. Bold means it's in the chapter. Rating is mature.
Disclaimer can be found on my page.
This is part of a three part story that I decided to post separately from Unwilling Juliet, Unsuspecting Romeo because I didn't want it to get swallowed up in those chapters. I want it to shine on its own. Yes, it the title was influenced by Taylor Swift's song Wildest Dreams :D
...Wildest Dreams...
Part One: African sunset
"So this must look a little funny," Sakura said and leaned back against the warm fur, running her fingers up Kora's neck and settling for a light scratch behind one ear. "It's always like this, you all trapped in the car and me out here."
The two reporters from National Geographic, Shikamaru and Choji, laughed, but the way they eyed the female lion told her they were more than happy to have metal and windows as a barrier.
Sakura smiled at the memory of the last group of journalists to come by. The smaller of the two male lions had become curious and the group had barely managed to close the window in time as Scruff sneaked up on them from the rear of the car. Before they drove off, he'd been able to easily take off their side mirror with his front paws.
Lifting the paw off her lap, Sakura stood and walked to the car. Kora watched her with half raised ears, but didn't bother to get up. She'd grown use to the cars, the people hiding behind cracked windows. Even with her comfort, that still didn't mean it was safe to get out of the cars. Oh no. While Sakura made it seem easy, she'd spent ten years of her life dedicated to researching these animals, this wildlife. Long hours had been spent, long years, so that she could be out here with nothing to hold her back, so she could be one-on-one with these majestic creatures.
Shikamaru, who was sitting in the front, climbed over the middle divider into driver seat. When she went to open the door, it was locked.
With a raised eyebrow, she stared at Shikamaru as he got situated and waited for him to realize she hadn't gotten in yet. Choji noticed first and tapped him on the shoulder.
"You know...lions can't open doors," she informed him as she heard the click, "so locking it doesn't do anything."
He rolled his eyes and, with a sigh, put the car into drive and took off fast enough for her back to press tightly against the worn leather of the rental car seat. It'd barely been a day since she'd met him, but she'd started to categorize him as a lazy man or bum she would say, but never aloud, so it had been amusing to find out he drove like his ass was on fire.
Choji seemed to be just as slow with motivation, but offer him food and he could probably move as fast as the lions or maybe the hyenas.
"It provides a feeling of security," Choji explained with a sheepish smile, "even if pointless."
Sakura turned in her seat and stared him in the eye. "You don't think I could protect you from them?"
Choji's mouth opened and closed, growing increasingly uncomfortable. He wasn't sure which answer would insult her more and so he settled for seeming to ponder his words until Shikamaru would answer, if he did. Hopefully.
And he did, with a snort and side glance at her body in a way that wasn't insulting, but more of a measuring look. "No offense, but you're a little skinny to be taking on lions."
Sakura settled back in her seat and shrugged. "I wouldn't need to take them on. They wouldn't attack me."
They came out onto a stretch that she called a road, but looked like it'd barely been driven over by more than a few cars ever which was the truth. Not a lot of people came out here, it was forbidden, so the tracks most likely came from her car. They'd decided to take one car to save gas as so hers was parked a good hour's walk away, at the first sight where the hyenas were. It only took the lions and hyenas half that time, if less, to go from one spot to the next, but she was stuck on two legs and a much slower speed.
Sometimes, when she needed to think or really wanted to enjoy the environment, she'd walk. Her buddies would catch with her sometimes, especially if she called their names, but even then there were times she just needed the stillness only nature could offer. Even though her home was empty, there was still a level of stress that came with walking through the door.
As they backtracked to the first location, Shikamaru and Choji fired off questions, Choji in the back with a camera.
She'd stopped worrying about her appearance after the first few interviews. When word first got out about her, the woman who laid with lions in the African sun, reporters and the likes had come flocking to Africa to get her story. And it worked for her, really, as she stared out at the landscape, the waist high grass only moved by the wind. But she wished it'd garnered more attention than it had because this stillness was unnatural.
"Look at all of this," she said as she pressed her hand against the window. The road curved and she used her other hand to shield her eyes from the late afternoon sun. It was a particularly hot day and the air condition was blasting. The air conditioning in her car didn't work, hadn't since the day she bought it, another reason for them taking the rental car.
"It's so calm," Choji acknowledged as he opened a bag of chips. Shikamaru shot him a glare over his shoulder and Choji shrugged.
"I'm hungry, dude," even as he said that he dropped so it rest against his hip and picked up the camera from its perch on his knee, "I can't help it."
"It shouldn't be," Sakura informed them after they'd finished bickering. "There should be wildlife, lots of it, but it's too quiet."
This was the point of the interviews. It wasn't the fame, the look-at-me-doing-something-cool, but the need for people to know this place was in danger. There was beauty here and it was dying. She couldn't save it by herself, she needed help.
"So what d'you do in your spare time?" Choji asked. She saw him shovel chips into his mouth in the rearview mirror, but he didn't make a sound.
Sakura shrugged. Truthfully, she didn't do much. Most things paled in comparison to being out in the wild, laying with Kora and Scruff and the others, watching the sun move across the sky.
"Read, I guess. Sometimes I go to the animal preserve and help out. I used to be into photography, but the only things I want to photograph are out there and the animals get curious so there's no point, it'll just get broken."
"You should try a GoPro cam," Shikamaru suggested.
Shaking her head, she said, "I used them for one interview and one of the hyena's got her teeth on one. The footage after was cool, but those things are expensive and I don't think there's insurance for lion and hyena destruction."
She turned to look at Shikamaru as she talked. The setting sun made his face a warm yellow and she secretly admitted he was one of the more attractive ones to come through. Sometimes she wished she cared more about her looks. Her fingers circled a small dirt stain on her cargo pants. Dressing up just wasn't her lifestyle and sometimes she liked to blame her loneliness on that, on the fact that she always had dirt under her nails, a braid that looked ready to fall out, and one pair of modest black heels for very, very special occasions, but it was more than that.
The wilderness demanded a lot of her time and she could never chose between that and a relationship. She'd spent too much time learning and raising these animals. But more than that, she was attached to them, was used to seeing them every day, the way Kai, the other, bigger, male lion would come running up to her after she'd called out his name, stand on his hind legs, and wrap his paws around her in a hug.
She drew her eyes away from his sharp jaw, focused on the blur of bright colors passing by, and pushed down the yearning growing like a weed in her chest.
Later, when the three of them, Sakura, Shikamaru, and Choji, are eating, Shikamaru will propose they stay in touch. It's the beer, she'll tell herself so it makes it just a little bit easier to turn him down.
Sasuke stared intently at the screen, waiting with his chin resting on his steepled hands. He was tempted to take a sip of coffee to help with the tired feeling behind his eyes, but he'd promised himself only three cups today so he had to go slow, sparingly.
One of his employees on the Research and Development Team, Hinata, was setting up the PowerPoint presentation, fumbling around with shaking hands, her blue hair shielding her red face from the long table of people waiting patiently, staring at her as she worked.
Naruto, another researcher and also his best friend, chattered in his ear saying things like "you're going to love this. I do, almost as much as ramen" and "this is a YouTube gem" in between other random, non-related things.
Sasuke swiveled in his chair so he was fully looking up at Naruto. His excitement, while a common thing, was unusually high for whatever he'd discovered. But what really caught Sasuke's attention was what he'd just said. He narrowed his eyes, confused, because Naruto knew much, much better than to gather ideas from YouTube for a company with such high standards.
"YouTube?" Sasuke asked and his eyebrow rose when Naruto gave him a sly grin. "It better not be some 'talented' person."
"Just wait and see," Naruto said, clapping his hands once when the presentation finally came to life. Hinata went off to the side to command the technological side of things while Naruto did all the talking.
Sasuke hoped he kept his rambling to a minimum today. They had monthly presentations from him about upcoming, potential for all branches of the company, and even though each time Sasuke prayed for them to be short, they always went on and on and on. Already he could feel a headache forming, right behind his left eye, and he wasn't sure if it was the caffeine withdrawal or the never-ending stress of being co-CEO of his late father's company with his brother Itachi, currently stationed at another headquarters halfway around the world. Probably a mixture of both, he thought, and finally reached for his coffee as Naruto started talking.
"Now, I know what you're thinking," Naruto started, all traces of his boyish grin gone, replaced with a relaxed, confident, half-grin. "YouTube? Yes, YouTube talent is outdated, a thing of the past, but what I've discovered, by the luckiest of chances, is something intriguing, different, a National Geographic treasure. An interview. It's exactly what we, what you, have been looking for."
Naruto let the words sink in for a moment as part of the theatrics. Sasuke noticed some of his panel start to lean back, slouched down in preparation for another boring or, in Naruto's case, insane idea that usually ended up working for the most part with some tweaking on Hinata's end. But still, some of them...Sasuke winced at the thought.
"I could ramble on, like I usually do," some people chuckled, others grumbled, all in agreement, "but I think a picture would do a much better job this time around. A picture of more than a thousand words."
The next slide indeed had a picture on it, one that made not only Sasuke, but the entire panel straighten in their seats. It was like a zap of electricity had gone through all he seats with how fast everyone went from dull eyed and slow brained to wide awake.
Sasuke was glad Naruto was taking his time, letting the picture linger on the screen for everyone to absorb the pink haired girl leaning back against a male lion, its body curled around her, its paw in her lap. She was smiling, squinting into the afternoon sun, cheeks slightly burnt. Her pale green cargo pants looked worn with dirt and grass stains, the ends turn and half tucked into a pair of sturdy, broken in boots.
The whole thing was bright, the sunlight, the colors, her smile, her. It was the completely opposite of him in every way, so he didn't understand why he couldn't look away.
Most women Sasuke came across were dressed nicer, smelling of perfume with perfectly lipstick lined lips, but this woman was none of that. And yet, she seemed so real, so happy, so different.
When Naruto finally moved onto the next slide, Sasuke felt like he could breathe again. He listened to the details about this woman like the words were drops of water and he was dying of thirst.
Sakura Haruno. 28 years old. Grew up in Japan before, at 18, moving to Africa to start research with the renown Tsunade. Takes care of lions and hyenas mainly, studying their lifestyle, needs, and ways to keep them from going extinct.
Naruto showed them an interview of her, one of many according to him, but none of them had garnered much attention. It was surprising, considering what she was doing.
"This is big," Naruto stated as the panel drank in the sight of Sakura calling out for a 'Scruff', a male lion they find out when he comes into view, running right at her.
Sasuke felt his heart slam in his chest. He was genuinely afraid for her even though he'd seen the picture in the beginning and should've therefore known better. Except lions were dangerous, wild creatures, and a pink haired woman hugging a lion, its paws wrapped around her back as it rubbed its furry face against hers, was never the first mental picture someone had when thinking about lions.
In the video she was laughing as she started talking to the lion in a familiar tone like it could be her own child or something.
"Now that I have your attention," Naruto smirked at them knowingly, his eyes finding Sasuke's own mesmerized ones.
The next slide showed how Uchiha Technology could benefit from joining with this woman and her cause.
"It's the perfect juxtaposition. Nature and technology working together, and we'll have an environmental cause to boost our image," Naruto continued, sweeping his hand up to the presentation to point out specific bullet points. "We can use our connections and a portion of proceeds, with a small price increase on our end of course, to give these animals what they need."
"We'll be one step ahead of everyone else," one panel member said, looking around. "Rumor has it major international corporations are thinking of heading down a more green path."
Naruto pointed at him. "Exactly! You beat me to it, my man." He looked back at Hinata, confirming something when she nodded her head. "Now, after one last, short video, I'll open the floor to questions."
The room grew dark as he finished talking and they were presented with boots Sasuke immediately recognized as Sakura's. She took one step after another, the camera pinned to her shirt's collar swaying lightly with each breath. He could hear the crunch her feet made over grass and dirt and rocks, his ears straining for the next step and the next and the next and the next.
He didn't think things could get better and then she straightened and he was presented with the far off smear of deep reds blending into oranges melting into gold of an African sunset. She made her way towards the light, pushing the waist high grass to each side of her as she walked; slow, smooth, deliberate like a ritual.
"They need this," she said softly, just above the low whistle of the wind. There was a rustling sound, growing louder, closer. In his gut he knew what it was before he saw it, waited on the edge of his seat for it. "We need this."
Three lions raced past her, breaking past the edge of the tall grass onto open land. It was like they were chasing the sun, faster than a lot of animals out there but still appearing to go slower than their full potential. He didn't know if they were taking their time or waiting for Sakura to catch up. One of them looked over its shoulder at her and he felt like it was him the lion was making eye contact with.
Sasuke didn't know what Sakura meant by 'it' but in his own mind, 'it' meant life, living.
The video ended to silence so thick Sasuke swore he could hear the traffic a hundred stories below. He ran his tongue over his dry lips, clenched an iron fist over the jumbled internal mess and then raised one hand slightly, one finger up to get Naruto's attention as the lights became brighter.
Without waiting for Naruto to speak, Sasuke said in a nonchalant voice that completely belied what he was feeling on the inside, "Intriguing indeed. Just curious, what is it the animals need? If I'm going to be putting my money into this, I'd like to know what exactly I'm buying."
Scratching the back of his neck with blunt fingernails, Naruto smiled sheepishly.
"I meant to mention this earlier, but we haven't been able to contact her yet," he explained. "We've done everything we could short of going to Africa."
Sasuke smirked, starting to feel like his old, confident, I'll-do-what-I-want-because-I-can self, already regaining control as an idea formed. Although he didn't know what exactly would come after her finding him on her doorstep, he could guarantee that his initial reaction to his woman was not something that would last. His chest felt like with anticipation.
"When do we leave?" he asked.
I really enjoyed writing this because I wanted to play with Sakura's effect on Sasuke without them even meeting. This has become my absolute favorite thing I have written to date in terms of SxS fanfiction and so I've decided to remove it from the oneshot collection I have and post it as its own piece.
Some reviewers have expressed their excitement that this is going to be its own piece, but I just wanted to clarify that it is still the SAME THREE PIECE STORY from Unwilling Juliet, Unsuspecting Romeo and at this point in time NO NEW WRITTEN CONTENT/CHAPTERS WILL BE ADDED. I would love to continue this story but at this time it is not on my list of things to write. I'm sorry if I mislead anyone in believing otherwise; that wasn't my intent. My intent was to post this separately because I see it as more than just a small oneshot piece but as a full story and didn't want it to be swallowed up in my oneshot collection when it deserves so much more.