Disclaimer: ... standard disclaimer applies...

A/N: Warning - the story is slightly AU-ish. Due to certain technicalities, and due to the fact that I've drifted from the Narutoverse, and I haven't finished watching the anime yet - so I have a general idea, but couldn't have picked up all the details. Somebody please tell me that Jiraiya Scrolls arc is the last filler arc in the series. I'm finding it difficult to push through it. :/


The Locked Room

Regard:

just tools, a washing-machine, a drier,

a water-heater, and a chain of keys.

Nothing that can alarm you. Nothing dark."

Neil Gaiman: 'The Hidden Chamber'

Ever since she was a little girl, Sakura dreamed of a happily-ever-after, and the perfect prince she could share it with. There were never any other choices. She knew it would be Sasuke from the moment she shyly peeked through her too long bangs and lay her eyes on him.

The knowledge refused to fade, even when she tried to convince herself it shouldn't be possible to love a traitor and a criminal. When the darkness seemed impenetrable, the knowledge still glinted, drawing strength from Naruto's promise. Despite of everything said and done, at the end of the day it still hung on a thread. When the impossible happened and he returned, there was just enough to lend her what it took to forgive him. Or give it her best shot, at least.

Sasuke was the one.

For that reason, she could overlook the holes in her prince's armour, and the shaky scaffolding which supported their happily-ever-after.

So she told herself. Time after time again.


The old wood of the entrance gate creaked upon the push. Sakura shifted the weight of the heavy box in her arms and followed her husband through the entry, glancing at the faded, rainwashed fans drawn on the fence.

During all those years they spent together as teammates, and during all that time they were apart, she never once set foot in the infamous Uchiha district. It was, in a sense, nothing and all she expected it to be.

Spring light fell on a long, expansive street, fraught with rows of sun-gilded houses. Her mouth opened at the sight of the miniature town. It didn't differ that much from the rest of Konoha until you took in the weeds invading the porches and the sad hanging of the wind-beaten shutters.

The silence, however, was the strongest tell-tale.

Despite of the cheerful sunlight, shivers scurried up her spine. Her eyes trailed over to her husband's back. Sasuke stood in front of her, observing the stone road and shut windows with dark, cold eyes. The creeps subsided, giving way to damp, gloomy sadness.

Of course, the ghosts residing here were visible to him alone.

Sakura walked to his side.

"Sasuke", she smiled, "where to now?"

Sasuke broke from the spell and turned a slightly dazed gaze to her.

"Hn. This way", he readjusted the grip on his share of the burden and resumed walking. Sakura followed the lead, threading deeper and deeper into the quiet area.


They spent most of the day walking. After leaving Sakura's personal possessions in the nice, small, renovated house closest to the exit from the district, Sasuke took her for a tour of the compound.

They walked the cobbled stone, dirtpath shortcuts and overgrown grassy training areas. Every now and then, Sasuke would take his hand out of his pocket to point at a building and say a few dry words of what it had been used for. Sakura followed his hints, trying to see all of the things he wasn't telling. His tone bothered her, but she couldn't expect him to show how he really felt. Instead, she tried to guess it on her own.

When Sakura looked at doors and gardens, she tried to use two pairs of eyes: to mark both her own impressions of a newcomer, and everything that could be passing through Sasuke's head.

In her mind's eye, tall, dark-haired men threw shuriken at training posts, and when their faces melted into Uchiha Itachi's, she would quickly drop the line of thoughts for something less sinister. She struggled to see the ghosts that weren't there, thinking up children running around the street, puppies chasing tails, women sweeping porches...

Somehow, the innocent images were worse.

On the day of the proposal, Sakura promised herself she would do whatever she could to make Sasuke feel warm, loved and needed, but it seemed the opposite was happening. His gloom was spreading over her. As the sun slowly lowered on the sky, she couldn't wait for Sasuke to call it a day and bring them home.

For the last visit of their tour, Sasuke chose his old house. They stood in the tall grass, looking at the cracked wooden porch and yellowed shoji screen. She didn't dare imagine a thing.

Minutes dragged. Sakura shifted and turned to look at her husband. "Sasuke", her voice was soft, "it's getting cold. We should head back to unpack." Sasuke turned his head and nodded, and Sakura sighed in relief behind his back.


The little, cosy house Sasuke chose to be their new home looked inviting and safe in the gathering dusk. When they crossed the threshold and turned on the lights, Sakura felt a chill seep out of her body. She followed close after Sasuke's heels, not wanting to imagine how it would feel to be alone in the place every time Sasuke went on a mission.

Yet, soon enough, placing the last neatly folded shirt on the designated shelf in the bedroom closet, she sighed with content. The place was neutral enough, empty enough – to become a home one day. Not today, probably not tomorrow, but some day. A home, with the quiet pitter-patter of bare child's feet, mouthwatering smells spreading from the kitchen, and a scowling, dark-haired husband returning from exhausting missions.

She slept relatively well that first night, all things considering. Probably because she managed to snuggle against him, into a semblance of a warm, intentional hug. His guard slackened in the depth of sleep. Or he did wake, and just let her come close! As sad as it sounded, that was a comforting thought.

The palpable tension returned the following day, already. The ANBU people came over. To collect all the hidden scrolls and data of the Uchiha clan, dug up from the secret underground vault, according to the arrangement with the village. All the scrolls and data which Sasuke hadn't as much as caught a glimpse of, before they were confiscated. The deceased family's paper trail.

It was sad. He felt sad, she could tell. He must have! But he wouldn't show it. Not so much as a derisive smirk, even. He simply came back to the new house, eyes fixed on the floor, the walls, random pieces of furniture, a chain of keys rattling in his clenched fist.

"It's done. They took it away," he said, and stretched the keys-holding arm toward her, to prevent her from hugging him. "Here. The keys to all doors in the premises. If you can open it, you can enter it. Although I can't see why you would want to." Neither could she. But she was an Uchiha now – Uchiha Sakura – and as the clan's latest matriarch, she was entitled to get acquainted with the district.

So she took the keys, put them away in a cupboard's last drawer, and resolved to forget all about them.

Time went on, days turning into weeks, approaching months. But they didn't follow – stuck in the monotony of the moment.


Sakura split her time between hospital shifts and tending the household – trying to transform it into a home. Sasuke was reasigned to missions, but of the pitiful D-rank kind. Plowing and mowing and moving things too heavy for the ordinary Genin kiddies. The former Team 7 hadn't been reinstated. She heard that Naruto, Kakashi and Sai functioned well as a three-men-squad, however. They would all meet up occasionally, but rarely. Not much to tell each other. Not without clawing at soft spots.

Sasuke hated it all! The D-ranks, the surveillance, the daily check-ins in the Tower! He must have! But he didn't show it. Sakura suspected he believed he deserved it, and somehow that enraged her more than silent resistance on his part would.

The man didn't share anything with her, except a monthly paycheck, accompanied by a bitter half-smile. Not as much as a silly anecdote from a rice-field!

And yet Tsunade seemed to expect her to be on the in.

Her old master would summon Sakura to her office on a weekly basis, under the pretense of informing herself of the state of things in the hospital, and poke around.

"Alright, I'll double the bandages order for the next month. Damn Ame coup...! Good thing Naruto and Sasuke don't use up too much, what with Naruto's restorative abilities, and Sauke's line of work these days. Right?"

"Did I tell you what sort of show Naruto put on the other day when he returned only to find Ichiraku closed for the night, Teuchi-san having taken a sick leave? Good thing Sasuke has you to cook for him. Is he eating well?"

After a while, Godaime gave up on the silly pretense and asked openly:

"How is he doing? Bitter much over the missions he's been getting? Well, he has to understand we cannot take him into confidence just yet."

'And you, my dear,' were Tsunade's unspoken words, hanging in the air, 'have to understand you cannot simply play the role of his wife. I – no – Konoha needs you to become an informer, the first on the line, the only one able to notice if anything goes wrong. The one to act, in such a case...'

She heard it, and she hated it, but she couldn't have shown it around her husband, either. Too much at stake. So she, too, pretended that everything was just fine and dandy. Blue skies, dandelions, and kittens... And tomatoes, too.

She went as far as to till a small patch of a nearby garden, and tend tomato plants, for her husband's appetite's sake.

All in all, she spent quite a lot of time away from the house, but that was alright.

So did Sasuke. That wasn't... alright. It was a bit worrisome.

Missions took up early mornings, evenings were dedicated to the extensive study of professional reading material. Afternoons might have been spent on training, but... Whole afternoons? How much training did an already exceptionally lethal ninja require?

She knew he wasn't putting his time into hanging out with people, because come on! – Uchiha Sasuke had a very limited number of close people – all of whom were thoroughly busy as it was. And the rest of the village made sure to keep a satisfactory distance from the blood-stained traitor.

So what was he doing, all that time?!

Sakura didn't know how to pose the question, but was rather certain she already knew what the answer would be: "Nothing much. Why?"

"Oh, nothing. The village, and I, just don't trust you, is all."

She couldn't ask the question, but she could obtain a sufficient explanation, nonetheless. She too was a seasoned shinobi, after all! And while her personal level of stealth wouldn't get her very far with the Sharingan-wielder, she had a more kunoichi-like trick up her sleeve. Offerring a plausible, unsuspicious excuse.

"Why are you following me around?!" he would say.

"I'm not following you around! I'm in search of a... clothespins, or a bigger ladle, or a gardening hoe, or whatever inconspicuous housheold item she might lack and look for in the neighbouring abodes... Which you would know we were in need of, were you paying closer attention to your own house, instead of loitering around these... dead ones!"

The last sentence was not to be uttered under any circumstances, but she deserved a bit of selfishness in the privacy of her own mind.

For... he hadn't been leaving the district. The ANBU were on the lookout, and wouldn't miss him sneaking out, not even via secret underground passages, not with all the Hyuuga in the service. Which meant he found something of interest within the compound. Like a... Another secret hideaway, stashed with all sorts of incriminating documents? It was possible. It wasn't... unlikely.

So she put the plan into motion, and followed him one day. Well, not as much as followed him, as strolled around the silent houses, keeping an inner eye on his chakra signature, with a perfectly innocent apron tied around her waist. A housekeeper in search of a rolling pin.

Their eyes met from across a long, barren yard, just as he was exiting his parental home. She gulped, waiting for him to join her. He did so, without a slightest attempt at clarification. She told him about the rolling pin, they entered the next house in the row, found one, and returned home. They were having home-made Udon noodles that night.

But the next morning, when Sasuke left for the daily drudgery, Sakura was also quick to step into the gloomy, overcast daylight. She headed toward the Ghost Mansion, as she came to call it in her mind. Hefty keychain rattled in her pocket.

After all, "if you can open it, you can enter it." So went the promise.

Sakura opened it, and shuddered as she passed the threshold. The interior was cool, and stuffy, and dark. She used a flashlight, too afraid she might forget to close the windows after opening them to admit the meek sunlight. There were many doors inside, some sliding, some fixed, none locked. They led into a kitchen, bathroom, bedroom, storeroom... Nothing out of the ordinary, nothing ominous. Except... The last door at the end of the hallway, on the right. Non-sliding, wooden, and... non-yielding.

Locked?

Sakura stooped down to inspect the key-hole, and only then did the beam of light sweep over that part of the floor, and revealed...

A track in the ages old layer of dust.

That particular door had been opened. Recently.

Sakura's hands shook as she took the keychain out of her pocket. What secret awaited her? What dark, bloody, incriminating piece of the past was her husband hiding from her?

Apparently, she wasn't about to find out.

None of the keys matched.

She stood in the dark, shadowy hallway, oppressed by the silence of the dark, shadowy house, breaking it with the feeble scratching of the unmatching keys in the unyielding keyhole. Key after key after key. None.

'If you can open it, you can enter it.'

Huh. Hahahaha.

But she could open it. There were other, unofficial, shinobi ways of prying one's way into a locked room. Sakura pocketed the disappointing keychain once again, and bent over. She didn't have a bobby pin on her at the moment, nor a handy toothpick or a piece of wire, but she did have impressive chakra control, and years of experience with chakra scalpels. Even the thin, tiny ones, protruding from a single finger. She could jimmy the lock. No problem there.

The problem might arise, if her ever-suspicious husband had set traps for the unwanted visitors. The lock clicked and gave way, and Sakura proceeded with caution.

Alright. No shinobi wires, paper bombs or any other booby traps, as far as she could see. And she would see so much better if she turned on the light. The room did have a window, but it was thoroughly planked. It was suggested, rather than evident, by a thin, rectangular outline traced by faint sunlight. Her fingers searched for the lightswitch, reluctantly.

Sudden onslaught of electric light hurt her eyes, and it took a while before she was able to take a good, hard, blinking look at the room.

At first sight, it looked disappointingly ordinary, too. Just another bedroom, although a bit more crowded – stocked with clumsily piled columns of boxes – ordinary, brown cardboard boxes – on the brink of a collapse. Sakura slowly closed the door, not willing to risk a disasterous onrush of draft, and moved towards the futon spread out in the corner.

There were hangings on the wall above it - two pieces of kakejiku. One represented a kunai-wielding man blending with the misty forest – a shinobi, if she ever saw one. The other offered a familiar, beloved sight – four faces carved into a steep cliff, enflamed by a setting sun. Four faces, not five.

Both pictures were of simple making, but executed with passion and vivid attention to details. Precious little artworks.

She let her eyes roam along the rest of the walls, and she couldn't but notice numerous nicks and scrapes etched into the off-white surface, as if someone used to practice with shuriken in there. The wooden door were scratched as well, but intentionally, she realized. There was a very distinct kunai-mark cut into the doorframe, and next to it, a tiny carving which read – Itachi. Another below it, somewhat lower – reading Sasuke.

'Height markers', she thought, and shuddered. The taller one barely reached to her bosom, and the second hovered around her navel.

'The boys' room.' Or rather, a boy's room. There was just one futon. She searched the room for further clues, and found them in the form of books stacked on the shelves above a writing desk pushed into another corner. The titles suggested professional, martial topics. Too heavy a reading subject for a boy who had just started Academy.

So, this used to be Itachi's room. Sakura shuddered again.

She glanced at the numerous boxes, debating on whether to peek in or not. Convincing herself that the official shinobi of the day wouldn't stack the massacred clan's body parts into plain cardboard boxes, and leave them unattended at the crime scene, she reluctantly opened the one which appeared recently unsealed.

The box contained more books. Or bookish, book-like objects.

Sakura gasped upon leafing through one of these. Family album.

Filled with pictures and pictures and pictures... Old and grainy, but clear enough. Photographs of the Uchiha family of old. A frowning man, and a frowning elder boy, but also... An astoundingly beautiful, smiling young woman, and a younger kid – who inherited all of his mother's beauty and light.

The album centered around those four faces – under blooming sakura trees, in front of a snow-covered hill, in front of a lake, in front of an Uchiha family crest... – but there were other faces, too. Strikingly similar, both elderly and young. Grandparents and cousins. Nearly all of them dark-eyed, with black or brown hair – but none with the cold smirk she came to associate with the Uchiha family name.

There were several photos of the brothers posing alone. A five-year-old Itachi holding a tiny something wrapped in a blanket. His face bore a smile most serene.

A five-year-old Sasuke perched atop his eye-rolling brother's shoulders. The younger kid's eyes were blazing with mirth. He used to be such a cheerful child, obviously. 'And then what hap-? Oh.' Sakura put away the album, but as she was returning it to the box, something slipped from between the pages. A folded piece of paper.

She picked it up and unfolded it, and didn't know whether to giggle or tear up. She somehow did both, simultaneously.

A child's drawing. Four stick figures, a house, and an enormously large rendition of the symbolic Uchiha fan.

After reopening the album, she discovered several more drawings, stuck between the cover and the opening page. One titled „Mommy", one which amounted to nothing more than a colourful bunch of lines and scribbles, one which contained two small handprints – one a bit larger than the other, and several presenting numerous attempts at capturing the Uchiha crest's outline.

A tiny drop splashed against the drawing paper yellowed with age, and Sakura quickly pushed it away. Quickly, before she ruined it. She wiped her cheeks, and then broke down – letting the tears fall freely, drenching the old linen of the futon. Sobs ensued.

After a while, she managed to compose herself enough to inspect the content of other boxes. One held clothes. Little boy's shirts and shorts, baby's onesies, but also grown people's clothes: numerous yukatas, both male and female. Most articles donned the all-pervading fan.

'This is his Mom's,' she thought as she fingered the flowery pink fabric of the late Mikoto's garment. She could imagine her wearing it on a summer night, with clear, fair skin, flowing dark tressets, and a blooming smile, overshadowing the night's fireworks. Her eyes were tearing up again.

Other boxes contained toys – wooden copies of kunai and shuriken, slingshots, balls and dominoes – and precious porcelain ware, and jewellery – hereditary pieces of kanzashi, earrings, bracelets... Fans, as well, both rigid and foldable. She admired their beauty, but didn't dare pressing them against her own skin and hair. A sacrilege, it would be.

The boxes led her to the writing desk, where something new caught her attention. Obscure enough on its own, it lay in an obscure corner, an unimpressive wooden picture frame, lying face-down. Sakura gingerly took hold of it and rose it against the light.

One of the pictures she had already seen in the album. The entire family: a frowning man and elder boy, and a smiling woman with a smiling younger son. Framed and held on the desk. Her heart hiccupped, and another sob escaped her. Because...

Because the picture was all dusty with the passing years, except... Except not all of it. Someone had recently wiped parts of it, leaving fingerprints over dust-free people's faces. Someone who had stood right there, where she was now standing, holding up the picture frame, just like she was, and gazing at the past, and unity, and family – whole, and unscathed, and with future ahead. Sakura turned her head aside not to splotch the picture with her tears, and that was when she saw him.

Sasuke.

Not the boy of five, but a man of nearly twentyfive.

Standing at the threshold, observing her. Not smiling. His face darkening, definitely not smiling.

"What gives you –?!" he snarled, the knuckles on the doorframe turning stark-white, before he turned and ran around.

Sakura tried to stammer something to hold him, to keep him there, but didn't succeed. She gently lay the picture down, and ran after him, leaving the light on.

He was almost at the passage which led further into the labyrinth of abandoned houses, where it would be nearly impossible to find him after he concealed his chakra, when she managed to catch up – well, catch his sleeve. She yanked the sleeve, pulled the man towards her, and hug-locked him, using the supernatural strength inherited from her master. The supernatural strength which not even Uchiha Sasuke could match without resorting to Ninjutsu. But he wouldn't electrocute his own wife, no matter how angry with her, right? Right?

"Wait! Just wait a minute! For both of us to... calm down."

She barely said it, she was so out of breath. She didn't think she could run so fast. A mixed adrenaline plus chakra surge. Lee would have been proud of her.

"I'm not having it! Let me go! Let me go!"

"Please, Sasuke! Just a minute! ... I've already let you go once – don't make me go through it again!"

She didn't expect it to, but that worked.

Sasuke stopped struggling against her, but the tension still palpably coarsed through his body.

"We need to talk. It's high time we did that!" she said.

"Talk?! Huh! Like you would hear out anything I have to say...!"

Sakura blinked. She couldn't see it, having his head lock-pressed over her right shoulder, but she could hear it. The derisive smirk of the old Sasuke. Genin Sasuke."

„If you would give me a chance...–"

"No, you wouldn't! Not even then! Why, Sakura, you're just like them! Talk?! Why? To have more to be held against me?!"

"Calm down! You don't make any sense!"

"Don't act stupid! You know perfectly well what I'm talking about! You're one of them! They got you on their side!"

"Whose side, Sasuke? Who are they?"

"You're going to make me spell it all out? Alright. Fine! – Konoha! The Elders! They got you spying on me!"

It began dawning on her.

"Sasuke, you're wrong. I have nothing to do w–"

"Sure you don't! You just ended up snooping through my stuff, accidentally! What were you hoping to find? Evidence of a new coup? Kage Tower's floor plan?! A jar filled with Sharingan to spare?!"

"NO, Sasuke! No! I didn't hope to find anything, but I feared I might find something! Because you've been so... so... Aaargh! So secretive! And sneaky! And stealthy! And you wouldn't tell me anything about anything!"

"Look, Sasuke." Sakura eased the pressure just enough for him to move his head, and look her in the eye. "I admit I was suspicious, but don't act like you didn't have anything to do with it! You know you did! You kept me out! ... I grew suspicious because you acted suspiciously."

"So, you're trying to say you weren't feeding the Hokage with information on me, huh? Is that what you're saying?!"

"No, I was. I was feeding the Hokage with information on you. Want to know what kind of information? 'No, Hokage-sama. Sasuke has been sleeping and eating well enough. No nightmares, as far as I know, no.' Highly incriminating, isn't it?"

"So they didn't try to turn you against me?" The derisive smile again. She so didn't miss it.

"No, Sasuke. Once again, the only one turning me against you was you! Would it kill you to trust me?! You proposed to me, remember?! Why would you do that if you can't bring yourself to trust me!"

"I thought I could, then! Before I caught you snooping behind my back!"

"Alright." She tried to keep her head cool. No point in getting caught in a vicious circle. "You didn't trust me. I didn't trust you. Now, how about a clean slate? Let's start over."

"Easy for you to say..."

"No, it isn't! It isn't. But it's necessary. For us to talk, openly, for once. ... Look, I'm going to let you go now. But if you storm off in righteous fury, I won't be waiting for you to come back! Not this time around. Agreed?"

He stared over her head, heavy frown in place. Sakura sighed, and let go. On several levels.

He stayed. The frown kept its position, as well.

"How about we sit somewhere?" She felt weary. And wobbly. The adrenaline was ebbing away.

Sasuke marched over to the porch, and sat down, frown and distant glare intact. Sakura plopped down next to him, but not too close.

The day was still overcast, and dull. So was her mood.

"Why did you go into that room?" he broke the silence.

"Because it was locked," she said. Simple, true. Too tired to play diplomatic mind-games.

"Didn't you think it might be locked for a reason?" Sasuke snorted.

"I did." She looked up at him. "But I didn't know what the reason was. I was afraid, I admit it, that you have taken some secret documents from the hideaway, and stashed them elsewhere. That you might get in trouble for it... Why didn't you tell me anything? You were absent on so many afternoons..."

"Because you never asked me."

"I... thought you wouldn't answer me," she admitted, feeling miserable.

"I... might have not, if you asked," he admitted. Misery pervaded his voice, as well. "There are some things about the Uchiha which only an Uchiha should have access to."

"Not an honorary Uchiha, like me," she lowered her eyes. The Uchiha and their pride. No room for a pinkhaired weakling from the sidelines, of course.

"That's... where I might have made a mistake."

Sakura had to look up at his face to make sure the sentence was said by him. The tone of the voice which uterred it was full with unusual... regret? The eyes held the regret, too.

"The day I married you, you became a fullfledged Uchiha, barring nothing but the Sharingan. But I didn't... follow on it. I've been the only one for so long that..."

His voice faded out. But she understood. She understood well enough.

The uncomfortable silence prolonged.

"So? Fresh start? How about it?"

A smirk flashed across his face. But not entirely derisive. Just around the corners, like a reflex. "You think we could do that? Just start over? As if nothing happened? ... Well, it wouldn't be the first time."

"No... But, if we learned from every mistake, it wouldn't have been in vain, right? There's a lesson in this, as well."

"What lesson?"

"Talking. Not assuming. Talking about issues, talking things through."

"I guess... Like right now?"

"Yup." Sakura leaned her head against his shoulder, and for a few minutes, they just sat there, and breathed – breathed the overcast, dull afternoon in.

"At least now I know where you got your smouldering good looks! Your mother was a beauty! I wish her granddaughter would look just like her."

"Are you suggesting something?" he tried to keep his tone flat.

"No, not yet. But, hey – this time you stayed, so it might not be too long before... a third Uchiha appears."

Sasuke smiled, and put his arm around her shoulders. "Let's go. Tonight I might make us dinner. It would be a shame to let such ripe tomatoes go to waste." Was he referring to her cooking skills? If so...– He interrupted before she could revolt: "And afterwards, we might start working on the new arrival, couldn't we?"

Sakura blushed, and allowed her husband to drag her up to her feet, and – home.


A/N: technicalities being, of course, the fact that the former Uchiha district must have been destroyed along with the rest of the village during Pein's attack. :/

Feels sort of nice to be back here... Who knows - I might scribble something new before too long. :)