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Fideism

Fideism is a theory which maintains that faith is independent of reason, or that reason and faith are hostile to each other and faith is superior at arriving at particular truths. The word fideism comes from fides, the Latin word for faith, and literally means faith-ism.

He didn't come back.

Three years had passed since Naruto and Sasuke had left. Half a year was left before Orochimaru would take over Sasuke's body with his forbidden technique. She knew she was supposed to hold out and wait, but she was nervous. Something was different.

Her time with Tsunade was helpful. She had learned lots about healing. All that Tsunade could teach. She had absorbed it like a sponge. Apparently, she had possessed lots of latent potential that everyone had failed to recognize. Or, at least, that's what she told herself when she felt particularly weak.

All of her achievements were due to Tsunade-shishou or Kakashi-sensei. She was just lucky to have had them as teachers, or she would never have gotten this far.

But she didn't care. Her whole world revolved around Sasuke still. Naruto was her best friend, better than Ino-pig had been. Had been. She almost cried. Thinking about how Ino had died was hard.

The last time she had seen Ino was before she left the village for her last mission. Ino had become strong, letting go of Sasuke before Sakura had even considered letting another man into her life. She still hadn't.

She curled her fist a bit tighter around her kunai. Her white knuckles pushed against her skin showing a crack down the middle of each knucklebone. A tribute to hard training, the once broken knuckles had healed nicely, and worked well, like the well-oiled machine that she was supposed to represent, they made no creaking noises from bad healing. She was still perfect physically. Just as she had been when she was 12.

Even though that was only 3 years ago, she felt that it was a miracle she had stayed so untainted. Her skin was flawless, missing the spider webs of scars possessed by most shinobi. She had none of these visible scars. It pleased her 15-year-old self quite a bit that she was able to stay this beautiful.

Her hair had re-grown as well. She thought it was beautiful. A medic had no need for fighting practicality, so she had let it grow out to its original length, with the help of some chakra enhancement. It had regained its old luster and beauty.

She had also been successful at suppressing the unladylike Inner-Sakura. Inner had never done her any good in the first place. She was not practical. Furthermore, split personality was unhealthy, and led to identity crises. Inner was not good for her.

She dropped the kunai onto her desk. She couldn't do it. She could not mar her beautiful skin. A small tear found its way into her eye and from there gazed at the world in apprehension, wondering if it should jump, before another came up behind it, and fearing nothing, pushed itself and the first tear over the edge. They fell together, desperately clutching at each other in their free fall until they hit the wooden desk and were sent flying in every direction.

Sakura wiped the tear off of her desk, hoping to keep it from ruining the wood and turned away. Slowly moving toward her bed, where she lowered herself, and curling up inside her blankets, fell asleep.

Naruto looked up at the sky. His face, tanned by the sun, had taken on the characteristics of a man. His body had grown as well. Since growing out of his old clothing he had bought clothing with black rather than blue details, and had ceased to roll up his sleeves and pant-legs.

Jiraiya had taught him loads more than he thought he could learn before. Confidently, he felt he could return to Konoha and bring Sasuke back as well, just as he had promised.

"Ero-senin?" he asked.

"Hn?" Jiraiya replied. It had occurred to him that they were later than they said they were going to be returning yesterday and he had quickly packed Naruto up in the middle of the night for their week long trek home.

"Are we there yet? My feet hurt!"

Annoying as ever I see. He mentally kicked Naruto for his impertinence. "It'll be a week Naruto. We just started walking an hour ago."

"But I'm tired…"

"Suck it up" They walked on in silence. Every so often, Naruto would send Jiraiya a pained look, and, realizing he was pushing his luck, turn back towards the road.

The sun was sinking low behind the trees before they started to look for a good place to make camp. The forest noises seemed to get louder with the deepening darkness and the unusual birds made their eerie calls between trees.

Jiraiya slowed down a bit as they neared a clearing by the lake. Bird Country was very hospitable and this camp looked perfect. Slowly, Jiraiya let his pack slip off of his shoulders and rest on the ground. Naruto gracelessly followed suit. Jiraiya and him had come up with a good method for making camp quickly, and as Jiraiya started collecting firewood, Naruto pulled out their cooking utensils and filled a pot with water before selecting some ramen, pork flavor tonight, and moving back to the middle of the campsite.

Jiraiya returned with some kindling and placed it in a cone shape, before placing a few dried leaves in the middle. A small katon jutsu later and he was back in the trees, looking for bigger firewood to burn. Naruto watched the small flame carefully, not allowing it to go out and feeding it small pieces of bark and twine, hoping to get the kindling to catch. When Jiraiya returned for the second time, Naruto unpacked both bedrolls and laid them next to each other close to the lake. It was hot in Bird in the summer and being close to the water would keep them cooler at night.

When Naruto had finished his tasks he turned back to Jiraiya, who had now brought the flame to a steady burn, where it no longer needed to be looked after, and was setting up an apparatus over it to hang the cooking pot from made of three sticks in a pyramid shape. They were held together at the top by the ring in the center of a shuriken and stuck in the ground with points sharpened by a kunai.

"Pork flavor?" Jiraiya asked sarcastically.

"Yeah, why?"

"This is the third night in a row…" Jiraiya rubbed the top of his head, mussing his spiky white hair even further.

"You got a problem with that dattebayo?" he challenged childishly, he knew that the argument would go nowhere. In fact, they had no other ramen but pork flavor, and, if Jiraiya had any talent for it, he could fish if he wanted something else to eat.

"None at all" Jiraiya's smile was more sarcastic than accepting, but Naruto didn't feel like arguing on an empty stomach.

"Do you think they'll be excited to see us?" Naruto asked, somewhat apprehensively.

"Of course Naruto! Who wouldn't want to see how you've gotten stronger?" Jiraiya hadn't told him they were late, but he didn't think much of it, it was usual for him to show up behind schedule, just like Kakashi. "We have to wake up early, so get to bed quickly"

"But we haven't eaten yet!" he whined as the pot boiled over a bit, dampening the flame before causing it to rise up in a fit of rage at being put out for even a fraction of a second.

"Well you can eat, but then you must get to bed" Naruto's nod encouraged him to go to sleep before eating. He let Naruto govern himself.

"Shizune, Sakura" Tsunade addressed, "I'm sending you on a mission." Sakura nodded and Tunade took this as a sign that they had both understood, "Wasabi Jirocho, who looks after business in the Degarashi Port area of the tea country was injured in some gang wars in the area, I'm sending you to heal him"

"Tsunade I can not-" Sakura was cut off.

"Sakura. I know you want to stay here and wait for Naruto, but it's been six months since he was supposed to get home. Three years is long enough to wait. He'll come back when he comes back, you waiting for him won't solve anything."

"But shishou- this is a D ranked mission, why not send someone who needs the experience, I've been a chunin for a year and a half now, I'm not some novice who can't do anything for themselves!"

"Youre right, this mission is below your caliber, and that's why I'm sending Shizune with you."

"What?" this time it was Shizune's turn to be frustrated, "I don't think we need someone to go with Sakura on a mission as easy as this"

"Shizune. This is a mission that is not only to heal Wasabi-san, who is a friend of mine, but also to show Tea Country our goodwill. Lately relations between Fire and Tea have been slightly strained, and Sakura was specifically asked for in this mission. You will accompany her to show that we wish to help as much as we can."

"Fine" Sakura sighed, frustrated, before turning to leave.

"You leave in two hours, meet Shizune at the east gate!" Tsunade called after her. Sakura made no motion to say that she had heard, but Tsunade knew that she had.

"Keep and eye on her Shizune. Please." Tsunade said softly, "Im worried about her, loosing both of her teammates like that"

Shizune nodded, "I know."

Sakura was ready in exactly 36 minutes. A trip to Ichiraku took her to an hour and 4 minutes. She still had 56 minutes to kill. She pulled out her wallet and looked inside. After paying for Ichiraku she still had quite a sum of money. Medical missions generally paid well, and she had been on some really important missions lately, not to mention being a top worker in the hospital. Her hourly salary was enough to pay for her small apartment.

Not that it was a nice apartment. She could afford better. Much better. But she didn't need it. It was close to the hospital, so when she had to wake up at ungodly hours for work she didn't have to get up quite so early. And the neighborhood wasn't that bad. Really. It was a bit unruly, but nothing she couldn't handle. The local gangs didn't have any problems with ninjas, so as long as she didn't hurt them, they wouldn't hurt her. Anyway, if they did try to hurt her, they'd be the ones in jail. Or dead. They weren't very talented.

A trip to the ninja outfitter nearby wouldn't kill her wallet, and she had plenty for luxuries on the trip. Her rent had been paid in advance. She smiled slightly at the possibility of a small splurge. Something she did rarely.

She looked down at herself. Now that she thought about it, she realized that she had not changed much about her appearance for a long time. She still wore the same kind of things she did when she was a genin. The only significant difference was her switch to knee-high boots with small heels from her flat ninja-sandals. She almost sighed in disgrace. Everyone else had changed something more significant about himself or herself. Maybe it was time for a change. More back is more professional, she thought as she entered the store.

She took one look at the small section of red and pink with the other colors before moving back to the bigger section of black. She looked at the standard merchandise of spandex and flak jackets apprehensively before laying eyes on a black fishnet shirt with a red band at the top. She looked at it closely before picking it up and placing it over her arm, a quick look around showed her that a black halter with a zipper in the back would cover most of her fishnet, until midway down her torso, where the fishnet would stick out a few centimeters past the bottom of the top. She placed that over her arm as well.

Looking for different bottoms than usual was harder than she thought it would be. The store didn't carry much in the way of feminine looking pants. Skirts were in short order. She was about to give up before she spotted a pleated back skirt with a high-rise waist that her spandex shorts might fit under.

Upon trying the clothing on, she found that the high-rise skirt just missed the bottom of her fishnet top. It had a… slimming effect on her. She pulled her headband from her hair to tie around her waist and rearranged her hair to fit her face differently. Her elbow bands came off next. And then her gloves. She looked more… natural. It was… nice…she guessed. She decided that instead of spandex shorts she'd use elastic medical tape to wrap her lower body under the skirt, it would be white, but it wouldn't stick out from under the skirt like the shorts turned out to do.

Quickly, noticing she only had about ten minutes left until she had to leave, she bought three pairs of identical sets and put them in her pack. It seemed frivolous, but she also purchased a new weapons pouch and some new kunai and shuriken. The weapons had red binding rather than white, and they made it feel like she hadn't changed the essentials of her life by switching clothing. Somewhere in the back of her mind she wondered if this shirt made her look flatter than she was, but she decided not to worry about it. She had never had much chest-wise to begin with.

"Shizune!" Sakura called, waving her now bare hand towards the small woman. Not that Sakura was large, she hadn't grown past 161cm. and with the heels, she got to 166. Maybe.

Shizune blinked visibly, but said nothing. Maybe Sakura's change was a good sign. She didn't know Sakura as well as she could have, but it wasn't her fault particularly. It was just that both of them were always busy, and when they weren't busy they were sleeping or trying to get some time alone. They hadn't had time to become good friends. Not that she wouldn't have been if she had had the time.

"Are we leaving?" Sakura asked curiously, as Shizune had failed to step outside of the gates behind Sakura.

"Hai, sorry, I was thinking," Shizune smiled.

"No problem," Sakura smiled back, "I'm not in a huge hurry unless you are." It struck Shizune that Sakura's eyes were brilliantly green before she lifted her foot off the ground of the city of Konoha and placed it, just barely, in the wild that made up most of the Land of Fire. "Off to Tea Country, right?" Sakura asked brightly.

"Hai." It struck Shizune that this cheerfulness could be a show, just for her, to make her trip more pleasant, I'll do my best to cheer you up Sakura, she thought, It's the least I can do for you.

Their trek would take a week if they moved at a civilian pace, but they planned to be back in ten days. Their paced picked up as they raced through the trees at ninja speed. A peacefulness surrounded their movements as their increasing speed reached a steady pace. Their bodies flashed from tree branch to tree branch. Racing against time to reach their future patient as quickly as they could. The journey could be made in 48 hours non-stop at this pace. If they could do it that fast, they would certainly save Wasabi-san. If they didn't, the cances decreased with steady certainty, until they reached 0%. Failure.

Shizune knew Sakura would not allow that to happen. Sakura had failed too many times before to allow herself to fail at a simple mission such as this. Sakura put her all into everything, and even when she didn't get results, she knew she had tried. That's why she had made such an excellent medic-nin. Sakura, like Naruto, didn't know when to give up. This ability had led her to save more hopeless-case patients than anyone had previously, excluding only Tsunade-sama, the fifth Hokage.

The steady pat-pat of their feet hitting the branches led Shizune and Sakura off into dullness, and their minds achieved a kind of sleep, while their bodies ran into overdrive.

Tsunade looked over her papers to find a genin had opened her door and disturbed her peace. He looked terrified to have found the lady-Hokage asleep at her desk.

"What do you want?" she demanded, grouchily, before picking up a cup of sake she had been sipping before she had fallen asleep and downing it.

"Ano…" he said quietly.

"Speak up!" she yelled, "I don't have all day." Actually I do, The part of her that was still drunk giggled, I have all damn day to listen to this brat stutter! But I can't let him know that, now can I? Her mind flew away into fits of hysterical giggles and she barely suppressed a hiccup before becoming serious again.

"There was a message this morning and, ano…" he mumbled a bit again.

"Yes?" she was growing more and more impatient.

"Jiyaria-sama and Uzumaki Naruto-san will be here in six days!" he practically shouted. His terror at having to address the Hokage made him antsy, apparently, because directly after delivering the message, he ran out of the room and slammed the door behind himself.

Damn boy. She thought, Am I really that scary? That's a real self-confidence killer. Ugh… Her head dropped back onto the cool surface of the table for a moment before snapping back up with a loud pop.

"What?" She yelled, "they're coming back now?" Her hand came up to rub the back of her neck without thinking about it and she knocked her sake bottle to the floor. "damn!" she cursed, just as four ANBU flashed into her office.

"Are you alright Hokage-sama?" asked one, with a tiger mask. "What happened?"

"I'm fine," she glared, "Why do you bumbling idiots have to stumble your way in here every time I find it necessary to yell about something?"

"Hokage-sama…" Tiger-mask trailed off.

"I know. I'm fine. Get out." She rubbed her forehead with her thumb and index finger. What to do about Naruto and Sakura?

She slowly reached for her sake bottle, and realizing it had spilled its contents all over the floor cursed silently. Nothing was worse than spilt sale.

She guessed that Naruto would just have to wait for Sakura to return before gallivanting off to find Sasuke. Sakura would have a fit if she found out that Naruto had left without seeing her. Sakura had just depared yesterday too. What a shame.

Keeping him in the village wouldn't be too hard, she decided, as long as he cooperated. A few meals at Ichiraku might be able to keep him quiet long enough to wait for Sakura's return. Maybe she wouldn't have to bribe him at all. Maybe he would be so exhausted from his journey that he would just collapse for a week. She doubted it.

Hopefully, she thought to herself, he'll be so upset at missing Sakura that he'll wait without any complaint… don't bet on it.

Naruto yawned. Their second day on the road had been uneventful. Today was the third day. It was only 9:00 and already he was tired. "Hey, Ero-senin."

"Hn?"

"Are we there yet?" Déjà-vu. Jiraiya thought disdainfully. If it isn't the third morning in a row… Jiraiya looked up, an idea came to him. "Naruto, if we speed up travel for the next two days, we will have time to stop somewhere nice"

"Is this another hot spring, ero-senin?" Naruto asked cautiously, gazing at Jiraiya from the corners of his eyes.

"Iie. We don't always stop at hot springs Naruto." Jiraiya looked somewhat defeated though, and Naruto took this as encouragement.

"Because if we do, I at least want some ramen." He nodded to himself. "All I can eat ramen. Your treat?" Naruto looked at him sideways, hoping that his 'cute face' was going to get him some fresh ramen.

"Hai, hai…" Jiyaria seemed resigned, but it was only a façade. Elated that they were going to one last hot spring, he picked up his pace and Naruto followed suit.

Racing through the trees was a good way to take his mind off of the fact that he had been woken up early three mornings in a row. Slowly, the movements became more automatic until his mind was able to wander off into a small reprise. Jiraiya, noticing that Naruto had mentally checked-out, sped up a bit to take the lead. Thus allowing Naruto his rest. He was still a boy after all. Two days of this kind of travel would allow for one day of rest at the hot springs. The toad sage looked forward to his future relaxation.

Night came sooner than expected and they fell back into their easy routine, Naruto decided that since Ero-senin was paying for ramen in whatever town they ended up in he would catch some fish for dinner in the nearby stream. When Jiraiya noticed he was gone, he carefully noted that it was going to take more work to keep the fire going at first. But dinner will be fresh and good.

Naruto returned quickly with the fish and the two of them sat in companionable silence while it cooked. This wouldn't be possible three years ago. Naruto really has grown. The two's contentment at the situation was almost palpable. They ate, and then they slept.

Sakura's heavy breathing filled the room. Shizune watched quietly as Sakura's hands hovered lightly above Wasabi-san's injuries. He was not injured badly enough for it to kill him anymore, but Sakura wanted to finish the healing as quickly as possible in order to return to Konoha more quickly.

It was not that Sakura was tired by this insignificant amount of healing, it was the healing on top of forty-eight hours of constant running. She had healed people much worse off than this without breaking a sweat before.

Shizune was worried about it, She didn't think that she should finish the healing right now, it wouldn't matter if she did it now or later anyway.

Sakura would have none of it. Wasabi-san was in pain, she said. He needed her to keep the pain at bay. Shizune couldn't say anything to that except that Sakura was going to wear herself out, and that it wasn't necessary.

Sakura's head bobbed slightly and Shizune's worry reached a new climax, how would it look if Sakura just collapsed on top of the patient? But Sakura seemed more determined than ever, and finished the healing quickly after that.

"Arigatou Sakura-san" Said Wasabi-san's attendant from the village. "You may rest in the room down the hall, if you wish"

Sakura nodded tiredly and Shizune moved to help her up, before helping her along the hallway to the indicated room. Sakura was asleep before she had even pulled the covers of the bed over herself. Fully clothed and unfed, she had just fallen on top of the bedsheets. Shizune smiled slightly. She hadn't known that Sakura was the type to work until she could no longer help herself go to sleep. It was a good quality, albeit foolhardy, in Shizune's opinion. She liked Sakura better for it.

Shizune quietly made preparations for her own slumber, hoping not to wake Sakura, although she knew it would take much more noise than she could make just preparing for bed to wake the exhausted girl. The 30-year-old woman hoped that Sakura had as good an opinion of her as she did of also hoped that they would be able to grow closer over the next few days, they had eight to get home, and maybe Sakura would relax and let them go at a steady walk rather than an enhanced ninja run. Slowly, her eyes drifted shut.

The ramen was delicious. The fifth bowl went down just as well as the first four had and it was soon added to the stack next to him. Jiraiya was aghast. "Treating" Naruto was expensive, but this was taking it to a whole new level. He quickly looked through his wallet again, his mostly eaten ramen steaming under his hands and making them slightly damp. The smell of salt and meat was so strong that Jiraiya almost wished he had not come to the hot springs. Almost.

Coming into the hot springs that evening, he had spotted some perfect subjects to study entering the baths. He had vowed to go find them as soon as Naruto finished eating his food. It had only been 20 minutes and already he was antsy to go find them. Naruto's complete silence and mass consumption of ramen didn't help.

"Mm." Naruto said finally, "I'm stuffed! Thanks Oji-san!" before getting up and leaving the ramen stand for the hotel room Jiraiya had booked for him.

Jiraiya passed the money to the shopkeeper before Naruto could be shouted after. He left quickly to go find the women.

"Thank you for your patronage!" the shopkeeper yelled after him happily.

A quick henge in a nearby alleyway allowed him to walk into the women's bath unnoticed. He almost got a nosebleed immediately, he had to hide behind a towel to not get too excited.

Naruto nearly cracked up laughing upon seeing Jiraiya follow his advice. A henge would be a much better way to hide in a woman's bath. Ero-senin would never change…

Sakura awoke to find that Shizune had left the small room. She sat up and as surprised to find that she was still fully dressed. A quick check of herself proved that she had not changed in over two days. She smelled bad. She ran her hand through her bangs to get them out of her face and instead of her beautiful sleek hair she found a tangled mess of oily pink fur. She needed a shower.

Looking around the room from her vantage point in the bed, she discovered that there were two doors leading out of it. One led, presumably to the hallway, and the other, to a possible bathroom.

She got up and moved to the closer door. Opening it revealed a short hallway with wooden floors and oriental doors on one side. The other door, she assumed, must lead to a bathroom. She walked over to it and pulled it open.

The bathroom was tiny. The shower booth was barely large enough for her to stand up with both hands at her sides in. Still, she decided, a shower is a shower, and she quickly turned the water on. No hot water, she noted dryly, wonderful. She ran a small hand through her tangled hair distractedly, she really wanted to get back to Konoha.

Pulling off her clothing she looked at herself. Still perfect, she smiled a bit. Remembering that the shower wouldn't get any hotter, she stepped into it and had to bite back a gasp as the icy water coated her body. She used to sing in the shower, in another, happier, time. The water running through her hair was no longer enough to make her happy, and she was no good at singing anyway.

The soap she had brought didn't go on as well in the cold and it took her longer to shower than usual, not that it ever took her more than 10 minutes anymore, the time spent in the shower was wasted, unless she was washing her gorgeous hair, which was perfectly acceptable.

Finished showering, she stepped out of the booth. Water splashed on the floor as she wrung out her long hair and then, using a small wind-jutsu she blew it dry. Arranging it took longer than usual, due to the fact that she had not quite gotten used to wearing her headband around her waist instead of on her head. She no longer needed to anyway, she had grown in to her gigantic forehead, and now it was just above average size.

She pulled a small, threadbare towel around her naked body and slipped back into the room. Shizune had not come back. Her pack at the foot of her bed was still sealed and she opened it, careful not to let the little towel fall as she did so. Pulled her panties on and then her skirt over them, she'd wrap her thighs for modesty later. Her bra and fishnet shirt came next. Finally she pulled the top of her halter around her neck, freeing her hair from it and then zipped it up in back. She had just picked up her bandages to wrap herself with when there was a crash in the hallway.

"Shh! You clumsy idiot!" a hushed voice whispered feverishly in the hallway.

"Sorry," a smaller voice tried to echo the quietness of the first and just managed to piss the other voice off. She heard a small thwack as the bigger voice presumably hit the smaller for his idiocy.

Sakura grabbed a kunai from her pack. She was weak from the strain of the past few days, and it was always safer to be visibly armed than not.

"Hello?" she called out stupidly, "Is anybody there?" all sounds from the hallway ceased. Just as she reached for the handle, her door flew open and hit her on the head. Dizzy, she fell back a step and the owners of the voices stumbled in. Noticing that she had a weapon, they gave her a wide berth.

"Just a little girl?" the smaller one asked.

"Shut up!" she's a healer. Sakura's eyes grew hazy as she tried to clear her head from being knocked. She kept her kunai in front of her torso.

"She looks weak…" he laughed a bit, "all we did was open a door on her" She blinked hard and when her eyes opened the men were gone. She rubbed her head, what? A whooshing noise preceded the bang of something heavy coming down on top of her head. She stayed conscious long enough to see Shizune appear in the doorway. Shizune, she thought, thank god…

A/N: Please Read and Review! This is my first story so any kind of comment would be welcome. Constructive criticism is much appreciated.