Disclaimer: If you didn't already know that I don't own Naruto, you obviously are not a fan. But in case you have gone temporarily insane: I do not own Naruto.
This story follows the manga up until chapter 402.
This story has been beta-ed by Lex Logikk, who, you should know, is bathed in a glow of awesome.
Kaeruno: The Return
Chapter One
Radio static echoed in her ear as Sakura crouched in the damp grass, wet morning dew – though most wouldn't consider it morning yet – clinging to her sandals. Sai stood only a few feet away, and behind him lay their shivering, whimpering client collapsed on the ground.
"Sai..." she began, but wasn't sure how to continue. She didn't even look at him, her thoughts drifting off into the dark surrounding forest searching for someone else. There was really no reason for this. No logical reason. Naruto had even told her to stay. And yet...
"I have to go." This time even she could hear the confidence in her voice, despite knowing how desperately she hoped her teammate wouldn't ask questions.
He didn't. He just smiled like he understood. She wasn't sure that he did, but then he was getting a lot better at that sort of thing. Any other time she would have smiled at the thought, just not now.
"You... you'll be alright by yourself?" she asked. Part of her knew she was stalling. Part of her didn't want to go. Truth be told, part of her was afraid what might happen when she did.
He gave the slightest nod, but said instead, "I thought you had to go."
Sai. This time she did smile, though it was small and filled with sardonic humor. She still felt better for it, though it didn't quite quell the butterflies in her stomach.
Another second and she had disappeared into the trees.
Sai turned a poorly formed cheerful smile towards the man cowering in the grass. "Shall we continue, Sagara-san?"
It was only an ordinary escort mission. They hadn't been on one of those in a while. Team Kakashi had been assigned to guard the wealthy but whining son of Suna's current feudal lord on his return home from a lavish vacation in the Fire Country's capital city.
Though Kakashi himself was not on the mission. He had given some lame excuse about being too sick to come, which Sakura knew just by looking at him wasn't true. He could have at least pretended to cough. She was pretty sure he'd been assigned to a different mission by Tsunade-sama; but really, why couldn't he have said that? Sometimes, she swore, he lied just for the fun of it.
Anyway, with Yamato reassigned to ANBU duty, it was just the three of them. Not like they needed help on a mission that barely made B-rank. No one knew they'd jump right into the frying pan, so to speak.
Before their small group even made it to the River Country border they ran right into a group of defectors from Sound. There seemed to be quite a number of them running around since Orochimaru's death. Of course a good deal of Sound had desperately hated the Sannin and rejoiced in his demise, but it wasn't that way with everyone. Whatever small percentage that had once made up the loyal occupants of that twisted village, they were now enough to cause trouble wherever they cropped up. It was like they were trying to avenge his death, or something. Such as it was, any Leaf shinobi were fair game, for who in all of Oto could have been unaware of Orochimaru's grudge against Konoha.
No sooner had the Sound nin spotted the swirling leaf that marked their headbands than they began to attack. For Sakura, Naruto, and Sai, they didn't even need to see the musical note to know that these were Sound shinobi. What were the chances of finding another group of ninja so deformed? Victims – or in their case, perhaps willing participants – of who knew how many experiments.
That was the reason their client was cowering in the grass. It wasn't exactly a sight tuned to inspire courage in civilians, especially those without much courage to begin with. But he needn't have worried; this particular band of misfits was nothing they couldn't handle.
It hadn't taken all that much effort to defeat them, either. A few ink monsters here, a shattering punch there, a rasengan or two over there, and they were done. That would have been the end of it too, except that they missed one.
The nin shot off into the woods like the Kyuubi himself was on his heels, which some might have said was true once Naruto started after him.
Sakura and Sai remained behind to restrain the few who were merely injured instead of dead, and of course, to guard their client. Naruto always forgot about that part of the job. But at least this time they had had the foresight to wear wireless radios and so could call him back.
And Sakura did try to call him, several times, but all she received over the transmitter was static silence.
"He's probably just fighting the stray," Sai said to her worried face. There were some emotions he'd seen often enough to recognize.
She didn't have long to try and be comforted though, because Naruto's voice shortly broke out over the receiver, "Sakura-chan, stay there…"
That was all. That was what had her hurdling head first through the woods in the same direction Naruto had taken. Because he had only said her name, Sai and Sagara-san were glaringly absent. Because there was something in his voice that she caught even through the crackling radio. Because she already knew what it was. She would not stay.
Naruto really ought to know her better than that.
Leaves brushed by her face, twigs caught on her clothes, branches scratched her skin, they bit like stinging flies at the speed she flew through those trees. But she would not stop for anything, not now.
An explosion illuminated the darkness before her. There. That was her destination.
Pushing just a little harder, moving just a little faster, she found herself soon alighting on a tree at the edge of the blast zone. There in the new made clearing was Naruto and…
She had known it as soon as Naruto said her name, but to know something and to actually see it are two very different things. In that one instant everything changed. Her feet were feeling like they were loaded with lead, her stomach was twisting uncomfortably and her throat tightened for the tears she was determined not to cry.
...Sasuke-kun.
Neither of the boys even noticed her, they were far too wrapped up in the battle between each other.
She would've frozen, but no one would have even known she was there until it was over. Or she might have called out to them. But really, what good would that have done?
It was the movement behind Sasuke that tipped her off. She knew he could pick up even the slightest movement with those red eyes, but Sharingan is still not Byakugan, he didn't have eyes in the back of his head. Naruto didn't see it either, though he was facing the right general direction. Fighting someone of Sasuke's speed and caliber took full concentration. Naruto's eyes never left his wayward friend.
But behind the charred ruins of what had recently been a tree hunched the forgotten Sound shinobi.
A thousand things might have flitted through Sakura's mind right then. How, no doubt, everyone from Sound was well aware of who exactly had ended Orochimaru's life. How, most probably praised him for it, but this man had been a loyal lackey, surely eager for an easy revenge. She might have recalled hundreds upon hundreds of memories of Sasuke all of which strained her heart in some way or another.
But there was no time for that. Anyway, she didn't need reason to see intention in those eyes, and she didn't need reminders to know she cared. One thought only resonated in her mind, and set her feet in motion. Sasuke will die.
He saw her then, as she came flying towards him. Sasuke's stance changed subtly, preparing to counter whatever foolhardy attack she tried. At the same time she heard Naruto cry out her name. But she didn't slow for either of them.
The ninja behind Sasuke – much too close behind – had already lashed his mutated, whip-like arm. Sakura could see its movement as though in slow motion. His arm was stretching to its full length as it flew through the air straight towards Sasuke's undefended back. She could see it all so clearly, down even to the subtly curved tip, almost like a bee's stinger, glinting in the moonlight coated, as it was, in some dark liquid. And they still didn't see. Now, both boys were focused on her instead. Why couldn't he just move? Why couldn't he turn around?
Sasuke was ready to attack her, but hesitated. As she drew near it became apparent that she was neither looking at him nor coming straight towards him. So as she raced past, he naturally turned, still half expecting an attack on her part. What he found instead was the end of some long pale whip frozen in the air barely an inch from his chest.
Sakura had tried to hold on, tried to catch it. All she needed was to grab hold of the arm; her hands were already prepared with a medical jutsu to numb nerves. She would render the enemy's primary weapon useless. But she stepped too far, just one step too far.
Even as she felt her hands close around the organic whip, she felt it tear through her abdomen in an attempt still to reach its target, but too late. The arm went limp in her hands before it could reach Sasuke. She could feel the nin tugging on it in an attempt to reclaim his now useless appendage. It was too late for that also.
Sakura's grip never wavered as she gave a single strong jerk sending the unfortunate lab rat careening through the air towards her.
Her fist slammed into his chest. She listened to his ribs crack and shatter under the force as one fateful organ ceased its beating. His lifeless body collapsed on the ground and she slid his tangled arm from her gut.
Her hand began to glow faintly, pressed over her chest. But the wound didn't shrink or heal, and she was still bleeding more than could rightly be considered healthy. The poison that had graced that curved tip was now flowing in her veins. She could feel it spreading. Her chakra shortly became too much to control. The gentle light around her hand flickered and faded out, even as she held it tightly over the wound.
Slowly turning around she looked back at the boys – maybe they were too old for that name now, but they were always her boys – who she had always known, really, that she was willing to die for.
Sasuke stared at her with what was presumably surprise. It was always hard to tell with him, but his eyes were just a smidgen wider. Naruto was wildly yelling and running towards her. It was getting hard to hear his calls, hard to keep her eyes open too. But she forced her jaw to open, her tongue to move.
"Naruto, Sasuke," a soft breath, a soft smile, "please live."
She didn't notice as her eyes closed, didn't feel it as her body collapsed. All she knew was pain. The poison ran like fire in her veins.
Naruto cradled the body in his arms. He just kept calling her name and shaking that lifeless form. But Sasuke, he didn't move, hadn't moved since he realized what she was doing. Saving his life.
Anger boiled up in him. She had no right. No right to get involved in his life again. Neither of them did, he had cut those bonds. They were broken.
But her unmoving body told a different story. Whatever he thought he'd broken, she had just rebuilt. And there was just one hitch, now she was dead.
His anger faded as quickly as it had come, and without it his mind went numb. Though the thought flitted by that this was the fate of everyone who cared about him: his family, his clan, Itachi, Sakura.
He might have begun feeling sorry for himself except that something caught his eye. Grabbing hold of Naruto's collar he tore the blond from Sakura, whom he'd still been trying to wake.
Now that she lay still, it was clear.
"What do you think you're doing?!"
Though faint, her chest still rose and fell.
"She'd not dead yet, you idiot."
Scooping her up in his arms he didn't even look at Naruto when he said, "Konoha isn't far." That's all it took for them to be off, traveling at a speed few shinobi could match.
Naruto made something near a dozen clones that traveled around them to deal with anything that might threaten to get in the way. Nothing was going to stop them.
Sasuke could feel the blood soaked through Sakura's shirt begin to run onto his, and where he felt her bare skin it was burning. Except for the rise and fall of her chest she didn't move. And the fragments of moonlight that splashed across their path revealed a face so pale she looked dead already.
The original Naruto ran beside him, matching his pace step for step, eyes glowing red.
At this rate, it wouldn't be long before they reached the gates, and Sasuke's thoughts flew in that direction. The Hokage was a medic nin, supposedly the best, and Konoha was probably the closest village with any kind of medic at all. If they tried to take her anywhere else Sakura's chances of surviving were effectively zero. That was why he had suggested it in the first place. But now that they were nearing he was reminded just what it meant setting foot in that village again.
He could hand her over to Naruto. There was still time, he could leave.
The wind whipped by his ears, carrying along Naruto's voice.
"Almost there."
His hands tightened just a bit around the form resting in his arms. Uchiha don't back down.
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