A Year

He knew something was wrong with Sakura on the third month of their travels. She ate less, her pace had slowed, and her requests for breaks had frequented. Her usually peach-pink cheeks held a tinge of green that warned him she was most likely ill. If he asked, she brushed his concern away with a simple, halfhearted explanations.

For all he was trying to relearn about the world he had shunned, Sasuke new that food poisoning did not last for weeks.

So instead he watched her, adjusted his urgency to match hers, and allowed her to believe her lack of concern for herself removed any concern of his own. He knew better than to pry into things Sakura felt were better left unsaid. He'd asked a few too many questions once and ended up with an image of red flowing rivers and the reminder of Madara's katana through his gut as being quite a pleasant feeling. Sakura was a medic, and she probably knew better how to take care of herself than he could ever hope to.

"You didn't eat again." he motioned toward the remaining food on her camp plate.

Sakura picked up another piece of fish, placed it between her lips and chewed slowly. "I haven't been too hungry, Sasuke-kun."

"I know my cooking isn't that bad. I eat it too."

She laughed, a short chuckle that didn't meet her eyes. "It's not the cooking."

"You need to eat."

His statement was curt and demanding, Sasuke knew, but he was tired of watching her waste away. Having Sakura accompany him on this mission drew all sorts of red flags, but she had insisted despite the danger. If he ran into trouble, she had reasoned, then he would need her. Unknown to her, he always needed her- he had just trained himself to be satisfied with the thought of her. At times like these he almost preferred that to the worry she seemed to bring along with her.

She drew a few more pieces of fish to her mouth before setting the plate back down, and he gave a resigned sigh. He would drop the subject for now.

When her cheeks began to hollow, Sasuke changed their direction and headed to a village he had assisted a few years ago deep in the Land of Earth. She followed with a lethargic step, and it did not go unnoticed to him how often his arm twitched to catch her if she fell. Once they made it into the town he paid for room for the next week. The relief in her eyes was obvious.

Just how sick was she?

"Sasuke-kun… I'm sorry. I know I'm slowing you down."

"Hn." he pulled her sandals off and then laid the blanket over her where she lay in the bed. "You haven't tried to help yourself."

She blinked, confused. "What do you mean?"

"You're a medic. You have to know whats wrong with you and how to treat it. We could have stopped a long the way and picked up whatever herbs you needed."

Sasuke sat beside her on the mattress, his hand fisting into the blankets. What he wasn't saying was the fact he feared she was pushing herself for him. He wasn't the best at explaining how he felt, or showing her the kind of compassion she showed him. If he hadn't made the decision to stop, would she have continued on until she finally succumbed to whatever was ailing her? He knew Sakura to be loyal and steadfast. She was everything a man could ask for in a wife.

What kind of husband was he to allow her to suffer this long? It seemed it didn't matter what he did, Sakura always hurt in some way because of him.

"I'm stubborn Sasuke-kun. It's easy to treat others, but you forget about yourself sometimes in the process. I'm sorry." she smiled, genuinely for the first time in days, and placed her hand over his. "I didn't mean to worry you."

Sasuke glanced toward their joined hands and marveled at how someone who could reap so much destruction with a single punch could display such gentleness.

"Tell me what you need. I'll get it."

The visit to the town had lasted two weeks instead of one, but at the end of it the color had returned to her cheeks, her smile had brightened, and she had begun eating again. Sakura was yawning a lot, but she never complained and continued with familiar energy and vigor. Satisfied that she was perfectly okay, Sasuke let his concerns for her illness subside. They were continuing on their travel and so long as she was happy, he was happy.

However, he had learned quite quickly that if he wanted to eat food that was edible, he needed to cook it himself. Whatever had gotten in to Sakura over the next two months Sasuke couldn't pinpoint, but her choices for meals had become questionable. Fish with bananas, tomato-and-melon salads, chicken dipped in mayo and topped with pickled plum- after two days Sasuke had taken over cooking the food and allowed her to top her own however she pleased. At least his would be edible. She seemed to have no problem eating whatever she concocted.

By the time they had traveled to the Land of Frost, Sakura no longer wanted him to see her naked.

At first Sasuke hadn't minded, but when it turned to her shunning him joining her in the bath or sleeping away from him as if she needed the distance, it began to bother him. Sex was not all there was to a relationship, and he had never been one to crave physical contact, but he had never had to fight Sakura to gain it, either. When the tables had turned from her having to seek him and instead turned to him finding himself disgruntled when she didn't… he chose not to ponder on that. There were just some things too intimate to be explained.

He decided to put an end to that.

"What are you hiding from me?"

The question was blunt in a way that caught Sakura off guard; she choked on the water she had been drinking, coughing until the liquid had cleared her airway. "Hiding?"

He knew his gaze was unforgiving and made her uncomfortable, but he was her husband and she was his wife and he was tired of not being able to touch her when he wanted. "Why else wouldn't you let me touch you?"

In the months they had been married, Sasuke had learned every scar that marred her body. There was the one along her abdomen from her battle with Sasori that paired with another on her back, the slowly fading burn marks on her right arm from the acid she encountered saying him from Kaguya's dimensions; there was one on her thigh from her fight with Sound Nin during their Chuunin exam. Most of them were hidden with the help of her Yin seal, but in those moment she had never felt a reason to cover them. After all, he was missing an arm, and both of them were broken in some way.

"I've gained weight." she said it with some embarrassment. "I'm not happy with how I look, so I would rather you didn't see."

Sasuke blinked.

"That's it?"

"Well… yes." Sakura answered.

"You look fine."

She laughed. "I guess fine is better than fat."

"Even if you were, I wouldn't care."

She watched him and Sasuke couldn't tell if he had said the right or the wrong thing.

In the Land of Lightning, Sasuke noticed two things. Sakura had, indeed, gained weight. And she was as moody as ever.

Somewhere along the way he had begun to piece together the puzzle- five months before, Sakura had been sick, unable to eat and vomiting. Once that had ended, she was tired but cheerful and her appetite had grown. She craved foods that he would not eat if they were only things left on earth. Then her desire for affection spiked and dropped, and spiked again. She had gained weight, and now the smallest things could make her cry, laugh, or seethe with rage.

He knew why. Sasuke knew he had a lot to learn about Sakura as his wife and as a woman, but he knew- and had known for a while if he was honest with himself- that she was hiding something from him, the biggest secret any wife could hide from her husband.

"You're pregnant."

Sakura continued mending the cloak he had torn earlier and did not look up from her work. "Yes."

"How long?"

"At least 5 months. Maybe six."

There were not many times Sasuke could remember being this angry. "When were you going to tell me?"

The tone of his voice seemed to capture her attention. Sakura placed the cloak and her needle to the side and placed her hands back in her lap like a child being scolded by their parent. At the moment he didn't care how bad she felt. There were more than enough times she had been in danger in the last few months, occupational hazards that came with being a kunoichi. He would have never let her be in that position if he had known better. She had no right to hide the fact she was carrying his child from him.

She was carrying his dream, his hope, his future.

"I was afraid you would send me away." her voice was earnest but not weak. Sakura finally looked at him and he could see her wince at the expression in his face.

"You should have told me sooner. I've asked you to do things I never should have… Dammit Sakura, you have done things that could have killed the baby."

"I know, it was selfish." she admitted. "I just didn't want you to miss out on your child because of your mission."

He ran a hand through his hair, finding that his arm was shaking. Pregnant. Sakura was pregnant. His wife was having a baby. His baby. The last remaining Uchiha was going to have a child, and rebuild his clan. Sakura needed his protection more than ever, their baby- if ever he had wondered about sacrificing his place in the village and the amount of time he would be away from Sakura's side in the mission he was on, he never would again. His child would not live in the world he had. He would keep this world safe, for them.

"Yes, Sasuke-kun. I'm pregnant. And you are going to be a father."

She had snuck up on him, her arms wrapped firmly about him in a secure hold. It was then that Sasuke realized he was crying.

Sasuke had not sent her away. Instead, they headed back toward Konoha together; he would have to put the mission on hold until he was sure Sakura and the baby were safe. She had been right to assume he would have made her go home upon learning she was pregnant. As her stomach began it's rapid growth and their child began moving inside her, Sasuke couldn't in his right mind let her go alone or leave her. She had kept it a secret to remain with him as long as she could, and if he was completely honest the knowledge that she was pregnant made him loathe to leave her.

He was sure they were going to have a boy. His family had far more men than women, Sakura was an only child without much family history to go by. He had also read somewhere that the sperm was what decided the gender, and Sasuke was sure his would product a son. They planned names for both a boy and a girl, but he harbored the belief it would be a boy.

God help him if it wasn't. Sasuke wasn't sure he could handle a daughter, especially if she turned out like Sakura. He was still learning how to handle her as it was.

Sakura entered her 7th month and their travel began to slow as they reentered the Land of Frost. He stopped at every village to rest and avoided them sleeping outdoors when he could. Her abdomen swelled with their baby and Sasuke found he was becoming anxious. With their slowed pace, he could not expect them to reach Konoha before Sakura gave birth. The act of walking could trigger labor.

It was Sakura who offered the back up plan.

"We can get to the Land of Sound faster than Konoha." she had mentioned one day.

He glanced at her out of the corner of his eye. "I'm not bringing you or our child near Orochimaru."

"Karin could help." Sakura offered.

That idea didn't appeal to him either. Karin had been an ally for a while, but never someone he had considered a friend. The fact that Sakura would trust her to birth his child was beyond him. Anything with Team Taka would lead them back to Orochimaru. Any knowledge of a new Uchiha would likely pique his interests in a bad way. If anyone knew what he could do to a child, it was Sasuke. Sakura had even witnessed first hand the way Orochimaru had led him down a dark, twisted path.

He would not step foot back in that country of his own free will if he could help it.

Sakura contractions had started near the bordered and Sasuke had no choice but to bring her to Karin's hideout. The red haired woman had received him openly and jump straight into action as if she and Sakura were old friends. Sakura gave directions and Karin prepared table for her and Sasuke found that in this situation, he could have all the power he wanted but his ability to help Sakura was limited.

He didn't like placing her life- and the life of his unborn child- in the hands of someone he didn't fully trust.

"You're going to have to do this without an epidural." Karin said. "Unless you want to go back to 4 centimeters dilation."

"How far am I?" Sakura breathed heavily.

"Eight."

"Sasuke-kun, you don't have to stay if you're so nervous."

He hadn't noticed he was pacing. Sasuke paused to glance at her, unable to stop the racing of his pulse. There were things he had witnessed, things he had done, decisions he had to make that no one would ever envy him for, and yet watching the sweat drip down her forehead and the way she winced with each contraction made his hair stand on end. Seeing Sakura in pain had never been easy. The problem was there was no way for him to stop it.

"I'm not leaving."

She smiled weakly and waved him over. "Then stay with me, please."

Sarada.

He had a daughter, and Sasuke had named her Sarada. She was beautiful with a tuft of his dark hair and eyes that matched the shape of her mother. He had cried. Sakura told him it hadn't been that bad, despite all the screaming. Karin had cleaned his daughter up nicely and in that dingy hideout he learned that nothing was more humbling than holding his own child. He swore to himself that her tiny hands would never hold the blood his did, that she would never see the horrors he had.

There was nothing he would not do to protect her.

"How long, Sasuke-kun?"

He glanced up from his sleeping baby girl and glanced at his wife, beautiful despite the exhaustion clear on her face, the remote sadness in her eyes. She knew. Sakura always knew. "As long as it takes."

She hung her head solemnly. "I'm glad you were able to hold her. You know I will always wait for you; maybe you can return home for her."

"You are the most precious people in my life, and I am a selfish man. If it means I can protect you and Sarada can grow up where she never has to know what it means to be scared and betrayed, I'd do anything."

"I know." Sakura responded, her fingers settling on the baby's forehead. "I know."

He kissed her hair. "I'll see you again."