Sakura is alive in the in between times. The times that are not quite day, not quite night. She can feel then. Feel something other than the cusp of numb monotony and aching disillusionment. Insight has been inflicted upon her, forced upon an unwilling mind that grapples with a reality she would like to think of as merciful but knows is just at best. In a merciful world, she would have struggled for love long denied and have, eventually, succeeded. It is in a just world that Sasuke is executed. It is in a cruel world that she is out of the village on a spy mission, trailing one Itachi Uchiha, when he is apprehended and a week later put to death. She would like to think that she felt it, his death, because she should have. They were like doves, turtle doves that die when their love has. Eternally one.
"Oh." Oh, had been all she said. Travel pack slung low on her hip, hair thrown up in a messy bun, clothes clearly travel worn. Naruto had been crying, hands clenched and voice shaky as he stood there speaking. Telling her the gritty details of closed council meetings, a simple medical jutsu that took him, and of how no one can know he's dead. She didn't hear him. They weren't doves, they were hawks.
A day later she stands in front of a calm Hokage requesting to be assigned exclusively to the Itachi case.
"Why?" The woman asks, shrewd eyes taking note of her apprentice that stands before her now.
"I need to do this." She speaks firmly, hoping her tone of voice will dissuade her mentor from prying further.
"Sakura, you have to understand, this is not something that I can throw to you just because. Give me a reason." She leans back into her chair, ignoring the manila folder containing Sasuke's information barely visible under Itachi's.
"I am the best suited. You said so yourself when you sent me out last time."
"Damnit Sakura, give me a single fucking reason. Do not make me repeat myself." Eyes narrowing at the younger woman's evasion, the older ponders the pros and cons of the request.
"Because he's dead and it did nothing. Because he spent his life on a single thing, deserted Naruto, Kakashi-sensei, and me. Because..." She stops herself. She knows that she couldn't handle it. She could not bear it if all the pain Sasuke had inflicted on himself, her, team seven, if it had been for nothing. "I need to do this. Please. Please let me do this." She can not bring herself to look at her mentor so she settles for looking out the window off into the distance.
"Damnit Sakura, you can't let yourself shut down. Sasuke Uchiha was a criminal, he left to follow Orochimaru. He betrayed this village. This is bigger than you, Sakura. You have to understand." Tsunade explains, eyes cold as she shakes off the feeling of nostalgia. Wasn't she told the same thing? Yes, yes she had been. She can only hope that she has trained her better; that she will not become another drunk, another gambler, another failure.
In a merciful world, Sakura would be able to extract a revenge long denied and been able to make peace. But, it is not a merciful world.
"Yes Hokage-sama." The name stings, it is clipped and formal. Allowing her eyes to close for a moment the Hokage of the Village Hidden in the Leaves wishes it could be different. For a moment, she allows herself to be human. She allows memories to overcome her and shriek out at the injustice. It is but a moment.
"Sakura Haruno, as Hokage I forbid you to have any interaction with Itachi Uchiha. Any attempt to leave the village will be seen as a traitorous act unless you have received my authorization. Am I understood?" Tsunade states, tidying her desk. Idly she notes that Sasuke's file is under Itachi's and is now being labeled as top secret information. They will live together for all eternity as the dark secrets of the village that broke them.
"Hai, Hokage-sama." With a stiff bow, Sakura walks away. In a just world Sakura, Naruto, and Kakashi would slip out of the village to destroy the man that had killed a part of them, that final piece needed to be whole. It is a cruel world that Sakura can't let them fall with her, not them. She can spare them this, this small and minor hurt and it has been the most she has ever done and maybe, just maybe that makes it worthwhile. So, she leaves. It is an easy thing to do, she has lived here all her life and knows the guard pattern. She wishes that she could come back but knows that she won't. She leaves a note, hoping that this small consideration will be enough. She knows it won't be.
She takes little with her, enough money to accomplish what has to be done and a picture. It is of team seven, of happy days that only seem happy in retrospect. Why could she not have seen what she had? Why was she so weak? Why was she so cruel? Why? But, the time for questioning, learning, is over. She has been a student of life and now she is acting. Ricocheting from tree to tree in a desperate struggle to fix things.
Maybe, she wanted to heal them, him, everything. Maybe that's it. That's been her job, her passion, for so long she can no longer recall. It's all a vague impression on her mind. Like soft nights and harsh half smiles and baby thoughts. But he's dead, dead, dead. Maybe, if she chants it in her mind it won't happen. But, it already has, hasn't it? She wonders though, can it? Can he be dead? Can a love meant to outlive the world die with him? Maybe.
She meant to fix them, the notion is solidifying, slowly growing with half forgotten truths coming to light. Yes, she wanted to fix it. But, it's broken, broken, broken. She wanted a fairy tale and was that so much to ask for? Yes. She knows it now. She's seen what happens to princesses and their fairy tales, she's broken a few herself. Hinata wanted to be loved, but, she won't. Not by him, not by her sunshine. Shine on me, on me, on me. The sad thing is, she can't do anything about it. She can't fix the broken what-could-have-beens, she's tried before. So, she repairs the body because that helps, right? Right. That's what she's always wanted. She's always playing catchup and she seized upon healing because she can do it. She can make it all better. At least, in a merciful world, she'd be able to.
She flares her chakra when she reaches her destination, calling out to her target. This will be the end. It will be him or her, or both. Both, yes, that is better. Who wants to die alone? She can fell her anger slowly ebb away, replaced by determination. Landing in a clearing she stops, letting the sun shine down and warm her because she's grown so cold and it feels so nice to let it all go.
"Why are you here little Kunoichi?" A raven calls from the trees.
"Sasuke is dead." A harsh crow meets her words. "I'm here to kill you."
"Do you hate, little Kunoichi? Can you beat me when my foolish brother failed?" And suddenly, he is there. Standing before her without expression and hands hidden in long sleeves. And then, where there was a void, she comes alive because it is in between life and death, day and night that she can let herself feel because time has no control here. Nothing is wrong or right in those precious moments, it just is. "I hate, love, and understand. I can appreciate what brought you here, what drove Sasuke, and why I am doing this. I know why you murdered the Uchiha clan." Silence, perfect and dark descends upon the clearing tinting reality with a level of surreality that leaves her feeling dazed.
There are days when Sakura can not stand it, can not stand the complex webs that are weaved and twisted so much that sometimes she can no longer see why she's the way she is and things have panned out so. Those days are the worst because she can think of no (good) reasons for things to happen as they did. She wishes on those days, looks wistfully out the window at the swaying branches and people that go about their business and wonders on the 'what ifs'. But, it gets dark and she can no longer stand it because it should have been simple, so very simple, but it all got muddled and the creases won't straighten. So, she shuffles away in her bathrobe to sit in the fake light and wait for meaning to come back to her.
"You know nothing." He says uncaringly, without any waver or hesitance. She relaxes her stance, just slightly because he will not attack right now. She can feel it in the bones that have been broken so many times they are perfectly attuned to the subtle shifts in battles. This is about truth. This is about the past and most of all, it is about death (life).
"Maybe not, convince me otherwise then. Convince me that the council didn't assign you the mission to kill your family, tell me that you didn't spare Sasuke, make me believe that he isn't dead." It is in this manner that Uchiha Itachi finds that his one precious person is dead. Disclosed from lips that twist in a grimace as if it pains the owner to say them. The truth is cushioned on a bed of sympathy and laid bare by harsh reality.
"Who?" Itachi asks and Sakura can't help but notice the subtle shift of the perfect stoic. He has lost it all aside from his plans that lack a key player now. He has become even more dangerous.
"Do you regret it Itachi?" Sakura queries finally getting down to the bare bones of the path of death she has walked since but a child, trailing behind an ebony haired child that no more cared for her than he did life. But she, oh she would have stolen the star's fire for love of him. All for love, love dear one, love.
"I can't." He says it with strength, with conviction but his choice of words is not wasted on her.
"But you do anyway." She is cut off with a hand to her throat that lifts her from the ground and sends pain shooting down her body. Fighting down the instinctive panic she forces her chakra to repulse him. He drops her, his hand hanging limply by his side no longer able to use the numbed appendage.
"I'm not done." She roars, her anger coursing through her veins in a heady rush.
"What do you want little kunoichi?" He asks, voice tight and formal.
"I want it to be right."
"You are a fool." A strange sort of mirth and joy fills her then because it is just close enough to her love's words to conjure the familiar feelings and she can almost feel the nostalgia rise in her chest. It is sudden, his strike to kill her. The battle that follows is swift and merciless, lightening quick strikes of physical prowess and an exchange of terrible ninjutsu. It is the slow bleeding out of endurance that determines this battle that shakes to clearing and the surrounding trees. Slowly, slowly, ever so slowly the many cuts that litter their bodies become too much, the small drain on their chakra adding up to deplete the precious supply.
She knows it then, she's going to die, right here. They're both going to die on this solid patch of ground to be discovered later by some unknown person that won't know what led up to make this, that won't understand the significance of the last Haruno dieing by the last Uchiha, the one that was meant to be wiped out by the other. This unknown person won't know the story of the Uchiha massacre, of the little girl that loved a little boy and at the end gave herself so he could finally live. But he's dead, dead, dead and it's time his turtle dove joined him on the other side of this sordid fairy tale that wasn't very good. No, not so good. This unknown person, maybe just a civilian, will see only a man and a women riped to shreds over things beyond their control but that made up their lives and maybe, maybe it was a choice. But, that's a little too much to think of right now as she slumps to her knees and then falls flat only distantly aware that Itachi has done the same and their hands are touching faintly.
It is the inbetween times that make Sakura feel alive, the only time that she can feel something beyond the aching numbness. So, she twitters away like a songbird singing out her story carefully slurring out the important things that have shaped her, crumbled her, and built her up again. When her eyes develop a film of tears, she grasps his hand because she's afraid. Sasuke never loved her. She died to fulfill childhood dreams that won't ever come true. Her remaining boys are going to find her dead, all because she wanted the world to be merciful but got caught up in the truth. She's dieing and she never really lived.
Maybe it is just her imagination but she thinks she feels a small squeeze of comfort from her partner in death. "I regret that he didn't know when he died." There. It is all out on the table. Nodding her heavy head Sakura faces her killer as her world fades to black.
In a merciful world she would have woken up in a hospital bed, gravely injured but alive. In that world she would have moved on, found purpose and lived until she was old surrounded by friends and family. It is not a merciful world. It is a cruel world that Naruto happens upon them some hours later. In this world he throws himself upon the cooling body of the woman he loves (loved) and feels the loss of his team (family) so deeply that he cries and shakes until Kakashi comes and gives in to the humanity of the situation by cradling the shaking boy to himself without speaking. What can you say? It is a just world that allows there to be a smile on her face and a hand entwined in her own. Perhaps she never was a turtle dove, but then, maybe she just hadn't found her mate.