(A/N) It's so weird I don't even remember what I wrote in this story. Nevertheless I'm going to continue it because rereading the chapter has put some ideas in my head. I haven't written anything in forever and I miss it a bit.
Sorry for not writing in so long, I have too many hobbies and having a hard time balancing them orz..
I have written about half a chapter for every story of mine before I inevitably get busy and forget about it in my folder. I will try to be better in future, although I doubt anyone cares too much :p
Warning: Violence, Language, gore. Nothing majorly bad though.
Also I don't own Naruto, you can assume that won't change throughout the course of this story.
She looked up through bleary eyes, not sure where she was or how she had gotten there. All she knew was that she was too weak to sit up. She turned her head to look around and was met with the image of a warm fireplace.
She had a near dry cloth still over her forehead and it was then she remembered her dream-like experience.
Sasuke placing a cloth drenched in cold water across her forehead. That had to have been a dream right? Sasuke would never actually try and help her.
When said person walked back into view and yet again dipped the cloth into the water she realised that this was actually reality.
When he moved to place the cloth back on her forehead she turned her head, near violently, away from him. She knew her attempt to be defiant in this situation was useless, just an attempt to gain some leverage in a situation where she felt helpless.
She should never have left her house while she was sick and vulnerable but curiosity had overpowered her common sense and the bitter cold of the forest had accelerated the sickness she had planned to deal with the next morning.
It was beyond her help now, she couldn't heal herself while she was this weak, especially after working an 18 hour shift at the hospital and already being low on chakra. She could only wait it out now.
He hadn't made any move to kill her yet which meant that it wasn't his intention in luring her out into the forest.
She jumped slightly when his hand touched her face and gripping her chin lightly, turned her face back to face him.
His eyes were as expressionless and as cold as ever and he said nothing as he placed the cloth on her forehead.
Her eyes hardened into a glare, as fierce a one as she could muster in her current state.
"What do you want?" she asked for the second time that evening, hoping that this time she'd get an actual answer.
"A mutually beneficial deal, Sakura," He replied, almost purring the last word and sending a shiver down her spine.
She ignored it, swallowing her fear. At 20 years old, a lot had changed in the last 8 years. He had gone from being the only survivor of the Uchiha massacre and her crush to being a murderer and the most wanted person in the Five Great Shinobi Nations.
"What could you possibly offer me, Sasuke?" She snarled back at him not liking where this was going.
"Why, your life of course," he replied nonchalantly.
Her face twisted firstly into shock then into anger. She decided against the snarky remark she was going to say and instead took the opportunity to find out exactly what it was he wanted from her.
"And what do you want in return?" she asked, painfully aware that she had little leverage in the current situation. She wasn't even able to defend herself in her current state.
"I've heard a lot about your healing abilities, Sakura." He said.
"You want me to heal you?" She asked in disbelief.
"Precisely."
"There are hundreds of healers in the five kingdoms, why specifically me?"
"Many have tried and none could do better than scabbing the wound over."
She took in what he had to say. He had a wound that no healers could heal? But he must have thought she could do it otherwise she doubted he would go to all the trouble of breaking into her flat to deliver that note and basically kidnapping her.
It was true that she had preceded her former sensei Tsunade and was highly requested as a medic by many outside of the village but she wasn't sure that she could heal a wound that so many others couldn't.
Besides that she wasn't sure she should heal him, she could get in serious trouble for healing a traitor. He seemed to be in good enough shape anyway even with the supposed wound he's talking about.
He still had her chin grasped between his fingers and at her silence his grip started tightening, snapping her out of her thoughts.
Her eyes snapped his direction and glared intensely into his stone cold black eyes.
"Let go," she growled, angered by how he was still touching her face.
He didn't, instead his lips twisted up slightly at one corner and he squeezed a bit tighter.
"Make me," he said, a hint of amusement in his voice.
She didn't reply to him and made no move to make him let go. He was a dangerous man and she was in a vulnerable situation. She would save her bravery for when she could at least stand and held her tongue for now.
His face went back to its usual stoicism and he let go of her face. He stayed in his position on his haunches next to the couch.
"So do we have a deal?" he asked, staring intently at her while awaiting her reply.
She wanted to stall that question because she did not know how to respond to it. As much as she could say she didn't have a choice with her life being threatened, she also did have a choice. She could die or become a traitor herself by healing him.
She didn't want to die like this, lying helplessly on a couch with a debilitating fever. However she had discovered that she indeed did have some leverage. He needed her. She wasn't going to test it at this point though and went for stalling instead.
"I can't answer that yet, I need to inspect the wound first," she replied finally, not lying but refraining from giving him a definitive answer. Once she was better she'd escape and avoid both outcomes; death and becoming a traitor.
He rose slowly to his feet and started unbuttoning his white cotton shirt in front of her. She realised he expected her to inspect it now in her current state.
"I can't do it now, I can hardly move," she said quickly, face going red at having to bring attention to her vulnerability.
She was not used to feeling vulnerable anymore, not since she was a child. She disposed of the part of her that was content in being dependant on others, her vulnerability.
She was no longer the scared defenceless little girl that hid behind her teammates. Although she felt that way now as Sasuke towered over her form on the couch, half his shirt open to reveal his chiselled chest.
His hands froze mid unbuttoning and dropped to his side. He seemed to look over her form on the couch again and considered what she said.
"Fine," he said and walked out of her sight and into a room that was positioned somewhere behind the couch.
She let out a breath of relief and relaxed slightly on the couch. She wondered where they were, she was certain he wouldn't risk going into Konoha again and staying for a prolonged amount of time, it was just too dangerous.
So in that case she was certain it had to be somewhere outside of any large villages.
This cottage looked lived in though, and she just knew it didn't belong to him.
Her eyes narrowed and she raised her voice to be loud enough that she hoped it carried over into the room Sasuke was in.
"Where are the people that live here?" She said.
"Dealt with," he replied back in a tone that told her exactly what she had feared.
He had killed them, an innocent family, just so that he could use their house for his own needs.
"You're despicable," she snarled, seething with rage at what he had done to them.
She could hear him chuckle sinisterly from the other room, the sound sending shivers down her spine once again. He was not the Sasuke she remembered, he was deranged. She needed to get out of this situation soon.
"I'd recommend you be quiet and sleep now, I expect you to heal me soon," his voice sounded from the other room. By the tone of his voice she knew it was not a suggestion but an order and not wanting to be at his mercy in the vulnerable condition she was in she went quiet.
She knew when she didn't show up for her morning shift at the hospital someone would go over to her apartment to check on her and when they didn't find her there they would go to the Hokage to report her missing.
Wait, fuck. No they wouldn't. Because she had been developing the flu she had said she would be taking the day off work, possibly more.
Who knows when they would even notice she's missing. Naruto didn't visit very often anymore, being Hokage had its responsibilities as did she being chief medic at the hospital.
Fever and tiredness eventually took hold of her and she drifted into sleep.
"I'll walk you home Sakura," young Naruto said to her, as cheerful as always.
"No, that's okay Naruto, I'd like to be on my own tonight," She replied, a weak smile on her face as she tried to convince him that she was fine.
"Okay Sure. Night Sakura!" He replied disappointed but still cheerfully and ran off in the direction of his apartment.
Her smile faded and she looked up at the full moon in the sky, some leaves twisted and twirled as they blew across her vision in the wind.
She knew what he was going to do and she had to stop him.
She sprinted in the direction of where she knew he would exit the village..
When she got there instead of seeing her Sasuke she saw an older version of him. His Sharingan glowed in the darkness and his face was stretched into a twisted grin. He held a blood covered sword at his side and now that she was really looking, she noticed that his clothes were drenched in blood, a few drops splattered on his face. It was evident the blood was not his own.
Her eyes went wide and her body started to shake uncontrollably, what was going on? She had to get away from him, now!
She turned on her heels and had only ran a couple of feet away from where she was standing before she froze entirely in her tracks. Behind her along the track she had just ran to get here were the lifeless bodies of the villagers she had just passed getting here.
Her body was frozen in place and she started shaking even more visibly.
She could hear slow footsteps behind her as he walked towards her.
Everything inside her screamed for her to run but she couldn't move even an inch. The footsteps stopped and a large muscular arm wrapped around her shoulders, holding her firmly in place.
She gasped as a sharp blade touched her neck.
"Sa-ku-ra" he purred sinisterly into her ear, causing every hair on her body to stand on edge.
She gasped as she shot up into a sitting position on the couch, her head spinning with dizziness as she did so.
She shut her eyes as she breathed hard, trying to calm herself down. Everyone is fine, it was just a dream.
She opened her eyes and almost jumped when she saw Sasuke staring at her once again, this time from a chair situated next to the fireplace and opposite to her couch.
"Took you long enough to wake up, it's almost mid-day," he said, his expression one of seriousness, ignoring the manner in which she awoke.
"Can you stand?" he asked, gauging to see whether she was well enough to inspect his wound yet.
She stared blankly at him, her mind still playing the dream over in her head.
There was a few seconds of silence until a noise of impatience sounded from Sasuke and she snapped out of her daze to look at him.
"Can you stand?" This time there was annoyance in his voice and he sounded out each word slowly and deliberately.
She said nothing as she turned and placed her feet on the floor, using the arm of the couch to support herself into a standing position.
She let go and to her relief she didn't go crashing once more to the floor.
"Yes," she finally replied.
He smirked and stood up, walking deliberately towards her. She found herself wanting to back away from him but having the couch directly behind her she instead fell backwards onto it.
He stopped in front of her, the smirk not leaving his face at her obvious fear of him.
She clenched her fists, refusing to let any more vulnerability slip through.
After an uncomfortable few seconds of him just staring at her she broke the silence.
"Show me this wound then," she said.
He unbuttoned and removed the white shirt he was wearing. There were bloodstained bandages wrapped around the area between his ribs and hip bone.
She wasn't at the right height sitting on the couch to properly inspect his wound but he had gotten so close that she could not stand up without awkwardly brushing against him.
She used her hands and pushed him back lightly so he got the hint that she needed space to stand up. He seemed surprised at the contact and suddenly pulled her onto her feet by her wrist.
Slightly flustered by the quick movement she ripped her hand from his and went to focussing on the task at hand, rather than her anger.
She unwrapped the bandage and was met with a grotesque sight. There was a diagonal slash along his hip bone that was poorly scabbed over and seeping with yellow fluid and puss.
Her hand lit up green and she could feel she still didn't have much chakra. She planned only to check the wound out for now, not heal it yet.
What she sensed shocked her however; she had never seen anything like it. Though she had seen wounds that were created by the use of chakra she had never seen a wound that retained chakra after it was used to create it.
Upon further examination she realised that the chakra was keeping the wound open and she imagined Sasuke must be in a lot of pain, not that he showed it.
After a few minutes of her inspecting the wound Sasuke finally spoke.
"Well?" He asked and after a few seconds of her looking at him blankly he spoke again.
"Can you heal me?" He asked, sounding more impatient.
In theory she could but it would take days, if not weeks to extract the chakra that was keeping the wound open and worsening by the day.
After looking at it again she was sure that the wound could even kill him if it wasn't healed in the next few months at the rate it was worsening.
Did she even care if it killed him though? After everything he's done? No.
There was a slight pang of guilt in her chest that made her think it might not be entirely true.
'You have to go Sakura, he's not your Sasuke anymore and there's no guarantee he'll even let you live if you do heal him.' She thought to herself.
"Not to mention with the amount of time it would take to heal this wound people would notice you're gone, you can't heal a traitor!" Her inner self continued to argue.
What should she say? He made it clear that if she didn't heal him he would kill her and she had no doubt that was the truth.
"I don't know yet," she lied. She never was very good at lying though and as expected he knew right away.
"Don't lie to me," He said evenly, though he didn't change his tone she could feel the threat behind his words.
"I u-uh…" She stuttered, something she had never done before and another obvious sign of her vulnerability.
"In theory I could but it would take days if not weeks," She finished her sentence, telling him the truth because she was certain if she didn't and he saw through it again that there would be consequences and she knew what he was capable of.
He looked at her for a moment, seemingly assessing whether what she was saying was true or not.
"That's fine," He replied finally sounding irritated at the outcome of her inspection.
"But I can't be gone for that long, people will notice and if I heal you I will be considered a traitor," she said before she could stop herself.
He clucked his tongue and his lips twitched up into a lopsided smirk.
"You will heal me or I will kill you, the consequences of doing so are irrelevant to me." He said calmly that smirk still plastered on his face.
Arrogant bastard!
'Betray my village or die...'
She already knew which one she would pick.
"Then Kill me." She bit out through gritted teeth, glaring intensely into the dark eyes of the man in front of her.
The smirk faded into a stoic expression and he stared at her emotionlessly for a good few seconds.
He was over a foot taller than her and towered over her rather petite form. There were so many ways he could kill her and in her current state she didn't stand a chance.
He wondered how such green eyes could hold such fire.
Didn't she used worship him? Didn't she want to leave behind their worthless village and go with him all those years ago? Didn't she say she loved him?
Although her stare was fiery and intense it still lacked hatred for him. He knew what true hatred was and he didn't see it in her eyes.
He had travelled to every country convincing medics to heal him, even killing a couple that refused to try because of his wanted status. Not one of them thought they could or managed to make the slightest difference. Sakura however he knew could, he could see it in her eyes when she was examining his wounds.
He knew if he wasn't healed soon it would worsen to the point it would kill him, and he wouldn't let that son of a bitch who wounded him win. He had already taken care of him and refused to be taken down with him, he had unfinished business to deal with, he couldn't die yet.
He had no choice but to force her to heal him.
Sakura however wasn't going to let this rare opportunity where Sasuke got lost in his thoughts go to waste.
Focussing chakra to her feet she propelled herself into the air and flipped backwards over the couch. In the blink of an eye she had bolted to the door and smashed it into a thousand tiny pieces with a chakra laden fist.
Not wasting a second of precious time she focused as much chakra as she was able to her feet and ran as fast as she could in the direction of Konoha.
She had hoped she would have gotten there but as she already knew he was so much faster than she was, especially in her Chakra drained state. And apparently he wasn't going to let her just leave.
She was grabbed by her shoulder mid air and turned to face him. Wide doe-like emerald eyes came in contact with raging crimson.
And that was the last thing she saw before empty darkness.
Hope you enjoyed the chapter, please let me know if you did! :)